The 114th Congress is "arguably the most anti-scientific group of politicians this country has seen in decades," writes Bad Astronomy blogger Phil Plait. Some members of Congress are very cozy with the "I’m not a scientist" line as a way to wipe their hands clean of any need for scientific knowledge — while they nonetheless determine the budget of federal scientific bodies.

the "core function of NASA is to explore space."

Texas Senator Ted Cruz is the chair of the Senate subcommittee on Space, Science, and Competitiveness, which oversees the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. So far, Cruz has released a statement indicating that his goal is an ambitious program for space exploration. Says Cruz in the statement:

We must refocus our investment on the hard sciences, on getting men and women into space, on exploring low-Earth orbit and beyond, and not on political distractions that are extraneous to NASA’s mandate.

In his most recent hearings on the matter, Cruz lambasted the agency’s focus on Earth science and climate change, saying that the "core function of NASA is to explore space." He said this to NASA administrator Charles Bolden, whose take on the mission of the agency was a little more general: "Our core mission from the very beginning has been to investigate, explore space and the Earth environment, and to help us make this place a better place."

At once, Ted Cruz represents one of the most conservative electorates in the nation and the home of one of the most ambitious government programs. Cruz’s view of NASA is a sort of call back to the idealized vision created in books like The Right Stuff — a group of rough and tumble space cowboys quite literally shooting for the Moon. It’s the same refrain once sung by President George W. Bush, who wanted a return to the Moon. Both men have, at points, represented Texas, where Johnson Space Center serves as the lead for crewed spaceflight in NASA’s facilities, and both have proposed ambitious goals for the agency. Bush’s vision, the Constellation program, was cancelled in 2010.

Calls and emails to Cruz’s office seeking comment weren’t returned. Also worth noting: NASA's 2015 budget has already passed, and the agency received more money than it requested. Any real showdown won’t kick off until 2016 negotiations begin.

Though Cruz is a space booster, he's also the same man who said of climate change in that CNN interview, "Climate change, as they have defined it, can never be disproved, because whether it gets hotter or whether it gets colder, whatever happens, they’ll say, well, it’s changing, so it proves our theory." Cruz has also said that there hasn’t been any warming in the last 15 years. Never mind that the existence of climate change is the consensus of the scientific establishment, which near-unanimously agrees that it’s happening and humans are causing it. What's more, according to scientists: 10 of the hottest years in recorded weather history have taken place since 1998, and 2014 was the hottest year on record.

though cruz is a space booster, he takes a dim view of climate change.

So who’s keeping track of those temperatures?

Well, NASA, alongside the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Cruz is overseeing NASA within the Subcommittee on Science and Space; like-minded Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) oversees NOAA from the Subcommittee on Oceans, Atmosphere, Fisheries, and Coast Guard. Neither senator is particularly friendly to the scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change. Both are overseeing the governing bodies tasked with gathering the data.