Recently in Surely You're Joking Category

The Los Angeles Times Science section is a-ok. Except, worryingly, the LA Times now puts Science in a subcategory under the category "US and World", in one of the top ten categories that editors use to divvy up the news: "US & World", "Local", "Business", "Sports", "Entertainment", "Health", "Living", "Travel"", "Opinion", and "More".

LA Insatiable for Hotlist, Brand X and The Envelope?

Let's look at how this works.

• Under the category "Entertainment", the LA Times has these subcategories: Movies, Television, Music, Celebrity, Arts & Culture, Company Town, Calendar, the Envelope, and Hotlist, in that order. Don't think they missed any "Entertainment" "news".

• Under the category "Living", the paper assigns these subcategories: Health, Home, Food, Image, Travel, Autos, Books, Hotlist, Brand X, Magazine and "Your Scene". Can't imagine they've missed much "Living" "news".

• Then, under the category "US and World", the paper puts these subcategories: Washington, Nation, Afghanistan, Middle East, Latin America, Asia, Science, Environment, and ominously, Obituaries -- again, in that order.

The LA Times has put "science" on the same level of "brand X", "the envelope", and "company town".

Bucket List

Get it? All the real news, all the stuff that really might impact us; like the whole rest of the world beside LA; two killer, budget decimating wars; 51 US states; global warming; stem cell research; microbiology research; astronomy and the universe; on and on -- all live in one convenient news bucket beside biographies of the dead.

Technology is in "Business". And where is "Europe"? I can't find it. Completely missing from the line-up? Perhaps so old world, that some editor shoved it into Obituaries? Does the Los Angeles Times have a grudge against all of Europe? Does that include Russia? Or is "Russia" in "Asia"?

I'm worried. Because if the LA Times can eighty-six all of "Europe", then it looks like the editors and managers have placed the two categores Science and Environment disconcertingly close to Obituaries. Say a little prayer for Science News, one banana peel away from the grave?

Carp, a Problem -- And The Government Solution

A couple of weeks ago we reported that scientists feared Asian carp had invaded the Great Lakes. Sure enough, scientists recently found carp DNA in Lake Michigan, an ecological problem considered so serious that the Supreme Court weighed in on the issue last week. (The Supreme Court said NO to Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Ontario, who together requested that the court allow the locks be closed to prevent the carp from impacting the $7 billion dollar fisheries industry).

Who could suggest a solution? Fortunately, the entrepreneurial government of the United States (but not SCOTUS) can tackle this kind of stuff. Now, some government go-getters suggest marketing the carp as "Silverfin" (not to be confused with the "silverfish", a revolting insect) to strengthen the filter-feeder's appeal to diners.

The Louisiana Department of Wildlife & Fisheries hatched the carp plan, identifying eleven "activities" to help rebrand the invasive fish as a delicacy.

The Media Could Actually Be Helpful

Number one on the list is surprisingly obvious: "determine if silver and bighead carp are suitable for human consumption". Apparently Chef Phillipe Parola (famous for trying to push other distasteful creatures on diners, like alligator and nutria) already tested the fish with consumers, and found that the only barrier to epicurean success is "a series of floating bones that are not easily separated from the flesh". The US Geological Survey got right on it, promptly producing a video to teach chefs and sports fisherman how to clean the invasive fish.

The agency also planned various promotional activities, and here's where journalists play an important role. In a series of events, producers plan to: "present the fish products to the media...", who will be "given samples of fish and fish products to eat". Providing no journalist chokes on a bone and dies, apparently the US Geological Survey will move on to Stage II Clinical Trials.

The Geological Survey also suggests "large media events", where attendees will be habituated to the idea as carp as food, since "videos showing the fish and cleaning methods will be continuously playing".

And Scientist Could Help Too, Doing What They Usually Do -- Research

When the Supreme Court chooses to be unhelpful, maybe scientists can aid the cause. Salon Magazine interviewed "the energetic Parola", who's pushing hard to change the fish's name from "carp" to "silverfin".

Parola illustrates how some government agencies work at cross-purposes -; as he explains how the carp got its undelicious name:

Parola: "Some clown from the USDA classified it as a carp. Carps are a bottom feeders and this is a filter feeder. The shape of the fish, the way it grows, the color: Literally there is no similarity to the carp. There's no other species named the silverfin, so what's the problem?"

Salon: "Well, off the top of my head, shouldn't it be up to scientists to name the fish?"

Parola: "But what I'm saying to you -- very loudly - is that this fish doesn't have any similarity with the carp. I want somebody out there to redo that research and help us out."

There you go. Team effort. Scientists? Change the research. Do what you need to do, whatever it takes, call in the IPCC (no!! little joke)...what do ichthyologists think?

Many people who are now disappointed by the Obama administration didn't pay close enough attention during his campaign and election. It's the same with all presidents, really -- the promise of a new president brings at first a golden era of hope during which people seem to cavalierly shed their analytical abilities; then the denial phase as the president comes into his own; then the rude awakening when they're shocked, shocked, shocked at the scale of the deception.

Remember the Bush presidency? Mr. Compassionate Conservative? People barely twitched when he invaded Iraq, then slowly awoke to his mendacious governance -- the fact that there were no WMDs, there was global warming, arsenic levels weren't safe, Guantanamo prisoners were tortured to within an inch of their lives the end of their lives -- etc.

Warnings

But before presidents are elected there's time to profile their past, time for people to shake themselves out of wishful thinking into clarity. Usually at least one enterprising journalist digs into a candidate's history and accurately predicts their presidency. For instance, during the George W. Bush presidential campaign of 2000, Harper's author Joe Conason wrote an excellent, disturbing article about Bush's tenure in Texas politics called, "Notes on a Native Son: Part I. "The George W. Bush success story: A heartwarming tale about baseball, $1.7 billion, and a lot of swell friends." (Feb. 2000) The article disabused people of their ideas that George W. Bush and Democratic candidate Al Gore were very similar. Conason nailed Bush's future leadership proclivities. Perhaps some of it was luck, and I'm sure Conason wasn't the only one who caught on early. But the Harper's article showed that some people really can get a bead on leaders, and that if we pay attention we could too. That, at least, is reassuring to know.

Forward to the Obama campaign, in July, 2008, when New Yorker magazine shocked the world with a cover cartoon of Barack and Michelle Obama pictured with radical accoutrements and dressed -- as Al Jazeera put it -- "in what many [Americans] see as 'Muslim clothing'". We think fewer people read the accompanying article, which we touched on back then in "We The Thin Skinned, The Public and The Media".

The New Yorker cleverly juxtaposed a detailed political biography of Obama by Ryan Lizza against their cartoon cover depiction. In Making It: How Chicago shaped Obama, Lizza portrayed Obama as a pragmatic politician alert to the vagaries of politics, who proved himself more than adept at maneuvering through the political quagmires of Chicago and Illinois to emerge unscathed, all the while governing blandly. We quoted this from Lizza's profile:

"Perhaps the greatest misconception about Barack Obama is that he is some sort of anti-establishment revolutionary. Rather, every stage of his political career has been marked by an eagerness to accommodate himself to existing institutions..."

Liberals now realize that Obama's "existing institutions", as Lizza put it, were in many cases set up by the George W. Bush administration. The public didn't seem to get the New Yorker's sly joke back then, the paradox of the cover story versus the true inside scoop. The public went apoplectic over the cover. And only now are people starting to catch on to the fact that the Obama they compiled in their head isn't the Obama who's leading the country.

Misconceptions

If liberals and independents are unhappy -- Bush at least went full tilt with his base-- so too are conservatives. Conservative columnist Ross Douthat sought to explain the Obama paradox recently. He wrote: "In hindsight, the most prescient sentence penned during the presidential campaign belongs to Ryan Lizza of The New Yorker", then quoted Lizza's two sentences ("Perhaps the greatest misconception...institutions"). Douthat's "The Obama Way" explained that everyone vilified Obama differently but the president fit no particular mold. The most discontented people were the liberals -- as Douthat said:

"The left has been frustrated, again and again, by the gulf between Obama's professed principles and the compromises that he's willing to accept, and some liberals have become convinced that he isn't one of them at all. They're wrong. Absent political constraints, Obama would probably side with the liberal line on almost every issue."

There goes Douthat, first heartily agreeing with Lizza's New Yorker quote describing Obama as a political accommodator, next labeling Obama a flaming liberal who's only tenuously tethered to some middle way -- as if to warn conservatives not to relax. Well, which is it, young feller?

Does Douthat peg Obama as impossible to categorize but at his core very liberal? Or does he fall for the same fallacies of judgement he's just finished explaining to us?

Pragmatism

How liberal is Obama, deep down inside? Honestly, we don't know. But look, for instance at the politics of one of his long term advisors, the only person with a more quixotic image than Obama himself, whose intentions are even more difficult for observers to pin down -- Cass Sunstein. Sunstein leads the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA). OIRA reviews regulations from all rule-making agencies in the Office of Management and Budget, regulations for banking, air and water quality, food, drugs, transportation...in other words, Sunstein's philosophy affects us all, and he's supposedly a close counsel of Obama's .

We've somewhat regularly followed Sunstein's progress in the Obama administration and his amazing ability to attract venomous critics as well as admiring followers from both the left and the right. There wasn't always such focus on OIRA administrators. Sunstein's very driven regulation-allergic conservative predecessors at OIRA, John Graham and Susan Dudley, attracted only the sparsest attention as they weakened regulation, ignored science, and developed symbiotic relationships with industry.

Sunstein often quotes John Graham and shares and builds on Graham's cost-benefit analysis legacy, yet people often label him, like Obama, as an out of bounds liberal. Sunstein's nomination was supported by conservative groups like the Competitive Enterprise Institute and by the Wall Street Journal. Yet wildly preposterous rumors about his views, for instance on animal rights, held up his OIRA nomination for months. Republican senators stymied his appointment, as hunters and factory farms hijacked meaningful deliberation about Sunstein's most controversial ideas -- on cost-benefit analysis, for instance -- by focusing on the false notions that he might ban hunting, something that he had actually convincingly argued against.

The other thing that's interesting given Sunstein's well-documented ideas, is how pundits from both sides seem to ignore history when they periodically burst out over one thing or another they unearth in his writing. Of course some people, like Rena Steinzor of the Center For Progressive Reform, have long focused on environmental law, cost-benefit analysis, and the likely impact of Cass Sunstein heading OIRA. But to my point, recently Glenn Greenwald popularized a flurry of concern about Sunstein with his Salon article, "Obama Confidant's Spine-chilling Proposal". Greenwald's focus is not on Sunstein's cost-benefit machinations or environmental stances, but on Sunstein's exploration of government control of "conspiracy theories".

The Mirror, A Gift or A Curse?

Greenwald takes Sunstein to task for advocating in a 2008 paper that the government ought to do things like anonymously infiltrate groups to dissipate conspiracy theories. The Sunstein paper is really interesting (and funny, to me), and Greenwald competently attacks the ideas Sunstein presents. But just like Bush and Obama, Sunstein's proposals in 2008 proved consistent with what he has publicly explored/advocated for years.

In his 2001 book Republic.com, for instance, Sunstein argued that the government (he later changed this to private companies) could fight internet "hate-sites" and polarization that 'threatened democracy' by enforcing things like cross-linking to politically opposing sites. What did Thaler/Sunstein's book Nudge urge but for the government to "architect" our "choices"? If you circle through his books and papers you'll find that one way or another, either by infiltration or nudging, Sunstein's quite pre-occupied with government control of "undesirable" information, voices and outcomes, as judged by the government. These aren't terribly liberal obsessions, and it would be hard for me to call Sunstein a liberal.

Back to Douthat's point, I would also be hard-pressed to call Obama a liberal, either by his associations or his Illinois and presidential records. I'm surely biased, but so far he's a pragmatist, (though not a "centrist" Douthat says), and we were adequately and accurately warned. How many years does someone need to act like a centrist/pragmatist before people stop labeling them a liberal?*

Obama gets everyone together, he does. And they're all suspicious. During his campaign, people would say that Obama's campaign gift was that he made everyone see a bit of themselves in him. Perhaps now he has the opposite effect. No one can see any bit of themselves in him. Is that a curse?

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*And btw, as an aside, what is a liberal? And does the country need a "liberal" president, anyway, liberals?

"We can only marvel at the disarray." - Jeffrey Sachs on climate policy.

The CRU Emails - Fool's Gold:

Like glittering treasure, the emails hacked from the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia (CRU) beckon Republicans and climate change deniers who paw through the loot like pirates with fool's gold, pulling out one little nugget or another from the 1000+ email trove. I'm sure there's more than a lifetime's worth of out of context quotes to be mined.

(Graph: Instrumental Global Surface Temperature Measurements from >150 stations; image from Wikipedia Commons. More info)

It's a lesson some of us know and others are just learning, that given the slightest excuse, the deniers will get louder and louder by the day, despite 30 years of accumulated evidence showing anthropogenic climate change. And so post CRU email events and protagonists continue to gather momentum. This week the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) and four members of Congress demanded that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) halt all rule-making to reduce man-made carbon emissions on account of the CRU emails. In their letter, Sen. David Vitter (R-La.), Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) and Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) requested that the EPA-

"conduct a thorough and transparent investigation" into the "questions raised by the emails". "Additionally, the EPA "should withdraw the Proposed Endangerment Finding, as well as the Light Duty Vehicle Rule, and the Greenhouse Gas Tailoring Rule....."

It was an over-the-top response to the CRU emails, but Sensenbrenner et al have been bombarding the EPA with this kind of stuff long before the CRU emails. Sensenbrenner is the former Chairman of the House Science Committee and ranking Republican on the House Select Committee for Energy Independence and Global Warming, a committee that he vehemently opposed before its formation, at which point he saw that he couldn't stop it so he got on board to undermine it anyway he could.

The EPA's Endangerment Finding, gives the agency the authority to regulate greenhouse gases affecting US citizens health and welfare. We wrote about endangerment in a number of posts ( here, here, here, here, here, and here), describing the protracted negotiations between the states, the Bush and Obama administrations, and the courts, including the Supreme Court in Massachusetts v. EPA.

The four legislators demand that the EPA withdraw the Endangerment Finding decision of last April and halt Light Duty Vehicle and the Greenhouse Gas Tailoring Rules, just when the EPA, after eight years of Bush administration shenanigans, takes baby steps to try and slow down our human contributions to greenhouse gas emissions. The letter might as well request the agency drown itself in a bathtub. ¹

If A "Climate Change Bullshit" Prize Bears Your Name, It Makes Sense That Republicans Would Quote You In A Letter To The EPA...?

"The content of the emails raises serious questions that demand your attention", write the four congressmen. To emphasize the erroneous climate science potentially informing their request, they quote from three newspaper essays - an editorial from the Wall Street Journal, a column from the New York Times, and a column from the British newspaper the Telegraph.

It's the job of Representatives and Senators to get information for their constituents. But what's their line of reasoning and who does it benefit? To anchor their letter, they reference UK Telegraph columnist Christopher Booker, presumably to give EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson good reason to consider their demands. Booker wrote that the CRU emails' "importance cannot be overestimated". US readers may not be familiar with the conservative Telegraph papers and they may not know Christopher Booker, but here's a sampling of his ideas (HT Wikipedia):

• Asbestos "poses no risk to human health and is chemically identical to talcum powder" [2]
• "Scientific evidence to support the belief that inhaling other people's smoke causes cancer simply does not exist" [3]
• Intelligent Design is valid and evolutionary scientists "rest their case on nothing more than blind faith and unexamined a priori assumptions" [4]
• "2008 was the year man-made global warming was disproved" and more, in columns, and a book "The Real Global Warming Disaster: Is The Obsession With 'Climate Change' Turning Out To Be The Most Costly Scientific Blunder In History" [5]

The UK Health and Safety Executive has rebuked Booker multiple times for his "misinformed" statements on asbestos. His false assertions on climate change are so well recognized in the UK that before George Monbiot wobbled uncertainly about the wisdom of casting his lot with climate scientists, he established the "Christopher Booker Prize for Climate Change Bullshit" with The Guardian.

The Christopher Booker Prize for Climate Change Bullshit awards the person who serves up the most climate falsehoods in a single article. That bullshitter gets a trophy made from what looks to me like a tin can and paper/styrofoam cup decorated with a magic marker - have a look for yourself. The "trophy" is made in "mid-Wales".⁶ You get a feel for Christopher Booker's authority.

The winner also gets an invitation from Monbiot to take a "one-way solo kayak trip to the North Pole" to "see for him or herself the full extent of the Arctic ice melt." (The Arctic video showing global warming here is actually in our last post.) The Guardian generously offers excursion support in the form of a little bit of mint chocolate.

The Gall (and Fatal Flaw?) of the GOP

Sen. David Vitter (R-La.), Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) and Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) don't offer the most countable untruths, so technically they're not even eligible for Monbiot's prize as defined, although Sensenbrenner has made such career out of hassling the EPA that he might be considered for a lifetime achievement award. Two styrofoam cups.

On the other hand, maybe we could redefine the award, given that everything is in "disarray", and all topsy-turvy anyway. Think about it. The EPA, after being thrown out to pasture for eight years, is now being served up demands by a foursome who cite as evidence the most egregious of science deniers, capable of provoking George Monbiot's most venomous contempt. But Monbiot himself fears that no sooner did he stake his reputation on climate science then the scientists left him standing on an ice floe.

Actually, there's too much evidence for global warming, no cache of CRU emails can undermine that, therefore the Republicans are reduced to sending a letter full of nothing. So perhaps Monbiot could redefine the prize and the four intrepid lawmakers could capture the "trophy" simply for offering the most nothing? The four would look very sporty upgraded from a kayak to a little round rowboat. But will Monbiot stand by his prize offer? Or will he throw the whole styrofoam cup and little bit of mint chocolate thing overboard...and throw back a pint with Booker?

The Myth of the Republican Rhetoric Machine?

Marvel that the Republicans cite Booker's opinion in a letter to the EPA. They do offer longer quotes from the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times that would also be facile to refute; however, I was most impressed with the audacity of opening a letter to the EPA administrator with a quote from such a clown. Such is the sad state of Republican intellectual rigor in 2009. When scientists fret about their ability to counteract deniers, they sometimes overestimate the GOP as some well-oiled rhetorical wonderboat. It's not always so.

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1. Grover Norquist said said: "I don't want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub."

2. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1381270/Christopher-Bookers-Notebook.html
3. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/1556118/Christopher-Booker%27s-notebook.html
4. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1495664/Christopher-Bookers-notebook.html
5.http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/3982101/2008-was-the-year-man-made-global-warming-was-disproved.html

6. I bet if these four won we could commission some Hackensack, NJ, USA made trophies, because I know that's important to some camps. Hackensack is nice now, like Brooklyn, they say.

Maher Still Loco on Vaccinations:

As he has for years, Bill Maher continues to spread disinformation about vaccines. Over countless news cycles Maher has infuriated doctors, public health officials, and responsible citizens with bizarre warnings about letting governments "stick a disease into your arm".

Challenged to get a word in edgewise between his fusillades about "mercury" and "diet" and natural "immunity", doctors and scientists nevertheless patiently correct his errors. They explain that a vaccine is not "a disease" but a disabled virus that looks to the immune system like a live virus or bacteria and therefore prevents infection by the actual deadly virus or bacteria¹ like polio, measles, diphtheria, or influenza.

But the talk show host persists, as is his habit. Last month, Bill "I'm also not f-king my interns" Maher baffled panelists Alec Baldwin, Chris Matthews and Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley by rehashing his concerns with vaccines. Yesterday, Maher continued with a rambling column at The Huffington Post titled "A Conversation Worth Having", saying he aimed to

"clear up a few things about my beliefs concerning the flu shot, vaccines, and health in general...I will admit, I have gone off half cocked on this issue sometimes, and often only had time on my show to explain a fraction of what needed to be explained, and for that I am sorry...I agree with my critics who say there are far more qualified people than me"

Mea culpa? Unfortunately, and spoiler alert for the 2800 word article: no. I didn't say "anyone who gets a flu shot is an idiot", Maher said, "it was twittered...my bad". Then, "vaccination is a nuanced subject, and I've never said all vaccines in all situations are bad..." Nuanced? "All vaccines"? Cagey creepy crapola -- bring it on, Maher.

Discerning Maher's Health Prescription -- When "Sometimes It's OK to Fuck with Nature"

Maher writes "I'm not a germ theory denier" and he claims "I do understand the theory of inoculation", exuding all the candor of a intelligent design proselytizer putting quotes around "the theory" of evolution. To the helpful doctor who corrects him, Maher retorts snidely "Thanks, Doc, I thought there might be a little man inside the needle. Yes, I read Microbe Hunters when I was eight." (Doesn't think the conversation is worth having?)

Cocksure and funny, Maher acts as though he's arguing about some scrutable line that any eight year old can see - you don't need to be a doctor or scientist. To the left of the line there are the OK vaccines, except, he hedges, vaccines are unproven. To the right, there are the not-OK vaccines that we should be debating, like flu vaccine. But actually, if you can't already tell, there is no line or margin, because Maher is arguing the same old run-of-the-mill anti-vaccine/medicine/science schtick you've (yawwwwnn) already heard. He allows that "sometimes it's OK to fuck with nature" and prescribe medicine, but listen to enough Maher and you realize he maligns all medicine, all vaccines.

Casting Aside Science

Sure, at first you may be confused because he mixes recognizable words into gobbledygook. Do doctors ever ask patients what they eat, he asks rhetorically? No, he answers, "and a lot can be cured with diet and a healthier lifestyle" -- then Maher adds in parentheses -- "And a lot can't [be cured]. I also understand the role of genetics and generations of artificial selection".

Despite his unassailable understanding, lets review. The risk of some diseases, like diabetes Type II, can be reduced with healthier lifestyle. Some conditions, like obesity can be prevented with diet, and losing weight concurrently reduces the risks of morbidity and mortality associated with conditions like heart disease. This isn't just semantics. Diet won't prevent crippling polio, or a flu pandemic or death of a pregnant woman, or stop a kid from succumbing to weeks of illness and a 105 degree influenza fever. And typical of Maher's machinations on science, medicine and disease, he jumps down the rabbit hole with "genetics and "generations of artificial selection". Scientists use artificial selection to breed products like corn by selecting for certain traits. Humans are not hothouse flowers, subjected to "generations of artificial selection".

How Does Maher Distinguish Himself From Dr. Beetroot?

In cajoling his audience to exercise skepticism and caution and arguing for "debate", a word that should tip anyone off to incoming falsehoods; Maher says:

"Someone needs to be representing the point of view that says the preferred way to handle flus is to have a strong immune system to begin with..."

Actually, we can think we recognize this "point of view". Take, for instance South Africa's former health minister, Dr. Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, (known derisively as Dr. Beetroot), who spent years telling South Africans to boost their immune systems against the AIDS virus with diet, beetroot and lemon.

In a familiar refrain, the South African Mbeki government insisted that Western drugs were too profit oriented and dangerous. As a result of this decision, hundreds of thousands of South Africans died from AIDS, and the dying isn't over, since infectious disease pandemics gather momentum over time. Newly elected President Zuma recently warned that the death rate from AIDS may overtake the birthrate in that country.

How is Maher's argument different than that of Tshabalala-Msimang's? Where does he draw his invisible line de-marking greedy Western medicine from essential life-saving medicine? How does this board member of the "Reason Project" (Wikipedia) dedicated to scientific and secular knowledge, identify good medicine?

How is Maher's Position Different Than A Mennonite's?

Instead of agreeing with scientists and doctors, Maher chooses to listen to Barbara Loe Fisher who he finds "extremely credible", because

"after devoting her life to studying this, she says that flu vaccines aren't proven and...points out that what we need, but do not yet have, are studies of vaccinated vs unvaccinated children."

Fisher is not a scientist or a doctor, and that's ok, anyone can educate themselves about vaccinations, eight or older. Based on her experience parenting and in public relations Fisher can certainly start a vaccination information center, appear on talk shows, testify at events like the "Vaccine Policy Analysis Collaborative: A U.S. Government Experiment in Public Engagement", and give lectures to naturopaths, chiropractors, and groups like "Body by God". Who's to say she can't?

But given that Maher says she's devoted her life to studying vaccinations, you'd think she'd understand that vaccinating some children against polio, but not others, would be medically unethical. You'd think that Maher would also see the moral quagmire.

Furthermore, unfortunately, there's lots of evidence to prove that what Fisher and Maher say is the untested theory of vaccination is flat out false. As the NYT reported in 2003:

"The last two American polio outbreaks were in Amish and Mennonite communities in 1979 and in a Christian Science school in Connecticut in 1972. Measles killed 3 students of 125 infected in a Christian Science school in 1985, and a similar-size outbreak among the Amish in 1987 and 1988 killed 2 people. In 1991, 890 cases of rubella, leading to more than a dozen deformed children, hit Amish areas."

Since then, Africans who believed rumors that vaccinations are an attempt by Westerners to spread the HIV virus or sterilize Nigerians, started a polio epidemic. The Amish also suffered polio outbreaks. Mennonites, who don't believe in vaccination but do believe in travel caused outbreaks of measles in Minnesota, then South America. Like the Amish, Mennonites don't believe in vaccinations or insurance, but do believe that hospitals should cure them for a discount, once they get sick.

How is Maher's position different then that of a Mennonite? Can we have this conversation? How does Maher square his position on vaccines with his libertarian views when people end up demanding hospital bailouts because they didn't take it upon themselves to prevent illness?

The Dredged Up "Under-reported Point of View" is Often Wrong, Concludes A Bright Person

The consequences of not vaccinating become graver and more frequent as more people refuse vaccinations. The value of vaccinations is not "debatable". Vaccinations have saved millions of lives, saved millions of dollars by keeping people out of hospitals, and boosted productivity of nations. But Maher ignores all this and calls for some cost benefit analysis, more familiar anti-science denialism.

Maher appeals to all of those who eschew facts and take solace in unpopular views.

"I'm just trying to represent an under-reported medical point of view in this country, I'm not telling a specific pregnant lady what to do...[I]t's just that mainstream media rarely interviews doctors and scientists who present an alternative point of view..."

Pregnant women and kids are most susceptible to dying from H1N1 virus. Pregnant women have decreased lung capacity that increases the threat of pneumonia, and they have decreased immunity due to their pregnancy. The reason the media doesn't interview doctors and scientists with "alternative points of view" on the subject, is because doctors and scientists agree that vaccines save lives, and that pregnant woman and parents of children shouldn't die because they've been convinced by talk show hosts to doubt the CDC, the doctors, and the scientists.

Maher's is not selling an "under-reported medical point of view", rather he's latched onto a non-medical, non-science point of view. Hmmm....why does he persist?

Bill Maher's Mainstream Media Profit Motives

Unbelievably, after flogging his point of view for years, Maher says he has no motive and expects no outcome: "[M]y audience is bright, they wouldn't refuse a flu shot because they heard me talk about it...." But his audience claps when he talks non-scientific hokum -- perhaps only because they're prompted? Either they're not thinking at all, or they're confused about science, or they're easily swayed by paranoid views, or they think they're at a gladiator show - in which case they will eventually be disappointed by the "debate." Can such folks be considered "bright" in the 21st century?

To the point, though, if Maher's especially non-bright, non-medical, non-scientific point of view weren't selling, weren't rewarded with clapping and viewers and advertising dollars, would he still be ranting on? Maher's anti-vaccination position has populist appeal that draws viewers and boosts ratings. His refutation of "mainstream media's profit motives" sells well. But lets be clear. HBO's Real Time, with millions of viewers each night, is mainstream media. What's not? Acronym Required, for instance, is not "mainstream media".

And why pick on science? Scientists are a remarkably easy target, as we noted before when John McCain chronically made fun of science research. When Maher chose to accost religion, at least 50% of Americans are quite religious, and that's a lot of potential audience members to insult. Plus, religious people can get dangerous. Other Maher campaigns have also backfired, like when Maher's remarks about military recruiting spurred one Congressman to demand that Real Time be canceled.

Considering his options then, and the groups he's already alienated, scientists make a good target. They're pretty tame, therefore easy to pick on safely, and a select target for a large potential audience, since everyone's thinking of getting the flu vaccine. Maher can perhaps equivocate about good vs. bad vaccines and fool a lot of people. So Bill Maher and his mainstream media show try to expand his audience by maligning science to become more mainstream? So they forsake scientists, but also pregnant moms and kids in the process? Is this the conversation? More or less? Bravo, talk show host!

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Photo from Wikipedia under a Creative Commons license.

¹ 11/19 Added "bacteria"

Acronym Required wrote on vaccinations previously, for instance in Vaccinations, Why the Worry? we wrote about the long history of rebellion against vaccinations. We also wrote about vaccinations here and in various posts and vaccines for specific illnesses.

Bill Maher's shenanigans have been will covered by scientists like Respectful Insolence here and here, by Pharyngula; by Aetiology here and here here and by many others.

Superfreakonomics authors Levitt and Dubner make it out like solving global warming is no more complicated than cooling off on the patio on a hot summer day. First, someone else puts up the umbrella, then they unwind the hose and spray all the kids so they stay cool. This may sound good to you, but it's not logical, despite what the Superfreaks insist. They're appealing to your laziness, your ennui, your fear, and your cynicism, all in the name of books and businesses that you don't hold stock in. Do you but it?

Daily Show Economics

When Steven Levitt appeared on the Daily Show to talk about their new book and the giant umbrellas that could be used to ward off climate change, Jon Stewart apologized for the collective response by scientists to Levitt and Dubner's unscientific treatment of climate change. Not only unscientific, dismissive too: Levitt told the Guardian "We could end this debate and be done with it, and move on to problems that are harder to solve", (hat tip Curious Capitalist).

Stewart commiserated to the criticized Levitt: "I'm sorry you're taking so much shit for it". But Stewart let his Daily Show audience down. For one, "Superfreakonomics" disappointed Freakonomics fans, especially those devoted libertarians and contrarians, who, though often delusional, generally manage at least a modicum of realism about climate change. Daily Show fans were also surprised that Stewart was so sympathetic to Levitt.

But if people were dismayed with The Daily Show's dismissal of climate change, they haven't been paying attention. Stewart isn't always smarter 'than that', if smarter doesn't fit the particular formula-funny he runs. Note how Stewart barely batted an eye when Levitt offered his other offensive assertion, that prostitutes should retain pimps in order to earn more money. It's true, shrugged Levitt, as if nothing can to be done because the invisible hand has sealed womens' fates the world over -- as if he didn't just twist up that statistical interpretation to get people tittering and buying books.

"The heroes turn out to be the pimps", he said. Shrug. "Get rid of the moral part" he insisted, and you have pure unadulterated economics, that's what we're about. Jon jested. Hahaha, heeheehee. Levitt shrugged again. Then the two entertainers moved on to climate change and the irrationality of environmentalists.

When Your Advertisers Are Auto Companies?

And trashing "environmentalists" isn't new territory, either, for Levitt or for Stewart. The Freakonomics blog has argued repeatedly that recycling makes little sense. The Daily Show host has previously criticized actions to lower carbon emissions, for instance "Auto-Neurotic Gas Fixation", May 20, 2009. At the time, Obama had just announced his intention to set new, ambitious CAFE standards for gas mileage. Stewart chastised him for it: "Dude...Obama...don't blow your load on mileage baby, save it for when the Chinese invade."

Stewart said that gas efficient cars, being smaller, put people "in harm's way because they're in a lighter vehicle", that "safety" was a "valid", "reasonable concern". A nod to all the automobile companies that advertise with Comedy Central perhaps? Or ignorance? You decide. We thought that this ancient Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) argument died back in 2007, once people thought through their elementary math and physics and realized that yes, if you run your Prius into a Hummer, you may get hurt, but the more Priuses on the road, and the fewer Hummers, the less likely you will be to run into a Hummer, therefore less likely you'll get hurt. Alas, there we were in the spring of 2009 and Jon Stewart was giving us his schoolboy version of the old auto industry fueled CEI argument.

Coincidentally, at the time -- April/May 2009 -- car sales had recently dropped to their lowest point in thirty years. A flurry of editorials pronounced the danger of small vehicles and so Stewart fit right in with The Wall Street Journal which droned on about about the "lethal effects" of CAFE standards and light vehicles. Lesson? Comedy Central is not always all that "progressive" people - really.

Just When You Thought Superfreak was Finally Gone

So Jon Stewart's accommodation to Levitt's argument isn't a surprise, nor is Superfreakonomics' bid to attract attention by rousing populist appeal. As the sequel to Freakonomics (which admittedly never did it for me), SuperFreakonomics seems to run aground the way many movie sequels do -- Rocky V, Clerks II, Caddyshack II... While maintaining sufficient audiences to grind through talk-shows, stimulate blog chatter, and generate pay-out, the authors deeply disappoint fans.

Here's a collection of about 90 blog links that criticize Chapter 5 of the book. They call the authors on many points, for instance:

• Of distorting the science and misquoting scientists - From an atmospheric scientist (Ken Caldeira) in response to the book's quote - "Carbon dioxide is not the right villain": "I don't believe I said anything remotely like that...we should be outlawing the production of devices that emit carbon dioxide...I do see CO2 as the problem...it's like if you got shot by a bullet and you said, well, it wasn't really the bullet that was the problem, it was just that I happened to have this hole through my body..."

• Of distorting science consensus - From many economists: "it is terribly misleading that the two scientists you quote are BOTH skeptics. What are the odds of that? Probably a billion to one, so my unavoidable conclusion is that you are deliberately trying to cast doubt on the scientific consensus."

• Of presenting facile, improbable solutions to climate change like pumping SO2 into the atmosphere with a giant hose - From scientists: "'..thinking of geoengineering as a substitute for emissions reduction is analogous to saying, 'Now that I've got the seatbelts on, I can just take my hands off the wheel and turn around and talk to people in the back seat.' It's crazy.'"

• Of deceiving the American public - From a congressman: "We have seen a similar effort to hoodwink, defraud, and deceive the American public now to cover up the toxicity to the world environment...I want to note a book...that basically said or asserted we don't have to control CO2..They purported to quote a scientist named Ken Caldeira from Stanford...Which is an absolute deception."

Like the Daily Show, the Superfreakonomics authors have a history of distorting reality.

Stripping Away Moralism and Giving You Freedom: The Ruse

As I wrote above, what Levitt claims, is that he simply "strips away the moralism" - then, all you have is the economics and prostitution, or economics and climate change. Glib. This is not uncommon rhetoric in economics, politics and public policy -- the ultra-rational, just do the math approach. It's used, for instance, to justify radical cost-benefit-analysis, where people argue that you can put a monetary value on everything - the price of one member of an endangered species, the price of the life of an old person, the price of the life of an infant, the price of a chemical to an industry - and otherwise complicated policy decisions fraught with difficult ethical choices can be reduced to simple math. Voilà.

The problem is, when the authors decided to write that prostitutes are better off with pimps then dug up some statistics to support that assertion, they made a moral decision. First Levitt and Dubner had to decide that this particular slant on prostitution was what they wanted to focus on, then they had to cherry pick some "data" to support it. Similarly, as we wrote in an earlier post, deciding that a male mule deer is worth $525.50, whereas a female mule deer is worth $163, while a just plain deer is worth $1, is not a decision without "moralism".

Moral sentiments are part and parcel of human decisions. Numbers and words that appear in print on a piece of paper or screen in front of you came from a formula or process derived by a human, based on that human's views, perceptions, expectations and desired outcomes. It didn't come from some superior amoralistic all-knowing power, intent on providing answers and comfort to confused humans beings -- despite what people may try to convince you.

Ironically, by asking his audience to "strip away the moralism", Levitt is appealing to ethos or pathos, but certainly not logos. He's saying -- be logical like me, I'm being logical. Shrug. But he's dismissing tons and tons of scientific proof of climate change and the need to decrease emissions as pathetic "moral" arguments (ethos), when those scientific studies are actually the logical ones (logos). He's appealing to his audience's laissez-faire tendencies, their desire to do nothing, their habits not to change, their pathos.

The Ploy: Technology will Suffice in Lieu of Action

Then, offering the equivalent of the old, chintzy plastic prize at the bottom of the box of Crackerjacks, he gives the audience something to grasp on to in the impending and threatening flood of unpleasant scientific reality, although again, it's not logical. Levitt insists that there's a simple scientific solution to solve the problem. Of course, there is no technological solution. The authors offer untested pie-in-the-sky idea that many, many scientists find problematic.

But this is what we all want to hear, right? The irrational, busy, lazy or pathetic side of all of all of us wants to be assured that electronic records will solve healthcare failures, that tsunami warning systems will prevent catastrophic losses, that ankle bracelets will prevent recidivism, that massive fences along international borders will prevent terrorism and drug trafficking, and that electronic surveillance will prevent crime. But giant garden hoses suspended up in the sky, are not even in the realm of feasible technical solutions. Yet we're so happy to slough off responsibility that Jon Stewart, although he's a modern icon of cynicism, doesn't even bother to ask questions.

Levitt plays to the audience's sentiments perfectly, first by laughing off science and scientists who present scary ideas as flimsy moralistic hogwash, then by presenting his very own special version of "science". I'm the logical one, he says, but I'm not dorky like a scientist.

His flavor of rhetoric is commonly used by those who oppose scientific evidence because it presents the type of science society likes, that which solves our problems, but is seemingly stress-free, simpler to understand than Tivo, and doesn't require you to have liked high school science. Therefore Superfreakonomics presents magic "technology solutions" in terms your average barbecuing Joe (if there is such a thing) will know and like.

According to them, solving global warming is no more complicated than cooling down on a hot summer day on the patio. First someone else puts up the umbrella to shield you. Then a kindly neighbor unwinds the hose and sprays away, and all the kids stay cool. Sound good? But its not logical. It's doesn't strip away moralism. It doesn't give you freedom. You do have to worry about global warming, you may have to change your lightbulbs. Superfreakonomics appeals not to your logical side but to your laziness, your ennui, your fear, your cynicism, all in the name of books and businesses that you don't hold stock in.

The Solution

This isn't to say that we don't need technology, quite the opposite, technology is imperative to global warming attenuation. But it's not the only effort we need, we need to conserve and to decrease emissions also.

Underlying Superfreaks' argument is the contention that people won't change. And true, people tend to squirm and stall when pressed to adjust, as we noted in "Sea Change or Littoral Disaster", Cars: Buying Cognitive Dissonance", Science Communication, Communicating Climate Change, and Climate Change, Fueling the "Debate", "Curvilinear Thinking on Climate Change", and other posts. But Real Climate's good point is that - people will change with the right incentives. People can work collectively for the better, they don't need a solution to be imposed from nigh. They do have a long history of employing morals as well as logic to solve problems, both are good, both are necessary. And given all that, it may simply be immoral for Superfreak authors to distort the truth of climate change and insist on selling implausible solutions.

Now, at PNAS Three Papers in Question:

The science journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) offers special publication privileges to members of their Academy, a group of elite scientists chosen by other esteemed scientists based on their unique contributions to science research. Now the editorial board has retracted some of those privileges in light of papers that recently appeared in the journal.

Nature News reported on a "row" caused when PNAS published research that didn't meet the journals' standards for peer review. The dispute is now heating up. The controversy began in August when one article published on-line at PNAS forwarded a theory by author Donald Williamson, all about what he called "larval transfer hypothesis".¹

Williamson suggests that the process of metamorphosis, whereby larvae turn into butterflies, arose when butterfly Leptidorae larva "mistakenly fertilized their eggs with sperm from velvet worms", as Scientific American put it (funnily twisting agency). Velvet worms Onychophora look like larvae but have completely different life cycles -- they don't turn into butterflies. According to Williamson, evolutionary transfer of genetic material causes butterflies to have essentially two lives, one as a worm-like larva, and one as a butterfly.

But there are problems with the theory. First, he offers no proof, just a "testable" hypothesis. And while interspecies fertilization is not unheard of within the animal kingdom, velvet worms are too distinct from butterflies to make this feasible, say scientists. The sperm could not fertilize such a distantly related egg and produce a viable embryo, and even if it did, it wouldn't "explain the process of metamorphosis".

Less charitably, scientists said that the paper was better suited to a a tabloid than to a science journal, and called the paper "absolutely ridiculous". They also scoffed at his attempt to show the "superficial similarity between adult velvet worms and larval moths and butterflies" with "very poorly reproduced line drawings that really need to be seen to be believed".

In short, the August PNAS paper brought a torrent of harsh criticism for the octogenarian's ideas. Moreover, while some people tolerated Williamson's submission as an attempt to generate discussion, nobody thought that PNAS should have published such a speculative paper. Scientific publishing is very competitive and many scientists who produce worthy research with real results are summarily rejected from high profile journals like PNAS. So how did the research get published, they asked, incredulous? The tale gets even more interesting.

When Push Comes to Shove

Shortly after Williaimson's PNAS article saw daylight, Scientific American published an interview with evolutionary microbiologist Lynn Margulis, an editor at PNAS who shepherded Williamson's work through the peer-review and publishing process. In recounting her story of how the paper got published, Margulis mentioned that she had been trying to publish the work for twenty years. After convincing Williamson answer how the worms fertilize caterpillars -- rather than the more conceptually challenging idea that worms breed with butterflies, she told SA it took 6 or 7 peer reviews before she got 2 or 3 that were positive enough to push the paper through to publication. More eyebrows raised in the science community.

It turns out that Lynn Margulis "communicated" Williamson's paper to PNAS, a method of publishing offered to Academy members that differs from "submissions". Via this method, members can suggest for publication papers by non-members, along with reviewers selected by the member. PNAS recently announced it will eliminate this "Track I" publishing in 2010. In the meantime PNAS editors will not publish Williamson's paper in print edition pending further discussion with Margulis about the review process.

But now it's not just that paper. Another PNAS paper by Margulis and co-authors that's being questioned apparently proposes a treatment for Lyme disease that's "800" times more effective than doxycycline -- "it is very important to get this paper published", co-author Oystein Brorson told Nature.

A third paper in question is a computational biology paper by an adjunct professor of the Margulis lab. PNAS has asked Margulis to withdraw that paper because of problems with the methods. Margulis told Nature she would do no such thing, and when asked in turn for comment, PNAS told Nature: "We don't want to respond to any questions or complaints she [Margulis] has through the media." Sounds like more entertainment is forthcoming.

The three PNAS papers all circle themes that Margulis has been pursuing for decades -- Spirochetes, desiccation, spores, symbiosis and more symbiosis than you'd ever believe, and disease. Is the recent spate of publishing from the Margulis camp a final push for these ideas? And even more controversial ones?

Another 2009 paper has been published on-line in the (less well-known) journal Symbiosis (another journal that Margulis edits), by the same authors -- Hall, Brorson, Margulis and others. This "position paper" proposes that antibiotic treatment of Lyme and Syphilis, both caused by Spirochetes, induces the formation of cysts, or "round bodies", that then revert to their original Spirochete form in a favorable (antibiotic free) environment, causing secondary infections, long-term human symbioses, and compromised immunity.²

Although the abstract is pretty straight-forward, the paper quickly leaps out on a limb to suggest that AIDS is not caused by HIV but by Spirochete round bodies. Again, there's no evidence. The authors draw tenuous connections between quotes made by public health officials after a 2007 HIV vaccine trial, and their own round body theory of AIDS. They reason that HIV seems not to infect heterosexual partners as much as men who might be infected with syphilis but not fully treated with antibiotics even though medical professionals say they are. So the authors have an idea:

"Is the situation [AIDS] better described as an obligate and ancient symbiosis where the bionts (spirochetes and humans) are integrated at the behavioral, metabolic and genetic level rather than a new viral infection such that HIV equals AIDS? ...We urge that the possible direct causal involvement of spirochetes and their round bodies to symptoms of immune deficiency be carefully and vigorously investigated."

So then HIV might not be caused by a virus but by Spirochete round bodies. See? Someone test this right away.

Forget Crabs, Look Out For Round Bodies and Symbiosis

Margulis told Nature her attitude about the three PNAS papers in question: "If they definitively reject these papers I will make it very clear to the reading public (because they make it clear in their anonymous letters) that, as usual, they don't like my ideas." Two years ago, we posted on Margulis's controversial ideas and public relations skirmishes. Our post followed her debut on PZ Myers blog, where unchallenged, she forwarded her idea that HIV didn't cause AIDS. If HIV causes AIDS than why doesn't NIH write back to me, she asked? We wrote:

"Margulis relishes controversy and slings mud far better than most people, a well-honed and essential skill....[but] famously, despite her formidable offense skills, she forever portrays herself as someone who has been pushed in a mud puddle."

The PNAS controversy is interesting, although it wouldn't leap out at everyone so much if the papers in question weren't so blatantly ludicrous. PNAS's publication "favoritism" is far from unusual in the science world. And really, Margulis has been publishing these ideas for years, drawing connections based on thin research (often foreign, often Russian, somehow lost on Americans), and asking the science community to run some experiments to test her ideas. In our previous post we talked about her theory of Spirochete symbiosis forming nerves (remember "behavior" from the quote above?):

"Think of the nerve as coming from what had formerly been a bacterium, 'trying' but unable to rotate and swim. Thought involves motility and communication, the connection between remnant spirochetes. All I ask is that we compare human consciousness with spirochete ecology."

"All I ask". That was in 1991. But the gulf between what she "asks" and a warm reception from scientists has grown as science has advanced. Williamson is an 87 year old retired scientist, who himself is no stranger to forwarding controversial ideas. Sketched drawings weren't so ludicrous 60 years ago when he was starting. But now, the idea that a paper could simply describe what you see, like generations and generations of cell biology papers before us, seems ridiculous. As an educator at Princeton said recently, "The days of sort of naturalistic walking around and looking at flowers are long gone". (Look at the emphasis on clinical description in this excerpt from a ptomaine poisoning paper from the early 1900's. Williamson was a scientist not too long after that.)

Margulis has always published in PNAS. Some of the labs' older papers have similar themes and a little research. But it's a different world now. Margulis still has the prestige to gather a cast of characters around her in symbiotic relationships, to continue to push ideas out, and to entertain admirers like PZ Myers and his followers. But while her fame draws admirers and moths it also draws vipers, many of whom are now online.

PNAS claims they were going to change their Track I policy anyway. OK, sure, but no doubt the deluge of online criticism didn't tempt them to tarry with the announcement. Just as high tech science has redefined what a good science paper looks like, online science criticism has become blood sport. And that's a good thing, don't get me wrong. But imagine what would we'd learn if all papers and journal publication policies got such a thorough raking over?

------------------------

¹ Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: Caterpillars evolved from onychophorans by hybridogenesis Donald I. Williamson, Communicated by Lynn Margulis, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, MA, July 24, 2009 (received for review May 19, 2009)

²SYMBIOSIS Vol. 47, No. 1 (2009) Position paper. Spirochete round bodies. Syphilis, Lyme disease & AIDS: Resurgence of "the great imitator"? L. Margulis, A. Maniotis, J. MacAllister, J. Scythes, O. Brorson, J. Hall, W.E. Krumbein, and M.J. Chapman

Better than Chicago 2016: ""Who will win?", they wondered: "Morgan Tsvangirai, the Zimbabwean opposition leader; two Chinese dissidents, Hu Kia and Wei Jingsheng; Afghan: Human rights activist Seema SamarSo; Prince Ghazi bin Muhammad of Jordan; the Western-educated Islamic scholar; Eighty-year-old Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Quang Do; Colombian senator Piedad Cordoba?"

Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize. The reaction, needless to say, was mixed, with the Taliban, Syria and Hamas weighing in, and praises from folks like the Mandela Foundation and Desmond Tutu. And where are the photos of the Weekly Standard staff members, who cheered when Obama's entreaty to the Olympic Committee failed to bring the games to Chicago? Snapshots of them crying into their coffee cups?

We think it's all working out for the best though. Olympics in Chicago would have no doubt snared and infuriated millions of people at the O'Hare airport we know and hate. Chicago 2016 would not have been peaceful.

Nobel Prize To Push the World In a Direction We Norwegians Can Endorse

But if you're feeling like Nicholas Kristof, who thinks that perhaps a prize for Obama would be more apt at the end of his eight years, "after he has actually made peace somewhere", whereas someone else should have won this year, know that all those left out are in good company. Foreign Policy lists other deserving candidates who failed to win in the past.

One committee member said that the prize should be viewed as "support and a commitment for Obama." In a way, the Nobel Peace Prize given to Al Gore and the IPCC in 2007 was a similar statement in its overt political support for one side of the contentious arguments about whether climate change was real.

Obama, charming, said:

"Malia walked in and said, "Daddy, you won the Nobel Peace Prize, and it is Bo's birthday!" And then Sasha added, "Plus, we have a three-day weekend coming up." So it's good to have kids to keep things in perspective"

He said he doesn't see the prize as recognition for his accomplishments, rather as recognition for the goals he's set. The committee therefore rewards Obama for being very Obama...and nudges him to do more?

• In the Beginning...Mini-T: Before Homo sapiens, before meteors annihilated Tyrannosaurus rex, before that massive dinosaur bounded over the earth, a smaller, similar looking dinosaur existed. Raptorex kriegsteini had 1/90th the body mass of the ~2.5 ton T.rex and lived about 65 million years earlier. A raptorex fossil found in China had the same body features as T. rex and scientists think that the specialized predatory morphology -- large jaw, small front legs, powerful back legs -- grew larger in future generations, evolving to become T. rex. The photo is of a T. rex is from Wikipedia Commons.

New Science Journalism: Futurity formally launched September 15. Futurity, not to be confused with "Singularity", is a collective on-line publication effort by leading research universities. The universities will promote their science accomplishments and fill the gaps of dwindling newspaper science coverage. Articles will be submitted by members of the Association of American Universities (AAU), with Stanford, University of Rochester, and Duke leading the effort. Critics point out that aggregating news generated by University PR departments (20% fact, 80% big story?) won't provide readers the same unbiased perspective as proper journalism coverage. True, but we can't ignore the fact that a significant amount of science coverage consists of press releases anyway.

• Swine Flu Fallout: The H1N1 pandemic not only causes havoc for humans who fall ill, college campuses trying to manage the illnesses, and health workers. The pandemic effects society and economy in ways you don't necessarily think of. Consider, for instance:

  1.) Egypt can't keep up with its street garbage. As we wrote earlier this year, Egypt set out to kill all the pigs in the country, an unwarranted action. Many belonged to Christian herders whose pigs cleaned the streets of millions of tons of organic waste per year. Now parts of Cairo are knee deep in garbage.

  2.) Pork belly futures, which fell from 89 in April 2009 to 40 in August 2009, have now rebounded to their previous high.

• A Chance To Recalculate the Bush Ozone Ruling?: The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced last week that it would reexamine the standard set by the Bush administration for ozone which had motivated states to sue the EPA. Ozone is a health hazard at certain levels, and in 2008, the agency set a new standard at 75 parts per billion (ppb), down from 84 ppm. The EPA heralded this as a life-saving improvement, but according to science advisors of the Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC), only 60-70 ppm will prevent deaths.

  Susan Dudley headed the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) in 2008 when the Bush administration decision was made. OIRA influenced the outcome of Bush's ozone ruling by sending a series of memos to the EPA impeding the ozone ruling and killing a secondary standard which would have triggered certain safety measures in some weather conditions. We wrote last year how Susan Dudley had argued on behalf of industry prior to her tenure at OIRA, that "smog was beneficial because it protected individuals from ultraviolet radiation, and that since asthma rates were associated with poverty, a smog ruling would have the 'perverse effect' of costing communities money, which would in turn increase poverty and asthma." Her's was a twisted cost-benefit analysis.

  Now Cass Sunstein heads OIRA. According to the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), the EPA has calculated the benefits to society from the now thriving environmental industry and determined that those monetary benefits outweigh the costs of the standard. So is cost-benefit ok when the outcome favors the politics you prefer?

• Team Players: Researchers at Oxford University published a paper in Biology Letters reporting that more elevated endorphin levels associated with team sports like rowing than single player activities.

• Justice Department On Proposed Google Books Settlement The Justice Department said Friday that the settlement needed changes to address copyright, class-action and antitrust issues, and urged the Federal Court to reject the settlement. However, the government added that current discussions between the parties were productive and should continue.

• EPA and NHTSA, Together At Last, Overlapping: The EPA also proposed new carbon dioxide emissions this week, in concert with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). The new rule would lower fleet standards to 35.5 mpg by 2016. As well, cars would be allowed to emit 250 grams of CO2/mile by 2012, as opposed to the current rule of 265 grams of CO2/mile. The Association of International Automobile Manufacturers, Inc. (AIAM), and Senator Markey praised the agencies for their collective effort.

  A coordinated effort from the two agencies that oversee automobile emissions and mileage efficiency has long been a goal of industry and policy makers, though a goal sometimes cynically pursued. We also wrote about EPA/NHTSA overlap here and here. The standards will cover model years 2012 through 2016, and as the Obama administration bills it: "the automobile manufacturers would be able to build a single, light-duty national fleet that satisfies all federal requirements as well as the standards of California and other states."

• Migraines: McCain's Bane: Cindy McCain is heading to Congress, reports the New Yorker, to lobby for money to study migraine headaches. And you thought perhaps you'd heard the last of McCain science research jokes? She told the American Headache Society (AHS):

  "For the first time in my life, I'm going to go to Congress, and I'm going to be tenacious and be forceful and be honest and tell them that it's time. If you can give five million dollars to study flatulence in cows and its effects on the ozone layer, you can give me some money for migraine research."

  Migraines are, of course, a debilitating problem -- that's no joke. As McCain details in her talks, migraine headaches are sometimes set off by "triggers" -- foods like chocolate, or particular odors or chemicals. McCain reports that her company's beer, Stella Artois, contains sulfites "out the wazoo" that trigger her headaches. Travel is full of trouble. Sometimes a perfume bottle breaks and the debilitating noxious fumes cause her to repack her bags and fly home. Foreign food smells prove treacherous too, she says: "...like...forgive me, but the scent of cooking dog"

  She didn't say which countries serve the offensive "dog", often a subject of nasty rumors, or how one can tell that it's not chicken, water buffalo, or frog. But fortunate she is then, that her role is the ambassador of headaches not the ambassador of smoothing international relations with her would-have-been President husband.

Scientists' Inspirations As They Tell It

Darwin wasn't all ships, and biology, and empirical notes on science, he also appreciated the arts, especially music, at least he did before he wrote: "the musical department of my brain atrophied". J.F. Derry wrote in the science history journal Endeavor, how Darwin's wife Emma influenced the famous scientist, in "Bravo Emma! Music in the life and work of Charles Darwin" ¹. Apparently Mrs. Darwin played the piano nightly, recitals that Mr. Darwin enjoyed while "lying quietly on the sofa". But her musical influence went beyond that. The article describes how the music perhaps even helped mould Darwin's take on evolution. Darwin wrote in one letter about "The Descent of Man".

"I conclude that musical notes and rhythm were first acquired by the male or female progenitors of mankind for the sake of charming the opposite sex."

And As the Wives Tell It

However some might tell the story of who influenced who in the Darwin family differently. Britain appointed Scottish poet, playwright, and creative director of Manchester Metropolitan University's writing school, Carol Ann Duffy, poet laureate last Friday. Duffy wrote in her collection, "The World's Wife", about women's roles and contributions to famous men. Duffy humorously chronicles, "the rage of women disappointed, discarded or overlooked by men", as the New York Times puts it, men such as Quasimodo and Rip Van Winkle. She characterizes the wives of real men too. Her poem "Darwin's Wife" (via NYT) goes like this:

7 April 1852
Went to the Zoo
I said to him -- Something
      about that chimpanzee over
      there
reminds me of you

Duffy holds the post that for the 341 previous years the job had been held by men such as Geoffrey Chaucer, Lord Alfred Tennyson, William Wordsworth and Ted Hughes.

¹Endeavor, March, 2009: doi:10.1016/j.endeavour.2009.01.005

Aspiring to be FOX News

We often take to task those who would begrudge science research money. Politicians like to use science projects to make points about "pork", but often the projects they begrudge involve piddly dollar amounts, especially considering the pay-offs science yields. Science research has both long term and short term benefits -- more efficient food production for example, as well as employment and livelihoods for scientists, farmers, workers in start-ups, marketing professionals, accountants, and maybe even bankers. None of these positives are trivial or laughable. But politicians like John McCain won't readily point out the benefits. McCain ranted recently about about a "honey bee factory", because as always, the ha-ha-ha value of these rants is apparently priceless. ¹

In ¹ In Science as Political Joke Fodder we looked at John McCain's multiple attacks on science and asked why science? In "Fruit Flies, Astronomy, DNA...There Goes The Economy", we analyzed Sarah Palin's attack on olive fruit fly research in France and the source of her information, the lobby group Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW).

Yesterday we came across a Harper's blogpost that pulled information straight from CAGW talking points.² The author criticized the $410 billion omnibus spending bill for earmarks in his "Weekly Review", focusing on two projects that have been circulating in the news:

"more than 8,000 congressional earmarks, among them provisions for improving blueberry products in Georgia and controlling the spread of Mormon crickets in Utah."

Was Harper's jumping on the whole earmarks bandwagon? We hadn't been following the earmark protests, but where did the Harper's information come from? John McCain talked about both science projects the Georgia blueberries and the Mormon Crickets in his speech to the Senate on the Bill. CAGW called out the Mormon cricket research this year and mentioned listed the blueberry research last year in its 2008 budget pork database.

Viral FOX

A few weeks about FOX News composed a video called "$209, 000 for Blueberries? From there blueberry research story went viral, to the New York Times, blogs, and sites that aggregate press releases. For politicians and media flexing against "pork", science spending is a favorite target, because face it, the organic dried blueberry lobby hardly buys a lot of advertising on FOX News.

People criticize earmarks as a way of securing funding and say that these no bid grants should go through the appropriate venues and compete for money. (I'm sure scientists might do this, if science were funded to adequate levels. Or maybe scientists wouldn't -- since this must be easier than writing a grants?) But, confusingly, some of the people who make these points about the harmful, not transparent nature of earmarks, like the group Americans For Prosperity, take distinctly anti-science positions. Americans For Prosperity for instance ran a "Hot Air Tour campaign" in 2008, where they completed a hot air balloon cross-country tour under the slogan, "Global Warming Alarmism: Lost Jobs, Higher Taxes, Less Freedom." According to the group: "Climate alarmists have bombarded citizens with apocalyptic scenarios and pressured them into environmental political correctness. It's time to tell the other side of the story." CAGW attacks particular research based on who funds their lobby efforts.

Taxpayers for Common Sense calls earmarks a "petri dish of corruption". Perhaps they make a valid point that calls for a more thorough exploration of alternative means of funding. But simply calling out research that sounds silly, as Harper's did seems less productive.³

209,000, How Much is That?

Why focus on $209,000 worth of blueberry research anyway? Why such a relatively tiny number? Is it because most people make less than that in a year and can actually fathom the number? To get perspective, consider this:

• $209,000 is the amount FOX News and Harper's are up in arms about. 209,000 seconds is 2.42 days, 1/137th of a year.
• 165 million was paid in AIG executive bonuses this week (because of "the contracts" -- pardon me while I die laughing). 165 million seconds is 1,910 days, or 5.23 years.
• In the past 6 monthes, AIG has taken out $170 billion in loans from the US government, which in seconds, is 5,387 years.
• The Service Employees International Union criticizes Geithner's trillion dollar Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility (TALF) because the taxpayers absorb significant risk and there's no guarantee that the money will be used to make new loans. 2 trillion seconds is 63,377 years.

Buy a Scientist a Petri Dish, He's Corrupt for a Lifetime

It's all relative. And as we've pointed out before, scientists work for much less than your average banker. Today with AIG's multi-million dollar "retention" bonuses, 20K-40K for a scientist is small change. But every person who is kept off the unemployment rolls keeps money in the taxpayer's pocket -- so to speak -- momentarily anyway, oops, now AIG has it.

New York State Attorney General Cuomo released details today of his AIG investigation and reporting that 73 employees received bonuses of $1 million or more in 2008. Say the average scientist make 50K per year, and no bonus was over 1 million, two generous assumptions. What would taxpayers rather do with that money? Employ 1460 scientists? Or keep 73 bankers on the dole?

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¹Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW) is an organization started by the late J. Peter Grace, who was CEO of W.R. Grace & Co. for 45 years and Jack Anderson, a syndicated columnist. CAGW was an extension of the Grace Commission formed when President Ronald Reagan, who appointed J. Peter Grace to aim at decreasing the role of government. CAGW extended from the Grace Commission.

W.R. Grace is a chemical company whose pollutants contaminated Woburn, Massachusetts well water, causing cancers and resulting in a drawn out court case chronicled by Jonathan Harr in "A Civil Action". CAGW is a lobby favorite of conservatives and lobbies. We previously noted that attacks on science from Sarah Palin and John McCain originated with CAGW. CAGW works with a wide range of industries tobacco, software, pharmaceutical, to avocado growers in Mexico, targeting specific actions based on the desires of groups who pay CAGW.

² In my opinion, Harper's is sort of a mixed bag on science and sciencey subjects. They've published some great pieces on the environment like Tom Bisell's excellent "Eternal winter: Lessons of the Aral Sea disaster", in 2002, or Erik Reece's "Death of a Mountain: Radical strip mining and the leveling of Appalachia."(April, 2005) On the other hand they've published some infuriating articles from a scientist's perspective, like Celia Farber's ridiculous "AIDS and the corruption of medical science", a misleading and factually false view on HIV and the treatment of AIDS, that was criticized by top doctors, virologists, researchers, microbiologists, immunologists, and the Treatment Action Campaign, a South African NGO. (Here's the 37 page PDF that documents the errors)

³Harper's has published some great pieces about lobbyists. See for instance Ken Silverstein's "Invisible hands: The secret world of the oil fixer", in the March issue maybe still on the newstand, or Silverstein's Their men in Washington: Undercover with D.C.'s lobbyists for hire, or his piece on John McCain and the Reform Institute.

This is a continuation of our last post "The Galt Gestalt". Not that Ayn Rand hasn't been memorialized enough. Quite the opposite. Companies like the demolition contractor at the World Trade Towers site proudly name themselves John Galt this or Fountainhead that. Companies also name themselves after John Galt or Howard Roark, and at least one architectural design firm in Minneapolis named a imaginary "Howard Roark" as a senior partner of the firm (in charge of marketing). Thousands of books and hundreds of institutes all over the world celebrate her ideas -- among them the Ayn Rand Center for Individual Rights, the Ayn Rand Institute, Ayn Rand Society, RebirthofReason.com, Liberty Institute, AtlasShrugged.com, The Atlas Society, The Objectivist Center, Objectivsm 101, Objectivism Reference Center, ObjectivistAcademiccenter.org, AynRandInstitute.ca -- to name a few.

With all that, who needs more Ayn Rand verbiage? Well, the recent outpouring of Randism would never suffer for more "balance". The gushing accolades over "Atlas Shrugged" at FOX News and cable news channels -- by announcers who Americanize Rand's name to "Ann" instead of "Ayn" rhymes with "all mine", or "swine" -- as Rand would say, could use another look.

In our last post we talked about modern day Ayn Rand acolytes -- those who didn't have the opportunity to write books with her like Alan Greenspan, but who still forward her ideas and writing. True, we read her books -- in high school -- as fiction -- so we are as surprised as anyone that full grown adults actually say that Rand's half a century old books foresaw America's current economic state. In our last post we reviewed the movie "The Fountainhead", with its fallible characters Howard Roark and Dominique, set among quarries and "modern" 1940's buildings -- all his "creations". We challenged Rand's portrayal of Roark as a "creator" and questioned how such daft writing by could be misinterpreted for 2009 economic wisdom. We observed that Rand's coterie of admirers pick and choose the parts of her philosophy they like and disregard the bits that don't fit their political agenda -- like her intolerance of mixing religion with politics.

Some executives say that "The Fountainhead" is their favorite work. Yet in "The Fountainhead" Howard Roark blows up buildings with explosives then defends his crimes by telling a jury some fantastic gobbledygook about great "creators" who stood up to all the men. Each individual scientist or inventor, he intones

"lived for himself. And only by living for himself was he able to achieve the things which are the glory of mankind. Such is the nature of achievement..."

How can a novel where the demi-god Howard Roark dynamites buildings be seen as a blueprint for America, by a nation that claims to revile the tactic of blowing up buildings? There's some irony to the fact that former Weather Underground member Bill Ayers, who is a respected as a professor and Chicago community service leader, is labeled a "terrorist", while fictional Howard Roark is revered by Ayers' same detractors as a "hero".

Everyone, including us, capably cherry-picks their evidence, and just as Rand's most fervent admirers cherry-pick her ideas, she cherry-picked her evidence, her ideals, and her followers, scorning even those who most fervently embraced her ideas. She dismissed libertarians as "a random collection of emotional hippies-of-the-right who seek to play at politics without philosophy." But still, they loved her, just as Howard Roark pined for Dominique in the quarry in the "The Fountainhead" and made statutes in her image when she married other men.

Why the enduring adoration? Why are sales of "Atlas Shrugged" still booming, aside from the fact that it's impressively thick but vapidly light read -- a delirious combination of Harlequin romance and "For Dummies" -- perfect airplane reading?

Americans Testy About The Flimsy Enterprising Spirit Myth

Is it the myth of the rugged individual? Historically, the US had some very hardy Americans, Teddy Roosevelt, for instance. But the US and its corporate economy hasn't been a wunderkind of noble individualists recently. In 1984, Roger Rosenblatt wrote about this strange phenomenon, asking in Time magazine's ("The Rugged Individual Rides Again"): "Why the pretense--why the evident pleasure--in seeing the country as a collection of loners?"

Now, twenty-five years later, the myth may be less intact but politicians still pimp it. It has served the GOP well since Ronald Reagan rode in with "Morning in America." Reagan came up in Hollywood at the same time as Ayn Rand, and seemed to be acting out his part as the rugged individualist, with his ranch, the his far-away look and his mythical powers -- "Tear down this wall!"

Two decades later GW Bush didn't ride horses around a ranch like Reagan but he acquired that dried out piece of land in Texas, and he would gamely pull on gloves -- Ironclad Icon Series Extreme Duty^TM gloves no doubt -- over soft hands and hack at brush and joke to the rolling cameras. The American male image is very particular, you see, and can't be properly projected from the decks of a Kennebunkport yacht.

If the whole American rugged individualism was seen as "hypocritical" by the mainstream magazine Time, over two decades ago, and was even more far-fetched as played out by GW Bush. Then when Bobby Jindal took a stab at the iconic myth the other day the whole premise jumped the shark. Talking about how he went down to the docks after Hurricane Katrina and saved some people threatened by bureaucracy Jindal deadpanned:

"Harry just told the boaters to ignore the bureaucrats and go start rescuing people. There is a lesson in this experience: The strength of America is not found in our government. It is found in the compassionate hearts and the enterprising spirit of our citizens."

It took mere hours, if not minutes, for people to uncloak Jindal's lies. You see, for Americans "enterprising spirit" has been exploited and tested and now it's seriously testy.

Interestingly though, while everyone attacked the Katrina survivors part of Jindal's story because Jindal wasn't on the scene, the larger myths that his tale served stayed preposterously intact. First, despite his claim, there is no bureaucracy in the US that holds up enterprising spirit. There is bureaucracy without a doubt, and some of it may encroach on certain individuals. But it largely enables business and corporate benefits, and occasionally, like with the Clean Air regulations, protects individuals. As well, needless to say, Jindal is not the rugged leader leading all the rugged individuals, that's his fantasy world.

Rugged Individual or a cog in the Machine

We're a long time from the Cold War era in which Rand became a political fixture. Nevertheless the rugged individual myth is one that the American people are less willing to tear down. The myth matters because GDP and production and fairly docile citizens who go to work matter. If you drive off to your job in your SUV everyday, thinking how "rugged" you are, you might get through eight hours in a cubicle without cracking up. Politicians push the conceit since its certainly an easier populist sell than all the proceeding political-economic models -- monarchy, colonialism, feudalism, slavery, etc. But the myth is outdated.

A global economy needs global leaders, and individuals who work together. Today, the enemy is certainly not "the collective", although that might have been a believable enemy for someone who immigrated from the Soviet Union half a century ago. Nor is the enemy "the government", which has secured property laws, patent law, corporate law, free trade, privatization, and an entire infrastructure to the service of capitalism and private enterprise. There is no salient enemy.

Of course that is not what we hear from media because there would be no television news if not for enemies and wars, and if the market did not first go up, then come down, and if there were not Democrats who opposed Republicans and Republicans who opposed Democrats. How could we go to all our boring jobs day after day if we did not have network news to break things up, with their histrionics, their drama, and their enemies? This breaks the boredom and it helps us feel whole and human even as so much of what humans do is totally dehumanizing. But lets separate entertainment from information and policy.

Prophets on Profits, Work, Nature

I previously described how Stephen Moore of the Wall Street Journal, like many Rand fans, thought the fiction of "Atlas Shrugged" was "eerily similar" to today's events.

If you too, think Rand was predicting the events of today half a century ago, than read more carefully to see how many predictions she made that were plumb wrong. Shift your gaze or tilt your head differently and Ayn Rand can seem like any cheap novelist. Sure, her books advocate capitalism. But her ideas were bounded by her experience, that is, Bolshevik history and the Cold War. Some people see Lenin in her work. You can even see Marx, whose philosophy Rand opposes. Both Karl Marx and Rand ruminated on the higher purpose that humans sought through fighting nature with labor. Compare Marx to Howard Roark in "The Fountainhead".

• Karl Marx said: "He [man] opposes himself to Nature as one of her own forces. in order to appropriate Nature's productions in a form adapted to his own wants."

• Howard Roark said: "The creator's concern is the conquest of nature".

Sixty years ago humans were still ensconced in what we would dub today "a war on nature", and indeed their life hung in balance everyday as they farmed and fished, although their fate was not as precarious as their pioneer ancestors. But now in the 21st century, when humans have decimated so many species and environs, how can people doubt we have the upper hand? In fact, our domination is so complete that the poles are literally collapsing back on us. Paradoxically, nature still challenges, but global warming is our Frankenstein, and the fight is against ourselves. The reality is vastly different than what Rand and Marx knew. We don't need individuals who feel compelled to prove their worth in big highway cruisers.

Marx and Rand shared other constructs. Marx had his class struggle. Today the internet swirls with talk about "Going Galt", the folly that professional workers should walk off the job if the tax rate increases.

• Karl Marx, writing on how bees build intricate hives noted, "...what distinguishes the worst architect from the best of bees is this, that the architect raises his structure in imagination before he erects it in reality. At the end of every labour-process, we get a result that already existed in the imagination of the labourer at its commencement. He not only effects a change of form in the material on which he works, but he also realises a purpose of his own..."
• Howard Roark said: "Throughout the centuries, there were men who took first steps down new roads, armed with nothing but their own vision...His truth was his only motive. His work was his only goal. His creation...gave form to his truth. I am an architect.

If there is a class struggle, its not against the government, which is printing money to save large corporations as we speak. Most Americans work for these corporations, and even if they're a self-employed electrician their income is completely entwined with the banks. There are few "creations" to speak of unless the making of financial instruments count, and as we've learned, cowboys in finance do real harm. It is not the government that got us to this place.

Ayn Rand and CEOs -- She Completes Them

While economics departments don't include Rand in their curricula, everyone outside of academia acknowledges how much Ayn Rand influences politicians and businessmen. Apparently it doesn't matter to her fans that "Atlas Shrugged" and "The Fountainhead" are cheap potboilers. In a 2007 article, the New York Times interviewed John A. Allison, CEO of BB&T, one of the largest banks in the US, who said of "Atlas Shrugged".

"I know from talking to a lot of Fortune 500 C.E.O.'s that 'Atlas Shrugged' has had a significant effect on their business decisions...It offers something other books don't: the principles that apply to business and to life in general. I would call it complete."

And there I was thinking all that math I learned in economics and business classes was so important, when all I needed to read was an overly thick Harlequin romance?

In January, 2009, the Times reported that BB&T profit fell 26% in the 4th quarter of 2008, and so the bank accepted $3.1 billion in government money". Poof? Just like that? Rand out the window? To hell with "principles"? Mr. Allison can you comment? Should we shelve Rand next to Marx, now that it's 2009?

The American Image Dilemma

Worshipping the individual and the market may be what business leaders say they like to hear, however, it doesn't make Rand's ideas successful policy. A few years ago Americans strongly believed in their rugged individualism, as they flipped houses and extracted equity and took out big mortgages from aggrandizing lenders. Now they're feeling a little chastised and mad. Americans are caught up in the throes of a financial behemoth of their collective making, generated by private banking and enterprises they don't understand. But they'd probably like to feel like rugged individuals again.

Although "rugged individualism" is evidently music to emasculated workers ears, it's hard to buy. The USA is, after all, a country where 30% of the people are obese. Rugged doesn't usually come in size 3X stretchy pants. As well, Rand preached "reason" not religion, but 50% of the people believe in the Creator, not the "creator", and will tell you that humans roamed the earth with dinosaurs 6000 years ago. In 2009 a political party that tries to lead by encouraging this level of intellectual rigor from its citizens doesn't bode well for the nation of "knowledge workers".

But the GOP seems unable to become anything else. The party seems superglued to the rugged individual image and in it's service, they've forwarded the most unlikely series of messengers, Joe the Plumber, Bobby Jindal, Michael Steele, Sarah Palin. Nice try, attempting to be the party for "one-armed midgets" and the party of rugged individualists a la Reagan? Seriously Republicans, America -- the individualists, the midgets, and everyone else -- deserves a more up to date and congruous image.

Of course in the frightening series of public relations debacles by the GOP and their media, Rand actually plays a tiny role. The rugged pioneering individualist myth is a strained fictional construct. But unfortunately, Rand fans and some in the GOP do have one winning strategy, which is to promote the facile idea that far, far less government is better (except military and police). It's a winning strategy because the US (and every other state) will never have no regulation. Government regulation is what ensures "free markets". Therefore Ayn Rand fans have a permanent platform.

Like the unlikely longevity of the myth of the rugged individualist, now it's painfully obvious that deregulation is not the answer. But it's child's play for Randians to argue that George W. Bush was no Ayn Rand, and we need still less regulation. When we examine the notion however, it's clear that this too is part and parcel of old plot lines from outdated fiction. Mid-century may be fine for furniture, if orange plastic chairs and aqua blue polyester are your thing, but it doesn't work for economic policy.

The Rand Rage

Everyone's reading Ayn Rand. Have you noticed? The other day the Freakonomics blog wrote about a "recession icon of sorts emerges, wrapped in a Snuggie, puffing on a pipe -- and now with a copy of Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged on his lap." Back in January, Stephen Moore fantasized in the Wall Street Journal:

If only "Atlas" were required reading for every member of Congress and political appointee in the Obama administration. I'm confident that we'd get out of the current financial mess a lot faster.

Sure enough, two months later, look! As books sales went up, the stock market rose, purportedly because Citi's living richly again. Is it Rand? Another sucker rally? Moore explained his rationale for the Ayn Rand reading assignment: "Some years ago when I worked at the libertarian Cato Institute, we used to label any new hire who had not yet read "Atlas Shrugged" a 'virgin.'"**

The Movie is Better

I 'd last read "Atlas Shrugged" (1942) and "The Fountainhead" (1957) one summer in high school and found Rand entertaining. I wasn't an conservative, ideologically precocious teenager. I'd probably just finished up the Hardy Boys series and I wasn't submitting essays to her namesake institute's high school writing contests, -- I read Rand as pure fiction.

My recent dilemma was how to refresh my adult mind on Rand's ideas without adding another 1000+ page book to my staggering reading list. Sure, I could have skipped the book and read the reviews. But then I would have risked misinformation, like those who regurgitate PJ O'Rourke's interpretation of "The Wealth of Nations" thinking they're reading the real thing.

I reasoned that I could reread the "The Fountainhead" faster. It's a fraction of the size of "Atlas Shrugged" and although its written a decade earlier, it's laden with the same notions. I then stumbled upon "The Fountainhead", the movie -- even better. At 113 minutes, you save days of reading, and you can multitask while you watch, because it's pablum for simpletons.

Eerily Similar?

Beyond efficiency, there's another reason to watch the movie. When you read, your mind puts you in the story. You're standing at the quarry described in "The Fountainhead" (1949) in your 2009 shoes and 2009 hairstyle, with your 2009 global attitudes and 2009 cultural disposition and intelligence. You end up thinking what readers of Atlas Shrugged think these days -- Wow! Atlas Shrugged is just like 2009 -- wasn't Rand clever? You're perhaps predispositioned to the same specious comparisons that Stephen Moore made in his WSJ article:

"In one chapter of the book, an entrepreneur invents a new miracle metal -- stronger but lighter than steel. The government immediately appropriates the invention in "the public good." The politicians demand that the metal inventor come to Washington and sign over ownership of his invention or lose everything."

This, Moore says, is "eerily similar" to the banks' dealings with Paulson last year when they "signed a document handing over percentages of their future profits to the government". Really? No, actually it worked the other way. The government gave the banks the public's money, and the government isn't likely to gain much from those banks.

Consider many other examples that throw doubt on Moore's conclusion, for instance scientific research. Like many federal institutions, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), funds research at public universities and eventually those advances get transferred to private industry, which can develop, patent, and profit from research paid for by government. Arpanet, developed by the Department of Defense, is now the internet and quite lucrative for businesses. As Rand once said:

"When you look for the source of an historic idea, you must consider philosophic essentials, not the superficial statements or errors that people may offer you. Even the most well-meaning men can misidentify the intellectual roots of their own attitudes."

You can avoid this type of historical misinterpretation by watching "The Fountainhead" yourself. Rand wrote the script and was heavily involved in the editing so you should have an authentic experience.

Homeland Terrorism and Bodice Rippng

As you watch the movie you can ask yourself: Despite what Moore and others say, is this a story we want to claim as influential to our economic foundation? --Alan Greenspan was an acolyte? Is it weird that US Congressmen present "Atlas Shrugged" to departing staff? Is the USA circa 1957 relevant to the USA circa 2009?

The female protagonist of the "The Fountainhead" (1949), "Dominique", rides up on her high white horse while Howard Roark mans his drill in the quarry, all testosterone and biceps and brawn and pride. Sparks fly from the dysfunctional male/female tension typical of Harlequin romances. Like any bodice ripping potboiler-romance paperback, Dominique and Roark are each other's quarry -- but Rand goes the extra mile and sets the story in a quarry too.

Roark is an outcast architect who chooses manual mining labor rather than sacrifice his ideals as an architect who designs aesthetically unpopular buildings. In one scene Roark lets a fellow architect take credit for his drawings. Then Roark finds out the builder altered his plan, gets mad and dynamites the entire complex. So the 2009 message is...teamwork is for sissies?

How about when Roarke throws the high falutin' Dominique to the ground in violent, mad lust? 2009? Or when Roark stands up in front of the jury after his dynamiting spree and delivers his big speech on the superiority of "creators". Roark says of himself and his hero "creators" :

"The great creators -- the thinkers, the artists, the scientists, the inventors -- stood alone against the men of their time. Every new thought was opposed; every new invention was denounced....He held his truth above all things and against all men. He went ahead whether others agreed with him or not, with his integrity as his only banner. He served nothing and no one. He lived for himself. And only by living for himself was he able to achieve the things which are the glory of mankind. Such is the nature of achievement..."

Roark is not so much noble creator, as he is a one man Weather Underground". His narcissistic speech does nothing to explain how anyone benefits from rampant vandalism, how misrepresentation of authorship is good business, or how societies would sustain themselves with such rampant selfishness. In reality, we would lock this man up as a felon. But alas, in the movie, the jury acquits him.

Harlequin Potboilers Founded our Global Economy

Just as Adam Smith proponents rarely mention the "Theory of Moral Sentiments", politicians who adopt Ayn Rand's ideas selectively pick points that they find useful and reject other significant sections of her philosophy, hailing her wisdom only when it supports their agendas.

Rand, a Russian immigrant, thought America's founders had made a big mistake in the Declaration of Independence by saying that men were "endowed 'by their Creator' with certain unalienable rights." So she had Roark redefine "creator", banish the big "C", and make each individual his own "creator", little "c".

In 2009 at least 50% of the population believes in the Creator, big "C". Rand was intolerant of this, and of Reagan and the "New Right", who she criticized for mixing religion with politics. She predicted dire consequences for Reagan's embrace of religion in his campaign:

"[R]eligious zeal is merely a variant of irrationalism and the demand for self-sacrifice--and therefore it has to lead to the same result in practice: dictatorship... While claiming to be the defenders of Americanism, their distinctive political agenda is statism....."

"[C]hildren, we are told, should be indoctrinated with state-mandated religion at school. For instance, biology texts should be rewritten under government tutelage to present the Book of Genesis as a scientific theory on par with or even superior to the theory of evolution..."

"What we are seeing is the medievalism of the Puritans all over again, but without their excuse of ignorance....The New Right is not the voice of Americanism. It is the voice of thought control attempting to take over in this country and pervert and undo the actual American revolution....."

Those who see all the parallels between "Atlas Shrugged" and today's banking aren't saying anything about Rand's predictions for teaching religion in schools, a practice that GW Bush was strategically equivocal about and that conservatives continue to embrace.

Helping is Futile and Other Anomalies

During the Cold War, the US fought Communism and Socialism, so it seems natural that her writing was popular with politicians and citizens. Marginalized conservatives half a century ago naturally embraced her virulent opposition to Communism, since it fit into the narrative they were building. Now the Randian movement (and conservatives) drudge up other enemies. One such enemy is altruism.

The Simpsons satirized Ayn Rand in "A Streetcar Named Marge" -- where one poster in the "Ayn Rand School for Tots" declares "Helping Is Futile". It's no joke.

When the Asian Tsunami wiped out over 200,000 people across Asia, the Ayn Rand Institute urged western governments not to give aid. Ayn Rand criticized altruism because she predicted in was a slippery slope to Communism.

"the New Right is leading us, admittedly or not, to the same end as its liberal opponents. By virtue of the movement's essential premises, it is supporting and abetting the triumph of statism in this country--and, therefore, of Communism in the world at large."

Ayn Rand ranted about the "New Right" movement that ascended into politics with Reagan, and charged that by accepting of the "New Deal", the Marshall Plan and social programs they were destroying the USA.

Twaddle to Live By?

By the end of the movie I realized my high school memory of Rand was too complimentary. I'm not movie critic, but "The Fountainhead" would dissuade most of delusions that Rand has anything to offer 2009. Do we really need to recruit "high-priced twaddle" to support modern day economics or policy?

At first we thought that since "The Fountainhead" was old, the age might be clouding our opinion. But while her book was popular in its day it also had voracious critics, and the movie met with a lot of the same criticism. A 1949 New York Times review had only scathing words for the movie: "[A] more curious lot of high-priced twaddle we haven't seen for a long, long time"...."Loaded with specious situations"...."wordy, involved and pretentious"...."not the most brilliant demonstration of logic in pictorial form". The author thought Roark's "creations" were abominable: "his work, from what we see of it, is trash".

If you read PJ ORourke instead of "Wealth of Nations" to understand history, or Crichton instead of the IPCC climate change report report to understand science, you might also subscribe to Rand's philosophies and urge that for today's economy. But pundits and admirers of Rand's fiction sweep under a giant rug all the anachronisms and flaws of "objectivism".

Historians with Atlas Shrugged in their hands would convince you Americans are individualists and historical winners. They would trace a history that connects today to yesterday, wealth to happiness, to Reagan to Rand and the glorious defeat of Communism, to the Invisible Hand and to Jesus Christ himself. But these are gauzy, fatuous connections, built around tawdry tales like "The Fountainhead".

So why is everyone touting Rand? Perhaps so they can drive by all the food lines and spit on people with a clear conscious? Who knows. But if major constituencies in America turn now to embrace Rand's half-century old "philosophy", should we worry?

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**Then what? (Rand's fictional women were routinely flung to the ground by her male heros and defiled or deflowered -- Ahhh, the good 'ole days?)

The Inauguration

Many wept. Some for Obama, some for a lifetime of waiting; some because they'd miss Bush, still others because they'd thought Bush would never leave. Even Bush himself brushed tears from his face as he hopped up the helicopter steps. (The loss of power must be a blow.)

Who wasn't somehow moved by the reality of new presidential leadership? Less often now, my stomach churns before I check the news. I'm slowly deprogramming my habit of bracing for the next stunner, the next mendacious policy announcement, the next hair-raising revelation from the White House. I'll admit, in the past couple of weeks I've even lapsed into moments of (naive) hope.

• Hope for inclusiveness, triggered by small, many would think irrelevant episodes. Like when Pete Seeger showed up at the preinaugural concert to sing an Arlo Guthrie song with his grandson and Bruce Springsteen. Seeger may be an ever popular folk hero now as he approaches 90 years, with a new album and glowing biographical movie. But it wasn't always like this. He was blacklisted and banned from radio in the 1950's and 1960's on account of his "subversiveness".

  In the early 1960's Seeger refused to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) on First Amendment grounds, a decision which through him into economic hard times and patriotic hot water. But before that he had performed for US military chiefs in Theodore Roosevelt's White House. His father administered music programs as part of FDR's New Deal.

  Patriotism is so subjective isn't it?

• Hope derived from the crowds at the inauguration, good-natured people of cultural, racial and political diversity. Hope for religious tolerance. In his inaugural address Obama described a "nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and non-believers". How observant. According to a Pew Center report, about 16% of Americans identify as non-believers, but not one member of Congress does. It was surprising recognition for what a Beliefnet writer calls the "untouchables".

• Words that warmed my heart on a chilly day, Obama promising in his speech to "restore science to its rightful place". Indeed, on the first couple of days of his administration Obama overruled the ban on international funding for organizations that provided contraceptives, overturning Bush's ruling which overturned Clinton's policy. Obama also promised to revive stem cell funding.

  Bravo for science awareness!

Dashing Hope

Obama's first moves gave us plenty to be optimistic about. But as Mark Slouka wrote in this month's Harper's:

"It would be churlish to quibble.

Still, let's."

Slouka points out that Obama won in a perfect storm of economic disaster and Republican failure, that Obama was an exceptionally talented and articulate candidate. Given all this he still only got 53% of the vote. What about the others Slouka asks, those who thought Palin would be a fine Vice President, or who couldn't discern any difference between the candidates therefore didn't vote? Slouka worries about American citizens' choices and what he sees as an overwhelming contentment with ignorance.

"When one of us writes a book explaining that our offspring are bored and disruptive in class because they have an indigo "vibrational aura" that means they are a gifted race sent to this planet to change our consciousness with the help of guides from a higher world, half a million of us rush to the bookstores to lay our money down."

We're doomed, he concludes.

I'm not quite so cynical. But the barriers to "change" look high. Not to be a wet sock, but should stem cell policy changes and international funding for organizations that inform people about birth control options assure us that science is in its "rightful place"? Of course not. From these quick executive changes, we're convinced only that politics determines the place of these science policies.

True, nothing can happen overnight. More policy changes are in the works. Obama is set to increase NIH biomedical funding. He ordered the Department of Transportation to get to work completing emissions standards. He's told the EPA to review California's request for a waiver. But we have a long way to go to meet the President's promises on the environm ent and science.

Tunnel Vision

Will it happen in time? If the citizens cannot to be trusted, than we should look to their leaders. While the Republicans argue about every aspect of the stimulus bill, the economy sinks further. And if politicians seem unbearable, what about the corporations groveling about, looking for their next hand-out, planning their next party, all the while complaining how they can't possibly improve their product, honor a warranty, concede a dollar, accept a regulation.

Will we emerge from this tunnel in time? Or are Americans indeed doomed? While carmakers argue that technology doesn't allow them to raise emissions standards, a Chinese engineer, one year out of college, cooly introduced a new electric car from Chinese automaker BYD (Build Your Dreams) at a recent autoshow. The car? "A $20,000 plug-in hybrid that can go 60 miles before the gas engine kicks in, or the e6, an all-electric crossover that cruises 250 miles on a single charge."

According to The Atlantic the BYD car was parked next to the $500,000 Maybachs, the Lamborghinis, Maseratis, and Bentleys. Taking in the expensive American cars draped with bejeweled women, the Chinese engineer noted: "Those beautiful vehicles are for the very handsome men, those high in society. They're not for the everyday man."

Will Congress please slap its cheeks to alert itself to the dire straits of the situation and start working for us, the everyday man?

Some recent news:

• Plastic Bombastic In Everything You See -- In Your Soup, In Your Turkey Dinner, Even In Your Tea:

  Like the San Francisco Chronicle before them, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinal recently sent some plastic products to the lab for independent testing. In 2006, the Chronicle reported the bisphenol A and phthalate lab analysis results for a couple of dozen toys it had tested at an independent lab.The Chronicle's lab found that toys like a rubber duck, a Baby Einstein rattle, and a Goldberger doll had high levels of phthalates or BPA.

  The Milwaukee Sentinel sent products labeled "microwave safe" to a lab to see if the plastic products leached BPA. They did. The American Chemical Council denied the results of this study (and hundreds of others), saying there's no research whatsoever that shows anything bad about BPA.

• Plastic Classics:

  900,000 pounds of Lean Cuisine frozen chicken dinners will be recalled by Nestle Prepared Foods Co. because customers found chunks of blue plastic in Cafe Classics Pesto Chicken with Bow Tie Pasta, Spa Cuisine Chicken Mediterranean and Dinnertime Selects Chicken Tuscan. A USDA spokesperson warned that "a piece of plastic could cut your mouth, it could scratch your throat."

  Consumers are left to speculate about what happened as they toss their TV Dinners and pull into the Old Spaghetti Factory. Did someone on the assembly line pull the blue dye lever instead of the green one that gives that authentic look to the oregano and basil flecks? Nestle traced the plastic to one mean Lean Cuisine facility but hasn't divulged what piece of machinery dissassembled into their cuisine.

• Melamine and Me:

  While the US lambasts China for a regulatory system that allows melamine into the food chain, the New York Times reports that melamine is all around us in products made in the US, cleaning products, plywood, plastics, ink and paint all contain melamine. However yes, the author concedes, "[t]o be sure, in China some food manufacturers deliberately added melamine to products to increase profits."

• FDA in China: "An Ant Standing Against a Flood":

  That's what one company executive told the Washington Post in response to news that the FDA is opening offices in three cities in China to more closely oversee some of the regulation functions. The agency will post thirteen inspectors to the country this week.

• There's Research...Then There's "Research":

  The Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia surveyed 51 economic forecasters who unanimously conclude that the United States is in a recession. The gloom and doom predicted by economists however, isn't matched with by stock analysts research according to a report by Thomson Reuters Starmine.

  US analysts rated 48.6% of the stocks they cover as "buy", compared to 49% last year. Only 6.7% of US analyst ratings were sell, the lowest of all countries surveyed, and the rest -- about 45% were "neutral" or "hold." According to the Financial Times article which reported on the overly "rosy" predictions, William Herkelrath, StarMine's US sell-side specialist said: "'the use of the word 'neutral' here really does mean: 'stay away.'"

Autism's Dubious Research

They're back with an updated theory!! In "Autism, TV, Precipitation: Dismal Science", we wrote a farcical post about a study by economists Waldman et al. at Cornell, who posited that television watching and rainfall caused autism. The lead author attempted to stoke interest in a theory he developed while raising his autistic son by publishing a study. The team collected sketchy data sets and resolved the gaps with statistics, achieving tenuous results and conclusions.

Mark Waldman's paper caused the stir he probably wanted, eliciting ample coverage from the press, lay audiences, and patient families. But some scientists and economists felt the study was not properly rigorous or peer-reviewed. ¹ Joseph Piven, director of Neurodevelopmental Disorders Research Center at the University of North Carolina, said of the study and underlying data, "It is just too much of a stretch to tie this to television-watching...[W]hy not tie it to carrying umbrellas?"

So a year later, Waldman did exactly that. Instead of linking autism to television and rain, the authors linked autism only to rain, using data presented in their original report. This version is called "Autism prevalence and precipitation rates in California, Oregon, and Washington counties". It was published it in the medical journal Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine -- a nice coup for the authors.

Stay Tuned

Noel Weiss, MD, wrote the accompanying editorial in, titled "Precipitation and Autism: Do These Results Warrant Publication?". Yes, said Weiss, even though in "my opinion that this observation may well not lead to any insights into the etiologies of autism". He added: "the authors' analysis and the editor's decision to publish it are to be lauded, despite the uncertain ultimate contribution of this work and the possibility (likelihood?) that nonprofessionals are going to misinterpret and misuse it." The research isn't for parents, he indicated, who only need to "stay tuned" -- it's for researchers. Apparently over 100 news media who published the findings to the public didn't get the message.

Someone on the Huffington Post recently embellished Waldman's thesis by adding the discounted mercury theory of autism to the dubious rainfall theory, then proposing that the rain pulls the mercury out of the atmosphere, causing higher rates of autism.

Adjust your antennae for updates.

----------------------------------

¹ We also wrote "Autism Research Revisted", commenting on a a Wall Street Journal article that asked if economists were qualified to study autism. We suggested this was the wrong question.

YAY!

It's a new day.

"...His triumph was decisive and sweeping, because he saw what is wrong with this country: the utter failure of government to protect its citizens. He offered a government that does not try to solve every problem but will do those things beyond the power of individual citizens: to regulate the economy fairly, keep the air clean and the food safe, ensure that the sick have access to health care, and educate children to compete in a globalized world..." (NYT)¹

Yes, there's work to do. Yes, it will be difficult. But today we recognize how much America's just accomplished.

-----------------------------------

¹Obama won despite warnings about possible GOP ballot fraud stemming from information dribbling out of the Ohio trial concerning 2004 Ohio ballot fraud. In the latest episode, Michael Connell, a consultant whose firm has been accused of computer manipulation, denied knowing anything about GOP rigging the 2004 Ohio election results. Connell works for Randy Cole. Cole owns 15 companies that work simultaneously on GOP election campaigns (Bush/Cheney 2000/2004, McCain 2008, many others), anti-Abortion groups and churches, GOP mass mailings, government contracts, etc. Stephen Spoonamore, a key witness in the trial brings the allegations, explains in a multi-part series starting here.

When Sarah Palin took a rhetorical whack at a research grant worth $211,000 last week scientists angrily reacted to her characterization of research as "pork". Palin's tip came from CAGW, who in 1997 raised funds to rid the taxpayer of science research expense and "target agencies such as the National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Mental Health, the National Science Foundation, and the Environmental Protection Agency". The group enjoys a collaborative relationship with John McCain and was also the source of McCain's comments on grizzly ecology research and planetarium equipment. Why does olive fly research rate special attention from CAGW? Who is CAGW? Does any of this matter if McCain isn't elected?

Science Jokes for Dummies

As Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin put it: "Sometimes these dollars they go to projects having little or nothing to do with the public good. Things like fruit fly research in Paris, France. I kid you not!" The audience snickered. Palin's fruit fly joke continued the comedic run that McCain began with his "grizzly bear DNA" comment and his "overhead projector" joke. They could author a book.

It's theater, some say, arguing that McCain always talks like this but doesn't vote against the measures. Case in point, Adler Planetarium's equipment grant got rejected, but McCain keeps it as a talking point. But the fact is, the GOP campaign team relegates science to political joke fodder used to misinform the masses, which doesn't endear them to Acronym Required as we previously commented. Will electing Obama put an end to this silliness?

Entomology Etymology

The "fruit fly", as every science blogger pointed out -- (and, on a positive note, so did tons of non-science bloggers, writers, and reporters) -- refers to the Drosophila melanogaster, an important model organism that scientists have employed to further research in such things as human development, disease and genetics. Scientists reacted ferociously to Palin's fruit fly research talk.

However Palin was actually referring to the olive fruit fly. The olive fruit fly which is indigenous to the Mediterranean and an invasive species of California arrived on California soil in the late 1990's. The fly poses an economic threat to California's olive crops. Olive trees are usually protected from olive fruit fly with insecticides, but from their research, scientists now know of at least six natural predators to the olive fruit fly.

The research station in France gives US based researchers a chance to study the fly in its native territory, where scientists have been dealing with the pest for years. Their research is beneficial because it will explore ways that these predators could be used as an alternative or extension of insecticides. Insecticides are a thriving part of the chemical industry however, so not all lobbyists will appreciate this new research.

Confusingly, some scientists interrupted the anger about Palin's attack to explain that Drosophila melanogaster, wasn't really a "fruit fly". The labeling confusion probably occurred sometime in the early 20th century or maybe with Aristotle, and "fruit fly" is the part of scientists' and lay persons' vernacular. Even the staid Entomological Society of America calls them "fruit flies". The real point was that Palin was referring to the olive fruit fly (Bactrocera oleae) -- a tephritid -- not THE "fruit fly".

Of course Palin supporters swarmed all over the fruit fly labeling mix-up and went on about how scientists didn't do their research, totally missing the fact that scientists really do call the ubiquitous Drosophila melanogaster "fruit fly". Acronym Required doesn't want to diminish the importance of accuracy, but in this case the label is superfluous to the larger crime of denigrating science for fun. ¹

Plus de hits, Plus de fun

Does the story just contain certain poll-tested key words -- "fruit fly", "French", "California" that Palin can throw out to elicit an audience reaction? Or shall we go out on a limb and try to guess who's is behind it the attack? Unfortunately scientists don't have comedy prank team at a radio station like CKOI ("Plus de hits, Plus de fun") at our disposal. ².

Clearly the French olive industry isn't behind the lobbying. Despite the fact that Palin said we "loved" the French, CAGW and McCain campaign aren't enamoured. The bottom line is we don't know who is behind the attack.

The olive fruit fly funding story originated with Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW), an organization that started by J. Peter Grace, heir to founder of the W.R. Grace & Co, the chemical company. W.R. Grace & Co. is famous for polluting and environmental damage (as well as not paying taxes). Jonathan Harr chronicled one of W.R. Grace's pollution debacles in the memorable book "A Civil Action". President Reagan initially appointed Peter Grace to an internal government agency aimed at decreasing the role of government. This government agency which morped into CAGW. CAGW has in the past attacked teenage alcohol education, science education programs and lots and lots of science research. The goal of the organization was initially to target "meritless" science research by government agencies.

So if you're trying to figure out why CAGW opposes $200,000K for olive fly research, you'd probably be on the wrong track. CAGW and their catchy anti-government hotline --1-800-BE ANGRY -- receives corporate donations in turn for their targeted lobbying efforts. CAGW funding comes from many companies, including Merrill Lynch & Company Foundation, Exxon Corporation (now ExxonMobil), Ingersoll-Rand Company, Johnson & Johnson F.M. Kirby Foundation, Philip Morris, RJR Nabisco (now part of the Altria Group) Sears Roebuck & Company, John Deere Foundation, Eaton Charitable Fund, Columbia/HCA Foundation.

Shooting Down Science, Contract by Contract

Among the thousands of campaigns CAGW runs, only occasionally does the media uncover or even pay attention to the source of funding. CAGW was behind a Northrup Grumman case and Microsoft's funded lobbying and astroturfing in the anti-open source.

Bill Adair of the St. Petersburg Times's did a great investigative stories on CAGW in April, 2006. In "For Price, Watchdog Will be an Advocate", Adler described how $100,000 from the Mexican avocado growers motivated a public relations effort against the California Avocado Commission's resistance against the import of Mexican avocados.

In another case, Public Citizen revealed that CAGW worked with PhRMA, a lobbying group for the pharmaceutical industry, to scuttle efforts for a government health care plan. However thousands of CAGW campaigns, and their donors remain unknown. A St. Petersburg Times article in December, 2006 described how the group's tax exempt status hides their defacto corporate lobbying role. The IRS code allows them to keep from the public records of who funds them (which is tax deductible) and other important details.

But you can get the gist of the game reading Adair's account. In "When Tobacco Needed a Voice, CAGW Spoke up and Profited" the St. Petersburg Times described how the tobacco industry donated at least $245,000 to CAGW to target movement put the FDA in charge of regulating tobacco.

CAGW and Tobacco

For years, CAGW worked with the tobacco industry. In 1997, the group lobbied the Tobacco Institute for $25,000 for the production of a publication called "Weird Science." The goal of CAGW, according to internal Tobacco Institute documents was to:

"...'expose federally "taxpayer-funded research projects that have little or no scientific merit.' The group will target agencies such as the National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Mental Health, the National Science Foundation, and the Environmental Protection Agency. In addition to researching agency spending, the publication will look at the issue of risk-assessment."

The Tobacco Institute memo recommended giving CAGW $5,000, instead of $25,000, because in the "wide array" of subjects CAGW proposed, "our story could get lost in the mix." You can find anti-regulatory rhetoric about tobacco and alcohol on CAGW's website.

McCain, Swindle, CAGW....

Earlier this year, Democrats, labor unions and concerned Americans criticized McCain for snubbing Boeing (headquartered in Chicago) by awarding a $40 billion contract to Northrup Grumman and European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company EADS. McCain struck back at his Democratic critics through CAGW.

CAGW has worked very closely with John McCain since at least 1990, when they collaborated to initiate a presidential line item veto. From all accounts its been a fruitful collaboration. Orson Swindle, a fellow Vietnam veteran, works for both CAGW and the McCain campaign.

Defining Cynicism.

In their annual 1995 "Pig Book Summary", the CAGW nominated Senator Sen. Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii, as one of the 14 worst offenders their so-called "Oinkers", for securing a $400,000 grant through the EPA to study algal blooms in Hawaii. Senator Byrd, also called out that year by CAGW, commented on the report: "It is old propaganda. It is a yawn and a boar." (an intentional mispelling) It may be a bore, but it's a persistent one. CAGW has only increased it's influence in the last 13 years, working hand in hand with John McCain, as well as some illustrious lobbyists.

A senate report by Senator Charles E. Grassley (R-IA), condemned Citizens Against Government Waste. Grassley singled out 5 tax exempt groups who

"who violated their tax exempt status 'by laundering payments and then disbursing funds at Mr. Abramoff's direction; taking payments in exchange for writing newspaper columns or press releases that put Mr. Abramoff's clients in a favorable light.."

The Washington Post wrote about the incident: "The e-mails show a pattern of CAGW producing public relations materials favorable to Mr. Abramoff's clients."

CAGW denied the charges and left the room when things got hot. Then when Senator Steven's (R-AK) was found guilty of accepting $250,000 in bribes last week, Citizens Against Government Waste sent out a press release that read: "The Stevens trial will go down in history alongside the trials of lobbyists Jack Abramoff...as just another sad, but not surprising spectacle of corruption and cynicism in the nation's capital."

Does It Matter?

John McCain mentioned "Citizens Against Government Waste" in each of the three presidential debates. In return, the group's political action committee called McCain a "taxpayer hero" in TV ads airing in Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida. CCAGW, a PAC associated with CAGW ran TV ads for a presidential candidate.

But if John McCain isn't elected does it matter? Clearly I'm not going to say no. In our last post we quoted Studs Terkel, who once said, "given the facts and an opportunity to act, the body politic generally does the right thing." But as Winston Churchill once said: "Americans will always do the right thing... after they've exhausted all the alternatives." If Congress doesn't ensure that the people can get the facts, then we have no chance of ever doing "the right thing".

Acronym Required agrees that not all science research is beneficial -- for the economy, for science, or for education. Furthermore, who could malign CAGW's ostensible mission? As people have said before us, who does support government waste? And while earmarks may be an expeditious route to funding, should we all pay for that? But if CAGW's projects are motivated by donors, who's to say which of the group's targets is fair game and which are solely contract political targets?

On its face, why is $200,000 fruit fly research so outrageous? You know that Goldman Sachs set aside $6.85 billion for this year's employee bonuses right? According to CAGW, the downside of the bank bailout was that it would "draw socialist vampires to Washington for decades to come."

CAGW has been around since the 1980's and their work will continue unless we change the laws and demand greater transparency. There's been only occasional chatter about discontinuing the veiled lobbying, despite the wisdom of Senator Byrd and others that "it is old propaganda." At the root of the McCain campaign's choice to play enfant terrible to scientists and science, there's a very popular ideology at work that will not die with an incoming Obama administration.

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¹ Palin's naivete about the latter bit her later when she didn't recognize the Canadian comedy team's faux President Sarkozy, with his faux Fraauunch accent -- even when he asked Palin to take him up hunting by helicopter: "I just love killing those animals. Hmm-hmm. Take away a life, that is so fun." "Kill two birds with one stone", she responded gamely. Palin exclaimed to "Sarkovy" "we love [the French]!".

Subcommittee to FDA: Room For Improvement

The FDA subcommittee reviewing the FDA's August 2008 draft report has released its first recommendations(PDF) on the draft BPA report. The subcommittee brought lots of suggestions for improvement.

They wrote that the draft did not adequately provide scientific support for their method of choosing which studies to include: "Specifically, the Subcommittee does not agree that the large number of non-GLP studies should be excluded from use in the safety assessment."

The subcommittee also questioned the use of "no observed adverse effect level" (NOAEL) standard the FDA employed to determine the safety of exposure. The panel pointed out that so many studies show effects in neurobehavioral development, prostate gland, mammary gland and puberty in females, that it seems BPA must bind to gonadal hormone receptors during development. The panel said this suggests safe exposures "at least an order of magnitude below the 5 mg/kg/bw/day NOAEL identified in the draft assessment." The panel authors suggest several alternative ways to measure dose response that would model findings across the many studies that the FDA excluded in its draft.

The subcommittee offered additional point by point criticism and noted that the studies cleared by the NTP's Center for the Evaluation of Risks to Human Reproduction (CERHR) indicate that the FDA standard should be "substantially below (i.e., at least one or more orders of magnitude lower than) the 5 mg/kg bw/day level selected in the draft FDA assessment."

Living Through Chemistry -- U. Michigan and Dow

The FDA panel released their draft at an opportune time. Philbert was under increasing pressure about his role on the panel given appearances of conflict of interest. Acronym Required wrote a couple of weeks ago on Philbert's directorship of the University of Michigan SPH Risk Science and Analysis program, founded and heavily contributed to by Charles Gelman, a retired manufacturer and tireless critic of chemical regulation. Had the subcommittee's report dared reach the opposite conclusion than the pressure would have increased.

Following our post Martin Philbert wrote a letter to the editor of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel protesting the paper's allegations that his work would be influenced by the donations he accepted from Gelman: "This simply is not true", he said.

To illustrate his point he described in his letter the $15 million dollar grant the Risk Science Center took from Dow Chemical for a dioxin study. Philbert told how, given the grant, his colleagues "still found that people living near the Dow plant had higher levels of dioxins in their bodies."

However, nobody should find Philbert's assurance about his work for Dow Chemical comforting since Dow manufactures bisphenol A and takes political action to protect its market when necessary. For instance at (http://dowaction.com/grassroots/notice-description.tcl?newsletter_id=30665022), you can read Dow's letter thanking their employees for their "Best in Class", 31.5% "grassroots" effort in defeating California SB 1713 Bisphenol-A Ban.

The University of Michigan task in the Dow study was to measure blood dioxin levels of home-owners in different geographic areas -- not to investigate health affects. In that sense the dioxin study is not an analogous situation to the BPA panel. But even if were comparable, the University of Michigan results got Dow off the hook in a way, by finding that the variation in dioxin levels was due to things like age and body mass index (BMI), not levels of dioxins in the air or soil.

Media, politicians, citizens and scientists criticized the study because Dow had long been under pressure from the EPA to clean up dioxin contamination ¹ and the study was seen as a stalling technique. The EPA had this to say in one memo: "the study was initiated at the request of Dow in order to downplay the risks of exposure to dioxin contaminated soils." The EPA went on to say:

"public presentations of the preliminary results have emphasized how little effect living on contaminated soils has one an individual's dioxin blood level. This emphasis has resulted in numerous media stories, an understanding by some members of the public, that remediation of dioxin contamination is unnecessary."

The BPA memo on the FDA draft will no doubt assure the doubters in the public that Philbert's panel has their best interests in mind. ² If not, Philbert warns that he will "think long and hard" before taking time to "perform this kind of public service".

Stay on your toes...

-------------------------------------

¹ Burnham, D. "1965. Memo Show Dow's Anxiety on Dioxin.", NYT 1983)

² Perhaps Dow's BPA economy is not at stake in Michigan? John Dingell (D-MI), bulldog for the auto-industry, has also taken on BPA.

Barack Obama and John McCain square off for their third debate. Sarah Palin draws predominantly males at "dude rallies". Obama surges ahead, but people are a little nervous, nervous about another GOP October surprise that's not an unlicensed plumber with a chip on his shoulder who doesn't pay all his taxes, a surprise that's not voter fraud accusations drummed up by the DOJ. On and on it goes. Here's news that's not about the election campaign.

• US Department of Justice eases up on Ranbaxy:

  A couple of weeks ago the FDA banned 31 Ranbaxy drugs imported by the Indian company after an unfavorable inspection. The Department of Justice became involved, and last time we reported, Ranbaxy had just hired Rudolph Giuliani to help them appeal to the regulators. This week the Department of Justice has decided not to pursue legal action against the company, causing Ranbaxy's shares to increase by 10%. The New Delhi Business Week reports that India's commerce department and chemicals ministry are saying the curbs weren't justified but the work of US drug lobbies. Typical international politics?

• Greening Your Lawn in Global Warming:
  

  In the US, many cities and towns have responded to global warming and water shortages by instituting voluntary water bans, especially on lawn watering. But this doesn't please everyone. Realtors chide people for not keeping their lawns watered, green, sellable. Global warming be damned. According to My Fox Tampa Bay, the man jailed for not keeping his sod attractive enough now faces court charges and fines, although he's out of jail. A home association in Florida had the man jailed because he didn't resod his lawn according to their specifications.

  The man, distracted from sod-care when his family was beset by hard times, spent his punishment time at the correction facility called Land O' Lakes (LOL) [this blog author adds the acronym, although its one I already intensely disliked]. The jail's homepage features a picture of prisoners sporting black and white striped prison-wear, bent over cultivating hydroponic lettuce. As LOL puts it: "This program joins the inmate garden and the aquaculture program, all designed to both reduce taxpayer's costs of funding the jail and to teach marketable skills to the inmates." There you go. Marketable skills to keep you eating in LOL and on the right correct side of your homeowners' association outside of jail.

  On the bright side, as with every problem faced by man LOL;) -- there's a promising technical alternative to back-breaking sod cultivation. In this case, LOL, a company that spray paints dead lawns green. Their business niche is foreclosed homes. LOL.

• Economics Nobel Laureate:
  

  Paul Krugman won the Nobel Prize in Economics for his "analysis of trade patterns and location of economic activity". In first year economics or political economics class most students learn the benefits of trade from comparative advantage. If one country sells bicycles, and the other cars, each will benefit from trade even if it intuitively seems like the car producing company could easily whip out a couple of bicycles. Students learn the simple math that proves this. However in real life sometimes countries with similar goods tend to trade a lot with each other, so one country that makes Volvos will trade a lot with one that makes Audis. Europe and the US trade extensively. Krugman's model from 20 years ago refined trade theory to explain why this apparent disparity occurs. He showed that there are economies of scale in industries that will make one city or country the best source of a particular specialized product and that these areas with similar capital and labor resources will preferentially trade. He extended this theory to explain how certain cities will become geographic centers of growth.

  Krugman's name didn't appear on the lists economist betting pools set up to predict the winner, but after all, leading economists sometimes make bad predictions. Greg Mankiw, for instance, detailed in Fortune, November 13, 2000 how Bush is a Leader The Economy Can Trust".

  Some reporters and economists took exception to Krugman's award in light of his vocal criticism on his "liberal" blog and newspaper column. However Krugman's economics practice and philosophy, people overlook, are quite "liberal", in the free trade - open market sense. Some commentators would like to see him change his work balance. For instance the Financial Times wrote last week:

  "It is not too late for Paul Krugman to return to what he does best: explaining how the economy works, why it matters, and what wrong-headed policies can do to it. In fact, that change may soon come. If so, it will not be because of the Nobel prize, but because the Republicans no longer hold the White House."

  But, but, but....isn't that what Professor Krugman is doing?

It's Not a Fish Story

Once at social event I was introduced to a couple sitting nearby, and after a brief exchange of greetings, one began to pepper me with questions. His first question was about fish, simply: "Why do scientists study fish?" Followed without pause by: "What could you possibly learn?" Nothing I've ever done has anything to do with fish, and everything I've done is only even remotely related to his subject, so it all seemed a bit out of the blue at the time -- even weirder now -- "Hello, nice to meet you why do they study fish?" Who's "they"? What fish? Where and how do you start with that? Gently.

Was it a specific fish study? As you the reader know, there's a lot of "fish" research; for aquaculture for instance- a growing industry that produces farmed fish for consumer products and agriculture. Scientists also study reproduction and development in wild salmon or sharks or trout or striped bass, they do migration studies, studies of predators, studies on the impact of non-native fish, the impacts of fishing, recreation, pollution, and global warming on inventories. Scientists study nutritional values of fish and fish oil for human and animal consumption. Researchers study mercury levels in fish. They study shellfish and crustaceans. Did my acquaintance mean fish in oceans, or in rivers, estuaries, or lakes? Perhaps he meant zebrafish used as a model to study neurobiology, physiology, the cellular and molecular basis of disease?

But it turns out his question wasn't about fish, per se, more just research in general, which he'd recently taken special interest in...something to do with investigating wasteful research spending for the government. After a cocktail or so, he thought I might be the source of a little information to help him with his new project.

Although he was clearly predisposed to a certain answer -- research having to do with fish is wasteful -- he wasn't hostile, just baffled. He had no way of connecting "fish research" to anything meaningful in his life and was bent on doing his patriotic best to route out fraud.

With further conversation it became clear that he was repeating a line that was told to him as an example of government excess. He had clearly absorbed someone's mission and its easy target, wasteful spending in science. If you blank out of your mind everything you know about science and research, you too could be convinced to think this way. ¹

It's Not About the Fish

The food we eat is supported by research, as is the water we drink, the air we breath, our medicine, the materials we build are houses with, the lawns we grow, and the toys we buy our children. Our lives are supported by science research. But while research is applauded when the result is a new iPod, people for some reason get skittish about other science research and its results, from genetically modified anything to global warming science.

In the past decade there's been great attention paid to science as a political target, especially during the last Bush administration. Analyzing the reason why this is so, some people even blamed the scientists themselves for their communication styles, their personalities, or the size of the words they use. While these things may contribute to lack of understanding, as I've written here before, I think there are more essential problems, for instance the paltry attention paid to science education.

The lack of understanding and interest isn't unique to science, it permeates our culture and influences conversations about economics, math, finance, history, and medicine. The ignorance is reflected in the priorities of our politics. So perhaps more fundamental to even-handed science policy than communication and education, is reconsideration of legislator's motivators and campaign finance.

But even small changes would improve things. Congress certainly doesn't need a greater percentage of scientists to balance science interests, as some have suggested, nor do more voters need to be scientists to think analytically. Not everyone needs to know the nitty-gritty details of polar ice research. But you'd hope they'd recognize the importance of the research in order to recognize talking points from balancing the pros and cons of an issue.

If they did, some could shut down politicians who talked science nonsense, Or at least tell them their jokes aren't so funny. Because as it turns out science is sometimes a target not because of lack of education or understanding, or communication, or scientists have a penchant for four syllable words. It just because it makes a good joke.

Furthermore, Don't Call Me Four Eyes..."Friend"

Take John McCain's repetitive joke about "pork spending", where he uses the example of the study on endangered grizzly bears in Montana. Since at least 2003 McCain has been using this one study to make a point about of excessive spending. He guffaws that he doesn't know whether it's a "paternal" issue or a "criminal" one. "Gotta get their DNA", he chuckles, riling up the crowd. Ad he gets a good response -- part indignant, part laughter, all approval. "Corrupt, my friends", he yells. "Corruption, my friends!" he yells louder.

In the past, so many people have pointed out the flaws of his joke that it immediately shows up on all those post-debate "fact-check" blogs. The "Religionblog" at the Dallas News, for instance, griped "the loser was the truth." Introducing their own assumptions and bias along with "the facts", they wrote:

"In fact, that study is part of a push by Montana ranchers and farmers (most of them Republicans) to have the grizzly bear removed from the endangered species list. If successful, that effort could lead to increased logging and oil and gas drilling in Montana, which would cover the government's costs for the DNA study many hundreds of times over."

So the good news is, that as grating it may be to hear McCain distorting science information one more time, wide swaths of the population do get the facts right. So then why is McCain still grinding away with the same joke? Despite how many times reporters tell him, over and over that it's both flawed and not funny, I guess McCain still gets a ha-ha from the audience -- so he continues.

It's akin to offering up your wife at the Buffalo Chip "beauty contest" during the biker convention. If it gets a laugh and is a crowd-pleaser, who cares? If women take offense or call you sexist, just scoff that they just don't know how to have a little fun...Vroom, Vroom!

Deoxyribonucleic Acid Tactics

There are several components to the bear DNA joke that apparently make it funny and effective for McCain. There's his insertion of a paternity or crime part, which confuses (on purpose?) the research with forensic science as seen on TV. If you think about it, his distortion of the this particular research also connects the research on bear populations with images of crime scenes and children of unknown fathers that are favorite Republican campaign devices.

There's also his utter denial of the value of the research, no mention of the Endangered Species act, and the sort of down home, "don't know much about bi-ol-o-gy" slap-on-the-back camaraderie in his joke. The actual Northern Divide Grizzly Bear Project succeeded. The goal was to obtain an accurate count of the bears in one of the Endangered Species grizzly areas, which the scientists achieved. The results were widely publicized, and will be published more formally as a research study in the January 2009 issue of the Journal of Wildlife Management.

Oceans of Pork? Maybe it is About Fish

Congress waxes on about earmarks because people like to hear about "cutting out the pork". The real issue says McCain, is that these appropriations use resources from the central bill and shouldn't be tacked on. Despite his angry fist thumping however, McCain voted in favor of the bill that included the bear population study appropriation. The bill's sponsor, former Sen. Conrad Burn, chairs McCain's campaign in Montana.

The White House Bulletin wrote August 11, 1997, "Mr. McCain has waged a lonely, battle against pork before. And in almost every case, he loses". But actually in every case he wins. He doesn't need to vote against anything, he just needs to sound tough. Basic research scientists generally don't make large campaign contributions, so its not surprising that individual research projects might be picked out by our representatives for public pillory. Basic science is not the farm lobby, the auto industry, the oil industry. It doesn't cost much political capital to score some points with voters on the back of a scientist or two. ³

And so the politicians continue to use science projects as examples of pork.² Tom Coburn M.D. (R-OK) recently complained about a Homeland Security bill. Citing the Citizens Against Government, he said there were "11,620 earmarks worth $17.2 billion for all 12 appropriations bills in 2008." But out of thousands of earmarks Coburn spoke of, he pointed out just a few for special focus, and those were disproportionately science studies.

He cited (in his words) a "Hibernation Genomics" study, and a "space technology" education center. He plucked quotes from the grants to amuse the readers and added short explanations. With no elaboration whatsoever, I guess because its so funny without explanation, he wrote these words in his list of studies "Pseudofoliculitis Barbae (PFB) Topical Treatment". Frankly, I don't know whether these are good projects or not, but they apparently have great political value for Senator Coburn.

The media piles on too. In countering McCain's grizzly bear DNA routine a few months ago, Politico wrote that "Palin requested millions of federal dollars" for the State of Alaska everything from improving recreational halibut fishing to studying the mating habits of crabs and the DNA of harbor seals." Politico chose a few egregious Palin examples from the Alaska's 30 item summary of appropriation requests, and the three they listed as absurd expenditures were all (coincidentally?) marine biology projects.

After perusing the state of Alaska's appropriations, Andrew Sullivan of the Daily Dish was also offended by GOP contender's hypocrisy -- indicating that all McCain's ranting about pork and bragging about Palin's record was a sham. Sullivan called John McCain's bear DNA joke an "endlessly repeated, grandpa-at-Thanksgiving, punchline provided, anecdote". But while he could apparently see the purpose of bear DNA, he commented derisively on one of Alaska's appropriations: "The DNA of seals?"

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¹ I never found out exactly what he was doing for whom or what the overall intent was, though I asked.

² Similarly his talk about "ethics and transparency" despite what many have pointed out to be dubious dealing and practices through the Reform Institute that he founded.

³ I'm know some research is pork.

If John McCain called you a "Super-Trailblazer", You'd Feel.....?

Before we dove into more earthy science news in our last post, we wondered why Palin's handlers had canceled so many of her public appearances. A couple of days later Politico inadvertently answered our query. Apparently an "anonymous aid" to the McCain campaign "stressed" they weren't canceling her appearances, instead: "the finance calendar was planned before Palin was tapped...and it's being adjusted now to fit the nominee."

Unsurprisingly, the somewhat discomfiting explanation doesn't really mesh with history. Just a week or so earlier, McCain campaign officials bragged to reporters around the nation about the amazing reception for Palin's campaign events that kept forcing them to change to larger venues. In an article describing the Obama campaign's "urgency" for funding, the New York Times and other outlets reported that GOP fund-raising was especially successful after Palin's nomination and that "party Officials have also sketched out plans for Ms. Palin to do some 35 fund-raisers over the next two months."

Every time they talked to the press, and they often did, McCain's fundraisers gloated about how popular Palin was and how much money she was going to raise in those 30-35 scheduled appearances, with comments like: "I just think it speaks volumes that she is coming in here. I can tell you, it has generated great excitement. And it has reinvigorated, certainly, the Republican base".

In the spirit of things, GOP organizers upgraded the titles they would award fundraisers who raised another $100,000 or $250,000 to more glorious labels, "Trailblazers" to "Super-Trailblazers", "Innovators" to "Super-Innovators". Lavish words in light of their simple folksy targeting, words, come to think of it, that could more easily be attached to a Google product than to the McCain campaign -- but I digress.

In California, Palin was scheduled to star at an event at the home of software mogul Tom Siebel, "where the asking price for a snapshot of her and a seat at the headtable is $50,000." (Just think, your smiling face with the hot one at the head table. A $50,000 snapshot that you could place under your mounted fixed-eyed, six-point buck's head at the cabin. Who needs "spit parties"? Unanswered -- if you purchased two photo-ops could you be called a "Super-Innovator"?) Alas, Palin canceled.

Scintillating Starlet Strategies

However, Palin did re-appear on the Katy Couric show, according to the short clips released by CBS at carefully timed intervals. You can't say McCain oversold her international experience when he said: "Alaska is right next to Russia; Sarah Palin understands that". Still her re-debut must have been a blow to all her coaches. Canceled, canceled, canceled.

Even if the Couric preview was disappointing, Palin's cancellations still nagged, we haven't been so let-down since the projectionist abruptly stopped The Princess Diaries halfway through the movie. The McCain campaign probably told Sarah that it wasn't personal, and it now seems it wasn't. The campaign also canceled all of Carly Fiorina's upcoming talks, including the one scheduled at Iowa State. She was to speak on: "Tough Choices: Women, Leadership and Power". Now you're sorry. They canceled a Fiorina headlining GOP rally in Florida, canceled her television appearances, rallies and other events -- canceled, canceled, canceled.

As if cancellation were a disease, yesterday McCain himself started canceling -- the Letterman show, his debate, Palin's debate. And to note, since the VP contender and present executive of Alaska previously cued us in to the importance of blinking, we couldn't help noticing that McCain showed a disconcerting blinking pattern when explaining the necessity of the bailout and needing to be in DC.

Canceling seems to be McCain's new endgame. You dash a lot of hopes, so it seems like an odd vote-getting strategy but granted, its a real attention getter. It keeps the-media-on-its-toes too. Try it at home. You'll have to adjust his routine to take into consideration the fact that you're not tailed by paparazzi day in and day out, but if it works, you won't actually have to participate at events anymore. What you need to do is every time you get to a party, don't say anything, just walk out the door and slam it with loud, conversation disrupting force. Then turn around a while later and walk back in, leaving the door open so that everyone is freezing from the draft and begs you to close the door. Cell phones are a great decoy to keep you moving in and out the door as if you had something else more important to tend to. See how now all eyes are trained on you, waiting for your next move? Make everyone else blink -- gotcha. Results guaranteed.

McCain eventually flew to Washington, where apparently he sat on the sidelines during the meetings and said very little, then reported that he was there. See? Walk-in. Do nothing. Walk-out. Precisely the executive skills America needs.

How to Bail Out

Really, I didn't want to write about all this. I wish I could follow this game with anything but lurid fixation. I wish it were a joke, or a light movie that I could walk out of when I pleased. In my airy flick, Fiorina, Palin and McCain would be going around a bend in the back of the Straight Talk Express, talking about all they have in common and enjoying a glass of Chardonnay together, getting pedicures, when the ladies would convince John that he too needs to take some time off. None of it would really matter because would be a light movie. So I'd walk out. But the actual unfolding real-life scenario is tense, filled with suspense and innuendo. It feels ominous as if it could all end badly.

Why am I so fixated? For the past couple of decades we have desperately needed responsible, wise, smart, resourceful council and leaders in government. There are many excellent, dedicated public servants. But the louder voice heard from government and the media that represents it is that of a tremendously spoiled, petulant 13 year old. Now, as the headlines scream that the whole edifice is crumbling, the GOP has the gall to suggest to us a VP leadership solution that's 180 degrees opposite of what's needed, someone who presents herself as so vapid and un-informed, so incapable of putting a sentence together or formulating a cogent response, yet such a smart-ass. (Not to be uncharitable, but Palin's not my stage-struck friend trying to get over a phobia at Toastmasters, nor is she running for student council here.)

The GOP suggestion their VP pick even approaches a solution completely insults any remaining dignity of America. Palin makes me squirm because she's will be representing the US to the world. Yet at the same time the cynical choice is perfect, as it represents the apex of an ignorant, manipulative, self-indulgent leadership that's increasingly excused, if not celebrated. How can this even begin to create a better vision for the country? [That's my bi-partisan opinion.]

Squaring the Circle

And that's not even touching Palin's talking points on the $700 billion dollar bailout. As the FT explained it a couple of days ago in "Bernanke logic reveals route to square a virtuous circle":

"the US government would fix the problem of procyclicality embedded in the mark-to-market accounting regime by the back door. It would use its purchases to establish new prices to which banks would mark their portfolios - prices based on expected cash flow rather than the prices private sector buyers would be willing to pay."

Supply, demand, you ask? Please don't garble on. Instead, we trust congress, a cadre of millionaires. We trust they won't sympathize too much with previous heads of banks who ran up debts with investors money and are now down on bended knee praying for their way of life to continue. And of course the de-regulators bay in the background for further concessions based on their own unique interpretations of research.

Personally, we hope that the government can negotiate down the "firesale price" and properly assess the "hold-to-maturity price", as its called. For now, the tentative bailout agreement is now apparently in disarray following the John McCain's little walkabout.

After their initial stunned silence at the news of the $700 million dollar proposal, it looked like the Democrat Party was staging a new episode of "They're Not Going To Get Away With This", but we harbor doubts about their gumption to negotiate any course they articulate. In examples from oil drilling, to military spending, to vetting Supreme Court appointees, to investigating the mushroom clouds of the Iraq War, the Democrats talk big then whimper submissively in the end, signing exactly what they vehemently said they opposed (but of course with all the right rhetoric).

Watching the Democratic Party in action can be like watching the occasional little league player who's assigned to right field. A ball's hit at them, they hike up their pants, scrunch up their face with can-do determination, run, run, run, plant their little legs, assure everybody "I got it", then the ball sails off past them, hits the wall and finally emerges from the flurry of mitts and dust. Meanwhile, the third base coach for the other team is circling his arm with rotator-cuff straining enthusiasm, yelling "go on home" to the hectic base-runners and the crowd covers their eyes.

Next, when the next player comes up, the bat cracks and another ball flies towards right field, the loyal fans will of course squint out in between their crossed fingers, as if imagining a time when their fielder might actually field the ball. Perhaps the Democrats will make it work. Or is all the fumbling around in the dust simply a populist charade?

Can We Wake Up Now?

It's a presidential campaign: Can't we talk about Iraq, Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, Afghanistan...? About global warming, energy, education or healthcare? Economics -- housing, unemployment, banking, regulation, etc.? Isn't the US international standing diminished enough without the entire press corps fixating on "lipstick on the pig" and Jane Swift's "truth squad" and rote coverage of Obama's perfunctory swift-boat charges?

There's a faux seriousness and tension to all this, like in "Dancing With the Stars". Episodes full of inane commentary and winking gravitas that communicates to the audience: "none of this really matters you know, its just a game."

But it does matter. As Letterman joked, "A vice president who likes guns? Well, what could go wrong there?" There's so much more. A vice presidential candidate who believes that dinosaurs, Adam and Eve roamed the earth a few thousand years ago; who appears to fundamentally misunderstand current events such as the recent government nationalization of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac; who's been in politics a shorter time than your average school board member; who jokes about her lack of international experience, and who treats the VP position like it were the challenge of bagging a moose. Ms. "I'm Ready". What could go wrong there? Think the Bush administration, I suppose, then pick some exponent to multiply the disaster by.

But lets not go overboard in histrionics. On one hand you just want Palin-drone to stop. Can't the show move on to any more substantive issue? On the other hand we might as well throw our arms up in the air and surrender to the inanity. So what if the US turns out bands of nincompoops who elect leaders with the gall to convince citizens that they'll prosper by praying for oil, promoting ignorance, and making their primary democratic focus advocating for teens' rights to pregnancy? Does anyone really lose when candidates pander to the lowest common denominator? So what if the US ends up with all the international clout and resources of a Trashcanistan?

In the Lands of Olive Trees and Insouciance

Other countries have successfully expanded their cultural offerings and so achieved acclaim, proving that perhaps it's not the worst fate. Are Greece, Italy and England deprived by their eviscerated international clout? In order to make the post almost-empire transition, perhaps the US should invest in culture. This will certainly appeal to some middle school teachers as well as to people like Wendell Berry who suggest art as the antidote to all the problems science and technology can't solve. ¹

Sure, Greece had its dark moments during and after the Empire. But it ditched the drachma, joined the Euro, and now things look brighter. Greece shores up its economy by cementing every inch of every island, and serves up nothing more serious than feta, freshish fish and ouzo.

Maybe the US is a "nation of whiners". But I'm sure Americans would relax if the whole country took a daily nap between fourteen hundred and twenty-two hundred hours.

Then there's Italy. As tourists gawk at the splendor that was once Rome, Italians sniff in scorn. Americans would turn their noses up too if we could satisfy the yearnings of international tourists clamoring for our "culture" by serving them no more than a sneer and limp pasta or Tuscan pizza, costing excessive Euros. Perhaps if the country simply invested more in sculptors and painters the US could run a sham of a military while chiding other nations for their military blunders.

Britain hasn't fared as well as Italy and Greece in developing an enviable cuisine, but I believe in time, like the rest of the continent, they'll develop their culinary offerings to the point that no one will pay attention to their diminished importance on the world stage. You can imagine that eventually the UK will serve dishes that augment those kidney pies, chips, and Yorkshire puddings (the most deceptively named of their flour and water specialties).

They haven't had enough time in Britain, with surviving generations still alive and attached to the legacy of the former Empire and collectively a bit too up-tight for the post-megapower club of nonchalant arrogance. They cling to the pound drink to excess on the continent and when vacationing in India sniff crossly about the train system being the only sign of civilization.

But you can see cracks in the stiff-upper lip resignation. At home they'll joyfully tuck into Indian curries rather than wash down one more dried out baking powder biscuit ("scone", they euphemise). As they delightedly slosh back their Rogan Josh you can imagine that eventually they'll lose the polo helmet and the clipped speech and take cues from their laid back Mediterranean brethren. They'll spice their food and enjoy long afternoon siestas. Sooner of later the UK will be so laid back they'll be exporting the Channel Diet.

The Post Never-Quite-An-Empire Adjustment

To successfully follow in these footsteps the US will have to lose aspirations to empire and adjust to the relaxed life. Americans will have to settle on some national cuisine. I'm not sure Freedom Fries will cut it, but perhaps some local, fresh California diet will suffice. If they adopted some of the Mediterranean cooking guidelines that might help with the adjustment to not thinking your hot stuff, as well as heart disease.

The US tourist industry is already booming, with Europeans shopping in New York, whirling through to peek at the Washington Monument, at Hollywood, and at Golden Gate Bridge. I've recently met several tourists renting RVs and touring the National Parks, a trend which will give the country continued rational to build large vehicles and continue the wars for oil.

Does the US really need to worry about the strength of the Chinese economy, about terrorists in Pakistan, about that grand "way of life"? Maybe the nation should ditch its hegemonic inclinations, make movies, brew beer, invest in artists and edifices, build some fences, kick-back under olive trees, stop arming the rest of the world and just mock it. If worse comes to worse they could temper certain inclinations to meet the Copenhagen Criteria, then appeal to the European Union for membership. This whole McCain, Palin thing just doesn't matter.

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¹ In Harper's, "Faustian economics: Hell hath no limits", May 2008, Berry proposes somewhat circuitously and alarmingly:

"To deal with the problems, which after all are inescapable, of living with limited intelligence in a limited world, I suggest that we may have to remove some of the emphasis we have lately placed on science and technology and have a new look at the arts. For an art does not propose to enlarge itself by limitless extension but rather to enrich itself within bounds that are accepted prior to the work."

• Golf As Solidarity -- Final Blow

  The court of public opinion can seem like a sand trap. In 2002 Thomas Friedman watched George W. Bush talk on CNN about the need to bring democracy to an Iraq called threatening by the US. Then in his column he chastised Bush about playing golf:

  "I had no problem with what the president was saying. What bothered me, though, was that he was saying it in a golf shirt, standing on the tee with his golf clubs....[H]e shows real contempt for the world, and a real lack of seriousness, when he says from the golf tee, as he did on another occasion: 'I call upon all nations to do everything they can to stop these terrorist killers. Thank you. Now watch this drive.'"

  Flash forward six years to May, 2008, when George Bush told Politico that he'd quit playing golf. "I feel I owe it to the families to be in solidarity as best as I can with them. And I think playing golf during a war just sends the wrong signal."

  2008 is not 2002 and Bush's gesture of solidarity raised hackles. Satirist Steve Young called it an occasion for "satirical nirvana" and in "solidarity" gave up satire for a week. The web mob ripped into Bush's out-dated gesture but the anger wasn't contained to the internet. Keith Olbermann raged on Countdown, MSNBC, that Bush delivered a "final blow to our solar plexus". As he said in his 10 minute rant:

  "...Mr. Bush, I hate to break it to you six and a half years after you yoked this nation and your place in history to the wrong war, in the wrong place, against the wrong people, but the war in Iraq is not about you. . . It is not, Mr. Bush, about your golf game! "

  Olbermann counseled Bush to "shut the hell up" on future golf questions. As the New Yorker describes the episode, when challenged ahead of the broadcast by the show's producers about the divisiveness of "shut the hell up", Olbermann responded that he favored "shut the f_ck up" but had censored his ending.

  The president was out of sync with the nation's mood on golf vis-a-vis Iraq. In 2008, the public, once reticent about invading Iraq and putty in the Bush's hands, expresses moral outrage about the US state of affairs. 4000 deaths? How dare Bush think about golf!

• Manhattan's Tasteless, Meanspirited, Malignant Rag: The New Yorker and the Obamas

  Moral outrage of a milder sort arose over the New Yorker cover showing Barack Obama in "what many [Americans] see as 'Muslim clothing'", as Al Jazeera put it, standing with his wife in front of a fireplace with a burning flag. Only a couple of years earlier the country expressed bewilderment when European Muslims protested Danish cartoons featuring Muhammad. In response, the US shh-shhed so as not to inflame, while parading its tolerant, liberal sensibilities to the world. Yet last week the US population became apoplectic, in its own little way, over the cartoon of Obama.

  The New Yorker maybe didn't predict the ire. The magazine enjoys a coveted position in print publishing, with more subscription requests, a slew of journalism awards, and a positive balance sheet. Four days earlier, the Financial Times "Lunch with FT" section featured an interview [accessed July 23, 2008] with editor David Remnick, who on that occasion had "much to celebrate after 10 years". Remnick had turned around a "desperate" situation at the New Yorker, the FT wrote, and over lavish lunch Remnick commented appreciatively (or hopefully in jest?), "We can't live without the goose prosciutto".

  Then abruptly Remnick found himself plunked unceremoniously in a distant place, explaining defensively to his now disenchanted "18-to-24 readership [that] grew by 24 per cent and 25-to-34 readership [that] rose 52 per cent", how the New Yorker publishes pages and pages non-offensive journalism about Obama too. His audience called the cover a despicable and not-at-all-amusing attempt at satire, a "angry, hateful, violent and unpatriotic", "most malignant, vicious", "tasteless", and "mean spirited" cartoon. One befuddled commenter mistook the magazine for the New York Post.

  The audience predicted that the likes of Rush Limbaugh would use the cartoon to promote malevolent myths about Obama and doom his campaign. But nobody died and nobody lost a campaign, so what gives? Maybe the outraged wanted to guard the naive against exposure to incorrect images? Protect Obama, the fragile flower? Did they read the article?

  In the flurry of discontent, few said anything about the 14,600 word essay on Barack Obama inside the cover. The profile detailed Obama's deliberate navigation through rough and tumble world of Chicago and Illinois politics. It firmly dispelled the message everyone thought everyone else would get from the cover with an extensive reporting on Obama's history, concluding:

  "Perhaps the greatest misconception about Barack Obama is that he is some sort of anti-establishment revolutionary. Rather, every stage of his political career has been marked by an eagerness to accommodate himself to existing institutions..."

  The article (and the roiling aftermath of the cover's release) brought the spot-on satire into sharp relief.

• If Comments Could Kill: Science Commenters Out of Control

  I sometimes find these adrenaline frenzied episodes enthralling compared to the drama under the much dimmer science limelight, where for better or worse, humor and satire are dished out in miserly portions. Like politics, the biggest breaches in real science can get only sporadic fleeting attention. But oh how the small science tiffs inspire big (embarrassing) headlines about itty-bitty squabbles where the stakes are squeamishly low.

  Don't get me wrong. The science brand of satire gets so vicious on religious subjects that Danish cartoons and satirical New Yorker covers seem positively warm and fuzzy. But the consequences tell the sorry tale. One misstep of political satire and the New Yorker loses access to the front-running U.S. presidential candidates (one it's loyal to) and might be barred from Obama's campaign plane. Sure, not the end of the world, but disconcerting.

  Compare this to brutishly spiteful science satire. One person says communion is but a biscuit (wafer, actually), the next threatens to kill them, then the first calls on a frothing pack to snap at the threatener's heels. The tragic outcome of this science satire gone awry is that somebody loses their job at 1-800-Flowers. That's about as funny as it gets. Yeah.

The World of Silver Spoons and Golden Specks and All that Disinfects

Did you know that a Hong Kong company makes "Antibacterial Table Ware" that can "prevent people from the following diseases: duodenitis caused by spirillums, virosis hepatitis, dysentery caused by salmonella and food poisoning caused by golden staphylococcus"? Such wishful thinking is common in the product claims featured at the Project For Emerging Nanotechnologies' inventory of available nanotechnologies. (PEN is a collaboration of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars and the Pew Charitable Trusts.) "Antibacterial Table Ware's" antimicrobial power stems from the "nano silver coating" but the technology has some fine print limitations. During holiday dinner when you're sitting at the table laden with such utensils you would need to urge your mom to "please dawdle", as she ladles the gravy and potatoes onto your plate, so as to give the "Antimicrobial Table Ware" enough time to "kill the attached bacteria and microbial [sic] in ten minutes". (emphasis mine)

The company also makes hairdressing tools that "protect people" from diseases they would (never but for horrendous circumstances) pick up at the beauty parlor, "hairdressing-related infections such as trachoma, conjunctivitis, virosis hepatitis, dermatitis and AIDS." Nanotechnology claims by companies in the US tend to be slightly more responsible, but the precociously labeled products available as imports litter the internet, while regulation and oversight lags behind prolific headfirst investment in the new technologies.

In real life, nanotechnology is not as fantastical as some marketing boasts but is very impressive. Products incorporate elements that are 1-100 nanometers in length -- a nano being a billionth of a meter, and scientists can change the structure of an element in the lab to give it unique properties. So although Carbon nanotubules can be found in nature, in soot for example, one of the most common carbon nanotubules is produced when scientists vaporize carbon between two carbon electrodes. When you think of carbon you'd probably consider the soft form of it -- graphite, or the very hard form -- diamond; however, from carbon nanotubules, scientists now construct materials that are both very light and incredibly strong -- perhaps a hundred times stronger than steel. Carbon nanontubules are used to make electronic brushes used in engines and for future applications in optics, electronics and material science, .

Silver is a proven anti-microbial -- the FDA recently approved silver coated breathing tubes used in ventilators, that may help reduce the risk of pneumonia in hospital settings. Researchers use nanotechnology for drug development and are advancing sophisticated technology to accomplish feats such as delivering drugs to a specific location in the body or building scaffolding for the regeneration of bone, nerves and other body parts. Nanotechnology offers promising advances for almost every field, medicine is just one example. However before much of this promising research yields viable products, nanotechnology will also be relentlessly hyped for selling more mundane items with dubious benefits such as "antimicrobial" socks and refrigerators.

Gilded Age

Nanotechnology products tout anti-bacterial, anti-reflective or stain resistance properties, many of which are not yet proven. Just as flatware marketing preposterously proposes to protect you from infections like Hepatitis A, hundreds of other products collectively promise to erect a magical nanotechnology barrier, a personal missile shield between you and the millions of germs that threaten you.

When you're done sipping your silver nanoparticle preserved soup from your special silver spoon you might want to brush your teeth with "cutting edge toothpaste which innovative nanotechnology is applied", made from "pure nano-sized gold that is highly effective in disinfecting the bacteria in your mouth". And if that company went out of business (likely), you can find some Korean made silver nanotechnology toothpaste that will serve the purpose. The PEN inventory lists hundreds of products with these sorts of thrilling if unsettling properties.

More concerning than blatant labeling for the benefits of nanotechnology however, is the empty labeling from companies which choose not to advertise their nanotechnology because of federal regulations. For instance, the "FresherLonger Miracle Food Storage" containers used to be marketed as "infused with silver nanoparticles that will keep soups, sauces, meats and vegetables "fresher three or even four times longer". Now the same product doesn't mention the silver nanotechnology, only the "airtight silicone-gasket locking system" which helps "retard spoilage". The change in product literature was made to avoid the EPA's regulation of products claiming to be pesticides -- antimicrobials are considered by the EPA to be pesticides.

$50 billion dollars worth of goods incorporating nanotechnology were sold last year, and nanotechnology is entering the consumer marketplace at the rate of 3-4 products a week according to the Project on Emerging Technologies (PEN). There are over 600 consumer products currently on the market, everything from utensils to washing machines to teddy bears, camera lenses, make-up, hearing aids, suntan lotion,clothing, and waterless car washes.

NanoNannies?

Beyond the veracity of labeling, is consuming particles that can't even be seen under a microscope floating around in your body safe? One skin care product called "DNA Skin Optimizer" notes that "Nano technology was chosen because it makes it possible to place the sensitive ingredients in the form of tiny crystals directly into the cell nucleus" -- which, were it true, is certainly not a comforting prospect. Scientists don't know if how nanoparticles accumulate in the body and what interactions and effects they might have, since there are very few studies on the safety of these products.

Last week, however, Nature Nanotechnology published a pilot study suggesting that the safety of carbon nanotubes warrants further investigation. (Poland et al. "Carbon nanotubes introduced into the abdominal cavity of mice show asbestos-like pathogenicity in a pilot study"; doi:10.1038/nnano.2008.111) The researchers subjected the meseothelial lining of the body cavity of mice to carbon nanotubules of varying lengths. Like asbestos, the long fiber carbon nanotubules created an inflammatory response in the mesothelium and scarring, while shorter fibers did not, which indicates (at least) that people who work with carbon nanotubules in manufacturing might be at risk for the same types of problems seen with asbestos exposure.

The environmental risks of this new technology explosion are also unknown but disconcerting. Last month researchers from Arizona State University did some experiments on silver ion containing socks that were marketed for their ability to cut down on foot odor. The researchers washed several brands of socks, and the silver washed out of the socks at various rates. The study motivated concern that the inevitable increase and indiscriminate use of nanotechnology would cast silver into streams and run-off causing environmental damage and endangering the health of species that live in and depend on streams and rivers. Products like Samsung's EPA approved washing machine releases silver ions into every load of wash, a gimmick Samsung calls: "Silver Wash that sterilizes your clothes".

Nanotechnology has broad funding support from Congress and research in this area is flourishing. However scientists and some consumer groups are worried that there are too many unknowns about nanotechnology's safety and that more research should be aimed at investigating the potential hazards. Scientists from industry, environmental groups and academia acknowledge that not only are we producing products with unknown risks without regulation, but that the lack of regulation may cause consumers to become skittish about nanotechnology.

Earlier this month a group of consumer groups recently petitioned the EPA to take a stronger stance on nanotechnology, specifically on products that market silver as a pesticide (antimicrobial). Congress is currently considering legislation on nanotechnology but legislators pared funding for studies on the health and environmental risks of the technology.

Barack Obama has wide appeal. Democrats, Republicans, commentators, opponents, they find themselves tagging along, like he's the new cool kid on the block. Sometimes the support is overt. John Edwards endorses him, as does Senator Byrd, Congressman Henry Waxman, and the United Steelworkers. But sometimes an endorsement is more subtle.

When Barack pulled ahead of other Democrat contenders under the banner "Change You Can Believe In", Hillary Clinton decided to adapt his slogan as her own, calling hers "Change and Experience". Clinton promised voters that "change" would happen on "Day One". Same, same, but different.

After springing into "change" mode though, Hillary began leaving audiences around the world spinning with her own image defying change. She morphed from one character to the next, leaving people gasping in her wake. What accent? Southern y'all? Gravely, standing on a flatbed truck? What new activity?

When she was swilling beer and flipping back shots with some Pennsylvanians, she reminded Bill Moyers of Marlene Dietrich in Destry Rides Again, specifically the song "Go see what the boys in the back room will have, and them I'll have the same." As time went on Clinton began to remind more people of more movie characters.

Hillary's Change

Hillary herself decided her image resembled the determined boxer in the movie "Rocky", but others had different ideas. To some, she was the Black Knight in Monty Python. To Scranton, Pennsylvania voters, she was the home girl, and then in West Virginia she was a West Virginia girl. But she's no coal miner's daughter, her victory speech in West Virginia reminded one reporter of the character played by Warren Beatty in Reds cheering for a revolution.

I found this tendency to compare Clinton to various movie characters fascinating, since for months I had found myself thinking she was a bit Reese Witherspoon in Election. Over time, I wondered whether she might be more like Tilda Swinton in Michael Clayton. While mine were contemporary, human, female characters, however, other depictions were less flattering. Dana Milbank in the Washington Post recently compared the ongoing debate over Clinton's electability to the fate of the parrot in the movie "Monty Python's Flying Circus".

Customer: "That parrot is definitely deceased, and when I purchased it not half an hour ago, you assured me that its total lack of movement was due to it being tired and shagged out following a prolonged squawk."

Pet-shop owner: "Well, he's, he's, ah, probably pining for the fiords."

Customer: (Takes parrot from cage, bangs its head on counter, lets it drop to floor.) "Now, that's what I call a dead parrot."

Pet-shop owner: "No, he's stunned! . . . You stunned him, just as he was wakin' up! Norwegian blues stun easily, Major."

Customer: "He's not pining! He's passed on! This parrot is no more! He has ceased to be! He's expired and gone to meet his maker! He's a stiff! Bereft of life, he rests in peace! . . . His metabolic processes are now history! He's off the twig! He's kicked the bucket, he's shuffled off his mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleeding choir invisible! This is an ex-parrot!"

Why do so many of us compare Hillary to movie characters? Is it that we're so unaccustomed to a strong woman in the President role that we have no real comparisons we can make? She's not many female politicians we know, Margaret Thatcher or Nancy Pelosi for instance...Unlike countries where female presidents or prime ministers are the norm, we have few figures to cast from (aside from The West Wing). This is not the first time people have looked to the movies to reflect a reality they can't fathom. People exclaimed that being in lower Manhattan when the terrorists flew into the World Trade Towers was "like being a movie".

Baking Cookies, Making Tea, That's Just Not Me

Some people, like Bill Moyers, welcome the Clinton change, say she's found her voice. Clinton recently spoke on behalf of her gun-owning church-going supporters when Obama "insulted" her working class comrades.

But mere months ago she was hanging out with Bill in the country diner cheerfully wondering idly about Chelsea's whereabouts. Journey's 1981 "Don't Stop Believing" hummed nostalgically in the background. Not too far from Fleetwood Mac's, "Don't Stop", which Bill's theme song, the theme was no change. While the Clintons awkwardly but quaintly attempted to build edge-of-your chair suspense at the diner over her campaign theme, Celine Dion's "You and I", their spoof of the Sopranos seemed one drive-in away from On Golden Pond. After declaring her new change theme, every day forward left quaint 'ole Hillary-and-Bill-at-the-jutebox a little farther in the dust.

Perhaps Hillary has found her voice. Male working class voters are warming to strong women, and maybe women wouldn't be as indignant as they were when she mused back in 1992 on Nightline "I suppose I could have stayed home and baked cookies and had teas but what I decided to do was to fulfill my profession". This prompted William Safire to offer advise: "You do not defend yourself from a conflict-of-interest charge by insulting a large segment of the voting public." He wrote that Clinton's remarks were: "elitism in action". 16 years later you can say she's absorbed Safire's patronizing lesson. Hillary went on to leap past her 'elitist gaffe' and has since been appeasing voters left and right.

But when she took the Obama change challenge last fall was her intent to prove herself more adept at corralling the "white non-college educated vote"? Is that what Democrats aspire to? Has the change helped her break through a glass ceiling? While some argue yes, other voters and superdelegates have veered over to Obama's side, and he's pulling ahead.

The question remains, why does Clinton remind everyone of fictional movie characters, while Obama reminds everyone of male presidents like John F. Kennedy, or Ronald Reagan (not in ideology, they quickly say), or George H.W. Bush? Hillary may have changed, from picking through old jutebox favorite with hubbie to being one tough bitch who'll obliterate anything in her way. But have we?

Star power

While Clinton strode defiantly, talked stridently, slagged Obama, and sank still lower with her the traveling hillbilly act, Obama coolly brushed it off. He refreshingly acts like he's being himself. An article in the New York Times yesterday quoted a publisher who said Obama's feat was to make millions writing autobiographies..."two books not based on a job of prodigious research or risking one's life as a reporter in Iraq. He has written about himself. Being able to take your own life story and turn it into this incredibly lucrative franchise, it's a stunning fact."

Perhaps Hillary could have taken away another Safire nugget before hiking up her pantsuits with such determination to wade into the rhetorical swamp. Safire's advice to the Clinton's in 1992 for what he gratingly labeled "The Hillary Problem", was a six step solution: "1. Hillary: Stop defining yourself by what you're not." Who is she?

Just as Safire raked Clinton across the coals in 1992, Maureen Dowd recently eviscerated Obama for making comments about arugula and bitterness which made him, in her eyes, a "charter member of the elite". However a lot of working class people I know know arugula quite well. Remind me about the working class cred of New York Times columnist? Aren't they the ones whose capital is hobnobbing with the ruling class in fine restaurants ? If Clinton has progressed to a more modern time, then perhaps media has not.

Republicans' Me-Too Change

As he accumulates endorsements and attracts 75,000 people to his stump speech in Portland, at times he even seems to have the Republican party skipping along after him acting for all intents and purposes like Democrats. The Republicans just launched their new slogan "Change You Deserve" -- hat tip to Obama's "Change We Can Believe In". [update: And an Effexor commercial apparently]

They're out to remind us to keep YOU in Republican, I guess. Do you see a "we" in Republican? Certainly not. If too many Republicans started saying "we", who knows the trouble it would cause? The whole country might slip into socialism, or worse. Would everyone's voice be important, would all votes count? That Obama "we believe" phrasing sounds like the U.S. is a team, like there's no decider in charge. Republicans can't have that.

Republicans may have deduced from polling that people feel like they "deserve" change. But which slogan would you bet on? People may feel like they "deserve" change after the last eight years but McCain will continue the tax breaks and war so what are the Republicans talking about? You know they don't mean "deserve" as in entitlement -- they're virulently opposed to Social Security, safety nets and all that. So then what does "deserve" mean? Anything? And looking at Hillary's record, will the Republicans lose themselves like she did by trying to emulate Barack Obama?

Not if some people can help it. David Brooks suggests that Obama is actually co-opting Republican politics. Brooks grilled Barack Obama after George Bush described the candidate's foreign policy statements regarding Hezbollah as "appeasement." Not grilled as in Chris Matthews and Mark Green, on Crossfire, mind you, but as in conservative NYT columnist grilled. Brooks writes in "Obama Admires Bush" that he wondered whether Obama would really consider approaching Hezbollah diplomatically as George W. Bush implied last week. If so, the pundit said, affably of course, "[h]e's off in Noam Chompskyland".

No, when they spoke, Obama "reaffirmed" for him that Hezbollah is "not a legitimate political party", but a "destabilizing organization...", supported by "Iran and Syria". Brooks goes on to explain some details of Obama's foreign policy before concluding (seemingly approvingly) that it reminds him of George G.W. Bush's approach to foreign relations.

So which brand will win? Will Barack Obama prevail by being "himself" as the Republicans dance around chanting "me-too" change? Or will the Republicans win by making it look like they have all the ideas?

A couple of weeks ago, the journal Nature wrote that Stephen Johnson should step down from his post at the EPA (Nature 452, 2; 6 March 2008). Commenting on the unlikelihood of that, Nature suggested that since the White House "doesn't want the [EPA] to do anything" for the environment, "we can only offer [EPA] employees a fantasy...shut it down until next January. Take some fully paid sabbatical time to relax, and prepare for a return to the old-fashioned protecting of the environment that so many of you joined the agency for."

It seems the EPA thought that a grand idea. Stephen Johnson heads to Australia on a two week trip with about eleven staff. Of course Johnson's travel plans infuriate Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Chairman of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, who wrote a letter to Stephen Johnson, demanding to know where the travel budget was coming from:

"I am deeply concerned that you will be spending a large amount of scarce agency funds and staff resources on such an expensive trip while the President has proposed a series of devastating cuts in EPA's budget for environmental programs....hundreds of millions of dollars from EPA's budget for such important activities as reducing pollution of streams and lakes by sewage treatment plants, cleaning up hazardous waste sites, conducting global warming research and programs, ensuring environmental justice, and carrying out many other crucial programs."

The letter advised: "If your goal is to learn about actions to address global warming, I suggest that you visit California, which has moved ahead aggressively with greenhouse gas controls". She noted that Johnson's trip coincided with a number of hearings the EPW scheduled for him during the month of April. Let's see -- on one hand, Byron Bay and scuba-diving in the Great Barrier Reef; on the other, being interrogated by Senator Barbara Boxer. Why would Johnson choose Australia?

PZ Goes to The Mall of America

PZ Myers of Pharyngula got booted from the line of registered guests to see the movie "Expelled", a creationist production about intolerance towards religion. In an act of abject poltroonery the movie's producer ejected PZ while the rest Myers family and his other companions, Richard Dawkins and staff, were allowed to stay. The "Expelled" producer, perhaps charmed by the English accent, said he allowed Dawkins to watch the movie because he was a 'guest to our country' and had probably 'flown a long way'. (Better than saying he didn't recognize him). In this amusing YouTube video Myers and Dawkins explain what happened.

"Expelled" is a flick of reportedly dubious quality not to mention phantasmagorical content that showed at the Mall of America. (There's the religion we know and love.) Dawkins, in good form, calls the movie "shoddy", "boring", and "bad in every possible way", filled with "Lord privy seal" moments and attended by a completely "sycophantic audience." He calls the whole production "second rate in film-making and public relations", to which Myers suggests that "second rate" might be a tad complimentary.

PZ Goes To The Apple Store

Mild mannered PZ, albeit with the ferocious quill, appeared in the movie at the request of the filmmakers. Then for his contributions, whambo, out on his 'arse, whereupon he whiled away some time in an Apple store blogging. Meanwhile, in the movie showing across the way, the helpful Myers explained that he wishes to increase science literacy and make religion a "side dish rather than a main course", something 'to do on weekends'. His tone is notably conciliatory, comparing religion to knitting, as in -- "we're not going to take their knitting' needles away".

His is a charming analogy. There is a 21st century knitting revival and as many religious people in the US as ever. I used Google's totally unreliable "Trends" to compare "religion" to "knitting" here, and if you squint carefully you can see an inverse relationship. (Either that no relation whatsoever or the two trend together.)

The Economics of Antediluvian Intolerance

Coincidentally, I'm reading Dawkin's "The God Delusion" now, along with "Christopher Hitchen's "God is Not Great". You've got to be impressed with how Hitchen's waves his pen around, regardless of what he says, and while Dawkin's book is milder, he has little tolerance for my tolerance or anyone else's. Serious books with bits of entertainment, and I'm sure good screedy profitable fun for the authors.

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Acronym Required wrote about science and religion in "Science Faith and Books", in "Dover: Science Prevails over Intelligent Design: Judge Doesn't Monkey Around", in "Evolution v. Not Evolution" among others. We looked at quests for fame and PZ Myer's reception for Stuart Pivar versus Lynn Marguis in "Science Fame: Million Dollar Minutes" and mentioned Hitchen's writing in "FISA: Turning Orwell On His Ear".

In an essay on how to pronounce the surname of the Putin's presidential successor Dmitri Medvedev, Serge Schememann writes of English speakers vexed by the Russian language, and gently mocks language teachers who guide them. The author quotes a bilingual journalist from the Moscow Times, who once tutored an American actress how to pronounce the consonants T,D, and N: "the tongue must touch the upper teeth, not the alveolus like in English".

Schememann adds, "Russians have their own problems with American names". I bet. He writes, "I never touch the upper teeth with my tongue nor anything that comes up when I google 'alveolus'". Which is unfortunate, since I hear Ringley Brothers Barnum & Bailey Circus salaries are somewhat comparable to journalists'.

"Alveolus", is simply a "a small cavity or hollow", and often refers to the pulmonary alveoli (plural) in the lungs, which function during respiration to exchange oxygen and carbon dioxide to and from the blood. Accordingly, the Russian reporter's alarming suggestion -- tongue to alveolus -- might actually constitute a medical emergency. "Alveoli" also refers to other hollows, such as the sockets in which the teeth are rooted.

If a Tree Falls in a Forest, 364 Days a Year, Does Anyone Hear It?

One day a year we celebrate Arbor Day by planting trees, then we have the other 364 days that aren't Arbor Day. (We'll disregard Christmas, the sort of a pro-logging holiday.) Of course the general mood of the world is plant trees. Plant trees to keep the cities shady, plant trees to keep the forests thriving, to provide shelter and food for birds and bugs and animals, and to capture CO2, which in turn helps reduce global warming. Saving trees is the choice of the day, the prudent much ballyhooed choice. But day in and day out, people are compelled to cut trees down.

Brazil's rate of deforestation increased last year despite efforts to stop illegal logging. The rate of deforestation in the 1990's was 7,000 square miles per year. Starting in 2000, the rate was ~9,500 square miles per year. Then the rate seemed to decrease in the last couple of years until the last 5 months of 2007, when loggers cut 7000 square miles. What happened?

The environmental minister told the Financial Times in last week's article, "Brazil takes battle to the Amazon", that the rate of deforestation had temporarily decreased because of government crackdowns and the arrests of corrupt officials. Brazil is in the midst of renewing its forest protection efforts.

But some say that Brazil's deforestation due to illegal logging results from a more complicated mix, including public policies and populist local politicians which encourage logging. Others tie the rate of deforestation directly to commodity prices. According to this account the recent rise of illegal logging occurred when farmers, especially cattle ranchers, cleared land to meet the demand and to profit as food prices rose. So we can see that arguably, rising food prices might be a reason to cut down trees.

There are many other reasons why people fell trees besides for food. In each case there's a logical, rational reason. Here are some recent examples:

• To Protect Your Truck: A mailman in Vancouver, Washington hacked at more that 30 fruit trees along his route because the city wouldn't trim them and he wanted to protect his truck.
• For Your Solar Panels: For six years two neighbors in Sunnyvale, California engaged in a legal battle to resolve whether a resident who wanted solar panels could force his neighbor to cut down some redwoods. The 30 year old Solar Shade Control Act outlines the rules governing neighbors trees and solar panels.
• For Aesthetics: Every so often a corner estate gets sold and the new owners begin refashioning it as their home. First the old toilets get discarded curbside. Last, despite the opposite trend in places like Miami and LA to replace non-native palm trees with shade trees, in some neighborhoods in California quixotic homeowners owners replace shade trees with exotic palm trees. Tequila sunrise in hand perhaps. I've seen this happen.
• To Confront the Rebels: The president of Chad cut down "centuries-old trees" so that the leader could "be adequately protected". Said one bicyclist watching the trees fall: "When I was a child, soldiers used to stop us touching the trees...[n]ow they are being destroyed."

While Chad acted in the name of terrorism, the US for some reason didn't deploy that reasoning when it moved forward to develop its national forest areas. Last week the state of California sued the U.S. Forest Service, which wants to open more than 500,000 acres of California national forest for roads and oil drilling. The state wants to keep these forests free of roads.

State Attorney General Jerry Brown told the Los Angeles Times "I find it kind of ironic that the federal government won't let us clean up our cars and they now want cars going through these forests." California accuses the Forest Service of violating the National Environmental Policy Act and the National Forest Management Act by moving ahead with development plans and disregarding the state's laws. California enacted a moratorium on road construction in "pristine areas of its national forests" in 2006, according to the LA Times. But sometimes federal governments make the National Forests earn their keep, come hell or high water.

And so each new day gives a fine reason to chop a tree.

You're so Sad, We're So Happy

Antidepressants have taken a beating over the past couple of years with a steady stream of difficult news, some of it contradictory -- about studies biased by doctors interests, potential dangers of the drugs for children, limited effectiveness as a result of selective reporting, and patients struggling to withdraw from the drugs. Regardless of the news, many patients critically depend on antidepressants and pharmaceutical companies invest heavily in their development.

Last week Wyeth announced the approval of Pristiq, an antidepressant they're marketing to succeed Effexor XR. Effexor was the first of the serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors (SNRIs), followed by Eli Lilly's Cymbalta. Wyeth won FDA approval for the drug's use as an antidepressant and is hoping to get the drug approved for menopause. This is a savvy move. With the HRTs in decline because of cancer risks Pristiq is the first drug to be marketed as a non-hormonal option for menopause "symptoms".

Eating Your Own Dog Food?

Some doctors question whether "Pristiq", a metabolite of Effexor, is an improvement over any of the drugs currently on the market. Regardless of doubts, the drug is a lithe marketing confection, starting with the name, "Pristiq", which summons to mind "pristine", as in, that is the cleanest most crystal clear pristine lake you've ever seen, and "mystique", as in, wow, he/she has that certain je ne sais quois -- mystique. Ergo "Pristiq". Just saying it makes you want to hop out of the chair, dress well, smile brightly, finish a report, wrap up a business meeting, or throw a dinner party -- tonight, for 50 friends.

With Effexor coming off patent, Wyeth is happy to have Pristiq in the wings. As Gino Germano, Wyeth's president of pharmaceuticals told the New York Times, doctors and patients need to have options. The Times' print edition featured a photo of the beaming Germano, perhaps elated over the FDA approval news and definitely projecting a certain unique Pristiq mystique. Some analysts predict $1.5 billion in sales by 2012.

Art Tries to Imitate Science Tries to Imitate Art Tries to Imitates Science.....

Last year, Acronym Required wrote about the American Film Institute's Catalyst Workshop, which recruits scientists to train them in scriptwriting. "Science's Silver Bullet -- The Silver Screen?" described a Pentagon sponsored workshop that recruited "hard-core", "lab-certified scientists" to write scripts and portray "appealing" science protagonists.

The rational behind recruiting scientists? Back in 2005, the New York Times published a story on the Catalyst Workshop that explained Hollywood's demand for scientists: "They're compensated very minimally, they're going on blind faith that what they're searching for is going to pay off. And film making is exactly the same way". ("Pentagon's New Goal: Put Science Into Scripts", 08/04/05). An unflinching assessment indeed. We venture that "blind faith" is a slur to most scientists, no doubt filmmakers as well. As for the pay, true enough, most "lab-certified" scientists get paid pitifully. When we published the story we could only guess how scriptwriters fared.

Now with the writers strike, we have more information. According to the New York Times, some writers get paid significantly more than your average "lab-certified scientist". A recent article said that the "typical TV series writer may get $30,000 an episode, plus residuals". Movie scriptwriters get a million dollars in advance payment, according to studio executives. ("In Hollywood, a Sacred Cow Lands on the Contract Table", August 5, 2007 ). Of course sometimes the truth is found by reading between words, so we'll take that for the propaganda that it is.

While the top of the pay scale for Hollywood writers does seem like a brighter star than what scientists have to wish for, we know that only a few lucky writers get a stab at these choice positions. The rest of the labor force traipses gig to gig for what many consider menial pay: "More water sir?"

Sure, wink, wink, the writers are gouging the poor executives by asking them for residuals on digital works. The obvious question is: If the projected digital profits are such pittance, than why is the executive side of the contract table so apoplectic?

Is it "Over"?

In the case of the writer's strike, despite weekend rumors originating with a Fox News executive, claiming that the strike is over, we're waiting for the writers to make the call. We know that announcements like "it's over" are sometimes craftily used by those in charge of crisises to make the media go away.

Over or not, there's happy news from an unexpected source. Nature offers a proposal to the strikers. (Nature is a science journal.) The editors tell scientists to "saunter down to your local picket line, gather up a couple of film and television writers, and introduce them to the fascinations of the scientific life..." They add that plying them with drinks might help. ("A Quantum of Solace", Jan. 31, 2008). Who knows how the Hollywood writers will receive the offer, but I can't help thinking of the Anthony Burgess quote: "We all need money, but there are degrees of desperation."

Anyway, until we can truly cheer for the writers, we'll marvel at how the tables have turned. Last year, Hollywood sought out scientist scriptwriters, this year scientists seek out Hollywood scriptwriters.

PBS Nature, Animal Fare Light

I don't too often plunk down in front of the television and watch nature shows. The last time I watched a television show on animals was in a small restaurant in SE Asia which had the sort of overwhelming television presence that precludes conversation. Animal shows were popular fare in SE Asia. I occasionally watch PBS's Nature series. The last episode I remember watching, sometime last year, was called "Can Animals Predict Disaster?"

The show was a vehicle for elephants, hippopotamuses, tigers and fish to gambol about in zoos, deserts, forests, rivers, and oceans on various continents. "Can Animals Predict Disaster?" pondered whether animals could someday warn us of disasters, like the Sumatra tsunami of 2004. Behavior researchers investigated various related questions, like whether infrasound or geological cues warn animals of upcoming earthquakes or tsunamis.

One scientist set up large speakers on the safari and blasted classical music to giraffes and hippopotamuses over an impressive wilderness stereo system, then observed the animals' reactions. That was the control part of the experiment. I shouldn't anthropomorphize the giraffes by saying they looked bewildered. The scientist then blasted some pre-recorded hippopotamus calls. This prompted chorusing¹ from nearby hippopotamuses. The show explored at length what it meant for the hippopotamuses to chorus (in instances when a scientist regales them with his own recordings of their calls), and whether the animals could communicate impending disaster to each other.

As it turns out, animals have senses that humans don't, and unsurprisingly, communications systems we don't understand. Owls see better than humans, dogs' have more acute hearing than humans, elephants can sense vibrations hundreds of miles away through their trunks, and hippopotamuses chorus. But as one scientist pointed out, it's highly unlikely that animals evolved to run from tsunamis, since tsunamis are so rare. More likely, he said, animals would run from anything that sounded as threatening as a tsunami.

The episode crept towards its tentative conclusion: At the end of the day animals probably can't warn us of impending disaster. I say "probably" because "Can Animals Predict Disaster?" left some doubt about its answer. Perhaps PBS Nature's mission statement precludes it from completely trouncing people's fantasies about animals. On that note PBS Nature concluded ambiguously with a "what-if". "What-if" someday, humans could rely on animals to warn us before "the earth turns angry"?

These programs often feature predictable, anthropomorphic, action oriented fun. Suspense builds, large animals thunder across the plains, and the predator voraciously gets the prey. It's formulaic, family-friendly TV, with lots of death but very little copulation -- and certainly no embarrassing wardrobe malfunctions.

The extent to which these shows aim to please audiences is almost always inversely proportional to the production's potential as Acronym Required blog fodder. And we do, occasionally, mock media's science offerings, for instance our posts about Meerkat Manor, and the movie March Of The Penguins, commented on anthropomorphic edutainment. But always, even as we poke fun at these productions, we're acutely aware that the alarming pablum spooned out by the media in the name of nature or science today, can be bested with a thinner and less substantive gruel tomorrow.

TV, radio, newspapers -- they're all under the same pressure: money, money, money. The Wall Street Journal used to feature long, investigative health and technology articles, with corporate friendly front and editorial pages. But the paper's entire content is being Murdochized. CNN's home page used to highlight flimsy science coverage. Now we often find a CNN front page slathered with lurid crime tales. The network even managed to get itself panned as "corrupt" for its debate hosting tactics, on the front page of last Sunday's LA Times.

TV producers seem to forever probe the depths of available content, seeking the lowest common denominator, raking up muck from ever deeper ponds, flinging it out, wrapped with delicious advertising, to the apparently hungry masses. Since I watch TV infrequently, I don't get pulled imperceptibly into watching stupider and stupider shows until one day I find myself enthusing about some reality show contestant's outfit to a stranger on the bus -- no offense. Every six months I watch TV again and it hits me -- wow, is this it?

"Inspiring People to Care About the Planet": National Geographic, Aircraft Carriers, and Automobile Factories

In some blip of high expectations and naivete the other night, without considering any schedule, I turned on the TV and flipped to the National Geographic channel. I grew up reading National Geographic, along with Scientific American. Somewhere along the line, Scientific American changed. It used to carry long science articles with great graphics and lucid explanations of physiology and geology and other interesting topics. I still like it, but my impression of the current format is that it falls somewhere on the spectrum between USA Today and Highlights magazine -- albeit SA's website is better than Highlights'.

National Geographic used to feature anthropological articles on people and places around the world. Of course I wouldn't expect the same stories today, about some never-before-discovered jungle tribe that fashions strong vines for transportation,and brews therapeutic teas from the roots of exotic plant species, for example. But that evening I thought I'd learn something at least vaguely interesting, about a place, an animal, an ocean, some fish, a spider, an expedition. So I was surprised to tune in to the National Geographic channel and find myself watching a feature about the world's largest aircraft carrier, the USS Ronald Reagan.

The USS Ronald Reagan is in the Seventh Carrier Strike Group led by Rear Admiral Wisecup. I sat through a segment on loading supplies from the supply ship, everything slung onto the carrier via a pulley system set up between the two ships. What was I watching? Could this be right? I met the supply chief, Commander Pimpo. National Geographic? I checked the channel to make sure I hadn't landed on the wrong channel. The USS Ronald Reagan is big. Its run like a small city, with its own fire department, hospital, and police force. Maybe the remote is broken? No, all of this and more was the subject of National Geographic's "Supercarrier: USS Ronald Reagan." I guess it had been a while since I watched National Geographic. I suddenly yearned for a goofy show with the snake gulping down the bird.

The supercarrier has won several best in class awards, such as the "Ship's Store Retail and Services Excellence Award", for the U.S. Pacific Fleet for fiscal year 2006 in the CV/CVN class"; the excellence in food service award for its class; and the "Battle "E"" award, for its condition and wartime readiness. All of this is interesting if nuclear powered aircraft carriers interest you. You'd find this story fascinating if aircraft carrier logistics stories excite you as much as stories about animals, history, science or space. You'd be intrigued if patriotism to you means appreciating the fine tuning necessary for "prompt and sustained combat" by 6,000 people manning a ship longer than the Empire State building, that costs taxpayers $2.5 million dollars a day to run.

National Geographic claims its mission is: "Inspiring People to Care About the Planet". I'm sure some people would argue that a show about the Navy's USS Ronald Reagan fulfills the mission. Anyway National Geographic can feature any type of show it wants. And it does. Take for instance "Ultimate Factories". There's "Ultimate Factories: Ferrari", "Ultimate Factories: BMW", and "Ultimate Factories: Corvette". Sure, ok, car factories are fun. But does a Ferrari factory inspire you to "care about the planet?" Yes, these are slick cars, but am I total stick in the mud, given NG's mission statement, to point out that Ferraris get 7-10 mpg in the city and 12-16 mpg on the highway?

On National Geographic's "Advertise with us", website page they advise hopeful advertisers: "Now we are placing more emphasis on preservation, seeking a sustainable relationship with our planet, and promoting greater public understanding that will lead the way to global balance." When does it start? Or is the sentiment reserved for the "Global Warming" section of the website, where they dare not mention that cars contribute to global warming? Oh well. I'm sure that National Geographic's hat tip to the US military and car manufacturers is rewarded.

Discovery: Future Weapons

Where else would one turn for a good nature show these days? The Discovery Channel? In 1985 the fledgling cable network was launched to be "Scientific American of the air", as a spokesperson told AdWeek. When asked how Discovery Channel planned to compete with other networks (at a time when cable TV hadn't taken off), he said "If we are a 'dark-horse' to be a fourth network, we're almost invisible because we're so dark". He added, "To be a fourth major network, we'd have to add a lot of stuff, which we are not going to do. The true beauty of The Discovery Channel is that it's differentiated and focused." In 1988 about one-third of the network's programming was nature documentaries, one-third was documentaries about "other lands and their cultures", and the rest was devoted to shows on science, technology, history, and human adventures such as trekking and mountaineering,according to a Christian Science Monitor article at the time.

But things change. Today the vast Discovery Communications, produces multiple channels; Discovery, Health, Science, Animal Planet, Travel, HD theatre, and TLC ("an affirmative and connective experience"). They launched the "Military Channel" in 2005. The channel was a rework of an aviation show that producers expanded because of "viewer demand" for land and sea --not just air-- military content. Last February, when Discovery added home-grown content to "Military Channel", Vice President Bill Smee enthused to USA Today about the US soldiers' videos they planned to air. The films wouldn't always be "feel-good", he assured, because they were filming on the job: "...I don't want to overpromise firefights, but you may see the aftermath of an improvised explosive device."

So why not I guess? Shouldn't gore be part of the "The Military Channel"? Granted, no one in their right mind would go there looking for basic science or nature shows. But fight fervor is not confined to the "Military Channel". If you happened to naively click over to Discovery Channel at 11:00 on a Thursday evening, you wouldn't find "Planet Earth", or "Shark Week", or "Man vs. Wild", or "Storm Chasers". You'd be watching "Future Weapons".

"Future Weapons" is now in its second season. The show created a stir last year with its special website dedicated to building audience enthusiasm for weapons. BAE Systems helped sponsored the site. The defense contractor told AdWeek in June, 2007, that their media goals for working with Discovery were "to keep the Non-Line-of-Site (NLOS) Cannon front and center in terms of the Army and people who are interested in the military'". BAE found Discovery's content so useful that it used the Discovery Channel's NLOS site as "real third-party validation that we could show to our prospective customers".

To be fair, defense contractor advertising has always been a part of Discovery Communications, even when the network wanted to be "Scientific American of the air", back in 1985. Shiny spiffy weapons just haven't been quite so "front and center". Also to be fair, Discovery Communications' mission is more in line with its commitment to military content than National Geographic's. On their "About" page, the corporation proclaims: "Discovery, it's not just our name, it's our very calling". A little dull, but universally inclusive, which gives the corporation an opening for all programming, even military recruiting.

Discovery Communications offers no pretense about saving the planet. Nevertheless, if "discovery is [y]our calling", forgive your audience for thinking along the lines of exploring the Amazon, or investigating bone marrow cell transplants, or climbing Everest, or observing some animals on the Kalahari -- without the NLOS Cannon and its "unprecedented responsiveness and lethality". Sure military technology is based on science -- but building enthusiasm for weapons is used for the purpose of exciting people about war, not science. From "discovery is our calling", its only a hop, skip and a jump to historical slogans like "it's not a job, it's an adventure", or the current Navy slogan of dubious meaning: "accelerate your life". ²

More, New Science on Cable

I do sometimes lament what passes for science programming these days, and I'm not alone. In 2003 there was a flurry of announcements and excitement around a proposed C-Span like science station called Cable Science Network - CSN. Science, and Scientific American, and Wired announced the program. The founders wrote in Scientific American: "Wouldn't it be great to watch congressional hearings on cloning, bioterrorism, global warming and aging? Wouldn't it be fabulous to attend--via cable--cutting-edge lectures given by scientists at various annual scientific conferences?" I'm not sure how the public answered, but CSN apparently never got off the ground.

There are other efforts starting however, and while programming can get worse, it can surely always get better. The National Science Foundation (NSF), has teamed up with the Research Channel to produce programs for national and international cable, TV, and internet audiences. There's also a PBS/Wired program called Wired Science. I'm sure there are others, I'll just have to channel surf a little more. Then there's always Second Life.

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¹Documented in various insects and amphibians. William Barklow has done (and popularized) the research with hippopotamuses, (ie, J. of Animal Behavior March 28, 2002, "Amphibious communication with sound in hippos, Hippopotamus amphibius").

² Granted, "discovery is our calling" doesn't fit too well with the new army slogan, "Army Strong" -- too many words in the former, whereas-latter-distorted-English --grunt. See more about "Army Strong" at goarmy.com.

Acronym Required writes frequently about science and media and has also written about global warming and cognitive dissonance, for instance in Cars: Buying Cognitive Dissonance", Sea Change or Littoral Disaster, Science Communication, Communicating Climate Change, and Climate Change, Fueling the "Debate", and others. Links to other Acronym Required articles are included in the text.

Today, Craig Venter published his genome sequence in the journal PLoS Biology, along with a self-portrait so large, in the journal's 'Synopsis' version, that this startled reader recoiled with fright.

Sheesh. Science should be soothing...first you have your abstract, your introduction, the methods, results, discussion...No unassuming reader seeking to understand science's newest frontiers, for the greater good, should ever be confronted with SO MANY individual facial hairs, in such...lewd...detail. Shotgun sequencing indeed, he's a bit in the reader's face, as they say.

The published sequence is diploid, both his mother's and father's contributions. Much of the sequence may seem familiar, due to the fact that Venter contributed his DNA to the first composite sequencing human genome effort made by Celera (his company, which is also behind the current effort), the results of which were published in 2001. His genetic contribution to that effort was 60%. According to today's Financial Times unique scoop, Venter is predisposed to "novelty-seeking behaviour and a preference for evening rather than morning activity". News you can use.

However both the journal and the author stress that individual human traits are each influenced by many genes. The PLoS paper concludes that human-to-human sequence variation is five- to seven-fold greater than earlier estimates, which Venter says, proves that we are in fact more unique at the individual genetic level than we thought.

Yawn. Good enough. Nevertheless, maybe next time, a composite photo? Perhaps? To display your essential humanity?

"Art is What You Can Get Away With." -- Andy Warhol

Scienceblogs' scientist PZ Myers of Pharyngula, one of the first and most entertaining science bloggers, was recently sued for 15 million dollars by Stuart Pivar because Pivar did not like Myers' scathing review of Pivar's book. Myer's 2005 review of the book is here, and an updated review from last month is here. On behalf of Myers, Lawyer Peter Irons wrote a response to Pivar here. Pivar dropped the suit, but until then feverish speculation and analysis prevailed on some blogs. 'It will be dismissed' some said. 'It's groundless' everyone agreed. But there was also unexpected and deafening silences from other corners, as if a cold wind had blown through some warm cozy blogospheric goodness. Some just had no comment. But others asked, what if people start suing individual bloggers?

What if? Would all bloggers just go quiet? Really? No. If it weren't Seed and a famous blogger, would there be any point of a suit? No. So what the suit was really about. We conclude that from Pivar's history, he's merely seeking fame by suing, but what does Myers get? Well, fame from being sued. And interestingly, while Myers tears apart Pivar's book for it's non-sciencey ideas, how is it that he can welcome Lynn Margulis to his forum without challenging her anti-science ideas? How do fame and science mix and confuse science understanding?

Who The Heck is Stuart Pivar?

When I first tried to search for "Pivar" and "science" I came up empty-handed. Google asked me if I meant "Pixar", as in Pixar Entertainment? "Picar"? "Piper"? My search terms were wrong and as it turns out "science" was throwing off the results. Well-known in art and New York Society circles, Pivar is often associated with famous people, sometimes deceased -- like Andy Warhol and Diana Vreeland. He has been featured in popular magazines, like the New York Times "Public Lives" section, and in New York tabloids' "celebrities" sections for over 30 years.

In 1975, Newsweek profiled Pivar, who at the time was curating a show on "Schlock Art" (not an insult, apparently). In 1979 he paid $223,250 for a rare sabre-tooth tiger skull to add to his collection of skeletons and bones. Then he spent oodles of time and money delving into the provenance of a life sized statue called "Roman Bronze Boy" that may have been fake.

He strives to be the highest bidder: "'This is an excellent painting,'" Pivar exclaimed...a W.C.M. - a world-class masterpiece.'" (Boston Globe, March 22, 2000), referring to art painted by live elephants for a foundation that teaches Asian elephants to paint. The foundation also develops "an affordable line of non-toxic quality paints for use by elephants and caretakers as well as underprivileged children in developing countries". Claudia Steinberg once interviewed Pivar (NYT September 9, 2004), on decorating and noted his "'grand tone"', as if he mastered "'the effectiveness of pontification.'" Pivar pontificated:

"'Every time I see an example of something that is better than what I own, I buy it... otherwise for the rest of my life I have to live with the knowledge that someplace in the world something is floating around that is better than mine, and that's intolerable.'''

This is the artist who sued Myers. He sues frequently. He targets a variety of people and organizations and was once called "'an institutional stalker"' by the president of the New York Academy of Art. (The New York Post, June 20, 1998). After suing the Academy (which he had founded), he showed up one night at their "Take Home a Nude fundraiser", which the Post described as: "flesh-filled works". Since Pivar had sued the association, he was unwelcome, in fact "barred at the door, then thrown down into a puddle". "'Ass over teakettle'", Pivar told the Post. He slapped the Academy with a suit for assault. Then he dropped the suit.

Perhaps the culture of New York artistes differs from that of scientists'? Somehow PZ and Pharyngula figured into Pivar's marketing plan. But it's odd that someone who pursues fame so relentlessly, who has so many well-connected friends, can't simply get himself listed on Wikipedia...Why Pharyngula?

Pivar certainly must not have looked too closely at the articulate, analytical, opinionated, sarcastic, and biting Pharyngula blog. Gauging the landscape, I would think twice before submitting a book for review there. But knowing that Pivar lives with "wallcovering of rose-gold silk brocade" and hundreds of art objects ( NYT, September 9, 2004), I wouldn't solicit his opinion about some things either, like design or my attitudes towards pursuing fame. So Pivar expected a cordial reception from Myers? Although, true, Myers blog Pharyngula gave controversial scientist Lynn Margulis a very welcoming reception when he hosted her earlier this year.

Mastering Fame In Science -- Your 15 Minutes? Again?

Dr. Lynn Margulis is renowned for cell biology she did 15, 20, 30 or so years ago on endosymbiotic theory. She's earned plenty of street cred -- of the science type, both for her science and writing. But she's also well-known for putting forth "non-traditional" ideas, like:

"In the nerve cell, the axons and the dendrites that make the physical connections that allow us to communicate are latter-day spirochetes. Nerve cells, having long ago discarded the rest of the spirochete body, use the fundamental motility system of spirochetes. Think of the nerve as coming from what had formerly been a bacterium, 'trying' but unable to rotate and swim. Thought involves motility and communication, the connection between remnant spirochetes. All I ask is that we compare human consciousness with spirochete ecology."¹

You can imagine a simple schematic that suggests the relationship.

Of course all fame, whether it's in science, art or blogging, demands selective use of charm. And to her credit, when granted the opportunity by Pharyngula for an on-line chat forum, Margulis was charming and gamely mastered the medium, tutoring the likes of a participants with handles like "Hairhead" on her theories.

Be Charming, Claim You're the Underdog, "Don't Worry What They Write About You...."

While she's well-established and somewhat revered, Margulis doesn't hesitate to use the opportunity to forward her harebrained and controversial ideas. With PZ Myers moderating, Margulis insisted that HIV virus doesn't cause AIDS comments citing a Harper's article published last year. However the Harpers article was roundly dismissed by scientists, public health and policy experts as well as AIDS patients and activists around the world (PDF).

Margulis persisted though: If HIV did cause AIDS, than why didn't the CDC respond to her written demand for proof? This is a weak argument. The feigned helplessness from Margulis, who with tenacity, research skills, and balls unearthed obscure microbiology references from 19th century Russian publications, compared these against modern paradigms for cell evolution, then successfully challenged scientists to accept symbiosis theory -- is laughable.

Don't underestimate her feat in establishing symbiosis theory. But think, when listening critically to Margulis's argument about HIV now. The CDC has a very accessible explanation of HIV virus and AIDS here. The NIH explains everything here. Given her mastery of chat and her previous investigative work, do you believe her Google search skills are so lacking that she needs to resort to 1960's communications method of sending snail-mail letters?

When Science is What You Can Get Away With

Reading the Margulis post on the Myers blog and the chat that he hosted, it's hard to tell what would or wouldn't have gotten axed under PZ's "no-trolling" rule. These forums tend to go sideways anyway after hundreds of comments, not just because of trolls, but because people don't know basic science. The Pharyngula comments transcript was like watching a parade while a posse of kids fights in front of you to retrieve gumdrops that rolled on the ground. In other words, Margulis got off lightly with her anti-science ideas.

Myer's "moderated" forum enforced civility that drifted to intellectual stupor. While the subject was promising, Margulis ably chose what she presented and answered. It was certainly not a place where an open exchange would occur, rather it was a place where she could get coverage for her crazy ideas. Margulis is savvy and used PZ Myers forum well. Pivar, obviously, played his unique hand with Myers differently, with different results.

Margulis knows how to get her ideas across because she knows the rules of the game and isn't afraid to make her own. Scientists employ well established rules of engagement in academia. There is an old adage that the feuds are intense in academia because the stakes are low -- that is the financial stakes. Not true so more, but unlike art, apparently, scientists generally don't sue fellow scientists. It never made sense because there was nothing to gain -- " Watch out, I'll confiscate all your test tubes!" Science fame is achieved with intelligence and/or least creating that image (to the point of intimidation). Equally powerful tools are words, wit, aplomb, and most of all, renown from previous accomplishments -- all attributes that Margulis deploys with rigor.

Margulis relishes controversy and slings mud far better than most people, a well-honed and essential skill. Years ago she would malign molecular biologists (who she felt threatened her cell biology) for various things, particularly being reductionist. Margulis also criticized evolutionary biologists for ignoring chemistry and microbiology in evolution and chided developmental biologists for not understanding important components of evolution like geology. She refused to talk to journalists because she said they 'always misrepresent' her ideas. Nowadays she decries online sources who she claims distort her theories. Famously, despite her formidable offense skills, she forever portrays herself as someone who has been pushed in a mud puddle.

Scientists' methods of acquiring prestige are not to be underestimated because it's these skills as well as their research that make and break careers. Of course this is so, but stereotypes of scientists would have people doubt this. These skills help hold scientists and lay audiences in hypnotized sway. Clearly Pivar's background makes him pathetic at science combat skills. I mean if you attain fame by being the highest bidder on art made by elephants with their trunks, which you refer to with cute acronyms like "W.C.M." for "world class masterpiece", and if your biggest publicity stunt takes the form of a lawsuit, think again before messing with scientists. Forget the image of pocket-protectors -- modern successful scientists have overcome far more adversity in the lab and in the politics doing science than you ever will by falling in a mud puddle "ass over teakettle" at a art show featuring nude paintings.

Crackpot Science or Breaking Science? "It may not be Raining. They may be Spitting on Us." -- attributed to Warhol

Scientists can be eccentric, though, as can artists. When scientists mutter poetry or mismatch socks their it adds to their mystique. But than there are the cranks. So who's who? Eccentric? Or crank? Einstein was famously "eccentric". Margulis herself observes how "'it's easy to be dismissed as a "crank" or "on the fringe"'. Unlike the artist new to the science party, Margulis's past publications give her the leeway to tell us that what looks like "crank" is really a new breaking science theory. The ghost of Thomas Kuhn lingers in the background, throwing an inkling of doubt on all our rock solid reality-based paradigms. This technique of reminding people how often paradigms are shattered to reveal new truths seems especially effective used on non-scientists by someone with some status.

So if one is a lay-person, how do you tell science from pseudo-science? It's tricky. Obviously, if the person doesn't have an established biography in science, it's easy to doubt their credibility. But what about scientists? PZ might say the Margulis exchange was an open forum, and indeed some people asked pointed questions. But did the warm reception send a mixed message to those who don't know or who swoon before fame rather than examining each new science proposal with equal amounts of analysis or skepticism?

It used to be that scientists didn't so often enter the public forum. They obviously didn't blog. In 2000, James Glanz of the New York Times wrote in "Geniuses, Crackpots and a Grand Unified Theory" forwarding a false perception of scientists, but one that holds an iota of truth. He said that interactions between scientists and the public occur when the public tries to appropriate scientists' ideas, or when they try to engage scientists in their own crazy theories.

The awkward exchanges depicted in the NYT article range from dealing with "cosmic theorizers", to engagements with "superannuated, formerly fine scientists who late in their careers get bored doing bread-and-butter stuff". Then there were the cranks and crackpots, that scientists would treat with kid gloves:

"Once, as [Moyer] was discussing crackpot theorizing with a fellow physicist in his office, his colleague took out a file marked "public relations" that was filled with letters on off-the-wall theories. When Dr. Moyer asked why in the world the folder was so labeled, his colleague explained that the writers sometimes turned up in his office, "and they get really upset if you take out a folder marked 'crackpots.' "

Margulis herself contends that new-age Gaia people usually misinterpret the science behind her's and Lovelock's ideas. She uses her history of legitimate science to continue to push fringe ideas. This makes it near impossible for the layperson to doubt her. But do know, dear layperson, that the HIV viruses, not say, intergalactic forces, cause AIDS.

Artists and Bloggers, "...Measure [Criticism] in Inches." -- Warhol

Crackpot crank or breaking science? This gives science bloggers unique challenges. Scientist bloggers need to work, often in science, publishing, maintaining labs, and teaching. The current political climate, in which fear dominates politics, drives people to faith and speculative pie in the sky theories. But at the same time the fame culture drives bloggers to be somewhat "controversial" just to get an audience. Many science bloggers want to expose readers to solid science and give them some sort of arsenal to distinguish good from bad. Yet paradoxically, to attract an audience, blogs need to entertain. So Myers devotes himself to anti-religion, anti-alternative medicine, and anti-fringe science screeds, but welcomes someone who denies HIV causes AIDS? How is the public to make sense of this?

Conflict is entertaining, as those who seek fame know. Margulis has mastered this. Pivar has cultivated a combative image in the art world but fell flat on his face in science. And certainly PZ has gathered admirers of his skilled rhetorical obliteration of science "foes". So for Myers' own fame, it makes sense to engage cordially with Dr. Lynn Margulis, a famous scientist. He allows questions under a "no trolls" policy. But was a troll someone who challenged her theories? Myers interestingly and controversially doesn't challenge her anti-science ideas, although his entire blog is devoted to attacking religion, alternative medicine, and "anti-science" ideas.

And of course Pharyngula agrees to review the self-published book of Stuart Pivar, a famous art collector, and does so in a frank and comedic way. Pharyngula is popular, Margulis gets more than her 15 minutes, and -- Pivar? -- sorry.

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¹ Margulis, Lynn and Hinkle, Gregory, "The Biota and Gaia: 150 Years of Support for Environmental Sciences," in Schneider, Stephen Henry and Boston, Penelope J. (eds.), Scientists on Gaia (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1991): 11-18.

Just when you thought the profile of the lowly rock pigeon couldn't sink any further. "Experts say" that pigeon guano may have contributed to the Minnesota bridge failure. Apparently the acidic guano corroded and weakened the metal.

With this sort of evidence, can we really continue to lash out at legislators, the governor, tax laws, the war in Iraq, federal deficits, the inspectors, Republicans, distorted taxpayer priorities --or if you happen to be a Rush Limbaugh fan -- labor unions? Sure investigators are still "investigating", but maybe they should just stop that, given this finding.

The abundant city pigeon, known as the rock pigeon or Columba livia, is one of the least favored species. Indeed, humans refer to them derogatorily as "rats with wings". Therefore the promotion of pigeon to scapegoat is brilliant, so much more community oriented than finding lapses in official judgment and blaming politicians.

An exceptional choice to take the fall, this will be like water rolling off a duck's back to the pigeon. They'll just continue on with that jerky red-eyed strut for as long as they live, heads jutting left and right, back and forth, parading across dirty city sidewalks, cooing in the gutters.

The alternative culprit to the bridge disaster is politicians, who may also be oily, but they're human and weak. We shouldn't blame them because they're more susceptible than pigeons to family stressing repercussions of disaster. When civilians who have been bopped over the head with perceived negligence one too many times start to stir, watch politicians leave in droves, tails tucked between their legs. Back to their "families". Not a problem with pigeons (squab, if you prefer). Most people can't even figure out whether they actually have babies or not.

The solution is simple and scientific. Aa wildlife biologist with the U.S. Department of Agriculture plans to oust the pigeons and suggests preventative actions: "netting to block holes and surfaces, spikes to keep them from landing, and sometimes poisoning, shooting or trapping the birds".

This is what's apparently called a "multi-pronged strategy" to deal with pigeons and their guano, and it's a sublime blend of sport, family fun, and civic duty. Carefully executed, it should be warmly received with rare unilateral support from the state and federal governments, taxpayers, and officials of every stripe. Environmentalists might even be on board. The squinty, awkward pigeon is certainly no round-eyed, fluffy, cute little spotted owl.

Not only could the plan save other bridges imperiled by pigeon guano, it could redeem whole cities. Scientists should think along these lines more often. It's one of those extraordinarily rare "expert" findings that's actually useful to society. Perhaps the levees in New Orleans were weakened by Pelican guano? Oh no wait, that's the state bird...

Murdoch -- Scarred by Chapter Books?

The Wall Street Journal -- sold to the only bidder. Finally the most obvious outcome arrives after months of drama and teeth gnashing. The Bancrofts apparently hadn't had a family member on the board since 1932, and by all accounts were "hands off" owners, busy with horses, aviation and other pursuits. Cashing out, with the appropriate level of public contemplation, was a clear-cut opportunity.

People are concerned about the outcome of the sale. Their's is reasonable consternation. The New York Post is a freak show, with it's distorted portraits lurching out at you from the newsstands, fear-mongering headlines battling for your attention. This week's issue features a story "The Tragic Madness of King George" -- about George Steinbrenner, of course -- subtitled "Babbling Boss 'Shocks' Pal". I'm surprised they let the "g" stay in "babbling". The Post is world of "Pals", "Cops", "Hubbies", "60 Second" interviews, chases where the "cops" generally prevail, along with riveting human interest tales like "Castrated Dad was 'Monster'. Will the editorial page views of the Wall Street Journal change, people ask? Hmmm...doubtful?...but fair enough....

Hopefully all readers aren't getting their news from the editorial pages, if so it's a sunk cause. But there's obvious confusion, especially given the hopeful to and fro about an independent board, that led the publisher to clarify in his "Report to the Readers", earlier this week:

"...some of the concerns raised about the acquisition have been illegitimate -- and could wrongly impugn the Journal. One is the notion that somehow ownership could be separated from control."

There you have it, people do indeed acquire things to control them, that's "biz".

Shorter Articles for Our Shorter Attention Spans

I'm aware of people's attentions spans in the world of the blog, in fact, I'm quite sure only a few people have read to this point in this article. It is with this understanding that I say that my prediction that the WSJ articles, especially investigative pieces, will get shorter. Not to mention that Murdoch said as much himself when he spoke about some of his ideas for his impending acquisition in a conversation with the New York Times a couple of months ago. He said he had a hard time understanding some of the technology articles. He also expressed his distaste for longer articles: "'I'm sometimes frustrated by the long stories'", he told paper, noting that he '"rarely" finishes' them.

That Murdoch can't finish his articles is as heartbreaking as watching a toddler pick all the green things off her highchair tray and hurl them onto the floor. Indeed it was Murdoch's "unfinished" bits, I'm sure, that most interested us. We noted this in Coke, Teaching the World to Sing (June 7, 2005).

"The Wall Street Journal article takes an interesting approach in its article ["How a Global Web of Activists Gives Coke Problems in India",Steve Stecklow, June 7, 2005]. The intended audience seems to be the corporate world, when the author writes about exaggerations made by exuberant NGOs (Non-Government Organizations). The Wall Street Journal informs readers in the second paragraph that Mr. Srivasta is a "pony-tailed, 39-year old college dropout."

However turning off the front page, you learn that the Wall Street Journal visited the bottling company in Kerala where Coke was accused of dumping toxic waste and found that required soil sample testing was not routinely done. As well, reporters found that while the Coca-Cola corporate website virtuously announced the results of a study that purportedly found a Kerala plant's waste material not hazardous, but that other independent studies concluded the opposite...."

It's exactly these stories that we devour, as they elucidate the complexities of issues, or at least pique our interest and stimulate further research. It's not a rule, but some of the most distorted news spews forth from short pithy sound bites, as on the FOX news network or in other Murdoch publications.

The "Old" WSJ?

Most people don't think of the Wall Street Journal as focusing on public health or environment issues, but we wrote quite a few stories over the past few years referencing Wall Street Journal articles, on diverse subjects, such as:

• Endocrine disruptors, particularly bisphenol-A found in plastics: ("Plastic Bottles- Protecting Your Baby, by the ACC")
• The oil spillage after Hurricane Katrina: (The Environment & Katrina - Slick Oil Fallout")
• Polyheme, a blood substitute product, and clinical trials being conducted by Northfield Laboratories, (Polyheme and The Newest Plastic Bracelet), and it's competing product, Hemopure (Polyheme & Hemopure: Life Savers? Products to Die For?")
• Autism research conducted by economists (Autism Research Revisted")
• The TXU buyout by KKR (TXU - Greenmail?")
• Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE) (The Companions of Mad Cows")
• CocaCola's manufacturing practices in India, especially related to pesticides and water use: (Coke, Teaching the World to Sing)
• IT project challenges in healthcare ("Kaiser IT: Whistleblowing in Internet Time")
• Potential encroachment of academic publishing by online, open source journals ("Accessible Research For All, By All- The Government, State, Universities and NGO's")

Some of the WSJ articles were extensive, like Peter Waldman's article on endocrine disruptors (one of a series). Others brought national attention to important issues, such as Thomas Burton's articles on Northfield Laboratories' clinical trials. A few were pure blog fodder, as may more often be the case in the future.

It's Not His Fault

As disappointing as this seems, the trend towards shorter enlivened content preceded Murdoch's incursion. Last January, the WSJ publisher L. Gordon Crovitz, announced changes to the paper that he called, "the first newspaper rethought for today's needs".

"..This includes more interpretation, analysis and context -- more focus on what the rush of news truly means....As Managing Editor Paul Steiger puts it, today perhaps a bit over half of our news space is devoted to exclusive, differentiated information and the rest to essentially what happened the day before. Our goal is to move to 80% exclusive news, with 20% making sure you're aware of the key developments of the previous day. ...Expect to see more forward-leaning coverage, with headlines featuring predictive and explanatory words like "will" and "means" and "why."

This is a more straight-forward admission than the crafty FOX News claim: "We Report, You Decide". The WSJ slant is obviously familiar to us. As Gordon Crowitz stated in his latest, "A Report to Our Readers", two days ago: "Opinions represent only the applicable publication's own editorial philosophies centered around the core principle of "free people and free markets".

Supporting free market ideology isn't new. It's "forward-leaning". Not to be confused with "right-leaning", or "left-leaning", but definitely, positively pro-business. Although FOX and other Murdoch publications broadcast far-right Republican political agendas, Democrats are also "forward-leaning" and pro-business -- albeit more supportive of government regulation and socially liberal values. Remember, Murdoch supports Hilary Clinton. Harper-Collins, owned by Murdoch, published John Edward's last book and provided hefty advances to the now indignant candidate.

News to Hypnotize the Masses - and No Democrat Left Behind

The WSJ also changed the format of the paper last January, because a businessman wrote in and said that when he flew first class, he would knock over his fellow passengers' orange juice, thus... "an easier-to-handle size, to a more standard width" -- New York Post-like. All the better to capture those can't miss opinions about what it all the days events mean. It's unfortunate that the first class businessmen are apparently too distracted to sort out their own opinions.

Hopefully the new Journal will continue providing a certain depth of coverage. If not maybe the analysis and opinions the editors feed to readers will help this broad new population alleviate what The Atlantic last month labeled "Cognitive Dissonance".

The Atlantic proposes a phenomenon where "rational voters", who watch certain cable stations, that feature news about the late Nicole Simpson, for instance, but not than the Iraq War, are dulled by the assuaging effect of the biased news for simpletons. As a result of the networks manufactured lack of concern, say about the Iraq war, these people are prone to support obviously failing government policies, like the war. Why did so many people re-elect Bush when his record was so bad, the article asks? Given the mass audience of WSJ readers, and the potential for the content to spiral south, The Atlantic presents an uncomfortable notion.

But maybe there aren't any "rational voters" anyway. An alternative theory is that maybe the WSJ readers aren't innocent lambs bound for a future shearing. They're self-interested voters, free market adherents both Democrat and Republican, who Murdoch has found corralled together reading the Wall Street Journal. They have already asked for and received WSJ publication changes that trend towards his 'ideals'. Perhaps he increases his personal power by adding Democrats to his audience, which coincidentally benefits his bottom line. So what, we'll ask impudently? Isn't that an accomplishment that all free-market thinkers should applaud?

EPIDEMIC!

You will be fat if friends in your social network are fat. Really?

It seems anecdotal - either completely obvious or an urban myth, but Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler claim to show proof of the pudding in their study, "The Spread of Obesity in a Large Social Network over 32 Years", published in this week's New England Medical Journal (NEJM).

The authors used data from the 'never stops giving' Framington Heart cohort, and importantly "quantified" what many people presumed to be a given, as Christakis explains in this video from Harvard's Office of Public Affairs. Apparently, they conclude, obesity spreads via social clusters which extend to three degrees of separation. Subjects who had a close friend who became obese within a particular time interval increase their own chances of becoming obese by 57%. An obese spouse would increase their chances of becoming obese by 37%, and an obese sibling would increase their chance of obesity by 40%.

Thus, the authors "document" a "higher order effect", "a spreading process through the network", "a cascade", whereby the fat begets fat, a meme perhaps, for those who like memes, or as Christakis put it, "like an epidemic, a real epidemic".

The video backdrop in Christakis's press release is a white board, heartily marked with technical scribblings. Obviously the authors slaved through the night to unveil these exciting results for us. You can make out some of the variables. T is for time I suppose, S - ok, R - sure, F is for..umm...fat? You can't gnash your teeth trying to discern the meaning of these scientific meanderings -- or is that a supply and demand curve? And what's that tic-tac-toe-game to the left of the speaker's head? Christakis helpfully explains all that we the lay audience need to know (except the white board doodles) in this 2 minute and 36 second video.

Genes, Memes, the Environment

It's fashionable these days to let genes off the hook. This study acknowledges genes but targets environmental factors -- sort of. The authors seem to ease by that too. They found that proximity doesn't necessarily influence obesity. If your next door neighbor is obese, this won't influence your own chances of obesity, and thus they say, "local" environment doesn't matter.

"Our findings that the weight gain of immediate neighbors did not affect the chance of weight gain in egos [primary subjects] and that geographic distance did not modify the effect for other types of alters (e.g., friends or siblings) helps rule out common exposure to local environmental factors as an explanation for our observations."

But what might "local" environmental factors of obesity be? Intuitively, we surmise there's nothing unique about Framingham or Massachusetts, obesity-wise. That is there's no rural diet these days that differs significantly from the the urban diet, not Southern diet radically different from a Northern Yankee diet. Sure maybe you can find grits more easily in the South, but local traditions have usually been replaced by not-so-quaint global alternatives.

The old-fashioned soda-fountain has been replaced by McDonald's. Fast-food habits aren't local, nor are habits of allaying thirst with Coca-Cola. Watching TV for 4 hours a day isn't a local habit. Nor is the propensity to drive endlessly around parking lots in a Jeep Patriot or Liberty vying for a parking space less than fifteen paces from the mall entrance.

These not-so-local habits make the jobs of photographers tasked with capturing footage for the ubiquitous evening news about alarming obesity trends easier every day.

It is a "real epidemic", but disease language only gets us so far. Sure it may be interesting to acknowledge that friends and family influence your perception of acceptable weight, as well as what you eat, your religious preferences, voting habits and almost all other choices or beliefs. But does this add meaning to the dilemma or is it just comfort food?

Spend Money, Preserve our Way of Life

In the end, the authors predict that people get fat together, therefore they'll get thin together, although in the study, there was a (to be expected) preponderance of weight gain. A seemingly obvious solution is to dump your fat friends, but the authors say no, no, no! -- don't "get rid of" any friends, since research "suggests" friends are good. What to do then, with this health fad, this obesity meme? As we all know, change is the tough part. We've already errantly tried various flawed experiments to clamp down on the trend.

Cristakis's concludes in his video that "interventions that target groups of individuals rather than sole isolated individuals are likely to be more effective". Aha! Like so many CDC recommendations? Trans-fat legislation? We'll institute more gym. Not possible? Cristakis manages to cover all bets with his third point, hedging, "to the extent that prevention or treatment of weight gain in one person works, you're more likely to contribute to avoidance of weight gain in others." Somehow I sense a collective "PHEW!" from corporations and individuals who would favor this obesity conclusion, this new social network phenomenon, because it requires no policy change.

This is a win, win, win type of study. The media snuggles up to this stuff like cats to catnip despite the very thin veneer of revelation. Weight loss enterprises will smile and thrive on the news. The study won't alarm fast food companies, since it hand waves in other directions. And finally, smart, self-promotional research that it is, presented via video press release, it of course suggests future research. Some scientists fret about the likelihood of not being able to repeat the result, given the uniqueness of the Framingham cohort. But can't intrepid investigators recruit chubby-faced cabals from Facebook to study perhaps? Can't epidemiology take advantage of these free-wheeling information yielding Web 2.0 types? Who needs nurses?

Of course, we've all been holding our breaths, waiting for a breakthrough in the obesity problem. Cristakis adeptly delivers, winding down his 156 seconds by hopefully noting: "the amount of money you spend in helping a person lose weight has much more benefit than you might have imagined". Waddle on then friends, the obesity solution is around the bend, just keep shopping.

(Image source: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Soda_jerk_NYWTS.jpg)

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Related posts at Acronym Required:

Common Sense Food in Schools
"Why So Fat? It's Systemwide",
"Childhood Obesity, The American Way"
"Survey Says: Pop's Out Drugs are In"
"News of Lightweight Study: 'Obese Should Walk Slowly'"
"Coke: Teaching the World to Sing"

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Flying Tedium

Sometimes you forget about the tedium of modern day air travel because the destination turns out to be so educational, enlightening, adventuresome, or fun. Your meetings, regardless of their purpose or outcome -- obligatory, joyful, fruitful, or entertaining -- redeem your travel efforts. But there's no denying that air travel can be tedious.

In previous eras travel at least required attention to your surroundings. Compared to a trek through the Amazon in the early 1900's, the riverboat tour today promising a piranha supper is no doubt cozier, but today's Homo sapiens vigor pales next to our swashbuckling, nature enduring ancestors. The intellectual or physical engagement once necessary for travel has been commercially scrubbed from most of today's mind numbing excursions.

U.S. airline travel offers the ultimate somnolent experience, with all the industrial efficiency required to fly 30,000 commercial flights a day in the US. Save the occasional blunder, air travel has been reduced from exotic to a mundane necessary evil. Sure, you don't want your flying experience to be "exciting". But we've been systematically trivialized to mindless beings who welcome the airline's beverage service with saucer eyed eagerness.

We put Pavlov's drooling dogs to shame with our anticipation of that one-ounce packet of salty peanuts doled out on a precise timetable; barring of course, the unforeseen "water landing" that would ultimately illuminate the utility or futility of grasping for our seats-cum-flotation-devices while the plane plummets towards the water at unfathomable speeds.

It's like being anesthetized during an operation -- you generally wake up alive, although there's a palpable risk that you may die -- but in that case you'll most likely succumb without too much of a fuss. Once we're sufficiently numbed for the flight, with all good fortune the plane will eventually bump us out of our induced coma by landing on the runway, whereupon everyone will finally breath in one deep, enlivening breath of recirculated oxygen.

No matter how much entertainment one arms oneself with, airline travel can bore you silly. My last flight was delayed for two hours before take off. The captain's associate wisely allowed the passengers to disembark and mill about "close to the gate", and so two hundred passengers promptly lined up at a nearby concession stand. A single employee tore his hair out trying to fill the espresso and lemonade orders of agitated passengers, one drop at a time. So those of us at the end of the line, unable to discern any progress at such a distance, abandoned our quest to quench our thirst and whiled away the hours on the plane devouring our scarce reading materials.

After take-off, non-advantageous wind patterns delayed our flight further. The Linux in-flight entertainment system crashed and the self-appointed IT guru/flight attendant stared, forever, plaintively, at the system console, not daring to reboot it for fear of irking those who were watching the movie. Time wasters like collaborative trivial pursuit were therefore out of the question and so eight hours into my flight, you might see how fighting off malaria and wild animals in the Amazon seemed preferable.

This may all have been an elaborate airline ruse to get passengers to purchase absurd items from SkyMall magazine (the link is to the amusing song, not the catalog), but instead I decided to dissect the contents of my eagerly awaited "snack pack". That offered, if not nourishment, an introduction to that mysterious subject of food science.

Snack Packs

Remember when airlines tried to "...distinguish themselves from other competitors and entice passengers with their in-flight cuisine"? I don't. I wasn't around when airplanes meandered to their destinations at a leisurely 100mph, when "pilots handed out boxed lunches to passengers as they boarded", or when airlines were so hard pressed for business they vied for customers with "sophisticated menus and elaborate meal service programs." But I've dabbled in the more recent meals of the last decade, the veal parmigiana barely identifiable from the chicken Provencale or the lasagna, all gray slabs of something with tomato sauce. These offerings, long a dependable topic for water cooler griping, are now also history, relative luxuries purged in recent airline budget cuts and operational restructuring.

The least promising part of the snack pack I was assigned was the "Pasteurized Process Cheese Spread Havarti-type Flavor" in the .75 oz plastic container. This is a substance from unknown sources that has the texture and look of condensed milk. It in no way resembles Havarti, even though they don't set the bar too high since Havarti itself, that semi-soft cheese developed on a 19th century "experimental farm", has few notable characteristics. These so-called "pasteurized process cheese spreads" generally consist of about 10-20 ingredients including various milk products like whey and skim milk, along with a smorgasbord of preservatives, and are usually of undefined nutritional value or detriment. A related product, "Tuscan" cheese spread, suggests that if you wish to know the nutritional content you can snail mail a company called "Lactoprot", in Blue Mounds, WI, for the information -- hope your not anxious for the news. In the meantime, go ahead, you adventure seekers, dip your crackers into the effluent if you dare.

The accompanying crackers in .5 oz plastic wrappers offer nowhere near the entertainment value of the runny, unspreadable spread, but do contain a miserly 60-80 calories. All of these plastic wrapped items are arranged in a square plastic container that is wrapped in yet another layer of plastic, along with a plastic bottle holding 8.5 ounces of water. A tiny box of 30 or so raisins is included on special days.

Airlines realize that although passengers may complain, they're excruciatingly bored, buckled in shoulder to shoulder in those knee binding seats. Therefore they'll alight with glee on any old plastic snack pack and gobble it down with the voracious enthusiasm of a squirrel eating an acorn on a telephone wire. Look down a row and you can see the line of passengers bent covetously over their snack packs, ripping into the plastic wrap, bits of plastic falling to the left and right of the meal tray. They dismantle layer after layer of plastic, eager prying fingers searching for a tiny little morsel of cracker buried in the plastic wrap. Then they quickly move on, deftly unearthing the next plastic encased scrap of processed food. When the passengers are done with the plastic unwrapping entertainment, the cabin crew circulates with plastic bags collecting the plastic wrappers and the plastic bottles.

Meal service used to require enduring the appetite arresting slurping and slobbering of tens of surrounding passengers. Now it sounds more like the packing area of a UPS mail room. The American Plastics Council has certainly captured the hearts and minds of the airline industry.

Airline Recycling

If you've flown recently you were no doubt concerned about the environmental impact of your flight. To eschew your guilt perhaps you offset your flight's carbon emissions, after all you can't go too far on the internet without bumping into an opportunity to do so. Less appreciated is the plastic waste we generate staving off hunger and boredom by gobbling up the 200-300 calorie snack pack. A tiny source of nutrients for a heap of plastic waste.

In December, 2006, the Natural Resource Defense Council (NRDC), released a report "Trash Landings: How Airlines and Airports Can Clean Up Their Recycling Programs", which documented the waste generated at airports and from flights. Did you know?

The airline industry threw out 9,000 tons of plastic in 2004, and enough newspapers and magazines to bury a football field more than 230 feet deep. Nationwide, U.S. airports generated 425,000 tons of waste in 2004 -- a figure expected to increase nearly 45 percent by 2015. Each passenger today leaves behind 1.3 pounds of trash, the researchers found. Seventy five percent of this waste is recyclable or compostable. Yet the industry-wide recycling rate is 20 percent or less -- one third less than the U.S. average as a whole.

The NRDC report suggests ways to revamp the recycling and waste programs of airlines and airports. You yourself can decline the snack pack. Trust me, this particular "Havarti-type" spread doesn't capture the very ordinary essence of the Havarti you may love, either the original flavor, or the cumin, dill, cranberry, garlic, jalapeno types valiantly introduced by flavor advocates. You would look so noble declining the snack pack. What if half the passengers on every flight declined the snack pack? How easy would that be?

To escape global warming you need to buy a new car. The automobile industry reminds me of this every day. In reality when I drive my "old" fuel efficient car, I end up on the highway, snagged in traffic with thousands of other cars. But all the car advertisements insist that if I would only buy a shiny brand new Ford or Chevy or Dodge, I wouldn't be stuck in that traffic jam. I'd be driving on the open road, in the mountains or the desert, not a car in sight, no smog, only the sunset baking the auburn canyons and the glint of sun off the new wax -- just me, the car, nature, (and my sunglasses).

Really, I seldom drive because I don't need to. I love to walk and I actually enjoy public transportation, with all its jostling and smooshing together of humanity. It's also a pragmatic choice, this "alternative" transportation. There's a lot of traffic congestion in my neighborhood, which at peak hours, involves mostly high-strung, work-ready parents dropping their kids off at school. Their idling SUVs jam the intersections for blocks. Each parent in turn deposits their child at school, with the lunch, and the homework projects, the gym bag, and the well-wishes. This inch-worming, stop and go and stop traffic wildly irritates the workmen and FedEx drivers. How and they deliver goods and services on time? People become frustrated and irritable and resort to crazy maneuvers and horn-blowing. So for me, it's often faster, cheaper and more relaxing to take the bus.

Sometimes when I'm out for a walk or run, I have to pass this restless line of SUVs and trucks and I try to hold my breath like I'm swimming under water until I get past the idling vehicles and short-tempered drivers, the restless children, and the impatient truck driver who wants to swerve around the whole line of cars and get through the intersection but then at the last minute -- can't. When I finally pass all the carbon monoxide emitting vehicles I eagerly gulp whatever air ends up in that space.

I should worry about the quality of that breath, I'm sure. How well am I oxygenating my lungs as an uncommon pedestrian in a sea of cars? In order to be a good citizen in a time of global warming, Time Magazine says you should live in the city. But if I were to take this advice to heart, would I become a naive martyr for the cause? Cities are polluted, and if I walk or take public transportation don't I make myself even more vulnerable to everyone else's choices to drive?

Plus, the new-car ads constantly tug at me, telling me to ignore reality and instead envision cars as a sort of personal utopia. Leggy models have long since been replaced by the rest of nature, and now I have confidence that if I buy any Infiniti, or Volvo, or Saab, the new vehicle will swiftly transport me from the smoggy present to a pristine, otherworldly mountain road. There I will switchback along, zooming past snowbanks and negotiating slick spots with the surest of handling, surrounded by the freshest air, forever warm and safe in the arms of mother nature.

Marketing with animals is effective marketing, and automobile marketers don't shy away from piling on animals as well as nature. Infiniti ads once featured woodpeckers that flew into the car to peck at the wood on the console. I'm not sure what happened to the birds, but I remind myself that it's not only the Queen of England, with her privilege and idle time, her Landrover and a vast territory of heaths and heathers, who can see a fourteen-point buck in the countryside. There's nothing to stop me from doing the same. I can purchase a new Subaru from my local dealer any day of the week and crash through beautiful forests in four wheel drive comfort. Then, according to one Subaru ad, a deer will emerge magically from the forest, stand next to my windshield and gaze at me appreciatively, the two of us, bonded by nature and my new car.

With all the marketing talk of blue skies, I'm always convinced that there's a very very environmentally hospitable, economical car just around the bend. I turn each magazine page expectantly, hoping to see this dream car of mine.

You would think my dream car would materialize, they've been "working" on it for decades. The time is ripe. News articles are suddenly unanimous, definitive and grim about global warming. Newpapers and online news shows feature photos of cars, bumper to bumper, in cities obscured by brown smog, with people on scooters wearing gas masks, sometimes coughing. But the automobile industry still natters away with the very same antithetical vision -- large gas-guzzling vehicles zooming silently through pristine, untouched nature. And how did they get that Jeep to the top of that precious precipitous canyon, so much cliff and sky, without a trace of car noise or exhaust?

At some point perhaps, we can be swayed, along with the auto industry, to conjure up any vision, no matter how absurd. To wit, you can place you and your imaginary new car into a scene from "An Inconvenient Truth" without a trace of remorse or irony. A recent magazine ad did this very thing, featuring an Aston Martin Roadster parked in front of a glacier, similar to Grey Glacier and Lago Grey, bits of ice floating by the car. (You can see the ad in this PDF. )

Of course the Aston Martins is the classic luxury car-- sporty, fast, and expensive; you would need to pay to realize this dream. The flagship "Vanquish" model lists for $255,000. It gets about 11mpg in the city and 17mpg in the country, but notably has outstanding horsepower and reaches speeds of 165 to 225 hundred miles per hour. All the better to blow by glaciers with. Naturally, for that price you have your choice of leather seat color, from among hundreds of nature's finest shades, including Falcon Grey, Kestrel Tan, Quail Grey, Red Fox, Sandstorm, Shark Blue, Bison Brown. I think their "Arctic Blue" succinctly complements the glacier theme. By immersing yourself in such dissonance, carbon credits would be a distant afterthought.

We know better than to think that the Vanquish is melting earth's glaciers, and to be honest, given the chance by some benevolent spendthrift, we'd probably be all too happy to take the Roadster for a spin. But while emissions soar, fuel economy standards remain the same, decade after decade. The auto industries fights tooth and nail for the right pollute, and we the people of habit collude with polluters by resisting change. The automobile industry, like an aging Faulknerian belle, forever insists on miring us in their beloved automobile myths. But there must be some breaking point. The further they attempt to pull us into the wilderness, the greater our cognitive dissonance. Then at some point we'll collectively snap and insist on change, insist on a new reality for transportation.

Many scientists have an intimate relationship with deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). They analyze DNA extensively and see meaning in inscrutable patterns of As, Cs, Gs and Ts. They study the nucleic acid structure of gene sequences that code proteins and determine the organism's development. They manipulate code to understand the mechanisms by which DNA replicates, self repairs, and occasionally goes awry. They've cleverly devised DNA computing and nanotechnology and have discovered things like "Zinc-finger protein-targeted gene regulation: Genomewide single-gene specificity". But scientists might still be baffled by this:

"Remixed here by "cutting edge names" such as Planningtorock and Rex The Dog, the song's DNA is spliced crudely into four mutated clones that warp the spectral waltz of the original into demented disco".¹

That's because while scientists toiled away in their labs, night after day, the rest of the world moved on to synthesize its own DNA. We may know deoxyribonucleic acid, but everyone else is defining modern DNA. True, other terms attained fame outside the lab. "Symbiosis" and "chimera" and the most annoying "meme", all served multidisciplinary roles and fits of popularity, but the use of "DNA" has spiraled out of control.

Deoxyribonucleic acid was always exciting to scientists, but the rest of the world largely left deoxyribonucleic acid to labs and lurid murder trials. For years it was pressed between glass plates and painstakingly sequenced in one organism after another. Then one day deoxyribonucleic acid became DNA, that sexy, mysterious be-all-end-all, ubiquitous highfalutin cool stuff. Beyond biology, people suddenly began to use the term in ways that had nothing at all to do with deoxyribonucleic acid. DNA became central to everything and now when you see the acronym it may mean anything or nothing.

Reporters revel in the idea that DNA is the central component of life. They even manage to elevate its importance. Here's one reporter's take on deoxyribonucleic acid:

"Bulbs in spring epitomize the season. They are kernels of DNA-- collective memory -- sprouting into plants we already know but, always slightly different..."²;

As one reporter elevates DNA to a prima donna role in glorious springtime, another cavalierly plunges DNA to impossibly mundane lows:

"There's a reason no one ever waxes rhapsodic over "that new fridge smell." You open the doors and you're hit square in the nose with a hideous, DNA-perverting carcinogenic stink."³

From those off-hand nature/nurture interpretations of deoxyribonucleic acid, DNA can become much, much more in the hands of an able reporter, author, or marketing guru. Even in national and international politics deoxyribonucleic acid becomes a sort of anthropological bureaucratic key, a way to understand official decisions:

• "The attachment to Washington is embedded too deeply in the DNA of Britain's political establishment for a new prime minister to risk an open breach..."⁴
• "This wording stemmed from the commission's core DNA, which prompts it to act on behalf of consumers by embracing competition, localism and diversity deemed to be "in the public interest"....Now, after XM and Sirius have fought ferociously for 10 years, they come on bended knee before policymakers..."⁵

Deoxyribonucleic acid adds panache to corporate name, especially for creative or design companies like PixelDNA or DNA Creative. The latter espouses that "the function of DNA is to define the genetic information that forms your Corporate Identity".

There are probably fewer books about DNA in the "Science" section of Amazon then in "Business and Investing". There are books devoted to every sort of "DNA" imaginable popularized with DNA laden titles: Financial DNA, investing DNA, entrepreneurial DNA, trader DNA, organizational DNA, decision DNA, the DNA Selling Method, the DNA of Leadership,the DNA of Marketing....

Marketing, especially, has discovered this most ubiquitous, malleable acronym. As DNA encodes the genetics of sea urchins but also elephants, so marketing teams press it into diverse roles, from defining multinational banks to health food company philosophy.

• '"..It was part of our DNA and a great foundation,'' said Catherine P. Bessant, who introduced the ''Higher Standards'' tagline four years ago when she served as Bank of America's chief marketing officer."⁶
• "Wild Oats employees are in for an entirely new kind of CEO....parts of Mackey's bio are practically shared DNA in the natural foods industry - a philosophy major who dropped out of college, attire that includes Tevas...."⁷

You probably thought motor vehicles were all about metal and plastic and oil and new car smell and just in time manufacturing -- how wrong.

• "With the balance of rear-wheel drive and the availability of V-8 power, the G8 represents another step in Pontiac 's commitment to its performance DNA."⁸
• ".."The all-new Lancer GS will crush all the myths about compact sedans with its inherited Evo DNA."⁹
• ''Our competitor is really on a strategy of re-branding Daewoo, but we're consistent on the Ford DNA of great driving dynamics.¹⁰
• "...tempt[ing] the buying public by unveiling a prototype street motorcycle inspired by the spirit of Flat Track racing and the XR 750. This XR 1200 prototype, they claim, comes from DNA from the XR line"¹¹

Moving on to the world of entertainment, the acronym's truly twisted meaning becomes even more incongruous. Music, you know, is all about DNA, and in this context it defines a certain je ne sais quois....

• "The six-track collection of slicker-than-your-average-indie boasts hooks as chiseled as the band's jaw lines. It's glam-infused pop-rock that shares melodic DNA with the likes of Placebo and Bowie."¹²
• "But many watching the Chicks fall from country grace were not surprised by the backlash. Country music has conservatism in its DNA, right?"¹³
• "The songs contained on (`Meet the Beatles!')," he says, "are part of the collective DNA of the Smithereens."¹⁴

Even a diamond isn't what you think it is, a rock chipped out of a cave, without deoxyribonucleic acid: "the Montblanc logo, with a sprinkling of diamonds, takes centre stage in the design DNA... the intricacies..the complexity of the Montblanc Star diamond..."¹⁵

Scientists have been through the whole one gene coded one protein thing and and back again, but the media has internalized some central dogma about DNA. As one reporter put it in an article titled, "The Essence of Being¹⁶":

"Our tastes, styles, values and choices in careers, relationships, homes, cars, music, books, TV, movies, hobbies, loves, hates and interests all reflect our archetypes. We may have been unconscious of the fact that our archetypal DNA was making these decisions, but they do[sic] influence every moment. Becoming conscious of this information is transformational".

I confess, though always impressed by the powers of DNA, I underestimated its omnipotence. I missed that my "holistic" "archetypal DNA" was making these decisions on my behalf. How shocking -- am I transformed?

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1.) "Bad Jamie's rumor mill" The Boston Herald February 23, 2007 2.) "This Week" The San Francisco Chronicle, February 18, 2007 3.) "Modern fridges, explained - somewhat" Minneapolis Star, Tribune MN, February 23, 2007 4.) "The affair is over as history leaves Bush and Blair behind" Financial Times, February 23, 2007 5.) Reject their request, USA Today February 23, 2007 6.) "Bank of America Tagline Has Run Its Course" The New York Times February 20, 2007 7.) "Whole Foods CEO doesn't back down" Rocky Mountain News February 23, 2007 8.) "Pontiac and Saturn will add new models developed overseas" The Oregonian February 17, 2007 9.) "The Evolution of Mitsubishi" The Toronto Sun February 18, 2007, 10.) "Mondeo firms for a return" The Courier Mail, February 17, 2007 11.) "The shape of things to come" The Irish Times January 24, 2007 12.) "The Guide: music" The Guardian (London) February 24, 2007 13.) "When country went right: Country music wasn't always married to conservative politics. It happened in the Nixon era." (American Prospect) in Chicago Sun Times February 23, 2007 Friday 14.) Love them do: Frontman Pat Dinizio is psyched about the smithereens' new beatles project Chicago Sun Times January 7, 2007 15.) Power jewelery; Montblanc and Roberto Coin have launched their jewelery collections in Singapore recently. The Business Times (Singapore) February 24, 2007 16.) Sunday Mail (South Australia) February 18, 2007

The Glamor, The Glory...Show-Biz for Scientists

Tuesday's Golden Globes award show was a far cry from the science lab, with all the glamor, the extensive grooming, and those flammable flowing getups. As the announcer opened an envelope, each newly anointed star's rendition of stunned joy seemed tearier and more heartfelt then the one before. And have you ever heard so many "thank-yous" in so few hours? Name after name blurted out in hyperventilated appreciation, fleetingly unsurpassed. Superlatives for hundreds of people in each production.

Acronym Required wrote a couple of months ago about Tony Blair's proposal that scientists should be treated more like movie stars. One thing is clear. If scientists aspire to the silver screen they should review their notions of credit giving.

You may scoff about the idea of scientists in show business. True, the closest thing to science at the Golden Globes this year was Sacha Baron Cohen's anatomically explicit tale of his suffering during the filming of Borat. And the most ambitious attempt to conflate science happened in our own little group of fans, when one person thought Bill Nighy, was actually Bill Nye the Science Guy. Not quite. But while comingling scientists and the cinematic arts may seem incongruous to you, some groups, like the U.S. military, think that engaging scientists in movies is just the ticket.

"America, it turns out, is suffering from a science and engineering shortage", explained the Christian Science Monitor, a couple of weeks ago. To change this situation, the Department of Defense is sponsoring a three day movie scripting course called the Catalyst Workshop, at the American Film Institute (AFI). The Monitor says that ideal science movies portray "authentic and appealing science protagonists". The goal is to "engage society (especially young people) in the activity of science", according to AFI's website.

Myth Bases

If using scientists to write movie scripts still sounds over the top to you, then Catalyst Workshop explains why it makes sense, starting with helpful pointers about the similarities between movie script writers and scientists:

"Most scientists already possess some fundamental skills applicable to the film making process. Successful professionals in the scientific community often have excellent writing skills and they frequently juggle projects as writers do, working on several disparate projects simultaneously. And scientists, like writers, often must manage time well to accomplish complex,creative goals."

Of course "managing time well" is not unique to scientists and writers. The skill is necessary for many jobs, including seasonal Park Aide/Maintenance Workers in the South Dakota Department of Game, Fish and Parks, positions in customer service at Burlington Coat Factory, as well as all other entry-level positions. The Indonesian government counsels that the time management skills are critical to being a soccer fan in that country.

For a more nuanced analysis of the aptitude of scientists for script writing, look no further than the New York Times, which published an article on the screen-writing workshop back in August 2005. Scientists, they said:

"... search[] for the unknown, they're compensated very minimally, they're going on blind faith that what they're searching for is going to pay off. And film making is exactly the same way." ("Pentagon's New Goal: Put Science Into Scripts", 08/04/05)

A grittier assessment perhaps. However, one 2004 Catalyst workshop participant interviewed by the NY Times was straightforward about her goals: "to sell a comedy built around a Bridget Jones-like biochemist who applies the scientific method to her hunt for a mate"..

Hmmm....that's confusing. Bridget Jones, if you recall, was the main character in Bridget Jones Diary, the one who spent her time --when she wasn't chasing the misogynistic cad played by Hugh Grant-- scribbling in her diary her daily weight and her cigarette and alcohol consumption (lab notes?). Bridget Jones appeared slightly more scientist-like when a friend asked about El Niño, which is the tropical Pacific ocean-atmosphere changes, and warming fluctuations that cause global weather disturbances. Bridget replied blithely: "It's a blip. Latin music's on its way out."

Maybe I misunderstand the military's "authentic" vision for science protagonists and stories. But perhaps it's explained on Day One of the workshop in the "Myth base for storytelling" section.

Better Science Fiction

Participants in the Catalyst workshop are actually "hardcore, PhD-laden, lab-certified scientists", said the Monitor. Intrigued, we looked at the 2006 AFI workshop application that was on the website a few weeks ago, (now removed) to see how the AFI gauged hardcore-ness. The toughest question was a fill-in, asking for the scientist's "Science/Engineering Specialty_____________". Not very "hard-core" we think.

Indeed, none of the questions seem like they would derail either scientists or non-scientists. "What's the best science movie or TV show you have ever seen? What's the worst?" The AFI application offers no hint as to what qualifies as a "good" science film. In 2006, the application was a mere 92 words, dwarfed by a 560 word legal agreement. But, for me, the worst science film -- after which I avoided the genre like the plague -- was Outbreak. Stunningly bad. Dramatic images of slow motion spittle arching out of infected air travelers' mouths following cartoon-like, microbe laden sneezes.

Since this workshop is Pentagon sponsored, you have to suspect that these "best" and "worst" questions might be a weed-out tool. Catalyst Workshop participants surveyed for the 2005 New York Times article seemed unanimous in their opinion that The Day After Tomorrow was the worst science film they'd ever seen.

It's hard to deny how artistically horrible that movie was. But the premise? A scientist predicts global warming and everyone ignores him, a decision that precipitates disastrous results? Solid. But what if the Pentagon screened for opinions like that of one viewer, who wrote on a Yahoo movie comment board, that the only reason to see Day After...was if you liked to make fun of Dick Cheney and George Bush, since Hollywood had created an "unabashed head-butt to the Bush administration's environmental policy". My, my, my.

Can Geeks Write Better Scripts?

Might a few "Ph.D laden" scientists help engage viewers? It may not be such a crazy idea. Local news stations could recruit them to aid science reportage. This might improve segments like one I watch last week on my local news station. It was a piece on research published in Nature Biotechnology, about researchers who had found stem cells in amniotic fluid. The announcer relayed this exciting news to viewers in a monotone, while a montage of various laboratory activities played across the screen. First there was the Eppendorf tube on a shaker, then a hand pipetting fluid with a multichannel pipetter, then a tube being removed from a -86C freezer -- complete with dry ice wafting across the frame. Visually engaging props perhaps but completely unrelated to the story.

This would be comparable to doing a piece on baking rye bread, and while the announcer talked about preparing the sourdough starter, in the background showing various other household activities that the producer deemed more visually and audibly exciting. I can imagine the producer saying: "Watching rising dough is boring, can we get a little vacuuming footage? How about if we discharge the safety valve on that fire extinguisher and get some white powder filling a room? Can we flush a toilet, wwhishhh! then film the water swirling round and round"?

Would this nonsense be helped by an infusion of scientists in movie-making? Would this improve peoples' understanding of science issues? Or should we accept that 95% of the population won't know that toilet flushing has nothing to do with baking bread, and will also think that a multichannel pipetter is neat, and by extension so are stem cells? Is this bad for science? Is science fiction news bad for science? I

But, isn't the Pentagon's project ridiculous, you might ask? Only a week ago the New York Times reported on a funding crisis in science due to congressional budget delays. It would be "disastrous" for American science, as one official at the American Physical Society put it. How could movies help resolve systemic problems like this, and why would the military use taxpayers' money there instead of for more fundamental problems? We can't say.

But there you have it. Scientists are essentially cheap labor. Their time management skills might be useful, especially if they have on hand an appealing and "authentic" script already written, so that they can effectively utilize days two and three, of the Catalyst Workshop, "Story and Pitch", and "Pitch Meetings".

There's a lot of buzz around a recent web publication by professors of business, policy, and economics at Cornell University and Purdue University, who theorize that allowing children aged 0-3 to watch television causes autism. The authors measured TV exposure times to annual precipitation to come up with their theories, which they outline in 67 pages of analysis and findings, in order to conclude:

"Hence, our results suggest that early childhood television watching, or whatever is the trigger driving our finding of a positive correlation between autism rates and precipitation and autism rates and cable, is an important factor in autism diagnoses both from statistical and absolute standpoints." [emphasis ours]

Sixty-seven pages for the "whatever is the trigger" theory? Scientists may question the ambiguous conclusion, but should they actually take heed? Maybe the researchers are right. Maybe more science research should be done by economists, policy and business professors. Researchers struggle to understand the causes of autism. They undertake extensive studies to elucidate reasons behind the increasing rates of diagnosis. Their studies focus, one by one, on the dizzying number of potential genetic and environmental triggers for autism.

The authors show how to cut this tedium by parsing the plethora of possibilities and inputs with their special brand of academic/business/economic/management Jujitsu. They derive a simple conclusion: TV viewing causes autism. For whatever reason, this theory eluded scientists, public health experts and physicians for decades. Worse still, according to these brazen science barons, even "the possibility" was "ignored" by researchers.

The methods may seem unconventional by science standards, but by simply ignoring the time intensive processes scientists habitually undertake, these authors stride forward with unprecedented speed to reach conclusions and propose both future research and policy. We sifted through their study aiming to convince ourselves of their theory. Could we resolve autism by reducing TV time? How simple, how easy -- what a perfect solution. Why didn't these new kids on the block show up earlier to let the air out of the tires of the tall truck stuck under the short bridge?

Of course, we don't for a moment pretend to understand all their research, we've only dabbled in any of these subjects - autism, economics, business or policy (we didn't even have TV growing up). But here we'll take the authors' cues and audaciously deconstruct their methodology. Step by step, we'll show how we think they did it and how you too, can arrive at such compelling conclusions. When we don't understand their methods or magic we'll wave our hands, skip over the details, bluff, and make a joke of it all.

1) First, disarm your readers by acknowledging that there are many possible causes for autism. Continue to do this throughout the study, but shed doubt on these possibilities to bolster support for your own theory. Choose one simple theory, take possession of it, make it your theory, then without hesitation, *prove it*. The authors declare that TV is the environmental trigger for autism. Sure, autism could be genetically linked or triggered by toxins or air pollution. There are hundreds of possibilities. But trivialize these briefly and dismissively en route to proving your own theory.

2) Slight other theories about autism by pointing out flaws in decades worth of scientific research and citing only a handful of studies. Say that genetics is "discredited". Say the air pollution links are "intriguing" but perhaps "families who are more prone to have autistic children for other reasons, tend to locate in areas characterized by higher pollution levels." A well known theory suggests that there is a perception of higher rates of autism today because more sensitive diagnosis methods exist now than in the past. Seed doubts about this by saying that researchers have "mixed conclusions".

3) Having quickly acknowledged then dispelled previous scientific research, move on to explain the rational behind your theory, calling your impressions simply, "Four reasons to suspect TV"

• First: California Data: ("Historical data are not very good".) The US Department of Education only changed requirements that effected autism reporting in the 1990's, making rises in the incidence of the condition difficult to discern. However California passed laws in 1969 requiring the establishment of service centers to provide services for developmentally disabled children. Rates of autism at these centers increased during this time. So did TV watching. Aha.

  But this could be explained by increased numbers of diagnoses of autism, which caused more parents to visit service centers. Or the fact that there actually were service centers could have, on its own, led to the increase. Increases in toxins or pollution would cause increase visits. Fortunately, you already disbanded with these possibilities, no need to revisit them. Autism rates have increased in the past decades, most people agree, and now you've linked this to television viewing. It never hurts to reinforce your point, so cite some redundant data regardless of its relevance, like the increased sales of VCRs, cable deregulation, the rise of Nickleodeon and Disney, and increases in the number of television sets households.

• Second: Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). You found one paper that showed a correlation between ADHD and television viewing. Note that there were no controls and no proven cause and effect in this paper, but say that the results "are suggestive", "of interest", and "certainly suggestive". [We'd suggest that since ADHD begins with "A" and autism begins with "a" too, TV could cause both.]
• Third: High risk kids "engage" with TV: Cite a study showing that children were more likely to become autistic if they were at "high risk" for autism, defined as those who had a sibling with autism. You previously discounted the genetic link, but whatever. These children were found to "disengage" more slowly from TV than their "low-risk" peers therefore you theorize that they get more TV exposure and more autism.
• Fourth: The Amish. There are low rates of autism in the Amish, according to a reporter. Acknowledge that this is sort of speculative, but say that "even with all these caveats", the reporter's "findings provide intriguing evidence". Use this type of word liberally throughout your paper: "evidence" (30 times), "data" (85 times), and "results" (64 times).

4) Having explained the reasons you suspect the link, explain your methodology. You chose three states, California, Washington, and Oregon, because of their "high precipitation variability". This allows comparisons between areas of low precipitation and high precipitation with corresponding autism rates. Explain the onerous county and state data collection process that no doubt stymied other researchers. For instance of the three states, Washington was "unwilling to provide autism data". "Oregon only reported the county autism count when it was greater than or equal to ten". Since the data are so inconsistent between states, counties, cohorts, explain how you resolved this. For example:

"For Oregon we use age-specific counts by county in 2005 and then construct autism rates by dividing by the corresponding county-level age-specific population taken from the 2000 census. For the case of California we focus on cohorts born between 1982 and 1997 (vs cohorts born between 1987 and 1999 for Oregon) and use the county autism count in the year a birth cohort was eight yrs old...dividing by that year's corresponding county-level age-specific population....For example, for children born in LA county in 1990 we use LA county's autism count of eight year olds in 1998...."

Continue like this, variable by variable, Black and Hispanic coefficients, income coefficients, education coefficients, sex of interviewee coefficients, household type, child gender, etc., paragraph after paragraph, page after page. This helps shed light on the morass of inputs and the challenges that have made conclusive answers so difficult, but also potentially increases the *wow* factor of your paper. Say that you've considered all of this and controlled for every nuance.

5.) Since the reader may not be following you at this point, model the data, as any economist would, into four formulas included below.

• For example, this formula represents the television viewing of a child measured in precipitation at the respondent's location on the day of the survey, and other variables:

  "TVi= β₁+β₂PRCP_i + β₃PRCP_i²+ β₄X_i+ <βZ_i+&epsilon_i"

• Most of this is fairly intuitive.

  "AUT_k=&beta₁+&beta₂PRCP+&epsilon_k", and

  "AUT_k=β₁+β₂PRCP_k+β₃logPOP_k+ β₄INC_k + β₅REG_k+ β₆HISP_k+β₇BLK_k+ β₈IND_k+&epsilon_k"

  Here in the second and third formulas "AUTk denotes the 2005 autism rate among school-aged children in county k. PRCPk is the average precipitation level in county k between 1987 and 2001, logPOPk is the logarithm of count k's total population in 2000, INCk is county k's per capita GNP in 1999, HIS and BLK and IND represent Hispanic and Black and Indigenous children...."

• Finally, this fourth formula represents pooled data between states for another look at the relationships:

  "AUT_k,b=β₁+β₂PRCP_k,b+β₃TIME_b+ β₄logPOP_k + β₅INC_k+ β₆REG_k+β₇HISP_k,b+ β₈BLK_k,b+ β₉IND_k,b+&epsilon_k,b"

6.) Now that you've modeled all of this like Play-Doh, you can restate your conclusion, which unsurprisingly, was your theory:

"There is a positive relationship between autism and precipitation in Oregon and Washington, but no [sic] in California...We present the precipitation and autism maps for each state[..] It is clear from the maps that there is a very strong correlation in each state between precipitation and autism."

Each state except California. Ouch. Tackle the conundrum that California doesn't fit the theory. The map shows that where it doesn't rain there are still high rates of autism--well it's more complicated -- higher than the median for the state. Suggest that there could be other factors, such as an "urban density", concurring with high autism rates which might make precipitation levels irrelevant. [This theory would also fit the OR and WA data]. Manipulate the data to erase this aberrant possibility by using the "fixed-effects specification". Just observe that autism rates vary as precipitation deviates from the "average". Does this prove that there aren't other inputs? Say it does. Now you've accounted for that whole "urban density" issue as well as other possible perturbations. The "omitted variables problem" is eliminated, phew, therefore California fits your theory.

7.) Suggest that one potential problem with this data is that indoor activities in general, not just TV watching, may account for higher rates of autism in places with greater precipitation. If this were the case, any indoor toxin may result in higher autism rates since TV time is coincidental to indoor time. Explain that you've resolved this by comparing Pennsylvania and California cable subscription rates with autism rates. Let the reader wonder why you chose these two states. Ignore precipitation for this analysis. Does it matter, for instance, that that most of Pennsylvania has higher rates of precipitation than California?

Model your findings for this: "AUT_k,b=&beta₁+&beta₂CAB_k,b+&beta₃TIME_k+&beta₄POP_k+&beta₂INC_k+&beta₆REG_k+&beta₇HISP_k+&beta₈BLK_k+&beta₉IND_k+ε_k"

Say that increased cable subscriptions correlate with increased rates autism. Does this prove that indoor toxins are irrelevant? Or has increased technology coincidentally increased with autism? Never mind. Say indoor toxins are irrelevant.

8.) Pull together your conclusions and state your theory again: Television watching causes autism "or whatever is the trigger driving our finding of a positive correlation between autism rates and precipitation and autism rates and cable". Humbly consider the flaws in your research, ie:

"because we do not provide a direct test of the effects of television watching on autism, we do not consider our results to be definitive evidence in favor of the television viewing as trigger hypothesis."[emphasis ours]

9.) Now that you've duly noted potential flaws, you can once again forge ahead to state with confidence that autism is caused by cable viewing. Declare that cable TV viewing causes "seventeen percent of growth in autism". Assert that TV watching due to precipitation causes "just under forty percent..of diagnoses".

Then tell everyone else how to proceed. Describe some experiments that scientists can do. Make policy recommendations for the American Academy of Pediatricians (who already recommend that kids under 2 don't watch TV).

10.) Publish this paper on the internet ahead of extensive peer review. Disperse the information widely in the popular press. People will be intrigued, interested, scared, nervous, possibly guilt-ridden. Sure, they may note the problems with the research, or they may say that your conclusions were obvious, but some will also say, possessively, perhaps even jealously -- we said that first!. Tsk, tsk, children, children, stop squabbling or no more TV rights. As for you, dear researcher, your intrepid actions will win you credit for saying it -- if it's true or if it's not.

(And we can see it now; soon, parents the nation over will be responsibly cutting off cable, trucking their TV's out of their houses;))

The non-science world reels with bad news -- national, international, all of it. We shudder and shut our eyes tightly as we pass the news stands, we cover our ears when we hear a radio or TV. But while much of the bad news emanates from Washington, Washingtonians have mastered an uncanny ability to forget it all. Have you noticed? Famously forgetful the Bush administration jeopardizes world affairs with its amnesia. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, when asked why the U.S. invaded Iraq when Korea posed an imminent nuclear threat, said that "North Korea was sui generis", a particular case. Veterans of the Korean War, stunned by Korea's bellicosity, plea that we don't forget North Korea's aggression in the "forgotten war". But the Secretary of State can't seem to even keep track of recent wars. Asked about why the U.S. invaded Iraq, she recalled spuriously: "We actually went to war against Iraq in 1991 because they invaded and tried to annex Kuwait...", as if she forgot when and why the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003 and by declaring events this way could distort her listeners memories too.

Not long ago, when reports suggested that Rice might have had a meeting with George Tenet before 9/11 when he warned her of possible Al Qaeda attacks, she morphed into apoplectic horror. She declared herself appalled by the allegations, she would remember the event she insisted. Has Rice merely perfected the scrunched up insulted expression of a prim goody two shoes in order to glibly side step reality? If we were to take the act at face value, the idea that Rice "does not recall" -- seemingly, anything -- alarms us. Is she afflicted by a rare disease, previously disregarded -- like chikungunya, but that affects neural cells? Has she caught a virus endemic to "Foggy Bottom"?

Unfortunately Rice can't be described as "Sui generis" in this way. Donald Rumsfeld scratches his forhead through every interview, squinting into the distance and wending and winding his way around various outcomes of his decisions. Shouldn't the leader of the Pentagon be mentally sharp as a tack? Reportedly he had only the "vaguest recollection" of warnings by top brass on the ground in Iraq about his strategy. In his 'fruit in a fruitbowl' analogy, he compared escalating insurgent attacks in Iraq incongruously to apples and bananas and oranges.

Congress, of course, epitomizes the symptoms of the affliction. In the latest in a long string of scandals, key Republicans knew about Mark Foley's flagitious ways but forgot to oust him, or, alternatively, lost the facts in the legislative shuffle. No one informed Senator Hastert of Foley's messages to pages, or perhaps Tom Reynolds told him but "brought it in with a whole stack of things". Our elected legislators find too multi-tasking onerous, apparently. Foley on the other hand, takes a break from harrassment to "remember" that he's an alcoholic, an abused child, a gay and in need of rehab -- thus maligning and misrepresenting all who are abused, gay or alcoholic. We're nervous, scared maybe, to watch Washington come apart into a billion little pieces.

The forgetfulness afflicts news reporters too. Millions of Americans protested the Iraq invasion 3 years ago and have kept up the chatter ever since, but some pundits didn't seem to know that Iraq policy was amok. Only now do they declare Iraq policy officially a disaster, now that Bob Woodward says so in his book. Woodward himself didn't realize the gravity of Iraq for two whole best-selling books, despite his experience in Vietnam and the sleuthing skills he honed in the 1970's. It's obvious, he now declares amnesiacally in State of Denial, that Mr. Bush isn't measuring up as the great president he was a year or so ago.

These memory glitches may help legislators forge ahead to their next crisis, but it seems detrimental to the world's welfare. How could so many Phi Beta Kappas be so forgetful? We've previously chalked up these lapses, these failures to keep apprised of the truth, to willful mendacity. But if we weren't convinced that this is a case of crooked, decietful, greedy and cavalier leadership, we would think that such rabid forgetfulness is disease based (not really their fault). Scientists often feel beseiged by politics and politicians, but if we were to treat this like a disease, we would brush that chip off our shoulders and reach across the aisle. Science can help. We'd start low tech -- rest, relaxation, exercise, simple nutrition. Perhaps if all of Washington were to eat yellow curries containing curcumin they would remember more -- or at least be less prone to amyloid plaque formation which can lead to Alzheimers disease. If they despise curry they could follow a simple Mediterannean diet, which reduces inflamation of the brain and may also protect against Alzheimer's. No Freedom or French Fries, no ketchup, etc.

If the forgetfulness persisted then we could apply more high tech solutions. Drugs could help, maybe, although doctors question their efficacy. Drugs that increase levels of protein kinase A may benefit the hippocampus but may harmfully affect the prefrontal cortex, which is also involved with memory. Anti-psychotic drugs, already disputed by psychologists for their inefficacy for other conditions are not recommended by doctors for treatment of memory loss, but perhaps desperate times require desperate measures. Finally technologists like to remind politicians that fact checking becomes easier with the internet, they could check their facts, or the voters will check for them. Google *Truth* could remind politicians and citizens what's fact and fiction. Finally, there's always elections, the ultimate surgical but low-tech cure.

From the site XKCD, for the cool kids...

Webcomic Randall Munroe posts cartoons about math, science, romance...

"Beliefs" was posted on XKCD while back. It is licensed under a the Commercial Commons 2.5 License (Attribution, Non-Commercial)

South Africa's Wealth/Health Paradox

South Africa, where approximately 1 in 9 people are afflicted with AIDS, has a paradoxical economic development profile. It is considered an upper middle income country based on its healthy Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The World Bank ranked South Africa's GDP 27th of 177 countries in 2005, putting it in about the 85th percentile for GDP. The International Marketing Council of South Africa, with the slogan "South Africa, Alive With Possibility", describes the country as the "economic powerhouse of Africa".

Yet about 800 people a day die from AIDS in this country. Life expectancy in South Africa has decreased by four years and deaths from AIDS continue to decimate populations of young women under age 35 and men in their 30's and 40's, people who are in their prime and who -- from an economic perspective -- are in the most productive years of their life.

Now more bad news. An alarming study from Statistics South Africa's shows yet another dramatic increase in deaths from AIDS in South Africa. The report analyzed death rates from unnatural and natural causes and found that the death rate from communicable diseases of South African women aged 30-45 had increased by about three times, from 500 per 100,000, to 1500 per 100,000 between 1997 and 2004. Male deaths from communicable diseases had also increased and had even doubled in some areas. Some of this bad news was predicted. Since there is a lag between infection and full blown AIDS, it was assumed that the death rates would not decrease until 2008. However the figures are still stunning - as they were last year, and the year before...

The expectations of economists and politicians was that post-apartheid Africa would rebound and that the health of South Africans would improve. Indeed according to economic measures Africa is doing better and foreign investment has skyrocketed. But even compared to Russia, where life expectancy decreased as a result of political upheaval and economic downturn, the current patterns in South Africa indicate a dire state of affairs. For scientists and doctors, the increases in deaths are distressing since there are few signs that action is being taken to stem the epidemic.

South Africa AIDS Policies

With full knowledge of the toll of South Africa's AIDS policies, international public health officials, scientists and doctors are taking South Africa to task and rightly so. Historically, the government has denied that the HIV virus caused AIDS, and it has been slow to implement treatment programs for AIDS afflicted patients. Despite pleading from world leaders, South Africa's AIDS policy remains one of obfuscation and denial. Health minister Dr. Tshabalala-Msimang often insists that nutrition will beat AIDS, and regularly pushes garlic, beets and lemon, and African potatoes as effective cures. Since patient treatment via antiretrovirals now costs less that $130 dollars a year. South Africa's health policies are out of step with the modernity and prosperity that it claims.

The country was condemned at the AIDS conference in Montreal this year for displaying a basket of this produce in its booth, initially without antiretroviral drugs. Earlier this year the country banned two non-governmental organizations (NGO's) from a UN AIDS conference because they were particularly critical of Mbeki's policies.

In the most recent international public plea for policy change, a group of 81 doctors wrote a letter to President Mbeki asking the president to replace the ineffectual health minister, Dr Tshabalala-Msimang. In response to the recent letter, the health minister complained that the international community was undermining the country's efforts. She has long defended her nutrition advice as "the truth", and allegedly doesn't mind her moniker- Dr. Beetroot".

In response to the outcry against him, the president has assigned a new committee to oversee the AIDS program, according to an associated press article (South Africa Scales Back Health Minister's AIDS Role). But the health minister denies that she has been demoted, and in typical sidestepping form, a government spokesperson, Themba Maseko, said: we need to shift the focus from saying the problem is the Minister of Health".

Effective AIDS Policies

AIDS programs succeed in countries because of many deliberate actions by leaders. It is imperative that there is strong leadership to combat AIDS at the very, very top levels of a government. So in South Africa's case, if the problem is not with the minister of health then it is with the president.

People have said that effective AIDS policies will be pushed to the fore by governments who realize that deaths impede economic progress. It's hard to imagine that South Africa, where 1 in 9 people on average are affected by the deadly disease and only a small fraction receive drugs, has not come to terms with this economic reality. Any government which claims that beetroot is as effective as antiretrovirals is, as Stephen Lewis put it: "obtuse, dilatory and negligent."

Once it seemed intuitive that a higher GDP could be linked to greater general welfare of a country's citizens. Economists now recognize that GDP doesn't always correlate with overall broader measures of prosperity. South Africa is a telling example of this phenomenon. The United Nations' Human Development Index (HDI) rates quality of life factors such as education, the status of women, morbidity, and mortality. South Africa's comes in at 121sh out of 178 countries. This puts it in about the 33rd percentile of all countries, in the company of many countries who have far fewer resources. Therefore in terms of HDI, as opposed to GDP, South Africa's is in the same band of countries that its pro-business groups lord over with their "economic powerhouse" status.

In this "post-apartheid" era, we would not expect this chasm between the HDI (where it lies in the 33rd percentile) and GDP (where it is the 85th percentile). We would not expect the travesty of preventable AIDS deaths. We only wish that such a sorry state of affairs would convince those at the top levels of the government that only an active AIDS program will assure that South Africa truly is, as its marketing campaign says: "alive with possibility".

---------------------------------

Acronym Required previously wrote about AIDS in Not in Paradise Anymore - AIDS in Africa - Reason for Optimism?" - in response to a David Brooks column and optimistic prognosis for the AIDS epidemic in South Africa. We also wrote about AIDS in Zimbawe, in Burma, as well as in other articles.

Silicone Breast Implants -- Now Safe?

In 1992, the Food and Drug Administration convened on the subject of silicone breast implant safety, as reported by the Washington Post:

"...as the panel members spoke up one by one, it became clear that they were far from certain about the risks and benefits of the devices. The first scientist to speak quoted the prophet Isaiah and writers Ralph Waldo Emerson and Samuel Johnson before calling for more testing. The second said it was impossible for women to make an informed decision about whether to use implants because there was not enough information. The third complained that the issue should have been resolved years ago.

Unable to agree on how to interpret the jumble of opinion, fragmentary data and scientific speculation, the panel members finally threw up their hands in frustration."

So reported Malcom Gladwell in "Breast Implants; After a Decade of Controversy, Key Questions are Unanswered and the Future of the Device is Unresolved", perhaps before he reached a tipping point, blinked, and got off that beat.

Since then, scientists have continued to debate the safety of silicone implants. While doctors and patients often say that compared to water implants "silicone implants feel more natural and look better", lawsuits against Dow Corning in the 1980's and 1990's linked silicone breast implants to breast cancer and various autoimmune disorders. The suits threw Dow Corning into bankruptcy protection, from which it emerged in 2004. Now, following several reports claiming the implants are safe, silicone breast implants look poised for renewed popularity.

Last year the Economist acknowledged that Dow Corning that it had "earn[ed] a lifetime achievement award for the courting of controversy", in "America's Most-hated Companies: The Very Bottom Line" (Dec 20th), but now, the company once routed by the legal repercussions of leaking breast implants , has reorganized, emerged from bankruptcy, paid out at least 3.2 billion dollars to plaintiffs, and is courted as a Wall Street "darling". Be that as it may, silicone implant safety is no less controversial then it was 15 years ago, but the FDA is now edging towards approving silicone implants.

Unfortunately, if silicone implants are approved, women will still be challenged in their quest to make informed decisions about implants. Who should they trust? Their surgeons? Scientific research in prominent journals? The FDA?

Research Showing Oxidized Platinum Leaked Into Implant Recipients, Retracted by Dow Chemical Following Complaints by Manufacturing Companies

If women turn to the internet for safety data, they will quickly find reassuring answers from sites like LookingYourBest.com, or CosmeticSurgeryTimes.com. The latter site features interviews with bronzed, well-fed doctors who urge you that their highest concern is women's safety. A more time consuming search turns alarming news, such as the recent, controversial paper in the journal Analytical Chemistry, widely covered in the national press.

The journal published a paper on silicone breast implants last May which provided evidence of platinum leakage from the implants. The authors proposed that the blood, urine and hair of 18 of 23 women who had implants contained higher levels of platinum then the controls. (Lykissa, ED and Maharaj, 2006. Total Platinum Concentration and Platinum Oxidation States in Body Fluids, Tissue, and Explants from Women Exposed to Silicone and Saline Breast Implants by IC-ICPMS. Anal. Chem. 78:2925-2933). Lykissa and Maharaj asserted that the platinum was found in oxidized reactive states, states that are associated with toxic physiological affects.

One the heels of that publication, Analytical Chemistry then published two articles that criticized the study and journal's editors quasi-retracted the paper. It was a confusing move from a research journal that you would expect would have subjected the first paper to rigorous enough peer-review to stand by its publication.

One was written by a chemist at Dow chemical, Thomas Lane. Lane has long been a supporter of silicone implants. He had testified about implants to the FDA, the National Institute of Cancer, and "other similar venues", but he had not been an expert witness, said the journal's disclaimer, writing, "Dow Corning Corporation has not manufactured silicone breast implants since 1992." Lane might be an unbiased scientist, as the journal says, yet he has long claimed that silicone implants are "harmless", which is quite controversial given the science research. Dow Corning might not currently manufacture implants, but that's irrelevant.

The corporation it is compelled to mount an active defense that 'the implants are and always were safe'. Michael Brooks, the other expert in the 'field' who wrote in to provide criticism of the paper was a 'neutral commenter' - according to Analytical Chemistry. However his background is not 'neutral'.

" ...he provided information on the chemical nature of the platinum in silicone breast implants at the FDA panel hearing on breast implants April 2005 on behalf of Inamed Corporation. He was also a member of Health Canada regulatory advisory panels considering applications by Mentor Corporation and Inamed Corporation for new breast implant models in March and September 2005."(Analytical Chemistry 78 (15), 5609 -5611, 2006.)

Brooks and Lane leveled specific criticism at the chromatography methods the authors used, as well as the authors' interpretation of their statistics. The original report's conclusion that "Pt levels [in the experimental group] exceed that of the control group" was spurious, Brooks and Lane said. According to them, the statistics in the paper proved there was no difference in platinum levels between the control and the implanted groups.

Disinterested Parties?

Clearly Brooks and Lane represent the interests of silicone implant manufacturers. But what are Lykissa's interests? Once a doctor at Baylor University, he now owns a toxicology lab and has been trying to show the presence of platinum for years. In 2000, the Minnesota Star Tribune reported that Lykissa had identified reactive platinum in implants that had been removed from women. (The FDA discarded that research for the same reasons.) His latest research was sponsored by a non-profit group dedicated to fighting the use of silicone implants. We can only speculate how he might benefit from the research.

A couple of weeks ago, when editors for Analytical Chemistry published a warning that Lykissa's and Maharaj's evidence flunked "this journal's standards", we wondered about the truth. The editors of Analytical Chemistry chose to throw a lot of doubt on the publication but do we really know why? The journal didn't accommodate a rebuttal from the original authors when they published Lane's and Brook's critiques. Should we trust that the science was lousy? Or should we wonder whether the journal was swayed by the critics' affiliations with Dow Corning Corporation, Mentor Corporation and Inamed Corporation?

So when Analytical Chemistry retracted the paper, did that soothe readers and potential patients, or, as it should have, did it alarm them.

The FDA is still wobbly on the implant safety issue, but we can see which way their leaning. A couple of years ago, in "FDA Breast Implant Consumer Handbook - 2004 (Specific Issues To Consider), the agency provided ample warnings about the implants. Among them, the FDA said that implants could interfere with cancer detection via mammograms, and that mammograms might cause implants to rupture. Women "may not be able to breastfeed" their babies, and there were safety risks to unborn children and nursing infants. There was a "...slight increase in deaths due to suicide", the FDA said, and there was a risk of "Gel bleed". The 2004 report also stated that although "platinum leaches (leaks) from these implants and is present in the surrounding tissue" causing "concern" there was no evidence that "leached platinum causes illness in women with breast implants." Today, two years later, the FDA is hardly more confident about the platinum risks and they continue to call for more research:

"Some studies have shown that small quantities of platinum may bleed through an intact implant shell and be present in trace amounts (parts per billion) in surrounding tissue. However, these results need to be confirmed using a larger number of subjects...Even if the analytical results of large, well controlled studies were to show relatively high levels of platinum in biological samples, the toxicological significance would still need to be determined."

For now, the FDA cites Brooks, the consultant for the silicone implant manufacturer, who votes: "The experimental evidence supports the conclusion that there are no clinical consequences of the platinum in silicone breast implants". The FDA concludes:"[The]FDA concurs with Brook's conclusions.".

So while it seems that neither the FDA nor the journal can really judge the veracity of competing conclusions in the available research, both the journal and the FDA nevertheless appear to favor the opinions of scientists with vested interest in promoting implants. The FDA has repeatedly discounted Lykissa's work. Yet he is not the only scientist with these concerns. Where are the "neutral" scientists? After a quarter of a century, women are still confronted with a sea of confusing, biased data in the leaky boat that is science research on silicone implants.

On a final, slightly different note, breast implant advocates might have more evidence for for their arsenal of reasons for why women should trust the implants. MSNBC reports in "The Breast Job That Saved a Life", that a women hit with shrapnel from an exploding rocket was spared piercing of her heart by her silicone breast implants.

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Acronym Required previously reported on silicone breast implants in Silicone Implants -- A Health Risk to Choose?, and Silicone Implants and the FDA (more).

In a surprising turn-around Monday, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) re-initiated discussions with Barr Pharmaceuticals about the company's Plan B birth-control, an emergency contraceptive. The move came one day before Senate confirmation hearings with acting FDA head Andrew von Eschenbach on his nomination to the permanent post heading the FDA.

Andrew von Eschenbach, on the brink of a Senate nomination to become the full time chief of the FDA, claims that the latest surprise decision to approve over-the-counter Plan-B one day before his Senate confirmation hearings is not politically motivated. In the committee hearings yesterday, Senator Tom Harkin (D. Iowa), said "We all know what's going on here. This is a disregard for science out of ideological concerns". To which von Eschenbach replied that his decision was based on a particular, non-ideological type of ideology: "not on a political ideology, but on a medical ideology."

In light of recent history and the fact that there are reportedly 100 whistle-blower cases currently active in the FDA alleging conflicts between ideology and science in the agency, we wonder about his assertion. A recent poll by the Union of Concerned Scientists, showed that 40% of 1000 FDA employees polled said they knew of cases where political appointees had interfered with agency decisions. Given this, Von Eschenbach's assertion borders on outlandish. Therefore, despite his "impeccable credentials", why, when grilled about the politics, did he not say something like this:

"Sir, Honorable Senator, I was a "political appointee". Bush and I are family friends from Texas. We're pals, in fact sometimes he affectionately calls me little nicknames like he does the others. Perhaps we pray together, but I'm not telling -- top secret. The point is, how could I be a "political appointee" and NOT understand the Imperative of Politics for an FDA chief? You've got the Pharmaceuticals, the left wing, the right wing, you've got religion, you've got deaths from drugs claiming to cure this and that, you've got scientists clamoring, citizens clamoring, and lobbyists swarming The Hill. I would be (in fact, I am now) juggling life and death decisions day in and day out and balancing those with the pharmaceutical industry, a virtual economic powerhouse. Silly Senators, of course, the FDA is willing to announce that Plan-B is slated for approval. Stop acting like you're surprised. Honorable Senators, if this weren't about politics, why would I be entertaining this barrage of questions from you, the politicians? Senators Murray and Clinton have said they won't appoint me with Plan B in limbo. I'm politically prudent. You're politically prudent. Senators, be real -- shall we revisit your campaign "promises"?

Senators, you know that before yesterday, there was no need for such a transparent conciliatory gesture. We know, that you know, that we know, that you know, and we don't worry about the clumsy looking timing. It's the base who are important, see, and now their mad at us. When mongo church membership balloons a bit more all your clucking and clacking will matter even less. [Behind his hand] Of course, if this doesn't fly, the President will simply approve me while you're all on recess assuring the voters with short attention spans of how tough you looked in your bold ties, crisp shirts and red dresses asking me these questions. I serve at the President's..pleasure, and being that this is politics, it's ALL political, all the time -- of course."

We're not surprised that the doctor didn't say this, but on the other hand, he seems to have a loose grip on these most obvious facts. How can we trust him to capably run the FDA? How could he oversee the approval of drugs, their safety and efficacy, how could he protect the health of Americans? How could he lead such and enormous, bureaucratic, entrenched agency, with such a pathetical level of political savvy? Unless this hearing, these questions, these tough stances are all kind of part of a political charade-like ritual that we knowingly revel in.

The Food and Drug Administration has successfully stalled the approval process of Plan B for years, refusing to allow the drug to be sold without prescription despite its own scientists' and independent review boards' recommendations, enduring leadership upheaval over its refusal, and successfully rebuffing outside insistence that the agency quit stalling. Scientists have verified safety data, and studies show that it does not change sexual habits (or pregnancy rates) in women. 45 countries allow women of all ages to access the drug without prescription. But while researchers have found Plan-B to be effective as a last resort for avoiding pregnancy, conservative religious groups say that the use of the drug without a prescription would have negative consequences such as promiscuity, drug use, or exploitation.

Acronym Required last wrote about Plan B and the FDA in FDA - Calling off The Dogs". At the time, Susan Wood had resigned as head of the Office of Women's Health over the FDA's denial of the Plan B application. A male veterinarian with no experience in women's health had just been assigned to take her place. Lester Crawford, another veterinarian, who briefly and tumultuously headed the FDA, had just resigned. The resignation was somewhat mysterious, but came in wake of the Plan B upheaval and uproar over his assignment of the male veterinarian to the woman's health division. He is now facing criminal charges of an undisclosed nature. Plan B medication is available as a behind the counter drug in some pharmacies in some states, but the FDA at the time seemed like it would successfully stall approval of the drug indefinitely.

The decision to withold Plan B was completely in line with the administration's antiquated, paternal "abstinence only" dogma, and runs counter to scientific advice. Yet despite this obvious chasm between science and policy, the very public political upheaval in the FDA about the decision, and the administration's blatant stance against birth control, the FDA flatly denied that the decision was about politics. The agency published a Questions and Answers" on Plan B on its website. The Q&A addressed politics in question #11, that asked, "Did the FDA bow to political pressure in making this decision?" The FDA wrote,"No. This decision was made within the Center for Drug Evaluation and Research." We thought the evasive "answer" was perhaps the quintessential "no" that said "yes" (with a wink and a nod). However this is political obfuscation of the facts and blatant denial that it's all politics, is so routine these days, hardly even gains attention.

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The FDA is planning talks with Barr Pharmaceuticals next week.

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Acronym Required previously wrote about the FDA:

"Resuscitating The FDA", about the FDA in the wake of various fiascos.

FDA -- Calling Off The Dogs, about Plan B and staff turnover.

Ethics- The NIH and FDA, about conflicts of interests among scientists in these two agencies.

We're quite accustomed to lying. Some may feign shock - as they did when a slump-faced, shifty-eyed, quivery-lipped Frey confessed to Oprah, the arbiter of truth, that his book was a pack of lies. It seemed like more genuine disbelief when the stem-cell myth slowly unraveled and the legacy of Hwang did a landslide shift from "supreme scientist" to he who would have had a street named after him, could have had a museum named after him, or would have been forever revered by his countrymen. Really, all this shock can't be more than an act. Maybe all jurors should be chosen from Oprah audiences; but lets be honest about the pretend "surprise" of it all. The routine deceptions are no more surprising than Groundhog Day (the movie). With all the Enrons and WorldComs and Katrinas and Iraqs, isn't it just the same day all over again?

Cut to Bush's State of the Union address. People recoiled at his proclamation about banning any sort of cloning research, "human cloning in all its forms; creating or implanting embryos for experiments; creating human-animal hybrids; and buying, selling or patenting human embryos". It has been widely pointed out that animal-human chimeras are a not so very scary part of health research. What Bush proposes also pertains to infertility treatments used by thousands of couples today to have families. People speculate about what he really means.

On energy, Bush said we were "addicted to oil" and that we would reduce our dependence on mid-east oil by 75% -- "through technology". There were arguments about this out of the gate -- the reductions weren't realistic or feasible and only 20% percent of our oil comes from the mid-east anyway. Indeed, say Bush's aides according to the Philadelphia Inquirer today, the President did not mean any of this literally. "This was purely an example", Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said.

So is the cloning rhetoric also just an "example"? If the administration knows what they say, perhaps they don't really mean it? Outside of the most obvious (and at the moment unfeasible) human cloning and therapeutic cloning "examples" that Bush wants banned, there are some technologies that are essential for the scientifically advanced, humane, non-isolationist nation he promotes. Unfortunately, since the administration has already gone to great lengths to curtail stem cell-like researh, indications are that they will be invigorated by their new court appointees and will continue down this path.

While the intention is certainly there, it seems ideologically distorted. The stated impetus of "a hopeful society...that recognizes the matchless value of every life", rings false. As a small example, why say "no cloning", then merrily "clone" these troops for speech props in this Photoshop picture. Isn't that disrespectful?

The good thing about Groundhog Day (the date) is that one way or another you know that the season or term or trend or silliness will eventually end.

There is exciting news in emergency medicine today that has apparently just been released by Boston Children's Hospital. The news tickles baseball fans too, especially Red Sox fans. It seems that emergency room visits decrease during riveting baseball games and increase during not so interesting games. According to the buzz, as many as 15% more people show up in the emergency departments of hospitals during boring games and 15% fewer people show up during riveting games. So says all the news. Let's have a closer look by going directly to the journal; first- where and when was the research published?

• The Boston Globe reports that the news comes from "a study published Monday in the Annals of Emergency Medicine.
• Other sources report a journal name that is strikingly similar but different. Both the New England News and Eyewitness News say; "The study appears in today's edition of the journal Annals of Emergency Room Medicine." (too much "ER"?)
• Another news outlet suggests that it isn't a research report per se that we should look for, nor is it published today, and the journal in question is neither of the aforementioned titles. Med Page Today (now with registration) notes that the results are presented as "a letter published in the October journal "Annals of Internal Medicine."
• Forbes also has the publication date as October but says that the authors are "reporting in a letter to the editor of the October issue of the Annals of Emergency Medicine..."
• Likewise, this is what the Boston Herald reports, however they are non-committal about the form of the research; "The findings will appear in next month's Annals of Emergency Medicine."
• Live Science plays it safe by listing no journal whatsoever.
• At least the publication Medical News Today helpfully provides a link: "You can read about this study in the October issue of Annals of Emergency Medicine". However the link takes you to the September issue and from there you can find some "teaser" October articles, none of which are this study, and as an aside the medical journal notes slyly that those articles will not even necessarily appear in the October issue.

So the study either appears in "today's" ("Monday's" as some vaguely reported it) or "next month's ("October's"), issues of either the Annals of Emergency Medicine, the Annals of Emergency Room Medicine (which is either non-existent or extraordinarily elusive), or the Annals of Internal Medicine. Maybe as a break from tradition the study will appear in all three places...or no place at all. The results are published either as a "research study", a "letter", or a "letter to the editor". Though two of the journals exist, we didn't find an accessible published article of any form. The only article we accessed was a press release here, that has some of the information propagated by many of the media sources and we're unclear as to where they're getting the spurious facts.

What sort of study did the authors (Brownstein, Reis and Mandl) conduct that warrants headline coverage in at least 82 (at last count) news outlets?

• Apparently "The researchers got data from the....Automated Epidemiological Geotemporal Integrated Surveillance system, or AEGIS, which is a disease-monitoring system that has been expanded for use by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, [that] analyzes patient data anonymously and compares it with data from previous medical visits...."
• Or, as another source puts it, they were; "[b]orrowing data from a real-time disease surveillance system developed at Children's.."
• ABC's explanation is more simply put; the researchers "compared Neilsen television ratings with hospital traffic."
• But don't underestimate the amount of work this was...."After a week of late nights crunching and plotting data for the hours in question, Brownstein and Reis..."

We wonder, AEGIS sounds like sophisticated equipment, it must perform precise parsing. After all it was developed to assist in identifying infectious disease outbreaks. Surely the authors must have "crunched" some sophisticated results and have developed an interesting discussion from the data? Actually co-author John S. Brownstein reports slightly disappointingly: "We didn't look at reasons why people were coming in for care, we just looked at the numbers -- and the numbers dropped..."

So is it far-fetched to imagine -- we do our best to check facts but we're slightly in the lurch since we have only these disparate news reports at our disposal -- that despite the power of "AEGIS", we might have generated the same conclusion by standing at the emergency room entrance with a little clicker like they do(did) for crowd control at the ball games?

The authors cumulated the data from six hospitals (and rest assured, none of the hospitals was Mass General, that seems a stone's throw away Fenway's traffic nightmares) The authors note that only in the most dramatic events, like Game 7 of the ALCS against St. Louis, or to use another example - September 11th - will such effects be noticed. Other series games only generated a 5% difference, "slight" - as very few news agencies forthrightly reported. Apparently the reason the media is so enthusiastic about this...press release...is because:

• "Although previous studies have found a decline in health-care use during major sporting events, the Children's researchers are the first to quantify the magnitude of the events"
• As well, said study leader Kenneth Mandl; "These studies suggest that the timing of ED [Emergency Department] utilization has a strong discretionary component' "
• Finally; "The scientists say that this is the first study to illustrate a direct dose-response relationship between the popularity of a sporting event and decreased use of hospital ERs."

"Dose-response!?" Number of people in Emergency Rooms v. Number of People watching TV? (Aren't we striving to move away from this?) The study seems to be misrepresented and overblown by many media sources.

Although the press release notes that; "Previous studies had suggested a relationship between important sporting events such as the Super Bowl and hospital visits", the release wasn't explicit about previous research. Clearly, despite the coverage and interest, this isn't the most pressing issue for emergency medicine.

Nevertheless, some groups have published studies in this area. Similiar less quantified results were published by the Journal of Emergency Medicine in January-February 1994, in a study by NT Reich et al titled; "The Impact of a Major Televised Sporting Event on Emergency Department Census." Different studies showed that the percentage of total emergency room visits was often more sports related during major events -- trauma/alchohol related -- at least in Ireland. Mattick et al published in the Irish Medical Journal, March, 2003, titled; "The Football World Cup 2002 - Analysis of Related Attendances To An Irish Emergency Department."

We can't compare the studies, different though they might be, because we don't have access to the current or future published study. It seems most likely that the results will appear in some form in the Annals of Emergency Medicine and we'll suspend further judgement until we perhaps see it.

Three political scientists recently made some research suggestions for the political science discipline based on their analysis of twin studies. Dr. John Alford, Dr. John Hibbing, and Dr. Caroline Funk of Virginia Commonwealth University derived their ideas about the genetic components of political views by reanalyzing two twin studies. They published their research in the American Political Science Review. The New York Times summarized their research. The 'scientists' "combed" the two research studies for indications that political instincts and party affiliations are genetic. Based on political analysis, they found that political instincts have genetic components. Based on their ideas they "urg[e] political scientists to incorporate genetic influences, specifically interactions between genetic heritability and social environment, into models of political attitude formation."

Based on their study, they make wide ranging suggestions, like:

It has long been known that certain political issues seem "hard"to people, and others seem "easy," presumably because some issues trigger "gut responses" while others do not(Carmines and Stimson 1980, 79), but no explanation has yet been offered for why given issues do or do not elicit gut responses. Why do social, more than economic, issues tend to hit people in the gut, even though both constitute ongoing and equally complex societal concerns? In light of the new findings, one distinct possibility is that easy "gut" issues tend to be those that are more heritable.

and...

...admitting that genetics influences political attitudes could actually help to mute societal divisions...As frustrating as it may be to debate with someone who holds such different orientations, value exists in recognizing that intransigence is not the result of willful bullheadedness but, rather, genetically driven differences in orientation...The exciting next step is to understand the reason such distinct orientations have evolved and lasted.

With the facile agility of political scientists to pogo stick over all scientific reasoning whatsoever in order to adapt convenient conclusions, who needs scientists?