Xenophobic scientific publishers: open access aids foreign enemies

"Huh? Think about what they’re saying: The US government should not make the results of taxpayer funded research available to all US citizens because it would also be made available to foreigners, which would give them a leg up over American companies in the competitive global marketplace. And how are the publishers going to protect us from this looming threat? By denying these nefarious foreign entities access to the information they are going to use to trounce us? No! The publishers want Congress to insist that these foreigners pay them a small fee to facilitate their fleecing of America.

COME ON! This one sentence exposes the publishers who wrote and signed the letter either as racist idiots who have no clue about how science works and what its goals are, or as craven liars willing to trot out xenophobic claptrap to promote their agenda.

We are not talking about classified information here – we’re talking about information that authors are willingly making freely available. And these foreigners the publishers are deriding are not enemies. They are our collaborators in science – whose ability to build on work generated in the US benefits us all. This is how science works, you morons!..."