Politics
clock | October 25, 2008Zombies pose no threat at Palin event:
ASHEVILLE - Supporters of vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin will have plenty to see outside the Civic Center if they are unable to get inside for her Sunday appearance.
As many as 700 zombies are expected to amble up Flint Street past the Civic Center about 5 p.m., just after doors open for the Palin event.
But a Republican who is afraid of Obama even more than of zombies already made this advertisement:
clock | October 25, 2008Peter Suber, James Love and Glyn Moody have already blogged about this, but we need to make sure this spreads far and wide:
The AAP and Copyright Alliance want to prod the next President of the US to tilt the unbalanced US copyright law further toward publishers. According to a letter the AAP sent to its members (thanks to James Love and Glyn Moody), the two organizations are trying to identify the positions "that will influence intellectual property policy", and will then "offer suggestions regarding appropriate candidates for these positions to both presidential campaigns."
But first they…
pharyngula | October 25, 2008I just got this in the mail, and smug elitist that I am, I thought it was worth passing along.
Dear friends, In these times, with extremely serious, complicated crisises confronting us both economically and internationally, we need to have intelligent, educated people as president & vice president:
Educational Background:
Barack Obama:
Columbia University - B.A.
Political Science with a Specialization in
International Relations.
Harvard - Juris Doctor (J.D.) Magna Cum Laude
Joseph Biden:
University of Delaware - B.A. in History and B.A. in Political Science.
Syracuse University College…
clock | October 25, 2008You have probably heard that Governor Palin, in a recent speech contradicted herself within a span of a couple of sentences. So, she said that "Early identification of a cognitive or other disorder, especially autism, can make a life-changing difference.", then in the next breath dissed that same research: "You've heard about some of these pet projects they really don't make a whole lot of sense and sometimes these dollars go to projects that have little or nothing to do with the public good. Things like fruit fly research in Paris, France. I kid you not." You can see that part here:
This…
gregladen | October 25, 2008
"In the same way I take offense at Mr. Obama running for president ....."
Oh, but it's not about race or anything, is it?
terrasig | October 25, 2008A reader sent the following to my blog e-mail address but under my meatspace name.
So much for pseudonymity.
Here's the version with my 'nym:
And am I the only one who wonders if Mrs Walsh is PhysioProf's mother?
gregladen | October 25, 20081975, winter, somewhere in the American Southwest. I am driving across a state border and there is a sign that reads "do not transport citrus fruit across state lines." There on the side of the road is a check point with uniformed federal agents, a place to pull off, some garbage cans. I look at the oranges sitting on the floor over on the passenger side and figure ... "better pull off and dump this contraband." But then something surprising happened.
I started to pull into the checkpoint, and one of the uniformed federal agents leaned over a bit to see who was in the 10 year old…
choofnagle | October 25, 2008I keep on hearing that the political polls are inaccurate because pollsters do not call wireless phones.
I commission polls at UC Berkeley and we call wireless phones. Seems like a no brainer to me. So, I've never quite understood why professional polling firms wouldn't call cell phones. (I'm an expert in telemarketing laws; survey firms can call cell phones legally so long as it is not a front for marketing.)
Today, I poked around at some prominent pollster's sites to see whether they call cell phone users:
Gallup: Yes, when it is a "national telephone Gallup Poll" survey.
Zogby: No.…
pharyngula | October 25, 2008California's Proposition 8 is a ballot measure that aims to ban same-sex marriage — it is a regressive proposal that aims to strip equality from a minority population. It is revealing to see who is supporting each side of the contest.
The organizations trying to oppose Proposition 8 include Apple Computer, Sergey Brin of Google, the California Teachers Association, and the state Democratic party — anyone supportive of civil rights, progressive causes, or (to be honest) finding a profit in not discriminating against well-educated people in a technological workforce for irrelevant reasons, like…
oracknows | October 25, 2008Think this election is bad? Think it's really negative? Think it's really vicious and nasty?
Think again.
Negative campaigning and vicious attacks by candidates on each other have been with us since at least the election of 1800. If anything, these days elections are probably tamer. The difference is the media. Between robocalls, television, radio, the Internet, the blogosphere, and all the outlets that attacks can find, our campaigns just seem nastier.
pharyngula | October 24, 2008This is too much. Sarah Palin gave a policy speech today in which she claimed that she wanted more support for children with disabilities, more tools to test for disorders, and while also decrying the expense of scientific research.
Where does a lot of that earmark money end up anyway? […] You've heard about some of these pet projects they really don't make a whole lot of sense and sometimes these dollars go to projects that have little or nothing to do with the public good. Things like fruit fly research in Paris, France. I kid you not.
I am appalled.
This idiot woman, this blind,…
evolvingthoughts | October 24, 2008
I told you so 1: High cost of internet filtering and controls stricter than Iran's, oh and critics bullied.
I told you so 2: Terrorism laws unsafe, court rejects charge of breaking laws that did not exist when the "crime" was done
gregladen | October 24, 2008I was sitting in a meeting the other day, and two people who have lived in Minnesota a lot longer than I have brought up Governor Arne (pronounced "arny") Carlson. Carlson was governor years ago. Since I've moved here, I've heard Carlson now and then as a commenter on Minnesota Public Radio, and to be honest, I just assumed he was a Democrat because of what he said about various issues and various candidates.
Anyway, someone brought up Arne Carlson and I said "He seems pretty moderate for a Republican." One of the people I was talking to said "Yes, that's right." The other one glared at…
pharyngula | October 24, 2008Oh, the pressure. This somewhat tardy edition of the Carnival of the Liberals happens to be the last one before election day, which makes it important to bring up the issues we ought to be considering as we make our decisions about who we're going to vote for…although, if you're liberal, this is a year when the decision is remarkably easy to make. So here we go with an issues-oriented carnival.
Foreign policy: What do you think of the Bush Doctrine, the idea that we should unilaterally and preemptively attack anyone we think might be a threat? Here's a better plan: Let's be the good guys.…
pharyngula | October 24, 2008
This is the top news story on Fox right now: a McCain volunteer says she was robbed at an ATM, by a black man of course, and then when the thief saw her McCain bumper sticker, he beat her up and carved a "B" for "Barack" in her face. It's getting a bit…shrill.
It could have happened, but there are just a few odd details here. She claims the assailant used a knife — a very dull knife — to cut her cheek, but all there are are faint scratches, not real cuts. It's also lettered quite nicely, not exactly like the work of an angry mugger on a struggling woman.
But the most glaringly obvious…
drorzel | October 24, 2008This week's department colloquium was Roel Snieder of the Colorado School of Mines on The Global Energy Challenge. I have to admit, I was somewhat rude, and spent a lot of the talk futzing with my tablet, but really, while his presentation of the material was very good, the material itself wasn't new to me-- if you read ScienceBlogs, you've probably heard it all.
It's a colossal ball of woe, too. You know the story-- demand for energy is increasing, supplies of oil are dwindling. The planet is warming, the ice caps are melting, the oceans are rising. Everything is on the verge of collapse.…
drorzel | October 24, 2008Chris Mooney visited Union on Wednesday, talking to two classes (one Environmental Studies class, and one class on presidential politics), and giving an evening lecture titled "Science Escape 2008." He's an excellent speaker, so if you're looking for someone to give a talk about science and politics, you could do a whole lot worse.
I enjoyed the evening talk quite a bit, in part because it echoed a lot of things I said in my talk at the Science21 meeting last month (video, live-blogging), thus reassuring me that I'm not a lone crank on these issues. He talked about his experience with…