CNN reports that Dr James Dobson, described by some as the most powerful living leader of the Dominionist movement, might be ready to kiss and make up with John McSame. The news came as a bit of a surprise -- to the irrevocably clueless anyway -- as just this year Dobson declared he could not vote for the aging Arizona Senator under any circumstance. Why the dramatic flip-flop? Ed Brayton makes a safe wager:

As I've been telling people for months, there is only one thing they really and truly want and know that they can get if they can keep Obama out of the White House: the Supreme Court. I guarantee you they have already cut a deal with McCain ...

On the wild chance that anyone really needed more or better reasons to vote for Obama, there you go. If McCain wins, odds are the next set of Supreme Court Justices will be chosen by an ultra-conservative American cleric leading a Neo-Reconstructionist movement in which public schools are blasphemous, and over zealous followers pray their hearts out for the violent end of the world every day -- just what every nuclear superpower needs. Forget about reproductive choices, science education, or equal rights. Ignorance and illiteracy breeds true. A decade or two under the purview of neo-clown winger judges groomed by the likes of Robert Bork or Roy Moore, and many of tomorrow's young women could end up in prearranged sexual servitude alternating between serial pregnancies and being locked in a menstrual shed.

Hurricane Dolly is undergoing a round of intensification prior to landfall later today near the resort town of South Padre Island, Texas, and could possibly even reach Category 2 intensity in the next few hours. From Jeff Masters:

Hurricane Dolly is putting on a impressive burst of rapid intensification as it approaches landfall on the Texas coast near Brownsville. Reports from the Hurricane Hunters show that Dolly's pressure is dropping rapidly, down 9 mb in just four hours, to 967 mb (as of the 8:30 am EDT Hurricane Hunter eye report). Dolly's central pressure dropped 15 mb in the 18 hours previous to that, so this is an impressive sudden drop this morning. Radar imagery out of Brownsville, Texas shows an well-organized hurricane, with excellent spiral banding and a 20-mile diameter eye. Visible satellite loops show an impressive eye, excellent upper-level outflow, and good symmetry. It's a good thing Dolly does not have another 24 hours over water, or it would have become a major hurricane.

[Update 11:55AM EDT by DS] NOAA/NWS is now reporting Dolly is a Cat 2 hurricane with additional strengthening still possible:

MAXIMUM SUSTAINED WINDS HAVE INCREASED TO NEAR 100 MPH...160 KM/HR...WITH HIGHER GUSTS.  DOLLY IS A CATEGORY TWO HURRICANE ON THE SAFFIR-SIMPSON SCALE. STRONGER WINDS...ESPECIALLY IN GUSTS...ARE LIKELY ON HIGH RISE BUILDINGS. SOME ADDITIONAL STRENGTHENING IS POSSIBLE BEFORE LANDFALL.

Unlimited, free alcohol consumed in public surrounded by an army of bloggers armed with every kind of recording device known to Silicon Valley. What could possibly go wrong at the official Daily Kos party? Fuck it, we'll do it live!

THE PARTY I'm referring to was produced by Kos Media. The theme was New Orleans and Billo's famous meltdown. But it was the vivacious Scout Finch who pulled it all together so well. As anyone who attended -- and who can remember attending -- can attest, she pulled it off superbly. Earlier that day, in a sober life, we jointly braved I-35, threading our way through semi trucks and hummers obviously intent on grinding us up in their over-sized wheel wells, for last minute party supplies in a two-seater the size of a healthy roller skate, all while she described getting thrown head over heels off her scooter after being plowed by a Volvo a few weeks earlier. And yet she seemed unworried by my desperate driving. Brave girl that Scout Finch ...

Scout thought it would be a nice touch if CE's were strapping on the top secret puke-orange wrist bands on NrN attendees in the Hilton Lobby that got you into the Fuck It Party. At first it was easy. Lots of people were eager to go, plus I got to meet some Kossacks I'd only known up to then by a handle and a UID number. But as time wore on, I felt the pressure to, you know, do my part with my allotment of wrist bands. Problem was I was competing against gorgeous blogger gals with a wad of bands and beautiful smiles. For some 'odd' reason party goers were more interested in being banded by those volunteers. I was finally down to half a dozen, and about to start strapping them on any random grackle that looked like they were ready for a good time when a band cranked up in the lobby.

We marched off as planned, a surging headless snake of enlightened humanity, almost a thousand strong, locking up downtown Austin traffic as we made our way to the bar. By the time we got there, the temperature had cooled off to a comfortable, ummm, 95 degrees and boy, was I thirsty.

The Devil in Dover: An Insider's Story of Dogma v. Darwin in Small-town America
By Laurie Lebo
The New Press
238 Pages $ 24.95

In late 2005 national media eagerly flocked to the heretofore peaceful town of Dover, PA in what many journalists labeled a modern day Scopes Monkey Trial, officially known as Kitzmiller Vs Dover Area School District. Reporters came from DC, New York, LA, along with every nook and cranny of the US, not to mention Europe and Asia. But there was one who didn't have to travel to get this story; Laurie Lebo grew up in the area, her family owned the local Christian radio station, her childhood friends were pastors, teachers, and parents embroiled in what would become a bitter controversy turning neighbor against neighbor. When America's simmering culture clash erupted into a full blown firefight, she found herself smack dab between opposing forces fighting tooth and nail in a battle to the idealogical death. Lebo leverages that unique geographical perch with writing skills that can only be described as both gritty and brilliant. Not to mention at times refreshing, for instance:

I've thought of this notion of "fair and balanced" journalism and of how, somewhere along the line, we as journalists have gotten confused by a misguided notion of objectivity. It is our job to inform readers of the truth, not just regurgitate  lies, even if it means the stories are no longer "balanced." page 158  

This is not the usual recap of claims and counter claims, or courtroom details provided by one dimensional cookie cutter characters. The local evangelical community in Dover has been portrayed in some quarters as dishonest hicks gleefully rubbing the hands together and cackling at the thought of bringing down science. The author quickly dispatches that erroneous image; these are the kind of Christians who live by the Sermon on the Mount. They comfort the destitute and terminally ill, they volunteer long hours persuading local businesses to provide recently released felons with gainful employment; in one touching example, the author's own father literally gives a total stranger going through a tough time the brand new shoes off his feet.

Despite her roots and understandable affection for the opinions of friends and family, Lebo courageously exhibits the highest standards in intellectual honesty and journalistic ethos. She doesn't go easy on those who led Dover ISD residents into a bitterly divisive, legal maelstrom based on crack pot pseudoscience. Far from it. Part of the great appeal of this book is that those conflicts are woven into compelling personal narratives and observations from an author who is clearly conflicted on both a professional and emotional level. Rather than trying to hide that internal pain, the author lets it all hang out to the great benefit of her lucky readers. And that's what makes this book such an important read for residents of other close knits communities all over the nation that may be or are being drawn into this debate: the price paid by the local community goes far beyond the cost assessed on the school district (In the case of Dover it ended up costing local taxpayers a cool one-million dollars). Once friendly neighbors become enemies, relationships are tested to the breaking point. And in some cases, based on what's revealed in the book anyway, it sounds like those rifts may never be repaired, even long after the cameras and media celebrities have left for the next big story.

Readers who appreciate the science of evolution, or the lack thereof in Intelligent Design Creationism, will not be disappointed. Lebo wryly remarks at one point she's thankful the topic under scrutiny was not quantum physics, or she would have been hard pressed to adequately convey the scientific testimony. Nevertheless, she does her biology homework magnificently, breaking down even the more esoteric material with such proficiency it should inform those readers new to the evidence for evolution, and still delight the veteran molecular biologist. Same goes for the legal history and constitutional intricacies underpinning the issues at hand, all of which are every bit as interesting as they are far beyond the scope of this review.

In short, this is hands down the best book I've read about the landmark trial. I recommend it highly for anyone. But most especially for any local board members being courted by IDC proponents; whatever you do, before you bring this misery down on your constituents, pick up a copy of Laurie Lebo's The Devil in Dover, and read every last word of it.

Never have so many people paid so dear a price for an opportunity so squandered:

Imagine, for a moment, what we could have done in those days, and months, and years after 9/11. ... We could have invested hundreds of billions of dollars in alternative sources of energy to grow our economy, save our planet, and end the tyranny of oil. ... Instead, we have lost thousands of American lives, spent nearly a trillion dollars, alienated allies and neglected emerging threats – all in the cause of fighting a war for well over five years in a country that had absolutely nothing to do with the 9/11 attacks.

And we're still paying the price to this day. Gas prices are smothering the US economy, tanking the stock market, already over stretched families standing on the brink of financial ruin are being flung off into the abyss, and the exorbitant cost of oil enriches the very same cabals that attacked us in 2001. But to hear the two oil men in the Whitehouse and their protegé John McCain explain it, it's either the democrats fault, or a mental problem running rampant among whiny voters. Forget the ole 'are you better off than you were four years ago'? What I'd like to ask people is, do you think you'll be better off four years from now with another Republican in the Oval Office?

Those of us who are science buffs or practicing scientists tend to value data, descriptions based on repeatable, controlled events, and explanations that make testable predictions. But to be heard above the din of pop culture and reach the vast majority of non-scientists on a topic as complex as climate change, we might do better if we resist those rational impulses and engage the lay public in other, more entertaining ways.

Randy Olsen, producer of Flock of Dodos, is back with a new movie that does just that: Sizzle: A Global Warming Comedy (Trailer). The first part of the movie follows the frustrating and yet light-hearted, almost slapstick back story about the making of a serious global warming documentary. But a little over half way through the film dramatically veers away from that script and takes viewers on all too real journey through one sobering illustration of the devastating heartbreaks nature may have in store for all mankind in the not so distant future. I don’t think it was quite as good as A Flock of Dodos -- which would be hard to top -- but I don't want to give too much away, so let's just say all in all it's an interesting, non-traditional approach to educating the public about climate change and one I recommend checking out with a non science friend .

This thread is now wide open.

Increasing CO2 in the atmosphere doesn't just raise global temperatures. It also turns the ocean into a toxic acidic solution and the process feedsback viciously:

Like a tooth dipped in a glass of Coca-Cola, coral reefs, lobsters and other marine creatures that build calcified shells around themselves could soon dissolve as climate change turns the oceans increasingly acidic.

Coral reefs are more than just pretty. They are the rain forests of marine ecosystems. Without them populations of fish and other plants and animals could crash precipitously leading to a disastrous cascade of death marching up the food chain the likes of which earth has not seen in millions of years. How long before the world's reefs could lay in bleached, dusty ruin? Some researchers estimate it could happen within 50 years. Fortunately our crack Whitehouse team led by Vice-President Dick Cheney is on the case ... doing everything he can to devastate the planet and wreak as much havoc as possible long after he and his gang of killer klowns leave office:

While George Bush and other G8 leaders were busy touting their agreement in Hokkaido to halve global emissions by 2050 as "a significant step forward" for climate action, this week's real story on climate flew under the radar back in the US, as a former Environmental Protection Agency official went public with allegations that vice-president Dick Cheney's office interfered directly with information about the threats posed to humankind by climate change.

Because we can't let anything threaten even one penny of Cindy McCain's portfolio or Phil Gramm's UBS bonus. And who can blame them in these uncertain times? After eight years of GOP mismanagement, the dismal US stock market is in urgent need of all the short-term bail out help it can get. So the ocean turns into a corrosive soup. Won't any of you selfish middle class taxpayers stop whining and please think of the immediate needs of our nation's poor, downtrodden zillionaires?

You remember the manufactured outrage over biology professors and K-12 public school science instructors allegedly being unfairly discriminated against for teaching creationism? Chuck Norris was up in arms over it, creationists made a propaganda documentary about it starring Ben Stein, right-wing politicians have been so moved that some have been furiously writing and passing so-called academic freedom bills so that teachers can teach creationism in science classes. It was, they claimed, a disgrace, a pox on free thought, an assault on free speech by liberal fascists, a veritable modern day Inquisition. And now the obligatory hypocrisy:

Oh, and of course, the university president's office has also received lots of mail demanding my immediate ouster ... So no poll-crashing today. Instead, I would appreciate it if you would write a short note to President Robert Bruininks. I have to ask for a few constraints, though: only do so if you are willing to sign a real name to it — most of the complaint mail I'm getting uses fake names, making it much less persuasive — and that, unlike the religious screeds I'm seeing, you take the time to proofread and send him something that at least looks like a high school graduate wrote it, which will put you way above the level of the hate mail. Be polite and rational, too!

Prof Myers' great crime was in writing a blog post on his personal web site -- a site hosted by ScienceBlogs which is unaffiliated with the university where PZ teaches biology -- about an article already in the traditional media concerning some guy who committed the heinous hate crime of 'kidnapping a cracker' (And no, I'm not exaggerating one bit). On top of the death threats he's receiving and to which he's grown accustomed, PZ suddenly finds himself the target of a national, coordinated effort to get him fired.

Of course none of this has anything to do with theology or bruised feelings among right wingers. This is an ugly power play pure and simple, a way for some of the worst dominionist thugs of the ultra right to hurt a secular progressive blogger -- who also happens to be an evolutionary biologist -- and by proxy, all of us. All snark aside, they just might succeed if you don't stick up for him.

Update: PZ adds "If you want to direct some email to Chancellor Jacqueline Johnson of UMN, her office address is grussing@morris.umn.edu. UMN President Bruininks' email address is bruin001@umn.edu. Both are my coworkers and friends, please treat them accordingly.""

There are places in America worth saving for future generations for their pure, stunning beauty alone. One of those most magical places started deep in the earth's crust, in fact some future components were laid down in ancient seas half a billion years ago. The layers were taken down, eventually passing near the grinding fiery boundary of two, long vanished tectonic plates. Over incomprehensible stretches of time and under unimaginable pressure, dollops of granite and other minerals were baked out of the mix and accumulated in growing, city-sized lumps soft as taffy. They would begin a journey so long that single human lifetimes would barely rate as a spark in comparison. Far above, on the surface of a changing planet, the dinosaurs would rise from the ashes of a devastating extinction event, reign uncontested for tens of millions of years, before they would perish. Through it all the patient plutons rose, bobbing elegantly up through denser rock like grand waxen blobs in a lava lamp, each solidifying in its own unique way.

As chance would have it, when the massive chunks were still creeping higher through the cooling rock around them, a large swath of underlying earth the size of a small state recoiled and bunched up, thrusting them ever closer to the light. Still pressed under miles of overlaying rock, each chunk began to assume it’s final rigid shape. Fierce erosion consumed the weighty burden above and the blocks lurched upward. As the pressure dramatically lessoned and the stone cooled for the last time, they were each fractured and shattered by huge branching cracks taller than mountains. By ten million-years ago, all that lay between them and the surface was a relatively thin layer of gravel and soil. Water and ice would take over, two of nature's most prolific sculptors, but even for nature, the pieces being forged here were built for giants.

Over geological time, a cluster of  a dozen or so colossal blocks burst out of the ground and were alternately cut with torrents of running water and carved by rivers of ice. One after another grinding glaciers wound through and around the monuments, enormous sheets of solid igneous rock were sliced away from their original block, pulverized into sand and pebbles, and transported out of the growing valley. When the ice last melted, the towering angular faces left behind had been buffed and polishing to a glossy granite sheen.

       
Left: uplift beginning 10mya increases the rate of erosion of a large region, rivers and creeks flow faster and begin to cut deeply around the hills creating a rugged, hilly valley. Center: Ice Ages come and go, each one filling the valley anew with relentless rivers of ice and rock. Right: The last glaciar begins to melt and the polished plutons are revealed. (Click image to enlarge. Source)

The first humans to venture into the region some 10,000 years ago were greeted by a breathtaking vista. They found a lush green carpet of giant redwoods, black oak, ponderosa pine populated by browsing megafauna, nestled between monumental spires and rippling walls reaching nearly three thousand feet above the valley floor. Along the both rims, smaller hanging valleys end abruptly fifty stores above the ground. Water pours out of the passes in between the rocks into space and falls for hundreds of feet, splashing noisily into pools shrouded in mist and highlighted by rainbows come to earth. One of the last inhabiting groups of Native Americans, the Miwok, called it Awoonie, because the valley walls resembled a "gaping bear’s mouth". But today we call it by another local name: Yosemite.

I defy anyone to adequately describe in mere words the scale and beauty of this place. Two massive formations that immediately draw the eye stand eternal guard over the Valley: Half Dome and El Capitan. Both these majestic sentries are exfoliation domes. Like their smaller brethren nearby, they started out as individual plutons millions of years in the making, formed under immense pressure miles beneath the earth. In the comparatively new low pressure conditions of the surface, they formations slowly inflate, shrugging off megaton sized veneers of solid rock along onion layer like fault lines which are then lazily eroded by wind and water. The process often leaves a pile of jumbled debris near the base called talus. What we see, when we stand transfixed by an illusory frozen, monumental glory, is but a snapshot of an active, evolving rocky exterior driven in part by a creaking, at times shrieking, interior as pockets of stony pressure are violently relieved.

El Capitan juts out of the steep valley rim like a massive fist of granite. Like the entire valley, El Cap beckons seductively to the explorer in us all, our inner hunter-gatherer, our ancestral trekker. Of course a number of people get hurt every year following that inner voice, but it's easy to see why! It's just a hypnotic, delightful place, as though nature had constructed a cornucopia of rugged winding trails littered on all sides with rocky jungle gyms built with derived, bipedal primates in mind. What climbers and hikers call "The Nose" of El Cap follows that sweeping leaning edge for three-thousand exhilarating feet above the valley floor.

Last week a two man climbing team reclaimed their speed climbing record for the Nose with a time of two hours, forty-three minutes, and thirty-three seconds:

NYT -- Florine and Yuji Hirayama on Wednesday morning set a speed record on the Nose, the most famous route on the most famous wall in the world’s rock-climbing Mecca. Their ascent shaved 2 minutes 12 seconds off the previous record set in October by the German brothers Thomas and Alexander Huber.

Which means they were ascending the three thousand feet of steep to dead vertical to slightly overhanging rock at an average rate of almost twenty feet a minute. You can see what it looks like staring straight down into the emerald abyss near the top of the Nose in the thumbnail right. The hand, beaten and grimy from thousands of feet of climbing is mine; except it took my two partners and I almost three full days to complete the same route. It's easy to get gripped when you're up there, but there are also moments when the view surpasses spectacular in more ways than I can articulate. And while I’ve described mostly the summer Yosemite, I’m told that Yosemite in Winter, dressed in soft white snow and gleaming icy lace, can bring tears to the eyes no matter where you look.

That's a big part of what make places like Yosemite so worth preserving. Anyone who has explored them from a hiking trail, through the lens of a camera or the eye of an artist, or from a hawk's perch on the side of the wall thousands of feet off the valley floor will agree; they are in their own way more spectacular than any manmade firework show and some are as impressive a display of our national heritage as any Revolutionary Battlefield. From all the members at Daily Kos, to all our allies here in the US and across to the world, we hope your summer weekend is going great no matter if you're enjoying our nation’s scenic parks or unique historical sites.

A new poll conducted by Scientists and Engineers for America indicates an overwhelming majority of voters prefer candidates who support research into science and technology, with emphasis on the three E's: education, environment, and energy. Nice to know, and in a sane world I'd be tempted to add a snarky "No shit?" But in the bizarro conservative fantasy world constructed by the Bush-McCain GOP, maybe it's we best count our few remaining blessings even as they vanish faster than dry ice on a hot summer day. Among the key findings:

Majorities across partisan lines say they would be more likely to support a candidate who is committed to these issues. However, Democrats express considerably more intensity than do independents and Republicans for a candidate who is committed to preparing students with the skills they need for the 21st Century, reducing the cost and improving the quality of healthcare, and addressing climate change and the demand for energy through public investments in science and technology.

Almost twice as many Democrats (65%) are "much more" likely than Republicans (38%) to vote for a candidate committed to preparing students with the skills they need for the 21st Century through public investments in science and technology education. Predictably, Democrats outnumber Republicans three to one (48% to 17%) when asked if they're much more likely to vote for a candidate committed to addressing global climate change through public investments in science and technology. Strangely a similar partisan pattern is seen when asked the same question about using science and technology to address the demand for energy. One interpretation of the above would be, apparently, a lot of Republicans still resist admitting they were wrong -- or more accurately were misled by sources they inexplicably continue to trust -- over climate change. And a sizable chunk seems to feel that either energy policy is fine as is, or that science isn't part of any solution.

Some of this may seem odd in the most technological nation on earth, but keep in mind the process isn't static; we're probably seeing the end result of some partidularly vicious recent iterations. In today's political climate, a sort of cultural selection regularly combs through the conservative base with every new shiny piece of evidence for [Insert Respective Field of Science Currently Under Right-wing Assault], leaving behind only those conservatives with the greatest immunity to invading intellectual pathogens from the insidious liberal vector called reality.

... And I feel fine. Unfortunately, that sentiment is not shared by a small group of folks in the Aloha State:

Now the media is correctly reporting that some physicists believe that the Large Hadron Collider might produce mini black holes in its collisions, and that black holes are in general so powerful that they can swallow up not just the Earth, but whole star systems. This in turn has sparked some rather sensational headlines, leading up to a lawsuit filed in the US District Court in Hawaii in March, where seven people are asking for a court injunction to stop the experiments at the LHC ...

The LHC will allow cosmologists and physicists to peer, briefly, into deep cosmic time and perhaps answer some truly fundamental questions bordering on the surreal. Why do some particles have mass while others do not? What are the particular handshakes stretching from the smallest to the largest scales in the universe uniting Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity? Why is there anything at all instead of absolutely nothing?

We may soon have the beginnings of an answer to some of these intriguing questions and many more. But as far as end-o-the-world concerns, cosmic rays with equal or greater energies strike the earth and every other planet and moon in the solar system. And the same goes for every observable object in the universe. After countless zillions of exotic collisions, each on par with or larger than those about to be created below the Franco-Swiss border, it is self-evident those bodies can survive the theoretical onslaught of nano black-holes or strangelets or anything else; at least for a few billion years.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting the White House continues to fight tooth and nail to prevent the Environmental Protection Agency's from publishing a report of greenhouse gases mandated by the Supreme Court. Their motive? According to the Journal, to prevent even the possibility of the EPA establishing and enforcing any kind of restriction on greenhouse gas  emissions (Subscription only):

The draft document, which has been viewed by The Wall Street Journal, outlines how the government, under the Clean Air Act, could regulate greenhouse-gas emissions ... The OMB instead wants the document to show that the Clean Air Act is flawed and that greenhouse-gas regulations should be developed under new legislation, several people close to the matter said.

The EPA document gained national attention last week when it was revealed that WH personnel refused to open the email containing it. It reportedly lays out a road map for how the EPA could regulate dangerous greenhouse gases as a pollutant under the Clean Air Act. Why might the Bush Administration be reluctant to  hear about greenhouse gas regulations? Well, like any good rapacious neocon with their microbrains buried in the sand, they despise the Clean Air Act. Their concern, at least according to this Journal article, is that by allowing this to go forward, it might threaten Bush's legacy as a ... well I guess as a full blown, toxic, industrial sociopathic tycoon hell bent on unleashing climate destruction on a global scale. The Wapo fills us in on another ugly angle:

The Defense Department, the nation's biggest polluter, is resisting orders from the Environmental Protection Agency to clean up Fort Meade and two other military bases where the EPA says dumped chemicals pose "imminent and substantial" dangers to public health and the environment. The Pentagon has also declined to sign agreements required by law that cover 12 other military sites ... The contracts would spell out a remediation plan, set schedules, and allow the EPA to oversee the work and assess penalties if milestones are missed.

Aha! Makes even more sense now, eh gentle readers? Now, normally this would be a good thing, because it could mean big fat no-bid clean up contracts, with zero government oversight, for a wholly owned subsidiary of Neoconia, Inc. But that jig works best when it's in a freefire zone on the other side of the world, cloaked by expedient Executive Privilege, far away from prying eyes, and it's mostly up when Bush leaves town anyway. And in the aftermath, as the imperial corruption unravels on a scale that may well leave the nation's head spinning in disbelief, senior contract fat-cats foolish enough to remain in the US and bid might find their asses sharing a cozy prison cell with WWWCrook.Com Bernie Ebbers. So the enthusiasm has, shall we say, dulled.

Meanwhile, ice at the North Pole might all but disappear this summer; the western US and Canada are in the middle of a decade of drought; radiocarbon isotope ratios and paleoclimate proxies confirm the unique anthropogenic origin of today's rising CO2 levels; gas is rocketing to five freak'n dollars a gallon and heating bills will follow suit in a few months; we're pissing a trillion dollars into the Arabian sand to maintain the status quo and help prop up terrorist friendly regimes across the entire region thanks to George Bush and John McCain. But Exxon and Halliburton are making out like bandits, so you know, it's not like they see any need to worry about fossil fuel dependency.

Besides, what's really important for the Republican fringe: they don't want to let anything happen that might make the next President's job easier in dealing with the vast shitty mess they're created, because it might help him look good to the rest of the nation, heaven forbid, maybe even better than Shrub. Yeah, that's some leadership, huh?

In December, 2005, proponents of Intelligent Design Creationism were dealt a crushing blow. A Republican judge appointed by none other than George W. Bush found that ID was creationism, that the tactic of teaching it even as a 'controversy' was disingenuous, and concluded in part that "citizens of the Dover area were poorly served ... that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks ..." In an utterly reprehensible act, sadly all too representative of creationist hucksters, the well-heeled Discovery Institute that helped create the whole shitty mess walked the check, leaving jilted local taxpayers to pay off a one-million dollar legal bill. They would not stay in hiding for long.

What soon emerged from a hasty PR makeover was no longer ostensibly interested in teaching creationism per se, but rather as fierce fighters for (Socially conservative) justice, a sort of brave-hearted, academic William Wallace replete with a new antiscience & martyr dog whistle cast as a proud, resounding battle-cry: "They may take our elected office, but they'll never take our Freedom!" By that odd definition, freedom is definitely on the march for residents of the Pelican State thanks to a former exorcist and faith healer turned politician:

Louisiana's Governor Bobby Jindal signed Senate Bill 733 into law, 27 years after the state passed its Balance Treatment for Evolution-Science and Creation-Science Act ... Jindal's approval of the bill was buried in a press release issued on June 25, 2008 ...Houma Today reports (June 27, 2008) that the bill "will empower educators to pull religious beliefs into topics like evolution, cloning and global warming by introducing supplemental materials."

The Louisiana legislature should be more wary than most of the Dover trap: It was there, way back in 1987, that the Supreme Court decided an earlier version of creationism was indeed a sham. But that didn’t keep Governor Bobby Jindal from signing SB 733, the mis-named Louisiana Science Education Act, last week. While the bill purports to encourage critical thinking and open discussion of various scientific topics, it perpetuates the same sham by singling out evolution (along with global warming and cloning) as topics deserving special criticism.

This, in and of itself, undermines the claim to secular purpose. Evolution is no more scientifically controversial than gravity, and Governor Jindal surely knows that -- he graduated from Brown University with honors in biology. His own biology professor reminded him recently that "Without evolution, modern biology, including medicine and biotechnology, wouldn't make sense. In order for today's students in Louisiana to succeed in college and beyond, ... they need a solid grounding in genetics and evolution."

Another sham is the claim of bill supporters that this bill isn't about creationism was put to the lie early on, when supporter David Tate, a member of the Livingston Parish school board, told the New Orleans Times-Picayune "I believe that both sides -- the creationism side and the evolution side -- should be presented and let students decide what they believe." He added that the bill was necessary because "teachers are scared to talk about" creationism, but didn't mention whether they were similarly scared about discussing astrology or the belief that babies come from storks, not sex. An anti-abortion news site crowed that, thanks to Jindal's signature "Louisiana public school teachers can now educate their students about the theory of intelligent design," a practice ruled unconstitutional in both 1987 and again in 2005.

But it isn't a partisan issue. Conservative blogger AllahPundit was unsurprised by Jindal's decision to sign the bill, declaring it "depressing yet predictable." Prominent right-wing blogger Charles Johnson declared that, with Jindal's signature on the bill, "American educational standards take a huge step backward... The creationist front group called the Discovery Institute is quietly crowing, and maintaining the fiction that the bill is not religiously-based." That many prominent conservatives would agree with progressives -- not to mention, heaven forbid, a New York Times editorial -- shows just how far into the fringes Jindal's decision was.

In Dover, a school board overrode the advice of parents, teachers, and scientists, forcing intelligent design into biology classes. Parents and teachers sued, and in the federal trial that followed, Barbara Forrest, a philosophy professor at Southeastern Louisiana University and co-author with Paul R. Gross of Creationism's Trojan Horse, showed that the concept of "intelligent design" entered drafts of the textbook at issue in 1987, just after the Supreme Court ruled that claims that "creation-science" has any secular basis were just a sham. The judge in Dover also saw through that sham, but Louisiana is on the verge of being drawn back into that legal maelstrom.

What can you do? Interested Louisiana teachers, parents and students should follow the excellent advice of the Louisiana Coalition for Science.  Those of us not blessed to live in the Pelican State can join the National Center for Science Education. Bills like the one Jindal signed were proposed in 6 states this year, and while most were mercifully put out of their misery, they’ll rise again quicker than a B movie zombie. NCSE and local Citizens for Science groups would be happy to give you advice about how to defend and improve science education near you.  

Remember, these bills have nothing to do with academic freedom or furthering science education – Imagine for example if health instructors tried to use them to ‘teach the weaknesses’ in abstinence only sex-ed! The goal is to manufacture doubt at the wholesale level on carefully selected subjects to serve a small segment of lobbyists and activists, while weakening the public school system in hope of, some might speculate, eventually drowning both it and the taxes that support it in a bathtub. Antiscience forces are well funded – in some cases by full blown Reconstruction Dominionist zillionaires -- and relentless in moving forward with their stated theocratic goals to preserve and expand their twisted version[s] of freedom, even, and perhaps especially, if it comes at the expense of your own.

In what is no doubt yet another amazing coincidence to those who don't accept evolutionary biology, a fish with four, well formed leg-like paddles turns up in the fossil record:

The aquatic creature, which lived during the late Devonian period about 365 million years ago, represented an evolutionary midpoint between Tiktaalik, one of the earliest fish to clamber onto land, and primitive four-legged land animals, or tetrapods.

And would you believe the new critter, Ventastega curonica, was found at exactly the right time in paleohistory, and with the exact suite of anatomical characteristics to make it cleverly appear like a snapshot of major evolution in action literally cast in stone? Gosh, I wonder, what the hell do these damn evil evolushunists know about so-called "walking" fish anyway ...

McCain campaign adviser Charlie Black is getting ripped for suggesting that a terrorist attack would bode well for the GOP nominee. Black quickly apologized for it, John McCain just as quickly distanced himself from it, so I have no desire to make hay with it here. My questions is rather, is it even true?

It's safe to assume that through 2004 it probably would have helped the Bush administration and thus the Republicans. But what about now, in 2008? Well, hard to say. And much of the eventual reaction might be a function of how bad an attack we're talking about here. If it were a London style train bombing vs an apocalyptic event topping the original 9-11 attacks, would that make a difference?

I don't think it's all clear that a terror attack would indisputably help the GOP at this point. It might even hurt them terribly. In stark contrast to the years immediately following September 2001, President Bush is about as popular as a yeast infection, the GOP hasn't been trusted on terrorism significantly more than democrats for a couple of years. Moreover, the neocons and related media and PR mouthpieces have been whining and promising for years now that everything from Iraq to suspension of the Bill of Rights is necessary because it will protect us from another terror attack, and they've done so at the myopic exclusion of virtually every other issue on the political playing field. What happens if and when that rationale is laid to waste?

The mark of a good theory in science is it unites previously disparate facts within a single unifying explanatory framework. And here, finally, we have evidence, a final piece in the puzzle, for a heretofore suspected but not yet fully accepted Unified Theory of Conservatism: Intentional Stupidity at the highest levels of the GOP AKA Idiocracy. I posit we could explain and unite just about any of the many Bush/GOP clusterfucks in one single willfully ignorant theme so well demonstrated by this:

The White House in December refused to accept the Environmental Protection Agency’s conclusion that greenhouse gases are pollutants that must be controlled, telling agency officials that an e-mail message containing the document would not be opened, senior E.P.A. officials said last week. ...Tony Fratto, a White House spokesman, refused to comment on discussions between the White House and the Environmental Protection Agency. Asked about changes in the original report, Mr. Fratto said, "It’s the E.P.A. that determines what analysis it wants to make available" in its documents.

No doubt intentionally avoiding reports and thus not knowing what's in them makes not commenting on it a much smoother process. But I propose this head in the sand approach helps explain more, much more. For example, it predicts that when senior government leaders refuse to even hear empirical data that might challenge their precious-s-s-s extremist warped ideology, we might end up blowing a trillion dollars and expending thousands of lives and limbs needlessly in a war against the wrong fucking country while the real bad guys slip away; or that fuel prices might skyrocket leaving American families in a bleak, unending bind with little or no alternatives; or that conservatives might ignore a category five hurricane bearing down on the most vulnerable city in the nation even though it had been predicted for decades and then blame it on a parade; or a looming housing crisis leaving entire families from shore to shore homeless; it even predicts that big fat tax gifts for a few rich people won't lead to an economic Mecca for the working man as promised by neocon idiots, but only to a few richer rich people ... really, need we continue?

At some point in the near future history of this great nation, "Republican" or "Conservative" might just become a generic insult synonymous with dipshit precisely because dangerously stupid has become the premier conservative governing philosophy: Shut up, don't open emails, don't read analyst reports, dismiss empirical evidence in favor of wishful thinking, keep your heads in the sand, and don't strain your faith-based noggins worrying about stuff like some silly report back in August 2001 that might say Bin Laden determined to strike in the US until it's too late. Think about that elite asshole in the corner of the country club social with the hot date and martini; shit doesn't that dumbass piss you off? Now, watch this drive, enjoy tonight's episode of rehabilitation, and drink your Brawndo, it has what plants crave!

Everyone on both sides is quick to point out how critical this year's elections are, but Dr. James Hansen at the NASA GISS climate science facility now says they're even more important than you may have thought and, regardless of who wins, if the next President and Congress don't take decisive action on climate change, we may all lose:

.pdf -- Again a wide gap has developed between what is understood about global warming by the relevant scientific community and what is known by policymakers and the public. Now, as then, frank assessment of scientific data yields conclusions that are shocking to the body politic. Now, as then, I can assert that these conclusions have a certainty exceeding 99 percent.

The difference is that now we have used up all slack in the schedule for actions needed to defuse the global warming time bomb. The next President and Congress must define a course next year in which the United States exerts leadership commensurate with our responsibility for the present dangerous situation. Otherwise it will become impractical to constrain atmospheric carbon dioxide ... to a level that prevents the climate system from passing tipping points that lead to disastrous climate changes that spiral dynamically out of humanity’s control.

That first statement is too kind; the gap between some large segments of the public and the climate science community isn't a result of inattention or accident. I regularly get updates from a couple of old friends in Austin containing attacks on Al Gore or the latest industry spinola oil. Like millions of well meaning Americans, they've fallen prey to a well orchestrated megafunded PR campaign to downplay climate change, create false uncertainty, and demonize anyone trying to warn us about it. But it's not all bad news from the right -- no matter what you may think of McCain generally or his energy policy specifically, his proposal suggesting a large cash prize for renewable energy technology is at least a step in the right direction.

That would be Ken Ham of Answers in Genesis and the Creation Museum in Petersburg, KY. He's also the proud speaker at a prayer breakfest sponsored last Wednesday by the Pentagon Chaplain's Office. PZ points out the alarming implications:

Pharyngula -- Just let that sink in. There are people at the Pentagon who are in charge of planning where your sons and daughter and nephews and nieces and other beloved family members and friends will be sent to put their lives at risk. ... There are people there who control nuclear weapons.

It's not merely that Ham is a fundamentalist, he's a complete fraud or a dangerous crack pot, take your pick. Ham makes his living as a Young Earth Creationist by fostering and exploiting the worst kind of willful, pseudo scientific ignorance. YEC hucksters are shams through and through who literally preach the complete dismissal of biology, geology, physics, astronomy and virtually every other field of hard science.

This is not someone we want to lionize or have any influence over people who make life and death decisions based on -- one would hope anyway -- facts, reasonable inferences, and sound analysis. Especially at a time when our military and intel agencies are trying to recover some measure of credibility after being hung out to dry by the Bush gang for ignoring facts, reasonable inferences, and sound analysis in favor of blindly ignorant and we now know fatally flawed neocon ideology. I'm not sure which is more disturbing, that the Chaplain's Office was unaware of Ham's reputation or just doesn't give a damn about their own.