mikethemadbiologist

(from here) The Kansas Republican Party has a loyalty oath that its candidates have to sign. And it's not to country, but to the Republican Party: I, _______________, promise never to abandon my present Republican Party affiliation for the purpose of political gain. The Republican Party, both…

You knew it had to happen: a LOLcatz internet quiz. Your Score : 7331 Cat 50% Affectionate, 53% Excitable, 57% Hungry Lolzergs have nothing on you. You are swift and ruthless, cutting down whatever and whomever necessary in order to obtain the foodz. As one of the first lolcat known…

Again. ScienceBlogling razib discusses some noises various biologists are making about levels of selection (I've touched on this topic before in the context of group selection). Sweet Baby Intelligent Designer, save us from this madness. I've been through this before--hell, I've even published…

Then Corn decides to get mean about it: The Bush-Cheney years have been marked by ineptitude, miscalculation, and scandal. A successful presidency? Bush will be lucky if he gets a public elementary school in his adopted hometown of Crawford, Tex., named after him. He has placed this country in a…

By way of Brad Delong, I stumbled across this column by Washington Post editor Ruth Marcus calling for merit pay for teachers. Centrist Democrats, particularly those who suffer from a touch of Compulsive Centrist Disorder, have been pushing this since the early 80s. And it makes no sense to me.…

Why can't you be nice to me?* Look, I realize that Rick Perlstein's phrase 'E. coli conservatism' is a catchy way to describe the continuing breakdown of the national infrastructure. But that phrase bugs the crap out of me (pun intended). I've noted before that most E. coli are harmless…

The Boston Globe reports that the Charles River swim race might be canceled because of cyanobacterial blooms. Again. So why is this happening? Phosphorous levels are too high: Blue-green algae are not true algae, but cyanobacteria. They are usually present in amounts so small they are harmless,…

I raise the question, which has rattled around in my head for a while, after reading two posts, one by ScienceBlogling Tim Lambert, and one by Scott Lemieux. Tim connects the dots of the Gore-Chilean sea bass non-story: Allow me to connect some dots here. How did the story get from People into an…

It's bad enough when the mainstream media engages in ersatz psychology and semiotics. It's even worse when this pseudoanalysis has a bias--it's like Colbert's truthiness, except that it's not funny (italics mine): Consider, then, the cheesesteak. While running for president, John Kerry ordered a…

First, driftglass points out an obvious--although previously unnoticed--problem with the neocon claims that there's is no civil war in Iraq: So if there is a Civil War, then we should leave, because there is no way for us to referee such a thing. But if there is no Civil War, and therefore no…

Be a mensch: stop by, and wish Lindsay Beyerstein of Majikthise well. It's good to have her blogging again.

Since I haven't discussed antibiotic resistance for a while, I want to put that health problem in context. The CDC estimates that every year, over 60,000 U.S. residents die from a hospital-acquired bacterial infection that is resistant to one or more commonly used antibiotics. Roughly 25,000 per…

A couple of days ago, I blogged about the Laffer curve. Hilzoy brilliantly skewers the idiotic Wall Street Journal piece that 'supported' the Laffer curve: Brilliant. Go read the whole thing.

...good for him. What struck me was this part of his goodbye post: For the last two years, as anybody who's been reading my blog since its inception will now, I've been feeling increasingly miserable and increasingly desperate because of the funding and (thus) tenure situation. My research…

Inspired by Quixote's excellent post about ascidians--my firstest study organism EVAH--I've decided to delve into the archives and repost something of my own about ascidians. I used to study botrylloid ascidians (Botrylloides diegensis to be exact). Ascidians are one of our closest invertebrate…

I was reading this fascinating article about Japan's adoption in 2009 of a jury system, when it struck me: the Pundits on the Potomac would love to have a society like this. From the NY Times: Japan is preparing to adopt a jury-style system in its courts in 2009, the most significant change in…

Matt Bai doesn't get that. In the NY Times Magazine, Bai writes (italics mine): The emergence of the Internet age has been accompanied, in general, by a steady devaluing of expertise. A generation ago, you went to the doctor to find out about the pain in your knee; now you go to WebMD, diagnose it…

Over the weekend, there was a lot of discussion of those ridiculous conservative faithtank graphs that were rerun in the Wall Street Journal. Several of my fellow ScienceBloglings have debunked the analysis that claims these data support the Laffer curve, although my favorite criticism is by Brad…

Here are some links for you. Science comes first: ScienceBlogling Chris continues his series on statistics: Samples, Sampling Distributions, and t Distributions, Confidence Intervals, and a Quick Example. The American Institute of Biological Sciences (AIBS) has a bunch of video presentations…

John Nichols, in an interview with Bill Moyers, clarifies a very important--and misunderstood--point about impeachment (italics mine): JOHN NICHOLS: Bill Moyers, you are making a mistake. You are making a mistake that too many people make. BILL MOYERS: Yes. JOHN NICHOLS: You are seeing impeachment…

Actually, that's not quite accurate. I'll let this picture explain why: (Ricardo Thomas/The Detroit News) I should have written Republican candidate, since Rep. Tom Tancredo was the only Republican presidential candidate to show up. And Ken Mehlman wonders why the Republicans aren't doing better…

At the Boston Public Library, there's a fascinating exhibit about Alexandre Vattemare, entertainer turned cultural ambassador. It's definitely worth seeing. While you're there, you'll also want to check out the miniature book exhibit (some of them are even kinda porny!).

digby writes what I've often claimed around here--'people of faith' who criticize Democrats for not embracing 'faith' really want Democrats to embrace theopolitical conservatism: The religious folk who vote GOP on the basis of religion are never going to vote for Democrats unless they become social…

We fire him. Actually, we refuse to fund his salary: There's a reason that Democratic voters aren't happy with Democrats in Congress. We feel as if Democrats in Congress are missing opportunities. Gonzales' crimes are one such opportunity. Rather than have another hearing, or issue another…

Sometimes a giant transforming robot isn't a Republican, it's just a giant transforming robot. A few years back, when Star Trek was all the rage, someone wrote a literary criticism of Star Trek, "The Literary Galaxy of Star Trek: An Analysis of References And Themes in the Television Series." It…

I have no idea if Bush administration officials individually suffer from manifest antisocial personality disorder, but when you get enough of them together, they certainly do on an institutional level. Here's a relatively unremarked upon tidbit from the recent Surgeon General scandal: And…

Or actually visitors who cite Galt. Jane Galt responds to calls for adopting a French-like system: In the United States, government at its various levels now accounts for roughly 45% of health care spending. (And by "now", I mean 2004, the latest year for which OECD data are available. In 2004, of…

Something very interesting in the news about the news--the Chicago Sun has publicly announced its decision to make its op-ed page more liberal. From Editor and Publisher: The tabloid that shifted toward political conservatism under the brief ownership of Rupert Murdoch more than two decades ago…

...and the Mad Biologist answers. Over at the World's Fair, David asks scientists: 1. What's your current scientific specialty? Microbial population biology. 2. Were you originally pursuing a different academic course? If so, what was it? Yep. I was originally a marine evolutionary ecologist. I…

(from here) "He hit me." Having lived in the NYC area for a few years, I kept reasonably close tabs on the doings of NYC mayor Rudy Giuliani. But over at the Group News Blog, there's a brilliant roundup of all the awful crap Giuliani has done. My favorite part: The ex-wife, and former local…