"It’s the single biggest simultaneous departure of institutional memory that anyone can remember." And these aren't people who can be quickly replaced. 

After Trump directed several federal agencies, including the EPA, HHS, USDA, and Interior Department, to freeze all communications, social media managers at various National Parks began tweeting out climate statistics and the like:

"Free speech, exercised both individually and through a free press, is a necessity in any country where the people are free." TR, 5/7/1918

— TR Inaugural Site (@TRInauguralSite) January 25, 2017

2016 was the hottest year on record for the 3rd year in a row. Check out this @NASA & @NOAA report: https://t.co/rLJUC56xqi pic.twitter.com/AKhFzYw6l6

— Golden Gate NPS (@GoldenGateNPS) January 23, 2017

The Times dismissed the outraged reaction online as "unrealistic," but the order seems genuinely alarming, with anonymous career bureaucrats all but promising Politico that they will be working against Trump's policies and leaking what they can to the press. 

Norman Eisen and Richard Painter, former White House ethics lawyers under Obama and Bush, respectively, filed a lawsuit against Trump asking a federal court to rule that Trump has already broken the Constitution's Emoluments Clause.

Eisen and Painter have both joined the board of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, part of David Brock's tentacle organization, but Brock appears to have ceded control to them.

As soon as today, reams of climate data used around the world will be taken down from the EPA website. The agency has already frozen its grants program. And it looks like further EPA research will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis by political officers before being published. While it's normal for administrations to take a moment to get their ducks in a row, the targeting of scientists in a specific agency hostile to Trump's fossil fuel cabinet is cause for alarm.

It's not just the EPA: A major climate change conference organized by the Centers for Disease Control was unexpectedly canceled. And the Dept. of Health and Human Services was told to cease communications with public officials, including Congress, which seems pretty insane. Many of these agencies adopted scientific integrity policies under Obama—but are now finding them toothless.

But there are causes for hope:

—Archive.org has saved copies of the EPA website.

—The USDA quickly rescinded an order to scientists not to publicize new research.

—And pissed-off scientists are gearing up to run for office with support from a new nonprofit. They also joined marchers on Saturday and are planning their own march.

Columbia Law School launched a Climate Deregulation Tracker on Trump's first day in office, so at least we have an idea of how badly the planet is about to get fucked.