nature

...do you think the nutroots would stop plugging their ears and shouting "nah nah nah nah nah nah nah"?

Oh, probably not. It's that godless science that's the problem, right?

Via Think Progress, we learn this horror:

In 2005, the Kansas Board of Education received national ridicule when it rewrote public school standards to cast doubt on the mainstream evolution theories of Charles Darwin.

One of the board members who voted to teach intelligent design was Kenneth Willard, a conservative who is now the only member running as president-elect for the National Association of State Boards of Education. NASBE is a nonprofit organization of state school boards that “works to strengthen state leadership in educational policymaking.”

Willard was one of the Kansas board’s most vocal proponents of intelligent design....

With education scores falling behind the rest of the world, this is just what we need: a champion of willful ignorance in charge of a national education organization.

Are you ready for 1,000 years of rising oceans?

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) will publish its report, the most complete overview of climate change science, in Paris on February 2 after a final review. It will guide policy makers combating global warming.

The draft projects more droughts, rains, shrinking Arctic ice and glaciers and rising sea levels to 2100 and cautions that the effects of a build-up of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere will last far longer.

"Twenty-first century anthropogenic (human) carbon dioxide emissions will contribute to warming and sea level rise for more than a millennium, due to the timescales required for removal of this gas," the sources quoted the report as saying.

The good news? This century we should see oceans rise only a couple of feet. American coastal cities can get by like the Netherlands, with dikes and levees. Of course, neglectful Bushian attitudes about their maintenance, as evidenced in New Orleans, would have to go.

The draft projects temperatures will rise by 2 to 4.5 Celsius (3.6 to 8.1 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels with a "best estimate" of a 3C (5.4 F) rise, assuming carbon dioxide levels are stabilized at about 45 percent above current levels.

This could make el Niño seem like a little boy indeed.

Apparently the Bible is now the litmus test against which all science must be measured. Never mind what we can observe in the world, religious dogma is the only truth to be taught in schools in Federal Way, near Seattle.

This week in Federal Way schools, it got a lot more inconvenient to show one of the top-grossing documentaries in U.S. history, the global-warming alert "An Inconvenient Truth."

After a parent who supports the teaching of creationism and opposes sex education complained about the film, the Federal Way School Board on Tuesday placed what it labeled a moratorium on showing the film.

That's right. Global warming is too un-"God"-ly of a concept for children.

"Condoms don't belong in school, and neither does Al Gore. He's not a schoolteacher," said Frosty Hardison, a parent of seven who also said that he believes the Earth is 14,000 years old. "The information that's being presented is a very cockeyed view of what the truth is. ... The Bible says that in the end times everything will burn up, but that perspective isn't in the DVD."

In other words, one can assume, Hardison believes global warming is a good thing. There's nothing like having people looking forward to Armageddon calling the shots in schools to scare the crap out of you.

School Board members adopted a three-point policy that says teachers who want to show the movie must ensure that a "credible, legitimate opposing view will be presented," that they must get the OK of the principal and the superintendent, and that any teachers who have shown the film must now present an "opposing view."

But not an opposing scientific view, but rather a view opposing science itself.

Let's look at some other examples where, following Federal Way's example, we should oppose science:

• The earth is round vs. the earth is flat
• The earth revolves around the sun vs. the heavens move on invisible spheres through ether
• The flu virus evolves vs. God makes the flu to punish humankind for homosexuality

Maybe it's time to buy stock in fundamentalist Christianist textbook companies.

You didn't want to eat them, did you?

WASHINGTON (AFP) - The world's fish and seafood could disappear by 2048 as overfishing and pollution destroy ocean ecosystems at an accelerating pace, US and Canadian researchers reported.

If current global trends continue, the loss of fish and seafood will threaten humans' food supplies and the environment, according to the most exhaustive study to date on the subject, published in the November 3 issue of the US journal Science.

"Our analyzes suggest that business as usual would foreshadow serious threats to global food security, coastal water quality, and ecosystem stability, affecting current and future generations," the international team of ecologists and economists wrote in "Impact of Biodiversity Loss on Ocean Ecosystem Services."

Of course, we don't want to do anything about it, do we? After all, we don't want government regulation of free enterprise, do we?

Or should Republican pollyanna sloganeering be set aside, once and for all?

"Whether we looked at tide pools or studies over the entire world's ocean, we saw the same picture emerging," Worm said in a statement. "In losing species we lose the productivity and stability of entire ecosystems. I was shocked and disturbed by how consistent these trends are -- beyond anything we suspected."

When ocean species collapse, it makes the ocean itself weaker and less able to recover from shocks like global climate change, Worm said.

The decline in marine biodiversity is largely due to over-fishing and destruction of habitat, Worm said in a telephone interview from Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Oh, but global warming is a hoax! Dick Cheney and George W. Bush said so! We don't want to be premature in our judgment, do we? Better to let the fish all die and the ice caps melt before we do anything about it — just so we're certain!

Right?

I've laid off this one for a few days now, but it persists in the headlines. Here's the logic:

While researchers have long shown that tall people earn more than their shorter counterparts, it's not only social discrimination that accounts for this inequality -- tall people are just smarter than their height-challenged peers, a new study finds.

"As early as age three -- before schooling has had a chance to play a role -- and throughout childhood, taller children perform significantly better on cognitive tests," wrote Anne Case and Christina Paxson of Princeton University in a paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Here's what's missing: That taller children's confidence will enable them -- yes, empower them -- to take on more challenging tasks.

Other studies have pointed to low self-esteem, better health that accompanies greater height, and social discrimination as culprits for lower pay for shorter people.

But researchers Case and Paxson believe the height advantage in the job world is more than just a question of image.

"As adults, taller individuals are more likely to select into higher paying occupations that require more advanced verbal and numerical skills and greater intelligence, for which they earn handsome returns," they wrote.

It's not just image, but self-perception, which translates quite easily into self-confidence. The assumption that it must be biology or nutrition alone is simply specious. You cannot simply eliminate cultural influences simply because you see a strong correlation with physical attributes. After all, physical attributes affect cultural responses. Just ask any racial minority. Or obese person. Or woman.

And how tall are the researchers?

They are both about 5 feet 8 inches tall, well above the average height of 5 feet 4 inches for American women.

Okay okay, full disclosure. I'm a half-inch taller than the researchers. I guess that makes me smarter, so consider that as you re-read this post.

More: God is for Suckers and Culture Kitchen

The Bush Administration has announced that New Orleans is open for the new season of hurricane business.

Federal emergency officials claim the New Orleans levee system is ready for another major hurricane, despite the less-optimistic views of other political leaders and engineers.

"I think we're in good shape," Don Powell, the Bush administration's coordinator of Gulf Coast rebuilding, said Sunday. "There's no question in my mind, we're ready."

Yeah, they're as ready as they were last year, which is not all that comforting.

Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., said the levee repairs alone aren't enough. "They're back up to Category 3," she said. "We need to get them up to Category 5, and we are working to do that."

New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin said the city was ready — but only to evacuate.

"You will never see a replay of last year, as long as I'm the mayor of the city," he said Sunday. "It's the storm surge that's really the major concern. ... We don't expect the catastrophic failures."

Contradicting other Bush administration officials, Lt. Gen. Carl Strock, the U.S. Army Corps' chief, conceded it isn't clear whether the levees could withstand a big hurricane this year.

Also undercutting a lot of the spin is the largely discredited Michael Brown, former head of FEMA, who says that the real problem is all the extra layers of bureaucracy Bush and the Republican Congress put into place when they formed, at great expense and with much disruption of federal agencies responsible for our national security, the dysfunctional amorphous blob called the Department for Homeland Security.

Bush government, you're doing a heckuva job!

Funny how some bloggers of the the right wing is so obsessed with party colors that they cannot see green. Clinging to their delusions in spite of scientific evidence, this past week we marveled as the right wing continued to plug its ears and start shouting wild accusations of pseudo-facts about individuals rather than see what is coming down upon us all: global warming. Gotta hand it to them: these folks are very effective at their GOP-stooge role, repeating anger points generated from Dittohead Command Headquarters. (Inconvenient truths are conveniently ignored.)

In response to my piece on Peter Schweizer's inane attempt to dismiss global warming because of unsubstantiated assertions about Al Gore's personal finances and business ties, I received this email from Lisa Wade Raasch of empowerchange.com that seems to shed new light on all this.

I'll just paste it here and let you read it:

This is yet another in the long string of tactics tied back to Exxon --
the CEI ads, the YouTube penguin video, the skeptic evangelical
response, etc. etc. Exxon gave $295,000 to the Hoover Institution where
Peter Schweizer is a research fellow.

It's amazing, on one hand the global warming skeptics call Gore an
environmental extremist, and on the other they say he isn't extreme
enough to be a credible spokesperson.

[contact info removed. -mg]

Exxon is at it again.
Setting the record straight on Peter Schweizer's misleading USA Today
piece

Peter Schweizer's ("Gore not quite as green.") piece that ran in USA
Today (August 10) was a grossly inaccurate misrepresentation of the
facts.

Unfortunately, Mr. Schweizer's op-ed is the latest in a string of
attacks from organizations receiving money from ExxonMobil-in this case
an attempt to attack the messenger to divert attention from the message
of the climate crisis. Mr. Schweizer is a research fellow at the Hoover
Institution, which has received $295,000 from ExxonMobil since 1998.
(http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/orgfactsheet.php?id=43)

PETER SCHWEIZER'S MISLEADING CLAIMS:

CLAIM: Schweizer claims that Gore receives royalties from a
zinc mine on his property.

FACT: This charge is false. Gore receives no royalties from the mine,
which shut down in 2003. Like many owners of small farms in Smith
County, Tennessee, the Gores received royalties on their mineral rights
when the mine operated. (A correction ran in USA Today on page 10A.)

CLAIM: Schweizer makes the false assertion that Gore controls stock in
Occidental Petroleum.

FACT: This claim is also false. Gore has never owned stock in
Occidental. His late father, Albert Gore Sr., did work for a number of
years at Occidental. At the time of his death, he owned stock in the
company, all of which was sold almost six years ago. The former Vice
President's mother had a small number of shares in her own name at the
time of her death; that stock was also disposed of by the trustee of her
estate. Mr. Gore is not the trustee.

CLAIM: Schweizer attacks Gore for not using green energy alternatives
at his home.

FACT: Gore was already in the process of adding photovoltaic solar
panels to his home before this scurrilous attack. The Gores have signed
up for every "green power" option their utilities make available.

CLAIM: Schweizer asserts that Gore does not offset his carbon
emissions because Paramount Classics pays for the offsets.
FACT: The Gore's personal carbon offsets are achieved independently of
and in addition to the carbon-neutral leadership shown by Paramount
Classics, Participant Productions and Rodale.
(more)
An Inconvenient Truth: "An Inconvenient Truth" is the first carbon
neutral documentary ever. Paramount Classics and Participant
Productions have worked with Native Energy to offset 100 percent of the
carbon dioxide emissions from air and ground transportation and hotels
for production and promotional activities associated with the
documentary (http://www.paramountvantage.com/blog/?p=35). In addition,
with the book "An Inconvenient Truth," Rodale became the first publisher
to produce a carbon-neutral book. The offsets for "An Inconvenient
Truth" will support New Native American and Alaskan Native wind turbines
and new family dairy farm methane energy projects will deliver clean,
renewable energy to the power grid and displacing power that would
otherwise come from burning fossil fuels.

Generation Investment Management: In addition, Gore co-founded
Generation Investment Management, which invests in companies that are
part of the climate solution. Not only does Generation offset the
carbon emissions of its London and DC offices and business travel
through purchases on the Chicago Climate Exchange to permanently retire
carbon credits, it also offsets the personal home and travel emissions
of all its employees through the CarbonNeutral Company. These offsets
support two projects: 1) a dam-less, "run-of-river" hydro power project
in Bulgaria forecast to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by as much as
10,000 - 13,000 tons per year, and 2) a rural solar electrification
project in India and Sri Lanka to replace the use of dangerous kerosene
lamps that produce high levels of CO2 emissions to light homes with
solar powered lighting systems that produce no CO2.

Current TV: Current TV (www.current.tv), an independent media company
co-founded by Gore that features viewer created content, approved going
carbon neutral at the beginning of 2006, while still in its first year
of operation, and will have completed the process by the end of the
fiscal year.

Reducing CO2 Emissions: Recognizing that we all inevitably emit CO2,
Gore sees offsets as one way to keep total global CO2 emissions in check
and to support alternative "green power" programs in the process. That
said, he believes that the first line of defense is to reduce carbon
emissions as much as possible. Gore works to reduce his overall energy
use by: switching to compact florescent light bulbs, driving a hybrid
vehicle, using green power, adjusting the thermostat a few degrees,
using clock thermostats to make sure no portions of the house are kept
warmer or cooler than needed throughout the day, installing sensors to
ensure that no lights are inadvertently left on in rooms that are not in
use, making a point of flying commercially whenever possible, and
telecommuting when he can.

Al Gore has worked for 30 years to raise awareness about global warming
and to advocate for meaningful solutions. In addition to the very
important role that government (at all levels) and companies must take
to cut emissions of pollution that cause global warming, he urges each
of us to take individual responsibility for our carbon dioxide
emissions. However, he has not asked more from the public than he is
willing to do himself.

Al and Tipper Gore are donating 100-percent of the profits from both the
"An Inconvenient Truth" book and movie to fight against global warming
pollution.

For a bit more context, I recommend David Roberts' post in Grist Magazine.

Methinks Peter Schweizer doth protest too much. The Republicans have enjoyed a nice political bubble over the years when it comes to the environment. "Global warming? What global warming?" has been typical of their responses.

That's been changing since Al Gore's Inconvenient Truth (directed by Davis Guggenheim) hit the screens. Since then, the film has enjoyed some remarkable documentary-level box office. As a result, the American public is seeing what the rest of the world has for years: that when it comes to the environment, the Republicans and the Bush Administration have no clothes.

Yet one more area where right-wing fantasies failed to convince the prevailing facts to change themselves. Reality's a bitch. And people realize that Al Gore, whom the wingnuts ridiculed in the 2000 campaign, was right all along.

Those stale old jokes no longer stick. And the Republicans are scared.

Now the right-wing fictioneers who so expertly dismantled Michael Moore's public image with loud and repeated falsehoods, distortions and outright lies of their own are now turning their sights on Gore. Why? Maybe because they are finding the truth just a tad too inconvenient.

In today's USA Today, we get an early shot -- intended to be a barrage, but which comes off more as a bb-gun sniper attempt: right-wing Hoover man and dittohead-industry author Peter Schweizer has a petty little piece nitpicking Gore's life.

Public records reveal that as Gore lectures Americans on excessive consumption, he and his wife Tipper live in two properties: a 10,000-square-foot, 20-room, eight-bathroom home in Nashville, and a 4,000-square-foot home in Arlington, Va. (He also has a third home in Carthage, Tenn.) For someone rallying the planet to pursue a path of extreme personal sacrifice, Gore requires little from himself.

Smell a little envy there? This is a typical smear by the right, attacking Gore based on class. "He's not like you folks," Schweizer is saying to us "peasants" (a popular word used in right-wing power circles to describe us non-special folks born without silver spoons in our mouths). I don't know what Schweizer's lifestyle is like, but his Republican and corporatist allies live much fatter lives. Besides, this is about global warming, not about a real estate crunch.

Schweizer then goes on to talk about the apparent fact that Gore's estates have not yet switched to alternative energy options in their areas, and that Gore owns stock in Occidental Petroleum. Apparently these are to be considered glaring character flaws and indications of some big great hypocrisy. He also goes after the Democrats, who also have not signed up for alternative energy.

Then, in a well-practiced move of non-sequitur pseduo-logic -- a speciality of Schweizer and Coulter and the other writers in the alternate-reality books genre -- he suggests:

Maybe our very existence isn't threatened.

Not exactly stellar reasoning from a defender of the ruling class, is it?

Ironically, Schweizer doesn't acknowledge that us non-ruling-class Americans are already struggling with energy prices. We aren't cashing in on big trade with mass-polluter China, or raking in record profits from oil speculation, or laughing all the way to the bank with 10-figure government checks for no-bid contracts. The men in power are screwing over America big time, and we're supposed to get mad at Al Gore?

The issue here is not simply Gore's hypocrisy; it's a question of credibility. If he genuinely believes the apocalyptic vision he has put forth and calls for radical changes in the way other people live, why hasn't he made any radical change in his life? Giving up the zinc mine or one of his homes is not asking much, given that he wants the rest of us to radically change our lives.

In other words, if you can't refute the scientific evidence, then shoot the messenger. Global warming, according to Schweizer, is not a scientific theory with evidence in our faces every day. No, global warming is just what Al Gore wants. Get it? Our response to global warming should be tempered by the right wing's approval of Al Gore's politics and financial investments.

My own guess is that Schweizer is accusing Gore of simple class betrayal. After all, being rich and powerful, Al Gore should be a Republican, right? How dare he!

Inconvenient indeed.

I'm struck by today's news that President Bush has designated an ecological treasure that's underwater a national monument. You can bet they made sure there was no oil there.

Also oh so ironic: Justice Antonin Scalia's Supreme Court majority opinion today that uses all sorts of ends-justify-means rationalizations to undermine a key provision of the Fourth Amendment. Scalia has just redefined judicial activism. To hell with the law -- and forget all that Founding Fathers crap -- just look at all my good reasons why we should ignore the law -- just look at the police academy!

At least the Republicans in Congress were in their usual self-righteous form today, using cheap rhetoric to try to score political points while doing everything to avoid talking about the disaster in Iraq. A lot of peacock feathers there.

In case you missed it on Wednesday, Zbigniew Brzezinski on the NewsHour [video | mp3]addressed what the Republicans won't:

Well, the president opened his press conference by make a statement, which I suspect most Americans didn't quite fully interpret correctly. This is what he said: "I have just returned from Baghdad. I was inspired to be able to visit the capital of a free and democratic Iraq."

[Holds up a map of Iraq, with a small dot on it.]

Now, this is what the president actually visited. This is an aerial map of Baghdad and, within it, the viewers can see a small spot. That is the so-called Green Zone, a fortified American fortress housing the American embassy, the American high command, and all the major institutions of the Iraqi, as he said, free and democratic government, in an American fortress....

And then, last but not least is the fact that the so-called Iraqi government, three years after the beginning of the occupation, still sits in an American fortress. It cannot venture outside of it. To call it a government is to misuse the word "government."...

[W]e have to get rid of the mindset, which is really by now totally ahistorical -- we no longer live in the age of colonialism. We no longer have to assume "the white man's burden" in order to civilize others, and I'm using these phrases in quotation marks....

Well, how many thousands of Iraqis will die in the meantime? How many hundreds, how many thousands of Americans will die in the meantime?

How much will our prestige internationally decline? How many billions of dollars will we spend on this?

Good questions. Questions the Republicans don't even want to ask, let alone answer.

But I'm sure the newly non-indicted Karl Rove will come up with some good anger points to turn citizen against citizen. Nothing stirs up the ire of the GOP like American citizens.