Memorial Day '08

Today is Memorial Day in the United States, when we remember and recognize all those men and women in uniform who went into harm's way for our country (whether the war was justified or not) and, in many cases, gave the ultimate sacrifice to protect our nation's interests.

Right now, the giant American flag that was presented in my grandfather's memorial service is hanging in my bay window, completely covering the glass there. Grandpa served aboard a supply ship in the Pacific during World War II, but came home safely. My great uncle fought in the Battle of the Bulge in World War II Europe. He came home, too. I also had a step father who served in the Korean war. A fall from an icy tank injured his back, but he came home. He never really recovered from his back injury, but he had a far harder time dealing with the mental wounds of war. And my lovely young niece is, right now, patrolling the edges of Sadr City in Baghdad. She is shot at often, and the risk of being killed by bullet, mortar, or roadside bomb is very real. I am lucky that none of my relatives has actually died while at war. Let's hope it stays that way. She comes home in August, just before her 23rd birthday.

But the danger doesn't end when they walk through that door to their good ole home. A recent study found that 1 in every 5 Iraq and Afghanistan veterans suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD):

http://www.physorg.com/news127650186.html

That's 20% of returning veterans. Of those who seek treatment, only about half receive "minimally adequate" treatment.

The biggest effect of PTSD is depression, with suicide as the worst outcome. According to the Pentagon's own assessment, soldier suicides are five-fold higher than before the wars began, and currently that rate is at its highest ever since the start of the war (SOURCE). At least five soldiers commit suicide each day. That means that the number of suicides may soon outpace the number of combat deaths.

In a recent phone call, my niece commented on how surreal it is, fighting there in Baghdad, where you drive around in a big city, like any big city, where there are cars and people walking around, except there you can expect to be shot at at any moment, and everyone you are supposedly fighting for wants you gone and may be conspiring against you.

This isn't the war my grandfather and great uncle fought, or even my step father. Those we were liberating wanted us there.

So as you enjoy your day off, going boating, cooking hot dogs with the fam, reading blogs by liberal scientists, or simply gathering around the home entertainment system to watch this week's episode of American Gladiator, give a thought to those who have fought for your country, and another for those who are fighting for their lives right now.

Hang in there, my niece. I'll see you soon. Though this holiday is meant to remember our soldiers who have died, my flags fly for the living heroes, too, and one day soon this unjustified war will be over.

Addendum: On a closely related note, May 17 was Armed Forces Day, a day where we celebrate all that our combined armed services do for us (and, I might add, a holiday which is practically unknown or ignored outside of miltary circles, as far as I can tell).

Image taken from HERE.

One Hell Of A Toothpick

Try to guess what the next three things have in common:

1. Last night I shoved a small, plastic stick with a wad of cotton at the tip into my ear canals and scraped out loving chunks of brown-yellow wax. It was nice to hear clearly again.

2. Today I go to the dentist to have my bi-annual tooth scraping and (bloody, painful) reminder to floss more often.

3. I plan to spend my supposed recession-deflecting economic band-aid of a stimulus package on something that makes me ignore the catastrophic national debt and economic recession.

Yes, you likely have already received a large sum of money from our government who, in their infinite wisdom, has waged an unjustified war that has cost the average American family $20,900, promoted big oil to record profits and record prices at the pump (the cheap stuff was $3.92 / gallon in town today!), and allowed fiscal irresponsibility to lead us into a recession. But, hey, even though it has cost each family dearly, they'll throw a trifle thousand bucks or so back at ya to spend on that new HD TV or, you know, buy the medicine that grandma needs because our failing healthcare system let her down. Thanks for the money, Dubya. It'll pay off about 1/8th of the average family's credit card debt. No need to invest it into our educational system, for instance, or social security.

Some folks suggested new and exciting ways to spend your stimulus package. Mark Morford had some good ideas (like buying one share of Google stock, filling four tanks of gas, or saving for the massive bonfire celebration to be held on 1/20/09).

Personally, I think a better way to blow your stimulus package would be to follow the lead of a wealthy Spanish galleon captain from the 17th century: a toothpick / earwax spoon made of solid gold:

http://www.comcast.net/articles/news-general/20080519/Florida.Artifacts/

Divers recently unearthed from the sands of the Florida Keys a 3-inch long personal grooming device made of solid gold which has a toothpick at one end and an ear wax spoon on the other end (see picture). This is the latest find of years worth of searching for a fabled lost galleon, the Santa Margarita, which was sunk during a hurricane in 1622. So far they have found bars of gold, a lead box filled with pearls, and gold chains, but have yet to find the ship. This golden toothpick / earwax spoon has an estimated value of around $100,000.

Are you as horrified as I am that such a thing exists as an "earwax spoon"? Ew! And to have a toothpick at the other end! Double ew! Don't mix up one end from the other! You're likely to get a mouth full of yummy ear wax or a pierced eardrum with gingivitis.

But, hey, isn't it really just a status symbol? This little tool was apparently worn on a necklace. Wearing it on your neck, you would be proclaiming to the world, "I can afford a golden toothpick and you can't." You would also be proclaiming, "I have such bad earwax and tooth plague that I have to carry a special tool around my neck at all times to deal with it." But who cares? You're rich! Women will want to lay you no matter how horrible you look, just for a chance to get their own golden earwax spoon.

So, please, run out and get a golden earwax spoon / toothpick of your own. According to our government, it will help the economy. Sound economics.

Now that's picking your teeth with style!



Image taken from HERE.

Happy Earth Day! (Unless You're A Polar Bear)

I’d hate to be a polar bear these days.

My family recently went to the nearest zoo, where my young kids had a great time watching the very large polar bears frolicking in their pool, chewing on things like giant soccer balls, children’s play structures, and even a mannequin (!). The highlight for the kids, though, was watching the bears back up to the pool like a delivery truck and deposit there hot steaming piles of poop or streams of bright yellow pee. Eww! Great fun.

On this glorious Earth Day, where we concern ourselves with the well-being of our environment and animals, and the wild relatives of those two less-than-sanitary zoo animals, let us pause a moment to consider the plight of the polar bear.

In short, they are dying because the arctic ice is receding due to global warming (at a rate that surpasses even the most extreme models that scientists had predicted less than a decade ago). Polar bears require sea ice to hunt for seals, where the bears hang out at seal breathing holes and then ambush the blubbery animals. Yum! Without the sea ice, the bears starve. For the first time in centuries, as you may have heard, polar bears are being found dead due to starvation, and there are even reports of cannibalism.

Since this was discovered, a few years ago, environmental groups have been pressuring the Bush administration to take action to protect the polar bear and to reduce global warming through legislation. Not surprisingly, the President is less than interested, stalling protective status for the bears, moving forward with increasing off-shore drilling rights in polar bear habitat, and doing the usual oil-industry friendly activities that belch forth lots of carbon emissions. This despite his supposed change of stance toward Global warming.

Now those environmental groups have taken their appeals to the federal court system:

http://www.truthout.org/issues_06/031108EA.shtml

These groups are now suing the Bush administration to force them to protect polar bears under the Endangered Species Protection Act. From the article:

“The Endangered Species Act listing process for the polar bear due to global warming was initiated with a scientific petition from the Center for Biological Diversity, NRDC, and Greenpeace. In December, 2005, these groups sued the Bush administration for failing to respond to the petition. As a result of that first lawsuit, in February 2006, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service found that protection of polar bears "may be warranted," and commenced a full status review of the species. A settlement agreement in that case committed the Service to make the second of three required findings in the listing process by December 27, 2007, at which time the Service announced the proposal to list the species as "threatened." By law, the Service was required to make a final listing decision within one year of the proposal. The decision is now more than 2 months overdue.”

“To date, the government has received approximately 670,000 comments in support of protecting the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act, including letters from eminent polar bear experts, climate scientists, and more than 60 members of Congress.”

Gee, what’s a polar bear to do? They can’t all live and poop in cushy zoo pools, can they?

Happy Earth Day. Now take a hike, and if you get cold, just think how much polar bears would like it to stay that way.


Image taken from HERE.

Bush's New Stance

I'm shaking my head right now, and that's never a good sign.

Yesterday, President Bush announced in a press conference that halting global warming was a priority for his administration and urged other nations to develop measures to fight climate change:

http://www.comcast.net/news/articles/general/2008/04/15/Bush.Climate/

Please excuse me, I need to run to the other room so that my laughter doesn't shatter the computer monitor and my tears don't short-circuit the keyboard.

Is he feeling okay? Is the prozac finally kicking in, or did another pretzel go down the wrong way?


This is the man who coined the term "junk science" to describe his opinion of years of tedious and well-formulated scientific findings from thousands of researchers all over the world who came to the conclusion that man-made pollutants were changing the world climate. The man who refused to include the United States, the world's worst polluter for carbon emissions, in the Kyoto Treaty. The man who put oil profits ahead of environmental legislation, and even put oil industry notables into key positions overseeing our nation's environment.

So far we've seen seven years of big-ass SUVs on the roads, a war over oil fields, huge cuts in research funding for areas of environmental studies and alternative energy sources, and record-smashing profits for oil companies. When Bush took office, a gallon of regular unleaded cost between $1.40 and $1.60. When I filled up my car a few days ago, at $3.50 a gallon, it cost me nearly $50.

And now, after years of melting glaciers, state-sized chunks of ice breaking off Antarctica and the arctic ice sheets, the opening of the fabled Northwest Passage in the summer for the first time in history, starving polar bears, bleaching coral reefs, and worldwide tours by one notable but very geeky ex-vice-president-turned-Nobel-laureate, our nation's Denier-in-Chief has suddenly changed his tune?

Hell, I'm glad Bush is finally acknowledging what the rest of the world's science community considers obvious, but how could we possibly take him seriously? It's too little, too late, especially for a lame duck who is drowning in scandal and oil.


Image taken from HERE.

Insert Foot In Mouth Disease

If your government is working on a highly-contagious virus that could threaten to wipe out massive numbers of cattle and other hooved animals, wouldn't you want it to be done in some location far, far away from other cattle? Say, a remote island?

Well, that's been the case for the last 50 years. Plum Island, out on the Long Island sound, has been the main research facility for Hoof and Mouth Disease (also known as Foot and Mouth Disease), for America, as well as Mexico and Canada (see picture).

But now the Bush Administration wants to move the facility to a mainland location:

http://www.comcast.net/news/articles/general/2008/04/11/Animal.Disease/

Oh, but hey, our government must surely take all the reasonable precautions. I mean, being a contagious cattle disease that, if released into the general bovine population would spell the needless slaughter of hundreds of thousands of cattle, won't this new facility will be located in some wilderness far beyond the reach of cattle farms? Right?

No, actually. According to a recent Congressional hearing on the topic, each of the five sites that they are considering, according to the article, are within range of between 132,900 and 542,507 cattle.

But they'll be careful. They'll have all the safeguards. Or will they?

It was revealed in that congressional hearing that the Plum Island facility, considered to be one of the nation's foremost top-level containment units, has had numerous accidents and releases of virus, one of which infected cattle outside of the facility in holding pens. Hoof and Mouth disease is so contagious that it can travel on the breath of worker, on their clothes, on their cars. In 2002, a simulation showed that an outbreak of the virus could potentially infect tens of millions of cows, leading to widespread food shortages, rioting, and a 25-mile-long trench to bury all the slaughtered cows.

The poor cows that get this disease experience painful mouth sores and hoof blisters that swell and burst, then can become infected. Eeesh. And I thought my occasional canker sores were painful.

And why are they moving the facility? Fear over being able to protect Plum Island against terrorists. Hillary Clinton was one of the ones who voiced this fear. Control of the island was recently put in the hands of the Department of Homeland Security. I tell you, with all the over-reaction to terrorism (two wars, illegal wiretapping, data mining, waterboarding, screenings at airports, etc etc), I'd say the terrorists have succeeded in their goals of disrupting the American Way. Let's not make it worse, shall we? And, may I add, I am a little leary of decisions about human and animal health issues that seem driven more by politics than science.

Now, I have a great deal of respect for Hillary (although I'm voting for Obama), but I am FAR more afraid of our government's inefficiency and the potential for mistakes by my fellow lab rats than I am of any zealous bin Laden followers.

Get real, Bush. Let's keep the virus off-shore.


Image taken from HERE.

It's Time My Children Went Deaf

I've decided my children need to be deaf. Tomorrow I'm going to ruin their hearing forever.

No, I'm not kidding. I'm not sure how I'm going to do it, though. Ice pick to the ear drum? No, too bloody. How about playing Iron Maiden at volume level ten on my stereo system, shoving their tender little ears up to the speakers. No, that won't work. They won't stay still long enough. I know! I'll take them swimming and give them a serious case of swimmer's ear, then pack their ears with ear wax harvested from my own auricular orifices via ear candles. Yeah, that's the ticket. That way it will seem "natural", and I will only be accused of neglecting to take them to the doctor as their ear drums swell and burst.

Are you horrified yet? Has our bombed-out, economically-depressed, Paris Hilton-ized culture not yet ruined your sense of ethics and numbed you beyond gross fear and loathing? No? Is it just because I'm talking about maiming my children?

Ah, but wait! If they were deaf, my little 2 and 3 year old babies would be part of a fantastic subculture of deaf people, able to learn the mysterious ways of sign language, and partake in a rich milieu of disability-turned-sense-of-self with their other deaf friends. Why, they would have an "identity".

You wouldn't think this could happen in the modern world, right? Not if the sensible government of England has its way.

A couple in the United Kingdom wants to have the right to purposely choose an embryo, through in vitro fertilization, which is deaf like them:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7287508.stm

That's right. This couple wants to purposely choose an embryo that, like them, will have a genetic profile that indicates it will be deaf. Says the husband (who has the unlikely yet gustatory name of Tomato Lichy): "The core issue is that the government is saying deaf people are not equal to hearing people," he told the BBC via an interpreter. They are "profoundly grateful" to have a deaf child already. Now they want another one.

It's eugenics in reverse.

What bugs me, though, is that Mr. Tomato Lichy is assuming that a hearing child would not be able to be a member of her father's deaf subculture.

I've blogged on this in the past, a little more than a year ago. Now the UK is likely going to pass the Human Embryology and Fertilisation Bill, which, among other things, would make it illegal to purposely choose an embryo with a disability. The tiny minority of deaf people who, like our friend Tomato, actually wish to select a child like them will have an even harder time making their diabolical wish come true. They are calling it discrimination.

Oh, but please don't get me wrong. I know deaf people have a subculture. I can respect that. I even tried to learn American Sign Language once, and I've had friends who were legally deaf, but none of them ever expressed a wish to have children who, like them, would never be able to hear the bus bearing down on them, or the bear leaping at them in the woods, or the latest slaughtering of your favorite elevator music by star wannabes on American Idol (I'm not sure which of these is really the worst way to spend an evening).

Careful, you English Lords. You tread a fine line there regarding how you define "disabled" or "unhealthy". Sure, deafness seems an easy thing to label as disabled, but how "disabled" is disabled? Would having a gene for heart conditions count? Cancer? Irritable bowel? Acid reflux? And just because there's a genetic profile, the body doesn't always pay attention to it. Having a bad gene only increases your chances.

Is my purposeful deafening of my children really any different from dooming a child-to-be to a life of silence, just to satisfy its parents' sense of self? Would that embryo have any more say than my kids would?

Hmm. On second thought, maybe I won't ruin my kids' hearing. I'll wait and let them do it to themselves in their teen years, with whatever future form of iPod ear speakers are being used at that time. They'll just have to wait for that marvelous subculture that Tomato Lichy and his reverse-eugenics friends love so dearly. How heartless and cruel of me not to understand.

And as for Mr. Tomato's next child, I feel sorry for the baby if she isn't deaf, whatever way she comes into the world.


Image taken from HERE.

Space Is Getting Colder

Don't you miss the Cold War? Our government does. All that muscle-flexing and ball-grabbing as we and our opponent, the good ol' CCCP commies, traded insults and ominously positioned our forces across the iron curtain, awaiting with childish glee and fear the First Strike as we aimed our nukes at the other sides.

Duck and Cover!

Ah, those were the days.

But, hey, there are other bad guys out there, right? I mean, China is a rising world power, with a space program of their own, big guns, millions of shouting, goose-stepping commies marching through blood-soaked Tiananmen Square, stomping on the human rights of their people. Doesn't stop us from giving them favored-nation status for trade, but I guess they'll do for the next Cold War enemy.

Well, dig out that back yard bunker, boys and girls. They've gone beyond buzzing our warships with their fighters.

Remember last month, when China shot down one of their defunct weather satellites? Now that was a novel bit of Cold War-ness if ever I saw it. Remember the worldwide condemnation of the act, led by the U.S. and our allies? If they can shoot down their own satellite, they could shoot down ours (spy satellite or otherwise). Here's a taste, in case it's too hard to remember back a month:

http://www.spacewar.com/reports/China_Under_Pressure_To_Explain_Satellite_Missile_Strike_999.html

What a furor that caused. Oh, how our government admonished China for breaking the treaty against militarization of space, chided them for failing to restrain themselves, shook our heads at their blatant disregard and aggression.

So now I'm chuckling. Surely you've heard the reports over the last week or two about how the U.S. is going to shoot down a defective spy satellite. It's supposed to happen today or tomorrow, depending on the weather:

http://www6.comcast.net/news/articles/general/2008/01/26/Dead.Satellite/

But we aren't flexing our Cold War muscles! No way! Not according to Bush. We're protecting our civilians against the potential for the satellite to crash into the good ole US of A and getting poisoned and eaten alive by satellite fuel (hydrazine). Very thoughtful.

Don't believe the hype. This is posturing at its best. Gotta keep up with the Johnsons, don't you know, or the Jong's. And we don't want damaged military imaging components sold on EBay.

As for the deadly hydrazine, it's not really so deadly. You'd have to eat the stuff or swim in it before it could kill you. It's an irritant, sorta like gasoline is. Read it yourself: http://www.sciencelab.com/xMSDS-Hydrazine-9924279.

So, when you look up at the sky tonight at the last lunar eclipse until 2010, cross your arms and try not to shiver. A space-based military arms race may have already begun.


Addendum (2/20/08): The Pentagon announced that the satellite has been successfully blown up. They are still sticking to the save-the-public-from-deadly-hydrazine story:
http://www6.comcast.net/news/articles/general/2008/02/14/NEWS-USA-SATELLITE-MISSILE-DC/.

Update (2/21/08): See footage of the satellite's destruction:
http://www.comcast.net/providers/fan/popup.html?v=658927153&pl=622214722.xml&plc=622214722&launchpoint=Cover&cid=fancover&attr=default_headline&config=/config/common/fan/default.xml.

Science Policies Of Presidential Candidates

Anymore it seems that if you are a Republican politician, your only interest in science topics is to oppose anything with the words “stem cell” or “evolution” and to support anything having to do with defense. If you are a Democratic politician, stem cells and evolution are back on the table, as well as protecting our environment and fighting global warming. So let’s hear it for the Dems, who wish to protect our health, fight for rationality in teaching science to our children, and actually want to protect the world we live in.

But don’t take my word for it. Below are three links to the stances of each of the candidates (including those who have stepped out of the running) on science issues, including their actual quotes and even videos. Enjoy!

BioTechniques:
http://mailcenter3.comcast.net/wmc/v/wm/47AC9192000792C500002A4122155517240A9D0109040705D202019C0E06?cmd=Show&no=317&uid=1326&sid=c0#news

Popular Mechanics “Geek The Vote 2008”:
http://www.popularmechanics.com/geekthevote08

The Huffington Post:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/susan-blumenthal/us-presidential-candida_b_60549.html


Image taken from HERE.

Happy Holidays, Damn It!

What's all this nonsense I hear from political candidates and radio talk show hosts upset about how "Christ is being taken out of Christmas"? One radio DJ lamented that he hated to hear "Happy Holidays" said to him at the check-out line. "Say Merry Christmas, Damn it!" he said on air, and loudly proclaimed that he says so to those people. And then there is presidential candidate Mike Huckabee, neo-conservative extraordinaire, and his pal Mitt Romney, who refuse (like the current president) to recognize that there is a separation between Church and State, endorsing "Christian values" as a political agenda and, to paraphrase Mr. Romney, people who aren't of a prominent faith would not be included in his presidential cabinet (as if Mormons are so prominent - little more than Muslims, to whom he was really referring). These same pundits are getting torqued all out of shape because certain town squares have decorations of all faiths instead of just Christian on the town Christmas tree.

Well excuse me for being an atheist.

I have close friends who celebrated Hanukkah, and other close friends who celebrate Kwanzaa and the Winter Solstice, instead of Christmas. Saying "Merry Christmas" doesn't get them bent out of shape, but it isn't exactly a meaningful compliment to them, is it? "Happy Holidays", general as it is, at least gives some measure of pleasant holiday feeling.

Now, I celebrate Christmas. Not because I apply any belief at all to the idea of virgin birth, God, or miracles, but because it gives me a good excuse to celebrate the meaning of love, friends, and family, and to express that true blessing with gifts and, of course, massive quantities of glorious food.

Nobody's taking "Christ out of Christmas" for the Christians. The neo-cons just want to maintain control. But our government is at least giving some measure of our constitutional right to be protected from others' religious intolerance by either keeping religious symbols out of the public square or being all-inclusive, and those (like myself) who work in public relations sorts of positions are being tolerant and inclusive by using a more generic yet still festive greeting. In my job, I work with people from cultures and religions from all over the world. If I say "Merry Christmas" to all of them, I'd bet at least a third of them would shrug and say thanks even though it had no real meaning to them, and some of them would be outright offended.

To you, my merry blog reader, I extend my warmest holiday feelings. However you celebrate the season, please go out and party hardy, open your gifts, and keep your family in your thoughts and arms at all times.

But if you wish to challenge yourself, and those you should happen to meet in public, I'd like to extend also this special assignment: Greet everyone you meet or respond to them with "Happy Solstice" and see what the result is. Sure, you'll get some odd looks and the occasional evil eye, but most people will probably give a wary thanks and shrug it off. Maybe a few of them will stop to think about how very personal the holidays are to each different religion, and thus how very special their own celebration is. Maybe, just maybe, there will be one or two who embrace diversity. At the very least, the "fake" feeling you get by doing this assignment will highlight how much the season means to you and how personal it is to you and your loved ones.

Happy Holidays!


P.S., if you are wondering what the heck this image is about (which was on my favorite holiday card sent to me this year), visit information about the Flying Spaghetti Monster and His Holy Noodly Appendage HERE or HERE.

Image taken from HERE.

Now China Is Giving Date-Rape Drugs To Children

I'm shaking my head right now. How many Chinese products need to be recalled because of lead poisoning, dangerous swallowable magnets, or faulty construction before our industry leaders and government officials realize they are slowly turning our children into mindless lead-poisoned vegetables one drooling lick of an Elmo doll at a time? The recalls just keep on comin'.

Yes, you have likely heard the most recent deadly Chinese toys to come to our Dollar Store and Wal-Mart shelves.

First, there are the Aqua Dots (CNN article). These lovely, candy-colored beads are an arts and crafts dream and oh-so-edible-looking. Your trusting, naïve small child can arrange them in whatever colored patterns they like on a nifty grid then spray them with water, and the glue coatings on them instantly glue them together into a semi-permanent craft project to be treasured by proud parents everywhere. Why, it's so novel, it was named Toy Of The Year in Australia. The only problem is that the supposedly inert glue is actually a chemical which, when ingested, gets metabolized into the date-rape drug gamma-hydroxy butyrate, commonly called GHB. That's right, a few of these beads, when ingested, become the equivalent of a rapist's dream. But overdosing, which happened to a number of children here and in Australia, leads to vomiting and coma. Luckily, no children have yet died. Apparently the manufacturer had not intended this chemical be used; it was the bright idea of the Hong Kong manufacturer to use it and save themselves some cash. And where, exactly, could one purchase these beads, prior to the recall of all 4.2 million units of them? One outlet is, you guessed it, Wal-Mart, lover of all things Chinese, cheap, and plastic.

Oh, it doesn't stop there! Today, two more recalls were announced. Dangerously high levels of lead were found in the faces of 175,000 Curious George dolls and in some 51,000 Dollar Store children's sunglasses. Lead poisoning in Chinese children's products? It's becoming such a skipping record hardly anyone is noticing anymore. Hell, I'm actually so wary now that I'm refusing to buy Chinese-made products for my kids. Of course, Chinese products are so commonplace now it's almost impossible to avoid them.

But wait! Don't we have a Consumer Product Safety Commission to oversee that these things don't happen to our lovely little nearly-toxin-free children? Why, yes we do! The only problem (and here's another skipping record!) is that the commission that is supposed to oversee our safety is headed by someone who comes from the very industries they are supposed to regulate (ARTICLE). Acting chairperson Nancy Nord, appointed by President Bush, is a former lobbyist for Eastman-Kodak and the leader of a consumer lawyer organization. Her predecessor, Hal Stratton, was also accused of unbecoming ties to Industry. She has opposed extending more protections to whistleblowers as well as better reporting of faulty products to the public. Prominent Congressional Democrats are calling for her resignation, in part for failing to stop these waves of faulty and toxic Chinese products, and in part for scandals on her part for conflicts of interest with Industry, including 30 trips paid for in part or in full by consumer industries to such locations as China, Spain, and a golf resort at Hilton Head, S.C. The fox is running the henhouse, folks.

Oh well. At least all these toxic products make us belatedly realize the benefits of governmental checks and balances and good, old fashioned, high quality American-made products. I just fear how many more children will be poisoned before our industries finally pull out of China.

Creep at Nightclub: "Hey, Baby! What ya drinkin'?"

Attractive and Tipsy Lady: (covering her drink) "I'm watching you, Buddy. I don't trust you any more than I'd trust a Bush appointee."

Creep: (acting hurt) "What? I'm just asking! Really, you can trust me. Here, I've brought this nifty arts and crafts project we can do together…."


Update (11/9/07): (LINK) Today China announced that it had suspended export of AquaDots and had started a thorough investigation. This comes as seven other children in the United States have fallen ill. The dots were supposed to have been coated with the nontoxic compound 1,5-pentanediol but had instead been coated with 1,4-butanediol, which metabolizes to GHB when ingested. 1,4-butanediol is 4- to 5-times less expensive.

Update (11/10/07): HERE is a news video where a mom tells what happened when her toddler swallowed just a few of these AquaDots.

Image taken from HERE.

China Is Trying To Kill Us

I’ve decided the People’s Republic of China is trying to kill you, your children, and your pets.

I guess it’s nothing new, really. I mean, for decades they’ve been trying to get Americans fat and give us heart attacks by exporting their food style. Call me paranoid if you wish, but have you ordered chow mein lately from your local Chinese restaurant? Or a nice, big egg roll? A side of wontons? Even fried rice? Go ahead, order some take-out tonight. I’d bet my left pinkie finger your dish is dripping with grease. Yum, but do you really need to see through your napkin? I really became suspicious when my MSG-laced Chinese food started giving me migraines. So I pretty much stopped eating Chinese food.

Perhaps, sensing this, China changed its tactic. They’ve stepped up their efforts to assassinate you. Now they’re taking the direct approach with good ol’ fashioned poison!

Consider these news stories from just the last three months:

1) Toxic Trains! Approximately 11 million “Thomas the Tank Engine” toys were made in china with a particularly dangerous lead paint, and are now recalled (ARTICLE). My soon-to-be three-year-old son really wants a “James” train. We had to tell him “Sorry, Son, but James is stuck in China.”

2) Recalls Galore. According to Scott Wolfson of the Consumer Product Safety Commission, “So far in 2007, 60 percent of the recalls we have conducted are of products made in China. We have done 24 recalls of toys; all of those products have been made in China." (ARTICLE)

3) Booty Bungle. I also had to rescue my children from another Chinese contaminant. There is currently a recall for a children’s puffed corn snack called Veggie Booty, which my kids love to eat. It turns out they are made with spices that are contaminated with Salmonella bacteria (ARTICLE). Yum! That’s good eats!

4) Malevolent Melamine. Dogs around the nation are dying from kidney failure and other symptoms due to shipments of wheat flour containing the protein melamine and, apparently, poisonous cyanuric acid from Chinese factories (articles HERE and HERE). China initially denied the contamination, then admitted the problem, but has been slow to investigate or work with outside investigators. They still deny the poisonous nature of the contaminants. It is highly likely some of this wheat flour got into human food. Careful with your dumplings!

5) Antifreeze Toothpaste. At least 900,000 tubes of toothpaste containing the toxic antifreeze component diethylene glycol came to America from China, winding up mainly in mental hospitals, prisons, and juvenile detention centers for some reason (ARTICLE), as well as your friendly neighborhood discount store. The FDA recommends throwing out all toothpaste made in China. A similar diethylene glycol contamination in cough syrup from China killed at least 100 people across Latin America, but Chinese officials say you shouldn’t worry, since the concentration in the cough syrup was much higher than in your toothpaste so the toothpaste is perfectly safe to use, and no one’s died - yet. Don’t forget to floss!

6) Shellfish Shocker. The FDA is carefully inspecting all shellfish coming from China, as a number of shipments have been highly contaminated with DDT and other toxins (ARTICLE). Mmmmm. I likes my oysters raw and full of chemicals….

7) Blown Tires. At least 450,000 tires made in China (by Hanzhou Zhongce Rubber Co.) are being recalled by their American distributor. Seems the Chinese manufacturer skimped on necessary glue (or “gum strip”) to hold the tread on, resulting in tread separation and blow-outs. At least two people are dead and another badly injured. Does 450,000 tires sound like a lot? That was just one distributor. There are at least six other distributors in America that have not come forward. I guess if the contaminated food doesn’t get ya, the drive to the gym will.

8) Magnetic Intestines. A product called Mag Stix is a children’s toy made of nifty sticks that interconnect using strong magnetic balls. Neat. Made in China. Unfortunately, if small children swallow the magnets, the magnets interconnect within the intestines causing blockages and perforations (ARTICLE). It has now been recalled. A previous toy, called Magnetix, was made much the same way and resulted in the death of a 20-month old. Other small children required surgery and hospitalization (ARTICLE). And where was Magnetix made? You guessed it: China.

9) Hang ‘Em High. And what has China done to fix the problem of all their toxic and malfunctioning goods? Why, execute those responsible, like any good communist regime, of course! (ARTICLE) Seems some high-ranking health and safety officials were taking massive bribes to look the other way, particularly for another oversight – falsely approving a number of fake drugs, mostly for leukemia and arthritis. Now they look down a gun barrel. Sure, they’re scum, but do they have to DIE for their crimes? China has also shut down 180 food manufacturers and publicly tried many of those responsible. Truly I don’t want to die from Chinese poisoning, but I wouldn’t care for them to die, either. But what else would you expect from those who masterminded the Tiananmen Square massacre?

Don’t worry, there’s more. Go to the Chinese Poison Train site to learn more.

Heck, after all this, it makes me wonder if Chinese president Hu Jintao and premier Wen Jiabao are sitting back laughing about all this. “Stupid Americans,” they must be thinking, “As long as they shop at Wal-Mart, we’ll have free trade status, and we can get away with poisoning their dogs, selling black-market copies of movies and CDs, and selling them cheap crap for a profit. And we don’t even have to be democratic, respect the rights of our citizens, or protect our environment to do it!” And they’d be right. One family recently finished living an entire year without Chinese products. They wrote a BOOK on it, and said it was extremely difficult. I don’t doubt it.

So, to my tens of readers, next time you crack open that fortune cookie after consuming mass quantities of egg rolls and shrimp chow mein dripping with cooking oil, be sure to read the fine print. It may read, “Made in China. Not approved for consumption by the FDA.”


Addendum (7/27/07): HERE is a good CNN.com webpage devoted to the issue of tainted Chinese products and the fallout from it.

Update (8/1/07): HERE, from CNN.com, is yet another massive toy recall due to Chinese production using lead-based paint. This time it’s for 967,000 Big Bird, Elmo, Diego, and Dora toys. Geez. Why the hell would companies keep doing business with China after all this??

Update (8/13/07): One of the owners of the Chinese company that made those Elmo (and others) toys has hung himself in disgrace. See THIS more recent post for details.

Update (8/15/07): (More Recent Post) Recalled lead-containing toys and baby bibs.

Update (8/23/07): The August 2007 issue of Nature Biotechnology (Volume 25, number 8) has, on page 835, an article on the rise, fall, and eventual execution of Zheng Xiaoyu, the former head of China's State Food and Drug Administration. He was supposed to be the face of a new era in Chinese modernism, now he's just another corrupt official that got rich off of making products cheap but dangerous products.

Update (11/8/07): (More Recent Post) Chinese AquaDots products metabolize to the date-rape drug GHB when ingested, as well as other recalled products which contain lead.

Image taken from HERE.

Biofuel Isn't Golden Yet

If you’re like me, you get a curious little quiver of excitement when you think about biofuels. Stick it to the oil companies, damn it! Those greedy, all-time record profit conglomerates that suck crude out of the ground in oh-so-unstable parts of the world, helping BushCo wage greedy little wars so they can pump up the costs and make us pay a significant portion of our take-home-pay at the filling station. Yes, the souls of the oil executives run as dark as their product.

Ah, but now we have biofuels. Just take that grease from evil obesity-causing fast food chains and refine it to burn in your VW bus and go happily along down the road smelling like French fries. What could be better? No crude oil went into that engine, thank you!

But there isn’t enough used canola cooking oil to fuel every car, nor do most people care to convert their garage into a refining station. Thus enters the biofuels market.

Now biofuels outlets are popping up all over the place. BioWillie, for instance.

And thus we enter into a glorious future where new and altruistic start-ups fuel our cars with biofuel, crude oil looses its grip on the car fuel market, the world gets less greenhouse gases, there is less and less smog to breathe into our asthma-riddled bodies, and we all live in a happy, hippie, utopia as golden as the canola we feed to our cars.

But wait. It’s never that simple.

Originally, biofuels came from corn. However, even though corn farmers have grown more maize in the U.S. than ever before, they are facing a deficit in the amount that goes to human and livestock food. Too much is going to biofuel, and growing every day, putting our dinner plates at risk for too little deep fried goodies. What are we to do? (HERE is an article discussing the tradeoff).

Okay, so if we can’t get biofuel from corn, we can look for other alternatives. No problem. Corn only yields 18 gallons per acre of refined biodiesel. It’s at the bottom of the list of alternatives, even though it is currently the easiest to grow.

The most promising source for biofuel oils is algae. I’ve blogged on this before. Early research suggests you can get an amazing 10,000 gallons of biofuel per acre of algae, presumably grown in massive vats in the deserts of the world. Unfortunately, research on this lucrative area has only just begun, so we must turn to other options in the meanwhile.

Well, how about trees? Wood pulp contains oils which are now able to be processed out, according to THIS article. But this, too, is a very early technology, far from release. And we wouldn’t want to cut down even more forests, would we? Being good flaming liberals, like me, you would rather forests go to spotted owls.

Well, there are many other alternative crops with large oil content, such as rice, soybean, olives, avocado, or opium poppy. But these face the same old problems of interfering with food sources, being unable to be grown in large enough quantities, or, in the case of poppy, are simply illegal.

That leaves oil palm. At 625 gallons of refined biofuel per acre, it’s near the top of the list of potential biofuel sources. These lovely palm trees produce fruit very rich in oil. So much, in fact, that it is the second-most produced cooking oil in the world, behind soybean oil. Grow ‘em up in orchards and harvest the fruit, and you’re in the biofuel business. Malaysia, for instance, is a leading nation in converting its cars to biofuel, growing orchards of oil palm, and creating biofuel refineries.

Ah, but here’s that evil little catch: where do you grow them? Why, you have to cut down wide swaths of old growth hardwood forests, or grow over precious crop or grazing land, or fill in delicate marshy ecosystems.

And here’s one I’ll bet you didn’t expect: drug lords. Yes, according to a recent article from TruthOut.com, drug lords in Columbia are KILLING peasants and forcing them off their land to take possession and build oil palm orchards:

http://www.truthout.org/issues_06/060607ED.shtml

It seems growing “legitimate” crops is more lucrative than cocaine, since the Columbian army and the United States (the third most funded military effort behind Iraq and Afghanistan) have attempted to eradicate illegal coca farming and cocaine production. Well, that hasn’t actually worked, since coca production is up 27% since 1999, but never mind. Columbia produces 1.2 million liters of palm oil biofuel a day. It’s not just the rebels and drug lords stealing land, but now even the paramilitary groups formed to fight them have taken land, as well. The Columbian government can’t keep up with the thousands of complaints they get each month.

When you go to the pump to fill up your Volvo with biofuel, there is simply no good way to tell where that fuel comes from.

And let us not forget that ANY source of fuel will eventually lead to greed and price increases.

So what is a good liberal to do, short of selling the car for scrap and biking everywhere? I guess we have to choose the least of the evils: continuing to support greedy global oil conglomerates and their smog- and greenhouse-producing war-causing goo, taking corn- or soy-based food out of the mouths of starving people, gobbling up precious natural lands and supporting drug lords and paramilitary groups with oil palm groves, or simply hoofing it until algae biofuel is made?

You be the judge. For now, I guess I’ll keep supporting big oil.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going home to eat some deep fried meat bits dripping with canola oil, and I’m not going to refine it to fuel my car, either. So there.


Images modified from HERE, HERE and HERE.

Father's Day, And Carrying My Children Through The Forest

Happy Father's Day to all you papas, grandpapas, and papas frites out there. We spent Father's Day picnicking at a nearby state park, then hiking a new trail (for us) up in the mountains with the family, enjoying the spirit of discovery I saw in the eyes of my kids as they explored the subtle joys of throwing rocks into a lake, splashing in the mud, and hugging trees along the trail. Though they are only toddlers, my son and daughter are real troopers. Still, by the end of it, I was carrying both of them when they ran out of steam. I didn't mind, though. That's what dads are for, after all.

Of course, I had started down the trail with the intention of making them walk all the way. Inevitably, it was my daughter who first broke me of that idea. How did she do it? Yep, you guessed it. She stood in front of me, arms wide, and looking at me with those adorable please-please-please eyes. How could I possibly say no to someone so cute? Oh, man, the things she's likely to get away with over the years!

I'm not alone in being influenced by my daughter. A study was recently released by researchers in economics and psychiatry from Yale that showed male congressmen who have daughters are more likely to support women's rights and health issues:

http://www.physorg.com/news101125978.html

But is it really surprising? Don't we naturally relate most to issues we have the closest connections to? According to the article: "Kyle Pruett, a clinical professor of psychiatry at Yale University's Child Study Center, said daughters make fathers 'think differently about how they're going to make the world a better place.'"

Yep. I consider myself an advocate for women's rights, anyhow, but I have no doubt she, and my son, will change the way I see the world, and in a big way. I think it's a reasonable argument that, though we play a pivotal role in molding the way our children see the world as they grow up, in the end it is our children who change us more.

Bring Them Home

Here in the U.S., today is Memorial Day, when we remember our soldiers, particularly those who gave their lives in battle.

Each year I put out my flags. Little ones along the road. A big one hanging on the porch. A bed-sized one draped in my bay window. That one is particularly important to me, as it was presented at the memorial service for my Grandpa, who served in the Pacific during WWII. I think of him when I see the flag, I think of my great uncle, who fought at the Battle of the Bulge, and I think of others.

But this year Memorial Day is different for me. This year my sweet, young niece is in Iraq. Soon she will be going street to street, facing the odds, where fully 65% of American soldiers who are wounded are wounded by improvised explosives, and the effects of it are devestating. Brain injuries are common. 3500 have died so far, and tens of thousands have been wounded. I have good reason to be concerned.

I hope my neice will return unharmed, but I doubt whe will be quite as sweet when she comes back, wounded or not. War spoils more than peace.

More so than ever I long to put an end to this unjustified war, a war built on lies, a war that seems to serve little or no purpose to protect the interests of America. It's another Vietnam, where even the soldiers who are fighting there see no reason to be there, and the people we are "liberating" don't want us there. I've lost a lot of pride in my nation in the last five years.

So this year the only flag I am flying is my Grandpa's, in memory of the nation as it used to be, the soldiers who fought from the heart, and the wars which were justified by more than greed. I just don't have the heart to fly the other flags this year.

Gay Flamingos Sit On Chick

That’s right – gay flamingos. If you were thinking being gay is just a human phenomenon, you’d be wrong. It’s actually quite common among flamingos, where mate pairs can form. Some animals do it as a form of “friendliness”, such as chimpanzees. Others as a form of dominance, such as in dogs (proof) and giraffes. I’ve personally seen this in cats. Go figure.

Lately a particular male pair of flamingos has made headlines:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070521/od_afp/britainanimalsgay

Carlos and Fernando are a male flamingo couple at the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust (WWT) in Slimbridge near Bristol. They’ve been so desperate to follow through with their maternal intentions that they have been trying to take over nests and eggs from other, “straight” flamingos. Now they’ve gotten their chance to “shine”. A nest and egg were abandoned, allowing Carlos and his beau to assume the nesting responsibilities. I guess this means they’ll be picking up at least one “chick.”

I wonder what the neoconservatives would say about this one. Gay adoption. “It ain’t natural! It ain’t godly! Perverse! One man one woman!” Well, all you neocons and evangelists out there (including those of you in the White House), it isn’t so unnatural as you may think. That bigot Jerry Falwell must be rolling in his newly-filled grave.

These flamingos are pink, after all. Now they can wear their color with even more pride.


(Thanks to my friend K.O. for the heads-up on this one.)

Image taken from http://www.ukgaynews.org.uk/Archive/07/May/2101.htm.

No Videos For The Troops

It just became tougher to share videos and pictures with American soldiers in Iraq:

http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/internet/05/14/military.sites.blocked.ap/index.html

Today my precious little niece, age 20, ships out to Iraq. She finished army boot camp and MP training a mere 2 weeks ago. She gets a little more training in Kuwait, then it’s off to the horrors of war for her, and she’ll be right in the thick of it. I still see her as a little girl in my mind, so the thought of her going off to kill people in an unjustified quagmire of a war that serves no apparent American interests doesn’t sit well with me, especially since I was one of those folks standing at my courthouse with anti-war signs back when it all started. But it’s the choice she made for herself. All I can do is hope she comes back in one piece, physically and mentally. I don’t want her to join the over 3100 Americans who have been killed, or the tens of thousands who have been seriously wounded.

Of course I hope to keep in touch with her while she’s “over there.” She brought her new laptop computer with her, and has a couple of email addresses and the internet, but she’ll be relying on the army electronic networks to keep in digital contact with us.

Many servicemen and servicewomen and their families use photosharing and video websites, like YouTube, MySpace, and Photobucket, to keep in touch with each other. Consider THIS video from someone to their Uncle Keith in Iraq.

Troops are also able to share their experience with the world at large, such as in THIS footage (“Looks like they blew up the showers again.”), or THIS patriotic footage of actual fighting.

But the military has decided to make these and many other photo- and video-sharing sites off-limits to their troops using military networks, starting today. Here is the DoD notice to soldiers: http://www.usfk.mil/usfk/bell-sends/5_11_07_27%20-%2007%20Restricted%20Access%20to%20Internet%20Entertainment%20Sites%20Across%20DoD%20Networks.pdf.

They say it’s because it slows the system down too much, but you would think the world’s most funded army would be able to have a decent networking system that could handle the bandwidth. They also say they worry about sensitive information being leaked. Maybe they have a point there, but don’t they already censor such things? No, I think they are afraid more about morale, since a great many videos and photos out there are being put out about the horrors the civilian population are facing (over 600,000 civilians have died, according to one estimate, and over 2.6 million have refugee status according to the U.N.), and increasing numbers of anti-war videos are being published. Here is a good example, but WARNING, it contains very graphic images: HERE. My niece has told me how nearly everyone she has met so far in the military is strongly against the war. And we’re talking about the new recruits, who are supposed to be “gung-ho” fresh from boot camp!

The military’s reaction is strangely hypocritical, since they are posting their own videos on the web, for the sake of recruitment and banging the patriotic drums, even have their own channel on YouTube (EXAMPLE). It’s a two-way street. As the CNN article says, this war is as much about minds and action as it is about bombs and guns. When the troops aren’t able to broadcast their side of things, all you are left with is official propaganda and the many, many videos put out by the other side.

Oh, well. For now I can still send emails to my niece, at least, as well as standard mail. Let’s hope cooler heads prevail and bring home the troops soon, anyhow.

Bring ‘em home, Bush.

Addendum: On a related note, the U.S. military set up its own YouTube channel just last week, and about a week before that they banned all blog posting by soldiers without express supervisory approval for each post (see blog links at this post: http://tailrank.com/1851635/The-end-of-military-blogs). Of course, how many supervisors would allow it, thinking that any perceived slip would fall on their heads? It all adds up to a serious clamp-down on soldier communications while at the same time increasing the military's propaganda machine. What's next? Will the military forbid email? Are the soldiers to be reduced to WWII-era censored snail mail, too? In a weird and scary way, it seems to me that the very people who are supposed to lay their lives on the line for our rights are denied most of those same rights, almost to the level of inmates in our prison system.

Update (5/18/07): Today PhysOrg.com released an interview with the YouTube co-founders: http://www.physorg.com/news98692938.html. They said they could not understand why the military, with its massive network and its own YouTube channel, would use the excuse of not having enough bandwidth for its soldiers to use the system. They went on to explain how they were willing to work with the military to solve the problems, and that they censor particularly violent videos.

Another Big-Industry Bush Lackey Resigns In Disgrace

Oh yes! Score one for lovers of the environment everywhere! Yet another Bush lackey has been forcefully booted into resignation. This time it is the pro-industry, non-science-literate, anti-scientist, non-lover of endangered species Deputy Secretary of the Interior, Julie A. MacDonald, who oversaw the Department of Fish and Wildlife:

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-macdonald2may02,1,7039154.story?coll=la-headlines-nation&ctrack=1&cset=true

Also here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/29/AR2007032902003.html

Fellow science blogger, GrrlScientist, has a good write-up: HERE.

Ah yes, MacDonald, the person who was in charge of safeguarding much of our natural resources, insuring that endangered species are preserved, and insuring scientific accuracy in the reports of her scientists, has resigned after repeated egregious abuses of her power. It is another glorious day in the turning of the tide, as science and reason are slowly winning back the minds of America against the disinformation spewed forth by the neo-cons and BushCo.

MacDonald repeatedly overrode her scientists, preventing important data about endangered animal populations from reaching policy makers and the public. According to the LATimes article, “In many instances, MacDonald's changes caused scientists to request that their names be removed from documents. The inspector general calculated that in the last six years, 75% of the endangered species reports from the Fish and Wildlife Service's Western offices did not have standard signoffs by scientific staff members.”

Among her abuses, MacDonald has repeatedly passed sensitive FWS and EPA documents to big oil and other industry lobbies, insisted on reduction of habitat for a number of sensitive and endangered species (stating that economic concerns overrode the value for the species), covered up data that would have seemed harmful to big industry, and bullied scientists into changing their conclusions.

Before her appointment to the position in 2001, MacDonald was a civil engineer, with no formal training or experience in the biological sciences. Of course, is it any surprise that she got the position, given that she was appointed by former Interior Secretary, Gale Norton, another Bush appointee who resigned in disgrace for abuses of power (with the Jack Abramoff / Indian Casino scandal and uncollected royalties from oil drillers, she had been a litigator beforehand for mining-, cattle-, and oil-interests).

It’s getting harder and harder for the pro-industry Republicans to get their way these days. How many have left in disgrace in the last 7 years? I’ve lost count. And let us not forget that the times are changing. All those dreams of the hippies are slowly but surely coming true (see Mark Medford’s article: “The Hippies Were Right”). Even the steak-chewin’ crowd who think raw vegetables are a “yuppie thing” are coming around to buying organic and recycled goods at Wal-Mart (of all places!) and finding a twinge of pride when they drop some money on that new hybrid to chauffer their soccer-playing kids.

Doubtless the White House (which fuels its heating system with the still-twitching corpses of environmentalists and oil taken from Alaska) will attempt to put another MacDonald in her place. Let us hope that America’s newly-restored Democratic Congress can insure an appointee who has at least a little bit of green in his “ring around the collar”.


UPDATE (5/9/07): Though MacDonald has resigned, controversy still rages over the long-term consequences of her meddling and the role her assistants played. Congress has conducted an inquiry (ARTICLE).

Go Hug Mother Earth Today

Yes, fellow Earthlings, today is Earth Day, around the world. Have you hugged Mother Earth today? No? For shame! Love your momma! Go outside and lay on the ground, arms spread out, and hug your planet. Go on, I'll wait . . . .

This year's Earth Day topic is, of course, Global Warming. Every week there are dozens of new research reports, papers, and science organization statements about climate changes and the resultant effects: bleaching of corals, increasing storms and hurricanes, decline of species, rise in sea level, change in the atmosphere and weather, and effects on economy of all these things. Even the Bush administration can no longer ignore the validity and pretend the problem doesn't exist. After 7 years of blatant disregard for the scientific data and a coordinated disinformation campaign, suddenly Bush is an advocate for global warming (though not enough to join the Kyoto Treaty, of course). Consider this article, released today, saying that Bush will be meeting with the Prime Minister of Japan to cooperate in building a zero-emissions coal plant. While I applaud the change in stance, I still have to shake my head, along with every other scientist in the world, and mutter, "What the hell took you so long? Too little too late, Mr. 'Junk Science.'"

Perhaps the most obvious effects of global warming can be seen anywhere there is "permanent" ice. Glaciers are melting and disappearing all over the world. Giant icebergs are breaking off both in the Arctic and Antarctic. And huge changes are happening to the ecology at both poles. Consider a report released last week:

http://www.physorg.com/news95869506.html

According to the report, the sea ice is forming later, freezing thinner, and thawing sooner in the arctic. As a result, more and more Inuit hunters are falling through thin ice and drowning; animals never before seen in those cold waters are now migrating to the region, including finches, robins, and even dolphins, which the Inuit have no words for; cold-climate mammals such as polar bears are migrating further north; and, interestingly, the Inuit in certain regions are unable to build igloos anymore.

Polar bears are starving or drowning from exhaustion. Sea ice is growing thinner and melting away, revealing new islands. What are we to do?

There are many, many things you can do. A simple search on the web will produce action lists - everything from being energy-conscious, taking part in political action, or simply planting a tree. HERE, HERE, and HERE are some sample pages. But the main thing, of course, is to educate yourself, dummy, and pay attention, unless, of course, you don't mind increasing heat waves, hurricanes, and the loss of many species all over the world. Those species were WEAK, anyway! Who needs 'em? Buck up, polar bears! Learn to fish.

Yeah, yeah, I know. You've heard it all, already. Every frickin' day there's some report on Headline News about this stuff. Frickin' "liberal media"! It's becoming wallpaper. But let's not get too used to this wallpaper. It gets an uglier shade every week, and before long you won't be able to ignore it anymore.

You didn't actually go out and hug the ground, did you? I see you, sitting there at your computer. I can read your mind, too. You're thinking about playing computer solitaire, aren't you? Typical. Now go out and hug the planet. Momma Earth loves you.

Clueless Conservatives and Geology

When you go to one of our nation's breathtaking National Parks with your family, you get a chance to see nature in action. No, I'm not talking about the raccoons attacking the dumpster at the public campground, or the squirrels begging for your chips. I'm talking about those amazing vistas that make you stop and think about the wonder and mystery of their creation, or the little things, like that endangered flower or mossy stream, that you could stare at for hours and never be able to comprehend the incredible complexity of it. Such awesome sights could make even me start to believe in some greater power at the root of it all (if I were slightly delirious from fever – being an atheist).

Take, for instance, our majestic Grand Canyon. We're all familiar with its fantastic, multicolored rock formations and nearly unfathomable depth. Geologists have studied this natural wonder since the late 1860's and tell us that it was formed by erosive action of the Colorado River over the past 5 to 6 million years, and that the rock formations are between 2 and 2.5 billion years old. Given that Earth has been calculated to be about 4.5 billion years old, that makes portions of this natural phenomenon half as old as our world. Since most of these geologists have studied their field and the Canyon most of their adult lives, I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.

Now, if you were to go into the Grand Canyon's interpretive center and try to buy a book on the Canyon's geologic formation, wouldn't you expect that book to be scientifically accurate according to the expert opinions of geologists? And if you had geological questions about the age of the Canyon, wouldn't you want the rangers to give you a straight answer? Unfortunately, neither of these assumptions are true.

Three years ago, the National Park Service approved the sale of a Creationist book entitled "Grand Canyon: A Different View" in the Canyon's book stores and museums. This book, sold alongside legitimate science texts (such as this one), argues a literalist interpretation of the Bible, that the world is less than 10,000 years old, and that the Canyon was formed by Noah's flood. Park officials, scientists, and academics were appalled and called for the government to remove the book. After all, an interpretive center is a place of scientific learning, not a library or common book store. They must be held to a higher level of accuracy. Yet three years later the book is still on the shelves.

Story:
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2006_12/010493.php


also here:
http://www.peer.org/news/news_id.php?row_id=801

Now the Bush administration has stepped its extremist fundamentalism up a notch, requiring that, when asked about the geologic age of the Canyon, park interpreters must say "no comment."

No comment?! About the primary scientific aspect of the Grand Canyon?! Pardon me while I bash my head into a wall until all common reason and scientific learning leaves me and I become a vegetable. Then, and only then, will this seem to make sense to me.

As I've commented before (here and here), it is appalling to me as a scientist how the neoconservatives who run this country have waged a war against science and reason. There is no room for Faith in Science, for therein lies ignorance and bias. Legitimate scientific study is a slow, meticulous, peer-reviewed process that leaves little room for error. Nothing is taken on faith, and no amount of silly pseudoscientific drivel or Biblical accounting can make up for shoddy reason and ignorance. The book in question did not go through that process.

The Bible has some wonderful allegories and wisdoms for how we should live (and a large share of violence and horror that people tend to gloss over). But the priests, monks and apostles who wrote it between 1900 and 3800 years ago could not have known the incredibly rich tapestry of knowledge Science has accumulated since then, not counting the ignorance of the Dark Ages (when, by the way, the Catholic Church controlled Europe and science was considered evil). In terms of understanding the physical world around us, today's college freshman science major is far wiser than these supposed wise men were.

I call for the National Park Service to remove that book from their shelves immediately and put it where it belongs: Sunday School.

Spaced Out

There’s been more talk from NASA and other sources about returning to the moon and going on to Mars. This, of course, following Bush’s announcement of a program to do just that earlier this year. The most recent discussion is about setting up a permanent lunar base (CNN story), and scientists are getting all excited about this, but calling for less lunar exploration and a stronger push toward Mars (another CNN story).

The last mission to the moon happened the year I was born. Space exploration is in my blood. I used to sneak up late at night to watch reruns of Star Trek on my grainy, rabbit-eared TV. I think I’ve seen every sci fi movie ever made (except some of the old black and white Flash Gordon sorts). I still thrill at news about the shuttle missions, like the one that just landed, and keep up on the news. Yes, it’s in my blood. If I pass gas, it’s likely to be solar wind.

But when Bush made his announcement, I rolled my eyes and thought, “Yeah, right! Can you spell d-i-v-e-r-s-i-o-n?” If he were serious about going to the moon and Mars, he wouldn’t cut NASA’s budget even more while continuing to expend the nation’s debt on the war in Iraq. The last time we went to the moon, we spent something like a quarter of the gross national product on the effort. No way that’ll happen now. I refuse to get my hopes up, since Bush isn’t serious about it, the Democrats are more interested in spending money on the social good (for good reason), and further presidents and Congresses aren’t likely to stay focused on the goal for that long (the goal is to be on the moon by 2020).

Lately, the celebrated physicist Stephen Hawking took it one step further. Like me, Hawking is a Trekkie. He even appeared as himself in an episode of _Star Trek: The Next Generation_, playing poker with Data, Einstein, and Newton. This month, Hawking gave a speech as he accepted the Royal Society Copley Award, the highest science honor in Britain (also given to Darwin, Faraday, and Captain Cook), for his contributions toward understanding gravity. Speaking in that trademark computer voice of his, he called for us to develop a Star Trek-like warp drive so that we could travel to distant stars, colonize planets, and preserve the human race against global catastrophes like asteroids, nuclear war, or global warming. He thinks it’s theoretically possible (though certainly far-fetched), and he ought to know. He also expressed a desire to be a space tourist. Can’t you just picture it? Hawking floating around in a space station, sans wheelchair?

Cool. The geeky teenager in me is smiling broadly. Now I’m jazzed. After all, who are you going to listen to more on this issue, a president with a failed domestic and foreign agenda who is likely creating yet another diversion tactic to draw our minds away from those failures, or a renowned scientist on par with Einstein, Newton, and Darwin who is hot on the trail of a Unified Theory of Everything despite being able to move only a single finger? Is there any way to name Stephen Hawking as Director of NASA?

Let’s just hope we’ve solved our earthly problems before we start spreading them across the galaxy, eh? That’s the future portrayed by Star Trek, after all.