October 2008 Archives
I've been predicting a government bailout of US automakers for some months now. Indeed, I bought bonds on the premise that this would be the likely outcome if things became bad; i.e. government action induced me to assume abnormally large risk. Moral hazard exists, and government intervention makes it worse. QED.
Palin to Science:
"Where does a lot of that earmark money end up anyway? […] You’ve heard about some of these pet projects they really don’t make a whole lot of sense and sometimes these dollars go to projects that have little or nothing to do with the public good. Things like fruit fly research in Paris, France. I kid you not."
Science to Palin:
"I am appalled
This idiot woman, this blind, shortsighted ignoramus, this pretentious clod, mocks basic research and the international research community. You damn well better believe that there is research going on in animal models — what does she expect, that scientists should mutagenize human mothers and chop up baby brains for this work? — and countries like France and Germany and England and Canada and China and India and others are all respected participants in these efforts.
Yes, scientists work on fruit flies. Some of the most powerful tools in genetics and molecular biology are available in fruit flies, and these are animals that are particularly amenable to experimentation. Molecular genetics has revealed that humans share key molecules, the basic developmental toolkit, with all other animals, thanks to our shared evolutionary heritage (something else the wackaloon from Wasilla denies), and that we can use these other organisms to probe the fundamental mechanisms that underlie core processes in the formation of the nervous system — precisely the phenomena Palin claims are so important.
This is where the Republican party has ended up: supporting an ignorant buffoon who believes in the End Times and speaking in tongues while deriding some of the best and most successful strategies for scientific research. In this next election, we’ve got to choose between the 21st century rationalism and Dark Age inanity. It ought to be an easy choice." (--P.Z. Myers, University of Minnesota)
From The Moderate Voice.
... Another econo-rhetorical smackdown by Austan Goolsbee.
While the New York Times is probably the best domestic news outlet, a quick look at their history of presidential endorsements is deeply amusing. The Times endorsed Barack Obama for president this year, continuing an unbroken streak of Democratic endorsements dating back to their 1960 endorsement of John F. Kennedy. While I personally agree with their endorsement this year, their Democratic allegiance over this extremely long period ironically erodes even the slight credibility that a newspaper's presidential endorsement might carry. No one will listen to your arguments if they suspect that they were created to justify a predetermined outcome.
My favorite is endorsement tagline is the one for Walter Mondale in 1984: "Walter Mondale has all the dramatic flair of a trigonometry teacher. His Nordic upbringing makes it hard for him to brag. The first debate may have been the high point of his political personality. But there's power in his plainness." Ironically the article itself is a pretty fair assessment of Reagan's strengths and faults, and it correctly lauds Mondale's honesty--rare in a politician. But I think that they probably underweighted the threat of Mondale's allegiances to anachronistic special interests.
On the other hand, the Times makes an incisive point in their recent article on the danger of single-party government. This is probably the single strongest argument for voting for John McCain over Barack Obama. If my vote weren't meaningless, it might actually sway me (sounds irrational? Meh, voting is irrational). Single-party government under George W. Bush sparked enough of a disaster to warrant serious consideration of this point.
Universities have a notorious habit of trying to inflate their count of
Nobel laureates by taking credit for everyone who was ever affiliated
with their university in any capacity whatsoever. But
occasionally they get lucky and one of the current faculty gets the
prize. Such is the case for the 2008 prize in physics,
whose largest share goes to Yoichiro Nambu of the University of
Chicago. The prize was awarded for the discovery of spontaneous
symmetry breaking in particle physics. He is the first American to win any share of a Nobel prize so far this year.
