December 18, 2008
In an interview defending himself against justified charges of homophobia, Rick Warren insisted:
For 5,000 years, every single culture and every single religion has defined marriage as a man and a woman.
Not quite. As the polygamous founder of the polygamy-espousing Church of Jesus Christ of…
December 18, 2008
Speaking of Hells yes, Hilda Solis is to be Obama's Labor Secretary. And remember how I said that "Concern for, and a desire for serious and urgent solutions to, climate change seems to be the factor unifying much of Obama's cabinet"? Well, "Solis brings a reputation as one of Washington's…
December 18, 2008
President-elect Obama named Jane Lubchenco to run the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency. The Agency conducts research into marine mammals, climate change, the air and oceans, it runs the National Weather Service, and enforces regulations on treatment of marine mammals, various pollutants,…
December 17, 2008
At the Inaugural ceremonies, the opening invocation will be given by Rick Warren, evangelical author of The Purpose-Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For? and all-around wanker.
He called for political assassination, telling Sean Hannity that it is the role of government to "take [] out" leaders…
December 16, 2008
An unnamed major in Vietnam told correspondent Peter Arnett that they had to destroy a village in order to save it. That, in a nutshell, is how George W. Bush views the economy, telling CNN:
I’ve abandoned free market principles to save the free market system.
He is literally beyond parody.
December 15, 2008
In announcing Steve "#75" Chu as Energy Secretary, President-elect Obama:
"My administration will value science," Obama said, in what sounded like a pointed reference to his predecessor. "We will make decisions based on facts."
Emphasis in the original. It's a nice change.
December 15, 2008
I'm in the process of reworking my blog reading, and one area I'd like to expand is science education policy beyond the creation/evolution fight. I'm finding fairly slim pickings, alas. If you've got a favorite source of information (blog or non-blog) on science education policy, please leave…
December 12, 2008
I can't say I've followed every nuance of the auto bailout. At first I was inclined to think that letting the Big Three go bankrupt and rebuild wouldn't be the worst thing ever, since they'd probably get restructured somehow into more viable entities. But in this business climate, who would buy…
December 12, 2008
Atrios sez No We Can't:
It is a bit weird that in the supposed richest country in the world even contemplating things like new subway lines is practically unpossible.
And yet:
Central Subway given feds' green light
The proposed Central Subway project that calls for running light-rail service into…
December 11, 2008
Stephen Suh responds to the discussion of Stephen Johnson, the creationist EPA administrator:
Stephen Johnson, Bush's EPA Administrator, doesn't see a "clean-cut division" between religion and science.
This is actually not quite right. He doesn't, according to the original article, see a division…
December 10, 2008
Steven Chu of Lawrence Berkeley Labs is reported to be President-elect Obama's nominee for Secretary of Energy.
While much will be made of his Nobel Prize and his aggressive advocacy for science-based solutions to the climate crisis, his nomination is important for another reason.
Chu is Steve 75…
December 10, 2008
Gristmill reminds us that They are called nonprofits for a reason ...:
It's the end of the year, and if your inbox is anything like mine, you've received a deluge of end-of-year donation requests from your favorite nonprofits.
On behalf of my brethren nonprofit directors, let me share some insight…
December 9, 2008
Illinois politics are fun.
December 8, 2008
The Philadelphia Inquirer profiles EPA head Stephen Johnson:
Johnson majored in biology. At Taylor [University, one of the oldest evangelical universities in the country], that includes discussion of creationism.
Taylor biology professor Timothy Burkholder, who was Johnson's adviser, said, "We…
December 5, 2008
Thanks to Kansas Congressman Todd Tiahrt (R-Wichita), ATF data on guns used in crimes were not available to policymakers or law enforcement. That provision was repealed, and a report by an association of mayors finds that:
States with lax gun laws had higher rates of handgun killings, fatal…
December 5, 2008
The Kansas Republican Party is in disarray outraged:
President-Elect Barack Obama has suggested that one solution for his problems with the Guantanamo Bay security facility could be solved by moving some of the most dangerous men in the world to a medium-security facility in Leavenworth, Kansas.…
December 4, 2008
Bob Reich is rarely wrong, and here he makes a very important point:
Teachers are being laid off and new hiring frozen, after-school programs cut, so called "noncritical" subjects like history eliminated, schools closed, and tuitions hiked at state colleges and universities.
It's absurd. We're…
December 3, 2008
Last week, I posited that any company "too big to fail" was too big to exist, and ought to either be broken up under anti-trust regulations, or should be nationalized if it needed to have such power over the marketplace.
Roman Werpachowski replied in the comments, saying that my underlying logic…
December 3, 2008
In discussions of the subprime mortgage crisis and the CDS crisis which grew out of it, a lot is made of the failure of federal regulators, and a bit is made of the failure of securities rating firms (who blew it by giving disastrously risky products very safe ratings). The latter failure is often…
December 3, 2008
CNN shutters its science/environment/technology unit:
[Longtime CNN anchor/reporter Miles] O'Brien's departure comes as the network dismantles its science, space, environment and technology unit in Atlanta. That includes O'Brien as well as six producers. O'Brien has been CNN's chief technology and…
December 3, 2008
Hotline reports:
Sources close to Rep. Dennis Moore (KS-03) say he will not run for re-election in '10.
I'll be digging into this and report more. If true, it becomes a question of who will replace him, and of what he'll do next. Hotline has him running for Senate, though odds seem to favor…
November 28, 2008
Various of the lefty blogs are suggesting that we only eat turkey on Thanksgiving because of tradition, and that turkey is actually a tasteless hunk of protein.
I must conclude that Ezra, Matt, and the rest of these barbarians are insane. (Though Ezra's braising proposal isn't altogether bad.)…
November 27, 2008
Gobble gobble.
November 26, 2008
Slacktivist talks about politics in Delaware, concluding:
the state's governor-elect … ma[de] a shrewd, surprising and encouraging announcement of his own regarding his upcoming inaugural celebration: "Markell: Give time for your neighbors."
Gov.-elect Jack Markell proposed an alternative to the…
November 25, 2008
This story is too good not to re-run (image h/t The Advocate). Sept. 11 loss leads mother to fight for gay rights:
Seven years on, she still wakes up with a shock in the night, startled to remember that her only son is dead.
Inside the bungalow in the mountains above Los Gatos where Alice…
November 25, 2008
Armen Sedrakian makes a good point in a letter to the San Francisco Chronicle: Don't let companies grow 'too big to fail':
Whatever happened to breaking up large corporations so they don't dominate the market? Instead of the Treasury Department bailing out corporations, why doesn't the antitrust…
November 24, 2008
Via Edge of the West, we are reminded that today is the anniversary of Lee Harvey Oswald's last dance, memorialized in this famous photograph:
At least, that's what I learned in school. Kathy tells it differently, but she doesn't explain why people claim Oswald and Ruby were acting in concert.…
November 20, 2008
The House Energy and Commerce Committee is one of the most powerful committees in the House of Representatives. It's especially important as we look at climate change legislation and fuel economy (both of which current chairman, John Dingell, has delayed and watered down). Newly selected Chairman…
November 19, 2008
Listening to the Texas TEKS hearings, I note that a speaker is decrying the "eliticism" of his biologist critics. Isn't it a little counterproductive to decry elitism even as demonstrating that one is ignorant of basic vocabulary?
Or am I being eliticist?
November 19, 2008
Paging Dr. Orac! Your crown has, apparently, been usurped.
The photograph above was taken at San Francisco's Green Festival, an over-all excellent event. I learned a lot about the state of green technology, from solar panels to composting, and more importantly I learned a lot about the state of…
