Re: OT: The President and "Intelligent Design"


TPS wrote:
> Rick N. Backer wrote:
> > On Wed, 10 Aug 2005 19:36:51 -0700, play-on <playon2005@xxxxxxx> did
> > courageously avow:
> >
> > >On Wed, 10 Aug 2005 22:18:10 GMT, Rick N. Backer <ken.wilson@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > >wrote:
> > >
> > >>On Wed, 10 Aug 2005 14:18:54 -0700, play-on <playon2005@xxxxxxx> did
> > >>courageously avow:
> > >>
> > >>>On Wed, 10 Aug 2005 19:26:01 GMT, Rick N. Backer <ken.wilson@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> > >>>wrote:
> > >>>
> > >>>>On 10 Aug 2005 12:04:49 -0700, "Chuck" <chc248@xxxxxxxxxx> did
> > >>>>courageously avow:
> > >>>>
> > >>>>>That's about the size of it. The cynical intellectual dishonesty of the
> > >>>>>creationist/intelligent design front robs it of any possibility of
> > >>>>>being taking seriously by those who care to examine what we know, what
> > >>>>>we surmise, and what we have extrapolated from the two. Once again,
> > >>>>>NOTHING about evolution and it's many related theories precludes the
> > >>>>>existence of God. It just doesn't fit into the neat allegorical
> > >>>>>packaging of the Bible or other creation stories.
> > >>>>>Chuck
> > >>>>
> > >>>>It's actually more horrific than one thinks. To accept evolution man
> > >>>>has to accept that he is an animal and that, in spite of being
> > >>>>allegedly sentient, he is very much controlled by his baser instinct
> > >>>>for survival and very much less by cognitive thinking or any real
> > >>>>feelings for his fellow man.
> > >>>
> > >>>That's about the size of it. But I don't personally consider this reality
> > >>>to be "horrific", and I don't accept that it's always instinct before
> > >>>intellect.
> > >>
> > >>I would still claim instinct. If your president isn't an alpha male
> > >>acting out I don't know what is.
> > >
> > >1. Dubya may run on instinct, but he doesn't stand for the human race.
> > >
> > >2. He's not "my" president.
> >
> > I can understand your position but I'm not so sure the outside world
> > sees it that way. During Vietnam the outrage at the administration's
> > actions became visible for all the world to see and support. America
> > shows none of that same outrage today. As far as the outside world
> > goes the see every American citizen as being complicit.
> >
> > Ken Wilson
> > Proud Owner of Lord Valve, PMG, John Wheaton, Claude Lucas,
> > Freep the Xenophobe, Chuck, the rest of the
> > Union of Rightwing Idiots Needing Explanations (URINE)
> > and, at his own request, Lars GotShanked
> > Supporting the Troops at http://www.resisters.ca
>
>
> I don't think you can show that to be true. Wherever I or my
> colleagues travel (which is a lot of places), people make it clear that
> they CAN differentiate us from our government's policies. All over
> Morocco, people told me "politicians are crazy, but you and I are just
> two people". They may have just been being polite, but I have no
> reason to believe that they're not savvy.
> Of course - I also believe that my country's policies make SOME people
> more amenable to the idea that an attack on any American could be
> considered self defense. I just don't think that's most people.

To an extent I agree. When two individual interact they usually judge
each other by the immediate experience, but when you expand the horizon
and one groups starts to judge another group you see a reduction of
experience to stereotypes.

I have a friend who just got back from Italy. He's Mexican American and
speaks English with a Mexican accent. As soon as the younger Italians
found out he was an American he started getting the finger. He said
older Italians forgave him because we saved Italy from Musollini. That
was specifically articulated yet it was also obvious they wished we
would behave a little better so that forgiveness wasn't necessary.

But to get back to our President and science

There's a war going on-and not just the one in Iraq. This conflict
may not get as much media play, but it could have just as great an
impact on our safety, national prestige, and long-term economic health.
It is a war over the integrity of science itself, and the casualties
are everywhere: career scientists and enforcement officials are
resigning en masse from government agencies, citing an inability to do
their jobs due to what they see as the ruthless politicization of
science by the Bush administration. Bruce Boler, Marianne Horinko,
Rich Biondi, J. P. Suarez and Eric Schaeffer are among those who have
resigned from the EPA alone. In a letter to The New York Times, former
EPA administrator Russell Train, who worked for both Nixon and Ford,
wrote, "I can state categorically that there never was such White
House intrusion into the business of the EPA during my tenure." 1
Government meddling has reached such a level that European scientists
are voicing concerns that Bush may not merely be undermining U.S.
dominance in sciences, but global research as well. 2

The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) recently published the results
of an investigation into the administration's misuse of science
called "Scientific Integrity in Policymaking," with a letter signed
by over 60 leading scientists, including 20 Nobel Laureates. 3
President Bush's science adviser Dr. John Marburger III's response
was hardly reassuring. 4 Part of Marburger's defense was to use the
common tactic to delay action by calling for "more research," while
in other cases he used verbal sleight of hand to avoid addressing the
actual charge. For instance, when the National Cancer Institute's web
site was altered to suggest there was a link between abortion and
breast cancer Marburger described the change as only a routine update.
What actually troubled the UCS was that the findings of established
science had been removed in favor of language that promoted the lonely
crusade of Dr. Joel Brind.

For those unfamiliar with Dr. Brind, he discovered the supposed
Abortion Breast Cancer link (or ABC as he calls it) after "making
contact" with a local right-to-life group shortly after becoming a
born-again Christian. "With a new belief in a meaningful
universe," he explains, "I felt compelled to use science for its
noblest, life-saving purpose." 5 Despite the fact that Brind is
completely at odds with his peers, the web site was updated with the
following text:

[T]he possible relationship between abortion and breast cancer has been
examined in over thirty published studies since 1957. Some studies have
reported statistically significant evidence of an increased risk of
breast cancer in women who have had abortions, while others have merely
suggested an increased risk. Other studies have found no increase in
risk among women who have had an interrupted pregnancy. 6

After an outcry by members of Congress, the National Cancer Institute
convened a three-day conference where experts reviewed the evidence,
again concluding "[i]nduced abortion is not associated with an
increase in breast cancer risk," ranking the science as
"well-established." 7

To prove that he took the issue of global warming seriously, Marburger
shamelessly cited a study that President Bush had commissioned from the
National Academy of Sciences. The administration had asked the NAS to
find "weaknesses" in climate science studies to justify their
efforts to derail an international global warming treaty. 8 When the
commissioned report instead confirmed human-induced climate change and
mentioned fossil fuels as a major culprit the EPA decided to replace
the findings in its Report on the Environment with a discredited study
funded by the American Petroleum Institute. 9

Marburger also pesented an argument that was made by Spinsanity, a
self-described government watchdog website, which pointed out that just
because a "frustrated scientist" had leaked an EPA report on
children's health to The Wall Street Journal, that did not prove
there was a sinister intent to surpress it because bureaucratic delays
in releasing information are common. 10

But the fact that so many scientists and government workers have risked
their jobs by leaking information to the media makes this explaination
weaker than it might be. As an editorial in The New York Times
concluded, Marburger's response is "little more than an attempt to
put a positive spin on some flagrant examples of tailoring science to
fit politics." 11

Then there are those examples the UCS does not mention: the Corn
Refiners Association and Sugar Association successfully lobbied Bush to
pressure the World Health Organization to de-emphasize the importance
of cutting sweets and eating fruits and vegetables in their
anti-obesity guidelines. 12 Two scientists were ejected from a
bioethics council due to what they believed to be their views favoring
embryo research. 13 Data on hydraulic fracturing were altered so
benzene levels met government standards after "feedback" from an
industry source. 14 Another study (sponsored by Florida developers)
claiming wetlands cause pollution, was used by the EPA to justify
replacing protected marshes with golf courses to improve "water
quality." 15

Nothing is so trivial that it escapes top administration advisor Karl
Rove's insistence on staying "on message"-from forbidding NASA
scientists to speak to the press about the global warming disaster
flick The Day After Tomorrow, 16 to letting National Park Service gift
shops sell books with the "alternative view" that the Grand Canyon
was formed in seven days. 17

One need look no further than the USDA to see how compromised the
research and enforcement environment has become. Agriculture Secretary
Ann M. Veneman was a former food industry lawyer and lobbyist and her
staff includes representatives of the National Cattlemen's Beef
Association and other industry groups. So it should be no surprise
that shortly after a dairy cow from Canada tested positive for mad cow
disease a senior scientist came forward alleging agency pressure to let
Canadian beef into the U.S. before a study concluded it was safe. 18
Nor should it shock us that whistleblowers accused an Animal and Plant
Health Inspection Service supervisor of insisting a cow exhibiting
symptoms of the disease be sent to a rendering plant before a
technician could perform the tests mandated by agency guidelines. 19
But even the most cynical among us might be baffled by the almost
cultish devotion to industry pandering exhibited when the USDA refused
to give Creekstone Farms Premium Beef the kits it requested to
voluntarily test its cattle so it could export to Japan because it
might "create the impression that untested beef was not safe."
Creekstone may very well go bankrupt as a result. 20

Such reluctance only makes sense if the USDA fears that positive
results are possible. Still, one hesitates to suggest the USDA is
trying to sell as much tainted beef as possible before people start
exhibiting symptoms. One hesitates slightly less so after learning
that EPA staffers were also prevented from performing routine analysis
of the economic and health consequences of proposed regulations
governing mercury emissions from coal-burning power plants. After all,
it's a lot easier to suppress unfavorable scientific findings if
there's nothing to suppress. But surely even they realize preventing
an analysis of the consequences of our actions will not prevent those
consequences from occurring. That's the rub. Science doesn't
appear to factor into their reasoning at all. The tests might come up
negative. They might come up positive. The meat is considered safe
either way.

Debates over Bush's character usually devolve into familiar partisan
arguments citing either his resoluteness in the face of widespread
negative reaction as proof of his conviction, or the chasm between
rhetoric and reality as evidence of Bush's disingenuous denial. Both
could be true enough to have created an atmosphere that encourages
government officials to practice outright deception to attain
administration goals. To get an exemption from the Endangered Species
Act the Pentagon simply changed a quote from an Army study saying
government regulations "enhanced" training realism at Fort Stewart
to "impaired." 21 A Park Service brochure used a
photo-supposedly taken in 1909-to prove that forests in the Sierra
Nevadas were thinner before the implementation of "preventative
thinning." The picture was actually a photo taken of a recently
logged forest in Montana.

Such distortions seem always to be in the service of a crusade of true
belief. Unquestionably Bush is a man of conviction. The problem is
that Bush does not seem to arrive at these convictions through faulty
human pursuits like science. He seems to suppose his knowledge comes
from a higher source.



In the book The Price of Loyalty, Pulitzer prize-winning author Ron
Suskind records former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill's view that
Bush based his decisions on "instinct," and left others to
"ponder the intangibles that [drive] the president-from some
sweeping, unspoken notion of how the world works; to a
one-size-fits-all principle, such as 'I won't negotiate with
myself;' to a squabble with a family member over breakfast." 22
Former Bush terrorism czar Richard Clarke paints a similar picture of a
White House staff inclined to ignore facts in favor of having truth
"revealed" to them. Bush's own wife says, "George is not an
overly introspective person. He has good instincts, and he goes with
them. He doesn't need to evaluate and reevaluate a decision. He
doesn't try to overthink. He likes action." 23 Bush seems to
value gut instinct over evidence, faith over fact, conviction over
reality. He doesn't need science to know that our food is safe, that
the Earth was created in seven days, or that Saddam Hussein was only
seconds away from handing over nukes to al Qaeda. If studies say
otherwise then agencies have to be reorganized, committees reshuffled,
and data reinterpreted until they get it right.

When agencies that used to be tasked with providing objective analysis
no longer inform policy, their only remaining value is in bolstering
preconceived conclusions. The ultimate danger of this view of
science-as-public relations can be seen in a recent proposal by the
Office of Management and Budget (OMB) that would grant the
administration greater control over peer review of "all major
government rules, plans, proposed regulations and pronouncements." 24
David Michaels of the Department of Energy complained, "It goes
beyond just having the White House involved in picking industry
favorites to evaluate government science. Under this proposal, the
carefully crafted process used by the government to notify the public
of an imminent danger is going to first have to be signed off by
someone weighing the political hazards." 25 After an outcry from
scientists, the OMB seems to have scaled back the proposal from
disastrous to merely horrifying, but if past behavior is any guide the
administration will keep returning to the cookie jar until science is
an empty vessel firmly under the direction of the White House press
office.

The White House's inclination to mold facts to fit preconceived
notions is crippling the government's decision making abilities in
the areas of health, safety, environment, and more importantly, in the
War on Terror. A opinion editorial written by conservative columnist
Richard Hoagland shortly before the Iraq invasion illustrates how the
White House allowed prejudices to influence pre-war intelligence:
"Imagine that Saddam Hussein has been offering terrorist training and
other lethal support to Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda for years. You
can't imagine that? Sign up over there. You can be a Middle East
analyst for the Central Intelligence Agency," Hoagland chides before
praising Bush for pressuring intelligence officers to reach the
conclusions they were previously unwilling to make. "The
'politicization' accusation suggests that those who find Iraqi
links to al Qaeda are primarily interested in currying favor with the
Bush White House." 26 As former Bush administration official J.
Dilulio put it, "When policy analysis is just backfill, to back up a
political maneuver, you'll get a lot of ooops." 27

Astonishingly, even after intelligence lapses became known,
conservative columnist David Brooks was calling for more political
intrusion in the process: "For decades, the U.S. intelligence
community has propagated the myth that it possesses analytical methods
that must be insulated pristinely from the hurly-burly world of
politics," he said. "What kind of scientific framework can explain
the rage for suicide bombings, now sweeping the Middle East? ...When it
comes to understanding the world's thugs and menaces, I'd trust the
first 40 names in James Carville's P.D.A. faster than I'd trust a
conference-load of game theorists or risk-assessment officers." 28
Never mind that those officers came ten times closer to assessing the
actual situation in Iraq than the politicians who now interfere in the
process like never before. But recognizing that would mean bringing
evidence into the equation.

The troubles in Iraq are not so much proof of the failure of the neocon
vision for democratizing the Middle East, as they are a reminder of the
disastrous consequences of removing empiricism from deliberation. All
the problems that have popped up in Iraq were predicted long ago-from
troop strength to the resilience of the insurgents-and available to
anyone who cared to look. The administration not only chose to look
away but actively swept them under the rug. When CIA war games were
discovered to be training personnel to deal with the eventuality of
civil disorder after the fall of Baghdad, The Atlantic Monthly reported
the Pentagon forbad representatives from the Defense Department from
participating because "detailed thought about the postwar situation
meant facing costs and potential problems." 29 Our refusal to face
reality hasn't been giving democracy much of a chance.

"Being steadfast in defense of carefully considered convictions is a
virtue," George Will wrote recently. "Being blankly incapable of
distinguishing cherished hopes from disappointing facts, or of
reassessing comforting doctrines in face of contrary evidence, is a
crippling political vice." 30 Bush has finally met his match. The
Universe is the one foe more steadfast than he is. It cannot be bullied
or intimidated. The laws of physics know no compromise. This is a game
of chicken Bush will lose. If he doesn't take his foot off the
accelerator, then the only question is: how will we recover from the
crash?



Dylan Otto Krider is a freelance writer with a BA in creative writing
with minor in astronomy/physics from the University of Arizona, and an
MFA in writing from Vermont College, Norwich University. He has
written many articles for the Houston Press, Texas Magazine, Kenyon
Review, Fiction Writer, Writer's Digest, and the Internet. His webpage
can be found at www.dylanottokrider.com/index.htm



Humanist morality is universal, while Biblical morality is not.

.

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