March 23, 2007
The bill provides funds for ongoing operations in Iraq and Afghanistan (remember Afghanistan?), as well as funds for critical upgrades to military bases in Kansas. It also requires that "units should not be deployed for combat unless they are rated 'fully mission capable'" by the Pentagon, that –…
March 23, 2007
Monkey Girl author Ed Humes will be on campus on March 28 and at the JCCC on March 29. He'll be discussing his book and the events in the Dover school board trial.
On April 3, Taner Edis will be speaking about "The Creation/Evolution Debate in the Muslim World" in Alderson auditorium on campus at…
March 23, 2007
A few days ago I pointed out the many, many ways in which Charley Morasch is a wacked out Christian Reconstructionist who has no place in setting educational policy for our children. His endorsement of bad history was pretty bad, but his lengthy, inaccurate and ill-informed defense of intelligent…
March 23, 2007
Senators Pat "Memory Pills" Roberts and Sam "More conservative that McCain, fewer wives than Giuliani" has come out against a bill funding base realignment and closures (BRAC) funding for two Kansas forts. They want those funds removed from a spending bill, despite the fact that Kris Kobach and…
March 22, 2007
There's no question that Nancy Boyda is going to be one of the top targets for the Republicans in 2008. Losing Jim Ryun really stung the authoritarians, and they want revenge. A good showing on her first finance reports will help show them they should look elsewhere. Give generously before March…
March 21, 2007
When the Appropriations committee voted on the latest Iraq spending, they had some tough choices to make. Should we adequately equipped and armor troops deployed to Iraq? After four years of deployments, should we make sure that troops have the time back home that they are supposed to have?…
March 21, 2007
Charley Morasch is a wingnut. Here are some answers to questions from the Kansas City Star:
What would you like to accomplish if elected/re-elected to the school board?
• Provide a stimulus to improve social studies curriculum to include the words and ideas of the founding fathers, and the legal…
March 21, 2007
Embryonic stem cell research gets surprise support:
"From my standpoint, it is clear today that American science will be better-served, and the nation will be better-served, if we let our scientists have access to more stem cell lines," Dr. Elias A. Zerhouni, director of the National Institutes of…
March 21, 2007
Expanding on a report leaked a few days ago, the Washington Post's account of Smithsonian Head Larry Small's expenses is truly appalling. Compared to previous Secretary's of the Smithsonian, Small has taken an enormous housing stipend, has decorated his office with museum specimens – including a…
March 20, 2007
IDolator David Tyler wants to make something clear about a new fossil, Yanoconodon:
The first point to make is that this is not an example of a transitional fossil. …
Rather, the new fossil has been hailed as illustrating an important evolutionary transition: detachment of the middle ear bones from…
March 20, 2007
Ashley Holm, an intern at the Statehouse's Legislative Research Department, still has her job. This is something of a testament to cool heads in the capitol, who resisted criticism of Holm for a bumper sticker on her car. In the AP's kind phrasing, "The red bumper sticker contains only two words…
March 20, 2007
Cato's gang continue to push vouchers, I mean "education tax credits," as a way towards ending public education. We will note only in passing that "education tax credits" are a shell game, an accounting trick meant only to pretend we aren't giving sectarian schools big bags of taxpayer money:…
March 19, 2007
After getting sick while meeting with some Lawrence EMTs:
Boyda went to the emergency room of The George Washington University Hospital, where she was diagnosed with gallstones. The Congresswoman was back at work the next day, but her spokeswoman says she will require routine surgery to treat the…
March 19, 2007
MB looks like he could use some help explaining to fans of the Confederate flag that a flag only represents freedom if that flag was meant to represent freedom.
March 19, 2007
Michael Egnor is confused.
No, wait, that's like saying that the Titanic is made of metal. Let's try again.
Michael Egnor's confusion is drowning him in his own turgid prose:
I can't tell what live people (or live rats) are thinking by looking at their brains, and I can't even tell using two-…
March 19, 2007
Four years, 3217 coalition fatalities, 50,000 wounded or medically transported, and 700,000 excess civilian fatalities later, our little baby of an invasion is really growing up. It's almost a full-grown cluster-f*¢k.
March 18, 2007
I forgot to advertise the campus blood drive that just ended, and I apologize for that. Your blood really can save lives and blood drives make it that much easier to do the right thing. They had plasmapheresis machines set up, which meant I got to give two units of cells rather than my usual one…
March 17, 2007
As art or as political statement, I have no beef with the installation shown here. It is an artwork produced by John Sims entitled "The Proper Way to Hang a Confederate Flag."
Neo-Confederates disagree. The Mary Brogan Museum of Art and Science refused a request to remove the artwork:
The request…
March 17, 2007
Jesus' General offers Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's Other Crimes:
New Coke
Formidable law blogger Ann Althouse
Not sending enough troops in the initial Iraq invasion.
Faking the deaths of Tupa, Elvis, and Jim Morrison, converting them to Islam, and hiding them out in a cave in Peshawar.
Selling Vogon…
March 17, 2007
This essay's title is meant to help candidates like John McCain, who seems unsure about condoms. Asked in Iowa about his views on taxpayer funding of condom distribution in Africa, he sort of fumbled around. Asked about teaching students about contraception in public schools, he said he "support[…
March 16, 2007
Bruce Bartlett defends the media against charges of partisanship at RealClearPolitics. Maybe the press was partisan once upon a time, he says, but not any longer. He tells the lefties now complaining about the partisan media (since he acknowledges that it has moved rightward):
The problem for…
March 15, 2007
Bart Gordon, chairman of the House Science committee, and Brad Miller, chairman of that committee's investigations subcommittee, will be digging into a memo restricting comment on polar bears and climate change. The memo told government scientists:
Please be advised that all foreign travel…
March 15, 2007
The Journal World reports that warm weather is bringing unusual birds to town. Remember that before you call climate change deniers "bird brains." Birds are smarter.
March 15, 2007
Research published in PLOS Biology reveals a fascinating trend – a survey of the seas shows that we have barely scratched the surface of the genetic diversity of microbes floating there. Craig Venter and his team have sailed around the world, collecting bacteria and viruses and rapidly sequencing…
March 15, 2007
I have no major problems with genetically modified organisms. There are, however, very legitimate concerns about their widespread use. Genes for herbicide resistance could spread to weeds related to crop species, making it even harder to control weeds. Genes interact with each other, sometimes…
March 14, 2007
A few days ago, General Pace tried to back the Don't Ask, Don't Tell program, claiming that homosexuality is immoral, like adultery. In fact, Don't Ask, Don't Tell is immoral, and has sapped our military of soldiers with vital skills. Anyway.
Senator Brownback came out in favor of Pace’s…
March 14, 2007
The Discovery Institute says:
Even with more forward operations by US troops in the past month, and even though the full complement of added US forces has not been attained yet, the number of US fatalities is down. In other words, the Surge is working.
It's true that the number of fatalities is…
March 14, 2007
It's mating season for frogs in Kansas. On a walk through the Baker Wetlands, the air was full of the sweet nothings frogs sing to each other.
I'm not sure what species they were, but I'm guessing it was mostly cricket frogs.
In Aristophanes' classic comedy The Frogs, the chorus of frogs sing:…
March 14, 2007
Jerry Johnston is an evangelical pastor at a megachurch in suburban Kansas City and a leader of many of the anti-gay, anti-science, regressive social movements in Kansas.
He keeps up many of the great traditions of megachurch minister, with the immovable hair, the TV show, the lavish lifestyle, and…
March 14, 2007
A year ago, John Bacon joined the other conservatives on the Kansas Board of Education in voting for nonbinding guidelines on sex education. While the Board has no power to do anything one way or another, they voted to tell local school boards that they ought to require parents to opt their…
