Strategic Brilliance

You gotta give it to McCain, his VP choice is a stroke of brilliance. Sarah Palin energizes the base, provides appeal to women, pro-Lifers, union people, conservatives, and provides a stark contrast to Obama. Palin shows gumption, initiative, resistance to the forces of politics as usual and the good'ole boy network. Obama by contrast is a do-nothing Senator who is beholden to a chain of special interests a mile long and never saw a baby he wasn't ready to sacrifice. It's just no contest. Every time the Democrats attack Palin for her lack of experience for the number two spot the obvious rejoinder is to point out that she has more relevant experience than their number one spot candidate has. Strategic brilliance and an energizing pick for the Republicans.

Vacuity

Apparently Madonna dissed McCain the other day in a presentation that put pictures of John McCain, an authentic American hero, up with pictures of Hitler and Mugabe while featuring Barack Obama with pictures of Mahatma Ghandi, Al Gore, and John Lennon shown while she sang "Get Stupid."
McCain for his part got the endorsement of another entertainer, Latin American singer Daddy Yankee (aka Ramon Ayala).
I suppose the big question is "Who cares?"
"Get Stupid" is probably exactly what you are doing if you are taking your political advice from popular singers, especially ones whose creativity is as shallow and frankly offensive as Madonna who specializes in offending people. She's getting pretty long in the tooth too. She'll have to come out with a cane pretty soon to climb up on her cross.
I suppose the best that can be said for this is that McCain has a sense of humor and reacts to this kind of thing in the manner it deserves — Good Cheer in replying in kind. Let the other fellows "Get Stupid."

Media Approach to Science

Of course sometimes you have to make up more than one fact. Wow! That's creative. The fun part is you interview these smart people and you have no idea what they told you so you can make up anything you like.

How Do You Tell? Where's the Beef?

I suppose "Put up or shut up" is the challenge when you make an assertion. If bad-science is bad, and who would deny it? How do you tell good from bad science? This is especially a question for those who are not scientists. Let's list a few things:

• Science is data driven
• Science is primarily about experiments to test hypotheses
• Science is a collaborative activity which requires replication of experiments

Bad science contrasts with real science in all three elements:

• Bad Science tends to be agenda driven using unproven theories and simulations instead of experiment
• Bad Science sets out to prove things and tends to cherry pick their data and dismiss conflicting data as unworthy because it doesn't agree with what is to be proved.
• Bad Science is often narrowly held and secretive and instead of being collaborative it demonizes those that disagree.

OK there are three things you can look for. Where's the data? Are you trying to find out the truth or push an agenda? Are you open to disagreement and having your results checked?

The Ubiquity of Bad Science

We live in an age of science, but often it is rather bad science. Science is bad when it ceases to be a search for the truth and becomes instead agenda driven. You don't have to look too far. When government gets involved the quality of science generally starts to go down the drain because the science becomes politicized.

All kinds of fiascoes have been perpetrated in the name of science by government. The latest seems to be Global Warming which comes off an equally bizarre claim of Global Cooling in the 1970s. Back in the 1970s when tight oil and government regulation led to long gas lines there was a government energy program. We heard all the same stuff we're starting to hear now and not very much came of it.

The bottom line is that when it comes to such a central factor of production as energy, the market will make it work or it will fail. Government typically will posture, puff up its chest and pretend it is doing something. The reality is that energy is at the bottom of the pyramid. Everything turns on energy and government really can't do very much at all except, frankly, get out of the way and let the people who do the real work, do it!

Ohio Shroud Conference

COLUMBUS, Ohio, August 15 -- In his presentation today at The Ohio State University's Blackwell Center, Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) chemist, Robert Villarreal, disclosed startling new findings proving that the sample of material used in 1988 to Carbon-14 (C-14) date the Shroud of Turin, which categorized the cloth as a medieval fake, could not have been from the original linen cloth because it was cotton. According to Villarreal, who lead the LANL team working on the project, thread samples they examined from directly adjacent to the C-14 sampling area were "definitely not linen" and, instead, matched cotton. Click for More

Since I was in attendance I can say from first hand experience that this was one of the best shroud conferences ever.

Russians should get out of Georgia

Who's kidding who. The Russians are playing a very dangerous game in Georgia and it puts me in mind of some of their previous adventures as the Soviet Union. I went to high school with Hungarian refugees from the Russian invasion of Hungary. Meanwhile I think our response has been pretty anemic, almost but not quite as bad as Carter's decision not to go to the 1980 Moscow Olympics because of the Russian invasion of Afghanistan. (Ooo naughty Russians, we won't play with you ... give me a break!)

Google News Reports that:

The United States, Georgia's main Western ally, cancelled joint military exercises with Russia due to start Friday in the Sea of Japan and is considering other protest measures, US officials said. France and Britain were also to take part.

"In the wake of this conflict, there is no way that we can proceed with this joint exercise at this time," the official said.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said: "I can assure you that Russia's international reputation and what role Russia can play in the international community is very much at stake here." [emphasis added]

I guess that'll show'em!