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Science: It’s all relative

ArchPundit January 2, 2007 No Comments

Not to be outdone by the National Park Service, we must remember that the Department of Health and Human Services has an appointee who is in charge of family planning, but opposed to contraception. He also refers to premarital sex as modern germ warfare and thinks that it leads to people not being able to form bonds in later relationships despite no evidence involving humans.

Planned Parenthood is trying to get his guy removed and is announcing a new initiative:

In paid print and online advertisements, PPFA has demanded that Keroack be replaced by a qualified health care professional to oversee Title X. In addition, PPFA has outlined priorities for the 110th Congress that focus on promoting commonsense health care policies like the protection and funding of Title X, expanded access to prevention services through Medicaid, and protecting teens through medically accurate sex education. The January 4, 2007, edition of Roll Call will include PPFA’s print advertisement, and online ads will run on thehill.com and blogs including dailykos.com, thecarpetbaggerreport.com, pandagon.net, and feministing.com.

Planned Parenthood supporters will wear buttons to events on Capitol Hill during the week of January 2, 2007, calling for “Health Care Facts, Not Keroack.” The campaign is aimed at raising awareness among new and returning members of Congress and their staff to the threats to women’s health posed by Keroack’s appointment, and the urgent need for prevention-first legislation that protects women’s health.

“The Bush administration’s approach to health care has given this Congress the perfect example of what not to do. Americans want commonsense policies that put women and families first,” added Richards. “Keroack should be replaced immediately with a respected reproductive health expert who recognizes family planning is good medicine.”

Of course, some would compare premarital sex to slavery.

I’m not really sure why America has been plagued with this level of idiocy, but the karmic payback is a bitch.

Unit 4: The next battle over creationism

ArchPundit January 2, 2007 3 Comments

John Bambenek has decided to run for the Unit 4 School Board.

That’s the same Bambenek who argued for the inclusion of intelligent design in the University of Illinois’ curriculum.

It’s hard to tell whether his support for intelligent design in the curriculum or his stunning dishonesty about evolutionary theory is more disqualifying.

I would imagine Narciblog, Running from the Thought Police, and It’s Matt’s World, will be covering the trainwreck in some detail.

Geysers of Old Faithful: Nostrils of Satan

ArchPundit January 2, 2007 2 Comments

The US NPS refuses to comment on the age of the Grand Canyon.

HOW OLD IS THE GRAND CANYON? PARK SERVICE WON’T SAY — Orders to Cater to Creationists Makes National Park Agnostic on Geology

Washington, DC — Grand Canyon National Park is not permitted to give an official estimate of the geologic age of its principal feature, due to pressure from Bush administration appointees. Despite promising a prompt review of its approval for a book claiming the Grand Canyon was created by Noah’s flood rather than by geologic forces, more than three years later no review has ever been done and the book remains on sale at the park, according to documents released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).

“In order to avoid offending religious fundamentalists, our National Park Service is under orders to suspend its belief in geology,” stated PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch. “It is disconcerting that the official position of a national park as to the geologic age of the Grand Canyon is ‘no comment.’”

In a letter released today, PEER urged the new Director of the National Park Service (NPS), Mary Bomar, to end the stalling tactics, remove the book from sale at the park and allow park interpretive rangers to honestly answer questions from the public about the geologic age of the Grand Canyon. PEER is also asking Director Bomar to approve a pamphlet, suppressed since 2002 by Bush appointees, providing guidance for rangers and other interpretive staff in making distinctions between science and religion when speaking to park visitors about geologic issues.

In August 2003, Park Superintendent Joe Alston attempted to block the sale at park bookstores of Grand Canyon: A Different View by Tom Vail, a book claiming the Canyon developed on a biblical rather than an evolutionary time scale. NPS Headquarters, however, intervened and overruled Alston. To quiet the resulting furor, NPS Chief of Communications David Barna told reporters and members of Congress that there would be a high-level policy review of the issue.

According to a recent NPS response to a Freedom of Information Act request filed by PEER, no such review was ever requested, let alone conducted or completed.

Park officials have defended the decision to approve the sale of Grand Canyon: A Different View, claiming that park bookstores are like libraries, where the broadest range of views are displayed. In fact, however, both law and park policies make it clear that the park bookstores are more like schoolrooms rather than libraries. As such, materials are only to reflect the highest quality science and are supposed to closely support approved interpretive themes. Moreover, unlike a library the approval process is very selective. Records released to PEER show that during 2003, Grand Canyon officials rejected 22 books and other products for bookstore placement while approving only one new sale item — the creationist book.

Ironically, in 2005, two years after the Grand Canyon creationist controversy erupted, NPS approved a new directive on “Interpretation and Education (Director’s Order #6) which reinforces the posture that materials on the “history of the Earth must be based on the best scientific evidence available, as found in scholarly sources that have stood the test of scientific peer review and criticism [and] Interpretive and educational programs must refrain from appearing to endorse religious beliefs explaining natural processes.”

“As one park geologist said, this is equivalent of Yellowstone National Park selling a book entitled Geysers of Old Faithful: Nostrils of Satan,” Ruch added, pointing to the fact that previous NPS leadership ignored strong protests from both its own scientists and leading geological societies against the agency approval of the creationist book. “We sincerely hope that the new Director of the Park Service now has the autonomy to do her job.”

Oh, let me count the ways this administration denies reality.

New Blog

ArchPundit January 2, 2007 1 Comment

There are always a ton of them in my inbox, but this is one I ran across from comments. Jen, who has commented here many times, has a pro-life liberal site called Turn the Clock Forward. I’ll get it added to the blogroll eventually.

The Real Impact of SEIU in the Aldermanic Races

ArchPundit January 2, 2007 2 Comments

Isn’t for 2007, it’s for 2011.

Simpson said finding issues that resonate with citizens is critical to mounting a successful campaign. Responsible government and accountability are two issues being raised in many wards.

Identifying those key issues is also a critical factor in winning the support of community groups and organizations that can help mobilize support.

The Service Employees International Union is one organization trying to flex its muscle in February. It has targeted incumbents in several wards -including Ald. Emma Mitts (37th) for opposition to the Big Box ordinance – and plans to place its support behind candidates considered more supportive of key union issues. SEIU officials are still in the process of determining which candidates will receive their attention.

The SEIU is also recruiting “block captains” from its 78,000 Chicago members to canvass their neighborhoods for the elections, the first time the union has done so.

While SEIU spokeswoman Marianne McMullen said the growth of the SEIU, rather than the political climate in Chicago, drove the decision to take more of an active role in the city elections.

The reality for SEIU is that since there will be no serious challenger to Daley, figuring out how to capitalize on the setbacks the machine has faced and will continue to face with further federal investigation leaves open a huge hole in the political infrastructure of the city.

Even while the machine has been falling apart through changing demographics and a relatively mobile population, the machine was the easiest way to put people on the ground in an election and having the support or at least the lack of organized resistance was the best way to get elected. As it becomes harder for patronage workers to be the foot soldiers of campaigns, SEIU can create an infrastructure to compete and a voter list that can identify those likely to support SEIU and generally progressive candidates.

It also fits in with the types of people SEIU represents in service workers who tend not to be neighborhood oriented. Additionally, the unionization of home child care workers provides an important network in communities with hard to reach people–single working parents.

SEIU will likely do well this cycle, but assuming Daley hangs it up for 2011, whomever is going to run for Mayor will certainly look to SEIU for support as the best organized entity to contact voters and organize a ground campaign. It’ll also be critical in statewide primary campaigns for Democrats. SEIU was a strong supporter of the Governor and whomever looks to replace him will be seeing a strong organization unit that help deliver victories to both Blagojevich and Obama and which has only strengthened itself since.

(h/t Rich for the article)

When Poor Assumptions Underly Your Old and New Strategery

ArchPundit January 2, 2007 1 Comment

The New York Times piece on the White House’s management of Iraq is pretty telling.

The original plan, championed by Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top commander in Baghdad, and backed by Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the defense secretary, called for turning over responsibility for security to the Iraqis, shrinking the number of American bases and beginning the gradual withdrawal of American troops. But the plan collided with Iraq’s ferocious unraveling, which took most of Mr. Bush’s war council by surprise.

Reading this one can only get the understanding that no one understood that Iraqis didn’t necessarily view a strong central government as a good thing. Iraqis standing up often meant they stood up to defend their neighborhood or religious sect, not a country to which most had been repressed under.

The assumption that this was the goal of enough Iraqis to overcome separatist tendencies was simply the dumbest assumption made in this war. Turning over responsibility to Iraqis generically never was designed to deal with tensions between sects and ethnic groups in the country. In fact, it had the very real possibility of aggravating such tensions in the military was not evenly controlled.

So what happens then? You create a militia and the monopoly on coercion and violence any government must have is lost. It’s not like Hobbes and Locke didn’t point these problems out for us. Since they were from Old Europe, maybe their works weren’t important.

And it is here that we see the problems with escalation. And let’s not kid ourselves about ‘surges.’ What happens when a temporary surge doesn’t work? It turns into a permanent surge–escalation. More to the point, what do we do with more troops?

You increase clear and hold operations. And what does that mean? It means taking on the Sadr militia which is the military wing of one part of the coalition holding the government together. This isn’t going to produce a functioning nation, it’s going to further insert the US in the middle of a civil war that was only averted previously through mass killing and repression.

Making matters worse is the Hussein execution. How one could bungle this further from the US perspective is hard to imagine other than to simply throw him into the streets of Sadr City. Taking a pretty much universally hated man even amongst Baathists and allowing the execution to look like sectarian payback just complicates the entire situation with Sunnis feeling threatened–as probably the Shiites wanted them to.

The assumption before was the Iraqis wanted to be one nation and that assumption underlies the escalation, but the evidence suggests that no such urge exists amongst Iraqis.

The Times article does nothing to address exactly what an increase in troops will accomplish nor does it ask the administration to argue what is wrong with Casey’s logic regarding not wanting more troops. And hence, we’ll move on to increasing troops because while Democrats oppose it along with some in the GOP, no one will tie the President’s hands.

The problem is it’s time. He’s lost the majority of Americans with only his hard core base supporting his effort in Iraq. He’s losing moderate Republicans and even some conservatives. And it should:

The speech, the BBC has been told, involves increasing troop numbers.

The exact mission of the extra troops in Iraq is still under discussion, according to officials, but it is likely to focus on providing security rather than training Iraqi forces.

If there is any clearer message of the decision being political and not strategic or tactical I don’t know what it is. While I understand the Democrats shyness at pulling funding, the election was an intervention that didn’t work. The Baker-Hamilton report was a second intervention and it didn’t work. It’s time for a third intervention and one that will work. An intervention that requires the President begin to pullout is the only way to start the process.

It’s not ideal because security situations require a fair amount of discretion, but discretion is a tool this President uses to avoid being held accountable.

A Bit of Overreaching

ArchPundit January 2, 2007 No Comments

Trib covers an internship in Obama’s office with some tie to Rezko

Rezko recommended a 20-year-old student from Glenview for one of the coveted summer internships in Obama’s Capitol Hill office.

The student got the job and spent five weeks in Washington, answering Obama’s front office phone and logging constituent mail. The student was paid an $804 stipend, about $160 per week, for a position valued mostly for the experience it provides.

Now, that otherwise unremarkable internship–one of nearly 100 Obama’s office awarded in 2005–raises new questions for the senator, who says he has never done any favors for Rezko.

n October, Rezko was indicted on influence-peddling charges and for alleged business fraud.

Rezko, a real-estate and fast-food entrepreneur, has emerged as a central figure in a series of state government corruption scandals. He began cultivating a friendship with Obama around 1990, becoming a key fundraiser.

As the internship drew to a close in August 2005, the intern’s father was cited in court records as an unnamed, unindicted co-conspirator in an alleged state government bribery scheme linked to Rezko. A news report about the court records identified him by name.

Obama’s spokesman said Obama would not comment on the internship because he is spending the holidays with his family, but spokesman Robert Gibbs said the internship in no way contradicts Obama’s previous statements that he has never done any favors for Rezko, given jobs to Rezko associates or been involved with Rezko “in any government activities of any sort.”

Gibbs said: “I believe it’s obvious that a [five-week] internship is not something that can benefit Mr. Rezko or his businesses.”

The math is funny:

1 of 98 interns from Illinois

In 2005, Obama had 98 interns from Illinois out of about 350 applicants, Gibbs said.

Meaning applicants had a one in four chance of being selected. That’s competitive, but hardly overwhelming odds for a internship in one office.

I guess reporting the internship is legit, but putting it into a context of this being an issue by itself is a bit silly. A 20 year old kid getting a low paying internship–essentially one with some spending money attached to it while the family would have to pay for living expenses and such isn’t exactly a smoking gun. At worst, it shows that people who understand the system of getting recommendations and such have a better shot at internships. That’s not news.

Bi-Monthly Column

ArchPundit January 2, 2007 No Comments

Was on global warming and covered Daley’s efforts briefly.

But hey, Willard Scott isn’t so sure.

And on that note, I received a screener for An Inconvenient Truth and haven’t had time to cover it.

First, it’s pretty good. A bit too much Al Gore for me, but a little of him goes a long way. That said, the documentary is well done in presenting fairly complicated scientific arguments in a very accessible manner giving both anecdotal and visual evidence tied to scientific data and explanation. That’s a hard thing to do and Gore’s presentation does a good job of presenting the data well visually–something most people are quite bad at–he doesn’t fall into the PowerPoint traps that so many do.

Despite all of the claims that it’s a new Al Gore, don’t believe the hype. He’s still the condescending ass who talks down to everyone and is very self-congratulatory in his self-righteousness. It just so happens that the presentation is enough to overcome the grating nature of Gore. How it is that Democrats flock to the same type of candidates in the last two elections blows my mind. How some now seem to see him as a savior for progressives after what he did to Bradley infuriates me.

All that said, the film is good on another front. During the Clinton administration, James Hansen upbraided the Vice President for going to far on the science before consensus was reached–Hansen has now been muzzled by the Bush administration for pointing out consensus has been reached. One of the film’s strengths is that it sticks to the consensus pretty tightly when presenting the science. One might argue that some of the potential effects are outside the most likely scenario, but nearly all of them fall within reasonable probabilities given the context and for that, it makes an incredibly difficult problem to illustrate comprehensible to the general public. Definitely take a look at it if you haven’t already.

Daley Might Not Have Enough Signatures

ArchPundit January 2, 2007 2 Comments

I imagine he’ll still get on the ballot one way or another, but there is a level of irony here that is hysterical.

Who wants to bet Walls ends up off the ballot before this is all over? No one? I thought so.

Poor and Need a Lawyer

ArchPundit January 2, 2007 No Comments

Well, your lawyer is getting furloughed just as you are.

This might be the time for someone to remind Stroger that his support was largely from poor areas.