The Republican War On Science

[stromboli]

http://www.salon.com/2015/10/03/secrets_of_the_gop_science_war_how_spin_masters_and_pundits_confuse_conservatives_about_facts/

When scientists announced the discovery of water on Mars recently, Rush Limbaugh drew the obvious conclusion: It was all part of a conspiratorial plot:

LIMBAUGH: If there was once all that water on Mars, and there is a lot of water here on earth, what’s going to happen to our ocean? How did the water vanish?

My point is, they’re presenting all this stuff to you as fact just like they’re presenting everything involving global warming as scientific fact. It`s nothing but wild guesses. It’s nothing but based on computer models which is the result of data input that who knows if it’s legit or not.

That’s to be expected from Limbaugh, I suppose. If you’re a huckster by trade, the truth is your enemyâ€"and not just the truth, but the very possibility of truth. The very existence of science is a threat to you. So naturally, if you’ve got as much time to fill as Limbaugh does, you engage in war on science. But the real problem isn’t Rush Limbaugh, it’s the way that the entirety of the GOP adapts to him in various different waysâ€"especially those who are deemed “sensible” in the world of bipartisan consensus, whose job it is to make plausible excuses for their sorry party.

Case in point: GOP strategist Liz Mair, who back in March was abruptly fired after just one day as a Scott Walker online strategist, in response to outrage over an earlier set of tweets critical of Iowa during a January forum. After her firing, Mair fired off a long tweet storm clarifying her views, which she did againâ€"with a more critical edgeâ€"just after Walker left the race a few weeks ago. In short, if there’s anyone working inside the GOP likely to be honestly critical of its problems, it’s Mair. Which presumably is why MSNBC likes having her on. But Limbaugh’s anti-science conspiracism clearly illuminates the limits of such critical honesty.

Thus, when Chris Matthews played that clip of Limbaugh and opened up a discussion on “Hardball” on Sept. 29 [transcript], Mair didn’t come to Limbaugh’s defense, but she did find a way to confuse matters further, taking the heat off the science-fearing, science-hating GOP base and blame-shifting to society at large. Before she spoke up, Jonathan Chait made a sensible point:

CHAIT: So, conservatives, in general, have grown more and more distrustful in polls of science over the course of the last four decades. They used to be more trusting of science than liberals now, they’re much less. And specifically with global warming, what they have is a conspiracy theory. They don’t have an alternative scientific theory.

So it fell to Mair to obfuscate, to undo that degree of clarity. “Science has worked for mankind across the board,” Matthews said. “When did it become the enemy of the hard right?” And Mair responded:

MAIR: I don’t think it’s just the enemy of the hard right. I actually think that we’re in a period in society where there are a lot of people who are very skeptical of discovery and science in general. I mean, when we had the debate about vaccines, right, and we were looking at the resurgence of awful illnesses because people weren’t having their kids vaccinated, a lot of that was center centered in very, very liberal enclaves of California. I think unfortunate â€"

MATTHEWS: They were afraid to get their kids vaccinated â€"

MAIR: They believe it’s going to give them autism, right?

I think we’ve reached a place in society, and maybe Rush Limbaugh’s comments are manifestation of this, where a lot of people just don’t prioritize discovery or science anymore. I mean, remember in the 2012 election how much Newt Gingrich was derided for all of his talk about moon bases and space exploration, right?

So as Mair is framing things, “a lot of people just don’t prioritize discovery or science anymore,” and they’re all over the map ideologically. She says that “maybe Rush Limbaugh’s comments are manifestation of this” [my emphasis], and maybe they’re not, I guess. “Who knows?” as Rush himself would say.

But there are a two major flaws in her argument. First, there’s actual data supporting Chait’s claim that conservatives alone have become much less trusting of science, and it’s not very scientific of Mair to just ignore that data, because she doesn’t like it, and try to counter it with anecdotes.

A 2012 paper by Gordon Gauchat in the American Sociological Review, using data from the 1974 to 2010 General Social Surveyâ€"the gold standard for public opinion researchâ€"found that “group differences in trust in science are largely stable over the period, except for respondents identifying as conservative. Conservatives began the period with the highest trust in science, relative to liberals and moderates, and ended the period with the lowest.”

There’s also much broader evidence that liberalism is correlated with one of the “big five” personality traits, “openness to experience,” as discussed by Chris Mooney in his 2012 book, “The Republican Brain: The Science of Why They Deny Science- and Reality” and in my review of it. Thus, to the extent that science involves prioritizing discovery, Mair is arguing against an impressive range of data.

Second, both of Mair’s anecdotes misrepresent the actual stories of what was going. In California, elected Democrats didn’t indulge the anti-vaxxers, they pushed back, and passed a law requiring all schoolchildren to be vaccinatedâ€"over GOP opposition, by the way. As for Gingrich’s space-talk in 2012, folks weren’t laughing at the idea of space exploration, they were laughing at Gingrich’s snake oil routine and his pretense of being a serious thoughtful leader.

The real stories surrounding both anecdotes are illuminating, so let’s take a closer look at each in turn. First off, while it’s true that a lot of anti-vaccine sentiment was seen in liberal enclaves around Hollywood, as the Hollywood Reporter explained in detail last year, the reasons cited weren’t that those not vaccinating their children “just don’t prioritize discovery or science.” It was much more complicated than that:

Today, on the Westside, those who abstain from vaccinating their kids see refusal through their own socio-anthropological lens. “They’re well intended â€" the people that only want to do the best for their child. They want only natural products, organic foods, attachment parenting, family beds,” says Dr. Lisa Stern, a Santa Monica pediatrician. Observes Dr. Neal Baer, a trained pediatrician and veteran TV writer-producer (ER) who wrote an episode of Law & Order: SVU about the public health consequences of vaccine refusal, “It’s about not wanting to have anything that isn’t ‘natural’ in your child â€" this whole notion of the natural and holistic versus the scientific.”

Baer’s framing of “the natural and holistic versus the scientific” reflects a broader cultural construct, but it’s inaccurate. Using products of scientific discovery without adequate risk-assessment is more properly described as “the technocratic” approach, rather than “the scientific,” or even as “the techno-corporate.” Determining where “the scientific” leaves off and “the technocratic” or “the techno-corporate” begins may not be so easy to discern. The story continued:

According to those on both sides of the issue, this demographic is unafraid to take on the medical establishment. “They are not intimidated by the authority of the doctor,” says Brendan Nyhan, Ph.D, a political scientist at Dartmouth who has studied parents who are vaccine skeptics. “Educated, high-income people are more likely to feel confident in standing up to doctors or seeking out ones who are more favorable to alternative schedules and selective vaccination.”

So, the irony here is that some of what’s motivating anti-vaxxers is actually a personal willingness to discover, however flawed their execution might be, which may then be taken advantage of by people with various different agendas. In short, it’s nothing like the clear-cut, simplistic picture casually tossed out by Mair.

But what was remarkably clear-cut was what happened once the issue entered the public policy realm: Democratic politicians overwhelmingly looked to the science, while Republicans ignored and fought against it. A bill that would ban personal, religious exemptions for vaccinations, co-written by a pediatrician in the state Senate, Richard Pan, was passed by the state Legislature with strong Democratic support, and was signed into law by Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown. In the California Senate, Legiscanâ€"which tracks legislation in all 50 statesâ€"identified the bill on the political spectrum as “Strong Partisan Bill (Democrat 27-2).” The overall vote on its third reading was 46-31, so a substantial majority of Republicans opposed it. In the California Assembly, just a handful of Democrats abstained (3) or voted no (5), while just two Republicans voted for the bill. An effort to overturn the law through the referendum process, just filed in late September, was led by former Assemblyman Tim Donnelly, a Republican, and former member of the anti-immigration Minuteman organization, who placed third in California’s open primary governor’s race in 2014.

[josephpalazzo]

The Right has been on the wrong side of science in regard to evolution, climate change, stem cell research; as to the anti-vaccination crowd, a good number of these people are on the Left.

[Baruch]

Generally the Left is against mandatory anything, until they get in power ;-(  The Right is more consistent ... they are in favor of mandatory anything, provided the Left doesn't support it ... then it is tainted.  The best way to stop the Right, is for the Left to start a campaign for breathing ... then the Right will try to stop breathing ...

[josephpalazzo]

I think they tried that... hasn't worked due to filibuster.

[AllPurposeAtheist]

Right as I type this many roads and dams here in South Carolina have already been washed out and more on the way.  This is a republican dominated state and of course they don't like paying taxes for infrastructure projects  and so soon as the rain stops and the damage assessed they'll cry to the federal government for relief with almost zero contingency plans for any other "acts of god" ..

Thanks god.

[TomFoolery]

I think GMOs are a perfect example of how science and bipartisan politics confuses the hell out of people. Both parties try hard to pander to public opinion rather than science, and neither one is doing a great job of settling down on a platform of "yes, they're safe" or "no, we should label the hell out of them before banning them outright."

Sophisticated readers know a science denier when they see one: the libertarian irresponsibly attacking vaccine safety, the oil-state senator mocking climate theory, the southern Bible-thumper denying the fossil in front of his nose.

But the biggest gap between public opinion and scientific consensus in the United States is not in the realm of vaccines, global warming or evolution but regarding the safety of genetically modified (GM) foods. And the science deniers on this topic are more likely to be Democratic than Republican, with college-educated Americans almost evenly split.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/fred-hiatt-genetically-modified-foods-prove-hard-for-americans-to-stomach/2015/02/08/3ae7902c-ad60-11e4-9c91-e9d2f9fde644_story.html

[Baruch]

I don't like to put artificial molecules or artificial foods in my body.  Limiting my intake of artificial substances, made available solely in the interest of making money ... is a desirable goal.  The pharma companies, the food conglomerates and the government ... aren't looking out for my interests.  The science of making poisons is not a science I care to participate in.  Of course some natural molecules and foods are bad for me also ... I want to limit my intake of those as well.  A completely bought-off Food & Drug regulatory agency is not to be trusted, just like the SEC isn't to be trusted to regulate the stock & bond market.  Paranoia isn't insane, if the people you are dealing with actually intend harm, and for profit as well.

[stromboli]

I don't like to put artificial molecules or artificial foods in my body.  Limiting my intake of artificial substances, made available solely in the interest of making money ... is a desirable goal.  The pharma companies, the food conglomerates and the government ... aren't looking out for my interests.  The science of making poisons is not a science I care to participate in.  Of course some natural molecules and foods are bad for me also ... I want to limit my intake of those as well.  A completely bought-off Food & Drug regulatory agency is not to be trusted, just like the SEC isn't to be trusted to regulate the stock & bond market.  Paranoia isn't insane, if the people you are dealing with actually intend harm, and for profit as well.

Being raised in a rural environment and knowing what farmers deal with, I know where the GMO mentality comes from. Talk to a farmer who had his crops wiped out by Mole Crickets or locusts and ask his opinion. Every fertilizer and chemical soil beefing agent was developed to meet a need for (initially) healthier and stronger crops. These people feed nations and in order to stay in business have to produce crops despite drought, insects, plant diseases and a host of other problems.

Monsanto is bigger than any of you realize. The Monsanto plant at Soda Springs in Idaho that produces phosphates for fertilizers is many miles of area, mostly a gigantic mining operation that dwarfs your sense of scale if you've seen it, and I have. That is the reason and the excuse. Yes, they have gone way past the point of safety on many issues and I for one would prefer to have food without GMOs. But I don't have the real estate necessary to raise hogs or grow the feed for them, the silage that feeds the livestock in winter or the hay for cattle for milk or you name it. I also know dairy farmers and what they have to do to provide you milk.

Monsanto and the other companies are multinationals that in their own way dwarf governments. And they can justify everything they do because they in a very real sense feed the world. There is no balance to it and they are doing very bad things, but none of us has the clout to stop them.

Case in point is bee die offs. Some links have been made to neonicotinoids. Practically every insect preventive for any of hundreds of pests contains some form of the chemicals. So the trade off is bee die offs- which hasn't yet been absolutely proven, so you can still buy the insecticides- versus crop loss, pestilence from insect hordes and so on. I've seen what Mole Crickets can do to a farm, so I know where that need comes from.

To put it simply, it is a much more complicated issue than most people realize. If you want to get rid of GMOs I highly recommend you grow your own crops. Try growing enough tomatoes to sustain yourself for a year in your 2 bedroom flat and see how that works.

[Baruch]

This problem has been growing, along with the human population, since the invention of agriculture.  Animal husbandry for example, created a lot of cross-species infections that never existed before.  The availability of too much starch from cereals ... as been causing problems for thousands of years.  There is no free lunch, not for any civilization.  Once the fuel for tractors and fertilizer stop ... the human population problem will auto-correct.  We are the Anasazi of today, in 1000 years, people will be visiting our ruins as tourists, wondering where our descendants got off to (most likely on reservations).

[TomFoolery]

I don't like to put artificial molecules or artificial foods in my body.

There's a difference in not trusting GMOs and not trusting Monsanto. The debate about "artificial food" is a bunch of bullshit. Virtually none of the produce you eat occurs naturally in the wild and is the result of tens of thousands of years of agricultural development. The science of GMOs is clear: they're safe. Now, some of the debates surrounding Monsanto are understandably justified, such as herbicide overuse and resistance, monocultures, and seed/strain patents. But that has to do with the politics and the law, not the science. To suggest that we shouldn't use GMOs because they aren't "natural" when the world we live in is shaped by plastics and modern medicine is ridiculous. To say that GMOs are bad because Monsanto is bad is in essence throwing the baby out with the bathwater. GMOs have remarkable potential.

Limiting my intake of artificial substances, made available solely in the interest of making money ... is a desirable goal.

I think your perception they are made to only make money is kind of bizarre: all companies exist to make money, but GMOs have a wider benefit that extends beyond Monsanto's bottom line. GMOs are helping keep food costs lower. It is and should be your right as to whether or not to eat genetically engineered foods. GMOs go well beyond human and animal food and extend to industries such as textiles and lumber and conservation.

As to the intake of artificial substances regarding medicine, that's also your right not to take it. Many drugs are developed (and also aren't developed) based on profit margins, but to pretend the only point of a drug is only profit too is ludicrous. Vaccines are a whole different story, especially considering how affordable and widely available they are. If "Big Pharma" wanted to make serious money, they'd either charge way more for vaccines or skip out on their development altogether and focus on drugs to treat all the illnesses they prevent and charge premiums for those. But the fact that I can go down to Walgreens right now and get a $15 flu shot tells me it's not all about profit.

[Hydra009]

That’s to be expected from Limbaugh, I suppose. If you’re a huckster by trade, the truth is your enemyâ€"and not just the truth, but the very possibility of truth. The very existence of science is a threat to you. So naturally, if you’ve got as much time to fill as Limbaugh does, you engage in war on science. But the real problem isn’t Rush Limbaugh, it’s the way that the entirety of the GOP adapts to him in various different waysâ€"especially those who are deemed “sensible” in the world of bipartisan consensus, whose job it is to make plausible excuses for their sorry party.

I think this is probably more related to the GOP propensity towards denialism and conspiracy thinking than conscious antagonism towards science.  The conservative talking heads in particular are very prone to come up with their own narrative and their own facts to back it up and essentially any big news story is prone to being distorted.  Between FEMA death camps, Sandy Hook crisis actors, the evil gay agenda, the ebola scare as a totalitarian government plot, and the War on Christmas, they certainly are master shitomancers.

[Sal1981]

Gingrich shot down  Office of Technology Assessment, according to that article.

Now it's free-for-all, and bullshit is seeping in.

[stromboli]

This problem has been growing, along with the human population, since the invention of agriculture.  Animal husbandry for example, created a lot of cross-species infections that never existed before.  The availability of too much starch from cereals ... as been causing problems for thousands of years.  There is no free lunch, not for any civilization.  Once the fuel for tractors and fertilizer stop ... the human population problem will auto-correct.  We are the Anasazi of today, in 1000 years, people will be visiting our ruins as tourists, wondering where our descendants got off to (most likely on reservations).

"Animal husbandry" also created hybrids that are bigger, stronger, and feed more people. Same is true of virtually every species of food crop and grain you can think of. There are no untouched species that are domesticated, with the possible exception of "heirloom" tomatoes, turkeys or whatever. The turkey you buy in the store is no wild turkey, far from it. I guarantee you that if you stopped using GMOs or pesticides and herbicides tomorrow all of the resistant pests and plant and animal infections would do wholesale damage to food bases like corn and wheat and rice.

Ever hear of Ergot? A village in France was all but wiped out by it in the middle ages. Ergot is a commonly occurring growth on some grains like Rye that is similar to LSD. It is still a problem in the world and crops are still infected by it. It has to be dealt with and without technological methods to do would kill many people on a yearly basis.

We all hear horror stories about pig farms and chicken farms where despicable cruelty is discovered. Be the farmer- imagine trying to deal with 10,000 hogs, a full grown one being big enough and dangerous enough to kill a man, if given the proclivity to do so. Hogs are dangerous critters, as are goats and sheep and any animal with hooves and teeth. I know of people that were crushed to death by cattle. I've been personally kicked and bitten by horses. Like the old saying, don't judge until you've walked a mile in their shoes. I have, unlike most on here.

[Solitary]

Very good advice!

[Baruch]

Even if Jesus produced GMOs ... or pharmaceuticals ... I wouldn't trust them.  I know the chemistry.  SciFi folks think that arbitrary molecules produced in arbitrary processes (exactly what exomers you get from polymerization depends on the process) are good for you.  Tobacco is good for you, because it is ... natural.  Studies in France show that GMO is bad for you.  But then they aren't the Anglo-Saxon master race ;-(

And yes, maybe without GMOs, we can't support 10 billion people on Earth ... but are you sure we should even try?  So many people, so many imagined dystopias ... some of which can be actualized.  Just go upload your so called consciousness into a completely artificial android ... and be done with it ... then you don't need food, just an oil change ;-)  But if you go the android route, I don't suggest you use RJ Reynolds for your mechanic work.

And I am not against meat, even factory farmed meat.  I object to gaining moobs because of all the hormones injected into the cows however ... or becoming vulnerable to strong bacterial infections because of overuse of antibiotics in food animals.  We would be fed this shit by any organization, because ... corporations are not known for their sense of public responsibility.