The Commentariat -- May 13, 2014
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Justin Gillis & Kenneth Chang of the New York Times: "A large section of the mighty West Antarctica ice sheet has begun falling apart and its continued melting now appears to be unstoppable, two groups of scientists reported on Monday. If the findings hold up, they suggest that the melting could destabilize neighboring parts of the ice sheet and a rise in sea level of 10 feet or more may be unavoidable in coming centuries."
And if That's Not Enough...
Conservative haters of science who have played a huge role in allowing the Let's Do Nothing Until the World Ends club to force everyone else to sit still while glaciers melt into the sea, has been apoplectic over a series on Fox, of all places, running for some weeks now. Neil De Grasse Tyson's resurrected Cosmos series has the religious right in an uproar, especially when he talks about scientists like David Faraday who was able to separate religion from science.
It's All Fun Until Someone Dies
If wingnut hatred of science could be quarantined to just the propeller heads, it would be all fine and dandy. But when the constant drumbeat sounded by conservatives and 24/7 on Fox, tries to convince low information citizens that not only is science not to be trusted, that it's bad for you, and, by doing so helps allow the resurgence of deadly diseases, then their stupidity crosses the line into outrageous criminality. Last year diseases thought long gone have started to return, notably measles and mumps. The anti-vaccination crowd is to blame, but so are the right-wing sites and media outlets that flog this stuff as if it were true. Reporter Russell Saunders at the Daily Beast has more, and he wonders what's next.
Jen Sorensen from Daily Kos.
Presidential Woes
Kevin Robillard of Politico: "The GOP shouldn't even field a presidential candidate in 2016 unless Congress passes immigration reform this year, U.S. Chamber of Commerce President Tom Donohue said Monday."
Michael Peterniti has a GQ profile of Glenn Greenwald, "The Man Who Knows Too Much." ...
... Something to like about Greenwald: He thinks Tim Russert was a joke -- an enabler of the status quo.
Congressional Races
Dana Milbank: "In a series of ads done by and for [Rep. Tom] Cotton [R-Ark.], the former Army Ranger's military career is the centerpiece of his Senate candidacy -- and yet that doesn't seem to be helping him, even though his opponent may be the most vulnerable Senate Democrat in the country."
Another reason Cotton may be experiencing rough going is his, and his party's, express desire to destroy Obamacare, in the face of what are becoming legions of stories trumpeting its success and wild acceptance among voters in states like Arkansas. Smart Democrats have begun to stop running from the ACA and running with it. Success stories like "....Eleanor Evans in Roger, Arkansas, who has gained coverage under the private option and, as it happens, used to go to church with Rep. Tom Cotton. Evans now is the primary caregiver for her mother Kaye, who happened to be Cotton's pastor when Eleanor and Cotton were kids. 'There's no place for me if I don't have this coverage," Evans said. "And I don't understand why they'd want to get rid of that place for me.'"
The ever observant Tom Toles.
Let the Conspiracy Theories Begin
Asheboro, North Carolina Courier-Tribune: "Asheboro businessman and congressional candidate, Keith Crisco, 71, died suddenly at his home today." Crisco was running in the Democratic primary against Clay Aiken.
Be Careful What You Wish For
The problems GOP establishment types have been having with the Tea Party monster created to help win elections are well known. The tin-foil hat crowd that stormed the capitol building a few years ago helped to put the pressure on the hated president, but they also propelled the party to its current state of obstreperous petrifaction. And now even party leaders like Eric Cantor are feeling the heat. The other day, in Virginia, Cantor's handpicked lackey, Linwood Cobb was beaten back by rabid tea partiers in the race for leadership of Virginia's 7th Congressional District Republican Committee. Tea Partiers who were bused in to vote, booed Cantor when he spoke. The reason? They consider him too liberal. It's a bit like complaining that Jackson Pollock was too occupied with realism. Cantor himself faces a challenge from another Tea Party candidate named Brat (I am totally not making that up). David Brat confided that god told him that Cantor had to go. Well, hey, why didn't you say so? Cantor, for his part, known for his scathing, arrogant, fact free attacks on the president and the Democratic Party generally, complained about "inaccuracies" and the lack of decency on the part of the TP.
Et tu brutes?
Travis Gettys at RawStory has more on the brutes. This Friday, self styled Tea Party "patriots" will descend on Washington to demand that a long list of hated, "disloyal lawmakers" stand down and surrender. Like most right-wing groups who claim the Constitution as the source of their authority, they have clearly not read that document. Otherwise, they would apply democratically, constitutionally approved methods of removing individuals from office. Like voting them out. Operation American Spring, as they call themselves, expects 10 to 30 million like minded "patriots" to join them on Friday in a fun afternoon of revolution and tar and feathering. Jesus is expected to show up to reprise that fishes and loaves thing when those 30 million are ready for lunch.
Clinton Conspiracy Machine in Excellent Working Order
A few years off has not corroded the sharpened gears and bile soaked workings of the right's Clinton Conspiracy Machine. And even though she has not even declared her candidacy, Hillary Clinton can expect much more of this type of evil crap. Karl Rove, looking relaxed, fit, and fiendish after a couple of years of shock therapy following his election night breakdown, is back to his mendacious best. Speaking at a conference last week, Rove, a well known brain surgeon when he's not torturing small animals in his basement, stunned the audience with news that Hillary Clinton was suffering from brain damage resulting from a fall a few months ago. Even though hospital officials reported a small blood clot, Rove doesn't believe it. "Thirty days in the hospital? And when she reappears, she's wearing glasses that are only for people who have traumatic brain injury? We need to know what's up with that." Yeah. It was three days. Not thirty. And the glasses were standard sun glasses. But no matter. The right is in high dudgeon over Hillary. Recently, a sour little man with a cheap toupée and way too much time on his hands, the junior senator from Kentucky, began huffing and puffing about a subpoena for Clinton, because Benghazi.
Update on Clinton Insanity
This morning in the WaPo, Karen Tumulty reports that Karl Rove is shocked to hear that anyone, anyone, would say that Hillary Clinton has brain damage. "Of course, she doesn't have brain damage" he said. How the hell did that get out there anyway? But Paul Waldman, also in today's Post, wonders whether Republicans will be able to rein in their hatred where Clinton is concerned. "It's almost inevitable that at some point during any campaign involving Clinton, the Republican crazy train will run off its rails. The hatred she inspires among the GOP base, and their willingness to believe almost anything about her, simply cannot be overestimated."
Conservatives Just Looooves Them Some Womens
On Tuesday, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit will hear arguments on the legality of an Arizona law that limits the use of abortion-inducting medications and, according to advocates, threatens to end altogether the availability of medication abortion in the state. Meanwhile, back in South Carolina, Senator Lindsey Graham, needing to put on a show of strength for the anti-choice crowd, continues the GOP efforts to deny women the right to make choices that drastically affect their lives. Of course, father knows best. According to this article in Salon, Graham is demanding that his pseudo-science anti-choice bill be considered at the same time as Senator Richard Blumenthal's (D-CT) bill that would prohibit states from enacting burdensome and medically unnecessary regulations on abortion providers.
But Why Aren't Those Women More Confidant?
David Brooks (I know, I know) operating at his wonders about women and their apparent lack of confidence. But, he decides, maybe not being so all-fired confident about everything isn't a bad thing at all.
This Week in Stupid Red State Laws
Just when you thought you'd heard it all. According to Adam Weinstein in Gawker, "There are fifty states in our blessed union. There is only one state that holds an open election for the general who will command its National Guard forces. The reason is to keep black people from being too powerful. The result is that a convicted stalker may end up with all the tanks and guns." I know, it sounds too weird to be true, right? But one of only two candidates for General is one William James Breazeale, and this guy is a peach: "Breazeale is an Army Reserve field officer who has twice run unsuccessfully for Congress as a tea party-acceptable conservative and who is currently on probation after a stalking conviction and, according to one report, has "a lurid personal history which includes references to intimidation, aggravated stalking, criminal trespass, larceny, threats of suicide, and even threats of murder directed by Breazeale at members of his own family." Sure, let's give that guy tanks and guns. Why not?
Why Trey?
In case you were wondering why John Boehner picked do-nothing, loudmouth Tea Party twerp Trey Gowdy (R-Funny Hair on Fire) to lead the GOP Benghazi kangaroo court, The American Prospect has an answer. A video attached to the article shows Gowdy in full prosecutorial mode, banging the desk and yelling, demanding answers to questions that have already been answered. "Which tells you why Gowdy got picked for this job. John Boehner is doing this for the base, and the base wants someone who will channel the anger and contempt they feel for Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and the rest of the administration. Gowdy, a former prosecutor, is already referring to this enterprise not as an investigation but as a "trial," making clear that he sees his job not as finding the truth but as convicting the accused." He's not interested in investigating anything. He's interested in a guilty verdict. Surprise, surprise. A Tea Partier not interested in the truth.
News Lede
New York Times: "Ehud Olmert, the former Israeli prime minister, was sentenced Tuesday to six years in prison by a judge who likened him to a 'traitor' for taking bribes while mayor of Jerusalem in connection with the construction of a luxury housing development."
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Reader Comments (11)
As I mentioned in a previous post I recently finished reading "This Town" to which Glen Greenwald alludes and opines on Tim Russert's journalistic suck ups.
The book contains a hilarious anecdote. Seems Russert was quite adept at mimicry...and while he was an aide to Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan could do a great impression of his boss...and often 'used' his 'voice' while contacting and dealing with others. One day, concerning an important bill under review, Moynihan calls Ted Kennedy to discuss details.
Kennedy evidently having been played before by a same sounding voice, slammed the phone down mid' conversation (to Moynihan's surprise) with a: "Fuck off, Russert."
MAG: that is a hilarious anecdote about Russert/Kennedy. You inspired me to add The Town to my reading list. Thanks for the recommendation.
Interesting short piece by Mathew Ingram at Gigaom.com on he said/she said journalism.
“As [journalism professor and First Look Media advisor Jay] Rosen argues… the structure of the Times story [by Jeremy Peters about the pros and cons of voter registration] cleverly glosses over one of the key facts that it rests on: namely, whether voter fraud is a problem, and therefore a valid justification for voter registration. Is that actually the case? Rosen argues that this is something a reporter should theoretically be confirming or debunking, rather than just repeating:
“Would you happen to know, New York Times, whether fraud at the polls is ‘rife in today’s elections?’ Is that something I should expect you to know, seeing as you are the high-end product in the national news marketplace? Or is Democrats argue/Republicans contend/We have no idea a good enough standard?”
http://gigaom.com/2014/05/12/he-saidshe-said-isnt-just-a-failure-of-journalism-its-a-failure-to-understand-the-media-market/
Understand the Right's reaction to Cosmos' praise of Michael Faraday. But to some degree, they were set up. Around 2006, the Right with a little encouragement from purported intellectuals adopted him as a hero. Look, a scientist who believes in (the Christian) God! Just the kind of man we want to lead a charge against the godless.
Faraday was a Believer, but he had an excuse; he lived and worked in the early 1800's, pre-Darwin and a hell of a lot else. For anyone who wants more on Faraday and his genius than Wikipedia provides I would recommend "The Electric Life of Michael Faraday" by Alan Hirshfeld, published in 2006, which provides a good short look at Faraday's accomplishments.
Coincidentally, about the same time I read the Hirshfeld book I was following the annual announcements of Templeton prize winners because a few years before during my first retirement I had submitted a deliberately humanist essay (admittedly on paper that had a smirk as an invisible watermark) to the competition. Since the contest's purpose is Miltonian, to justify God's ways to man, needless to say, if for no other reason, I did not expect to win.
I noticed, though, a year or so later that the winner (which year I can't recall) won for his essay on Faraday, a Believer who found no contradictions between rational inquiry and Belief.
I remember thinking: Faraday had an excuse, but the prize winner surely did not. I also thought it pathetic he had to dip so deeply into history to find proof for a contemporary argument about the friendly relationship between science and religion.
As Byron said, less elegantly but more sensibly than Milton:
Malt does more than Milton can
To justify God's way to man
Ahem. Ken, I think you meant Housman, si?
Ken,
Good suggestion. I've always been high on Faraday as one of the greatest scientists not well known to the general public.
And there were plenty more like him. Newton was a Christian, so were Galileo, Francis Bacon, early proponent of the scientific method, James Dalton, the great James Clerk Maxwell, Lord Kelvin, Marconi, and even Max Planck. They may not all have been as zealous as Faraday in his time, but none of them let religion cloud their work as scientists, preferring, in some cases, to believe that scientific truth demonstrated the wonders of god's universe (and in other cases to simply set god aside until Sundays and go about their business).
Most of them would be burned at the stake by today's batch of fanatics.
Speaking of burnings at the stake, I'm sure Tyson's talk entitled "The Perimeter of Ignorance" really sets some panties on fire among the Religious zealots crowd. Among the wealth of information he covers (really interesting stuff!...if you can handle...Real history and science), I particularly enjoyed his stance around the 13 minute mark when he questions a survey which asked what percentage of the National Academy of Scientists reject the notion of God (turns out to be 85%). But for Tyson, the real question is how is this number NOT 100% for the elite scientists who demand rigorous testing for each question to answer.
Any winger watching this speech would blow his/her top over this guy's blasphemy (that's if they could even follow his thoughts of course). The fact that he's on the teevee calmly refuting everything that the delusional wingers believe represents an existential threat to those commanding their local sheeple and the politicians fishing for suckers with their holy bait hooks.
When this system is threatened temper tantrums are inevitable. Emotions are all they got. Who needs facts anyway when Jesus is your homeboy?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxiLnC7ikw8
James S.: I did mean Byron, but it seems I was wrong.
Thanks. I've been quoting that Byron, err, Housman line for years.
Ken
Colbert blows open the Lewinsky-Clinton conspiracy scandal!
Worth a look:
http://thecolbertreport.cc.com/videos/g2hf60/stephen-colbert-s-bats--t-serious---monica-lewinsky-s-conveniently-timed-essay
Facts are facts, until the conclusion works against your position. I like facts as much as the next gal or guy, but when glossed over facts tell me that mono-culture and eating GMOs are scientifically better I choose as 'verify and then trust' model to guide my own eating. Why not trust the scientists? You mean those same scientists who defame herbal healing and non-medical/non-institutional therapies at every paid opportunity? Vaccinations are a case in point: there is a simple medical triage that says some sickness from vaccination is better than no vaccination. Most people would agree with that rationale. Until you or your child get fucked over by those statistics, the rationale is just fine.
How about monarch butterflies, GMOs, monoculture farming, the loss of unique characteristics of heirloom varieties of seeds, is the rationale fine until it's not? I can't help see a parallel between that and big hunks of ice sloughing off the Antarctican ice shelf. One has got the benefit of load of research dollars and media attention and the other is stuck in the backwater of the research funding queue. What I stick into my mouth has my attention daily. Ice in Antarctica apparently is sexier and sells more media, but I don't eat it every day.
This is one reason why there is a special place in my heaven for real true-blue educators who can break up and serve in bite-size morsels facts. These educators find the work-arounds for in-group and conformation biases against the subject being taught. That is the art of the educator. Yet, when I saw my child have a couple of DPT vaccinations and become a silent and completely new animal afterwards, that does not make me a right-wing science denying yahoo.
On Faraday: One of the best books on science for the layman or scientist is his own: "The Chemical History of a Candle," written for young students but a joy to read for anyone. And, as a former biochemistry prof., illuminating both with respect to chemistry and physics of flame and of the mind of one of our all-time greats in science. And without a hint of witchcraft from the pen of the master.
Available for free at http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/14474