Assignment to the House Science Committee correlates with a -$46,000 drop in fundraising relative to all other committees in the House. Though Science has oversight over important agencies, like NOAA and NASA, they aren't a lobbying target. The result is that the best & brightest in Congress avoid Science, and adverse selection produces the worst possible Committee.

What's particularly aggravating about this is that there are agencies properly in the purview of Science & Technology that are lobbyist targets, but that aren't managed by House Science. FCC, for instance, is overseen by House Commerce; DARPA, obviously, is House Defense.

The fact of Congress is that if you don't play the game, and get the best committee assignments you can, you lose your seat. Each Congressperson can only have 2 committee assignments. Principled pursuit of the right assignments is thus a bit of a stag hunt.