Category Archives: Uncategorized

We interrupt this blog for a brief announcement: Too often, science fiction, no matter how imaginative, just plain sucks. Here’s an example, from one of the genre’s founders, Edgar Rice Burroughs. It’s from his second book The Gods of Mars. A Martian princess named Phaidor has just been rejected by a studly Virginian from earth,Continue reading “Science Fiction vs. Reality”

From MoJo Blog, a question on the House floor asked during the debate over the Artic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) by Rep. Edward Markey: So the choice comes down to this – do we raise $2.4 billion by prying open and forever destroying a national wildlife refuge, overturning forty years of established environmental policy, threateningContinue reading “Good Question. Bad ANWR.”

"Students are ill-served by any effort in science classrooms to blur the distinction between science and other ways of knowing, including those concerned with the supernatural." American Association for the Advancement of Science, in a new release backing the National Academy of Sciences and the National Science Teachers Association’s refusal to force biology teachers inContinue reading “Quote of the Week”

(from Granta this fall, by Maarten ‘t Hart)     Here, in Holland, there is only one plant from which one can make reasonable deductions about climate change: the broad bean. The broad bean likes the cold and you have to plant it early. But not too early, because then it will rot in theContinue reading “The Weather Where We Are: Holland”

Leftists such as Robert Scheer have been wondering out loud why the Republican Right is so upset with the Harriet Miers nomination. Miers may not be ""the brightest of buttons" (as Paul McCartney recently remarked about Yoko Ono–guess the reconciliation is off). But she adores the President, and has but taken a secret oath toContinue reading “No Wonder They’re Angry”

Though this writer comes to you from the left side of the dial, faithful readers will have noted an abiding interest in voices who defy the party line. Although politicized types on both sides sneer at independents and moderates, it is the undecided–or those who insist on being persuaded–who typically end up casting the decisiveContinue reading “Contrarian Round-Up”

A couple of weeks ago newly-elected Senator Barack Obama impressed even the jaded blogosphere with the brilliance of his response to those on the left eager to punish Democratic Senators deemed to be "appeasing" right-wing Republicans by working with them on certain issues, or not opposing them bitterly enough on others. The post on Obama’sContinue reading “The Uses of Cynicism”

A story in today’s Washington Post reveals yet another full-scale assault on the environment from the Bush Administration. This has become so routine that it’s a little surprising the paper even thinks it’s worth the front page.  Back in 2001, the Bush Administration Environmental Protection Agency (which clearly needs a new title) allowed industry lobbyistsContinue reading “Business As Usual in Bush Adminstration: It’s Okay for Industry Lobbyists to Write Hazardous Waste Regulations”

A commentator (Jennifer S.) points out that I failed to reveal to my vast constituency where I went on vacation a couple of weeks ago, after promising a billion bonus points to whoever could identify the spot from a photo (below). Well, no one knew, but I didn’t mean to be quite so coy aboutContinue reading “Place of a Billion Bonus Points”

Lots of catching up awaits me, but for now…     "The timber program is losing money–an estimated $48 million in the last fiscal year. It makes no sense to ask the taxpayers of this country to funnel millions more to such an expensive endeavor." –Republican Senator John Sununu of New Hampshire, on a senateContinue reading ““It Makes No Sense””