Finding things in common

The Mount Vernon Statement

[Via Eunomia}

What is there to say about this statement, which is being called a new conservative “manifesto”? Someone might object that Russell Kirk said that conservatives do not have manifestoes, but that would be entirely too quaint and old-fashioned. What is one to make of the organizers’ selection of the site of George Washington’s home for a statement that refers to a foreign policy of “advancing freedom and opposing tyranny in the world”? I would say that it is in extremely poor taste, but then this statement is not directed at people like me.

My admiration for Washington comes partly from his rejection of the sort of militaristic Caesarism that fuels the modern cult of the Presidency in which so many conservatives indulge. I agree with his advice that we should “observe good faith and justice towards all nations” and that we should “cultivate peace and harmony with all.” Most modern conservatives today embrace antagonistic, confrontational policies either informed by a hubristic nationalism or inspired by a misguided fear of vastly exaggerated threats. I also agree with Washington that “[t]he great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible.” It would amaze me if most of the signatories of the Mount Vernon Statement would endorse this view. After all, how can we exhaust our resources “advancing freedom and opposing tyranny in the world” if we do not enmesh ourselves deeply in the politics of every other continent?

I cannot object to the statement that the “federal government today ignores the limits of the Constitution, which is increasingly dismissed as obsolete and irrelevant.” This is true. However, I have no idea why the organizers of this gathering think that anyone will believe their professions of constitutionalism after enabling or acquiescing in some of the most grotesque violations of constitutional republican government in the last forty years. If constitutional conservatism means anything, it has to mean that the executive branch does not have wide, sweeping, inherent powers derived from the President’s (temporary) military role. It has to mean that all these conservatives will start arguing that the President cannot wage wars on his own authority, and they will have to argue this no matter who occupies the Oval Office. It has to mean unwavering conservative hostility to the mistreatment of detainees, and it has to mean that conservatives cannot accept the detention of suspects without charge, access to counsel or recourse to some form of judicial oversight. Obviously, constitutional conservatives could in no way tolerate or overlook policies of indefinite detention or the abuse of detainees. They would have to drive out the authoritarians among them, and rediscover a long-lost, healthy suspicion of concentrated power, especially power concentrated in the hands of the executive.

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Daniel Larison, writing at the American Conservative, and I may disagree about some things but there often are a surprising number of overlaps, which makes him my favorite conservative commentator. even when I disagree it is interesting to ‘argue’ with him. Mainly because his arguments, even when I disagree, make sense. They are rational.

So I love it when we come at something the same way.

Here is one. We both hate the concentration of power in the Executive Branch. It seems to follow a natural human wish, by both conservatives and liberals, to have a king who will just unilaterally make decisions that we want to happen.

And over the last generation or more, Congress has happily given up much of its power, mostly to conservative Presidents. But once given the power, I do not see a President of either party giving up power.

Our Founding Fathers split up government into three separate parts, hoping to drive this natural wish so far underground that it could never create a King to rule us. Other democracies get by with just two branches, often putting the legislative and executive branches together. Our Federal government was set up to not do anything. At least most of the time.

And, even as a liberal in many of my viewpoints, I like it that way. Because, although I might not like much conservative thought, I know that it can only really become bothersome if all 3 branches of the government agree. And this will only happen when when a very large number of people want those things done. It should not happen by fiat from a ruler.

Similarly, I would expect most conservatives to feel the same way. And through most of our history this has worked fine. Maybe not perfect but generally really large changes in how the Federal government does something happen only after a long period of examination and finally support by a large percentage of the population,

Craven people in the legislative branch have been willing to give up much of their power, mostly because they can continue to get elected that way. Corporations give plenty of money, both directly and indirectly, to provide enough influence for both parties.

It has all become a fancy kabuki show, at least on the Congressional side. Because it is now so broken it can not legislate and does not really seem to want to. Even for the small amount of work that the Founding Fathers expected it to produce. So even if everyone in the US wanted something to get done, it would not happen.

Why?

Our government today is not really beholden to people. It is beholden to money, to the corporations that have so much more than all of us and the influence to get what they want, to the detriment to the citizens.

Now, that is not strictly their fault. Like the scorpion in the parable, “That is its nature.” But we should definitely do something about it.

If someone wanted to create a manifesto, create one about breaking the hold of corporations on our politics. I think you would get a lot of liberals and conservatives to sign that one. As long as it was untouched by the stink of vested interests, as the Mount Vernon Manifesto is.

This Mount Vernon Manifesto is more of the same pablum from those with the money and power to influence things. It is what they put out to make people feel good about something but it will result in little change. As Daniel said:

The standard being set by this statement is so low that anyone in the conservative movement could claim to agree with everything in the document and still merrily go about his way violating both the letter and the spirit of the principles to which he supposedly just subscribed. The statement is so generic and so divorced from any contemporary policy debate that everyone from Marc Thiessen to Ron Paul could endorse it without the endorsement having any effect on their current policy views. Any consensus this broad and unrelated to actual policy is pretty meaningless.

We see this on the liberal side also. Mainly from the DLC types, the ones so beholden to corporations that they seem willing to give up all our liberal beliefs just to maintain their lifestyles. There is compromise and then there is going against basic principles. Neither party is immune. It won’t change very easily.

And the people that want to keep this broken government going are the ones who put out things like the Mount Vernon Manifesto on the right or tell us to accept a mandate without cost controls on the left. Playing platitudes to people by craven leaders who really do not want to follow those principles but to simply keep in power.

They have relied on the general lack of awareness of the American people, coupled with the geniality. It has worked for 30 years but people are waking up. The Internet helps a lot.

I believe that the fault of our Founding Fathers, the thing they overlooked, was the need to control the power and the influence of money on our form of government. I do not think they could have seen the harmful effects of such huge amounts of money that is now spread around so widely. If so, they would have put something into the Constitution preventing the ability of large groups of people created solely to make a profit to be treated as if they were a citizen, with all the rights of a citizen, including financing legislation of politicians.

There are some strange things that can happen but I would not be surprised if some populist leader was able to fuse the anger at corporations, on both the left and right. into a force for change. I wonder what that change might be.

Maybe a constitutional amendment. Here is a real simple one:

   Section 1. The sovereign right of the people to govern being essential to a free democracy, Congress and the States may regulate the expenditure of funds for political speech by any corporation, limited liability company, or other corporate entity.

   `Section 2. Nothing contained in this Article shall be construed to abridge the freedom of the press.’.

I’d rather see something stronger, something that simply states that groups of people do not have the rights of people.

As Judge Stevens said in his dissent to Citizens United:

It might also be added that corporations have no consciences, no beliefs, no feelings, no thoughts, no desires. Corporations help structure and facilitate the activities of human beings, to be sure, and their “personhood” often serves as a useful legal fiction. But they are not themselves members of “We the People” by whom and for whom our Constitution was established.

They are not members. We the People should not include corporations.

I hope for a time when this is true. Then people like Daniel and I can get back to really basic discussions of conservatism and liberalism, instead of agreeing about so much,

I yelled at the TV also

Psych FAIL.
[Via Observations of a Nerd]

I love the show Psych. For those who don’t know the show, it’s about a guy named Shawn Spencer (actor James Roday) whose uncanny powers of observation allow him to convince the Santa Barbara Police Department that he’s a psychic. He’s adorable, eccentric, and totally awesome in mostly every way. But I found myself yelling at my television (ok, my computer – I watch it on Hulu every week) while watching the most recent episode. I was really, truly pissed.

Let me explain. In the show, Shawn and company were tracking down evidence for a murder that was committed five years earlier to prove that the guy convicted for the killing is innocent. Shawn realizes that the scene, as it was told by the cops, couldn’t be right – the dead guy had to have been shot from a different angle, meaning that the bullet would have flown out the window, explaining why the investigators never found it. They then set out to find the missing bullet which is likely lodged in one of the many trees just outside. Despite their best efforts, they can’t seem to find the bullet hole, until Shawn’s best friend reminds him that Shawn is looking at the wrong height – it’s been five years since the shooting, after all. Low and behold, when they look a little higher, they find the bullet, but are chased off by gunfire before they can pull it out to find out who the real killer was.

Do you see it? Do you know what had me yelling at the screen?

No, it’s not the odds that the bullet would be visible from 30 or so feet below five years later (though, really?). It’s that the bullet somehow magically moved up a yard or two in five years. In fact, I’d be upset if it moved up in a hundred years. Let me explain.

Though it might seem intuitive that something placed at a certain height on a tree would move upward as the tree grows, that’s simply not how trees do it. If it did, that would mean the tree is growing from the bottom, pushing the older tissues upward over time. Trees don’t grow from the bottom, they grow from the top and outwards. What do I mean by that?

As a tree ages, it adds tissue to a limited number of places called meristems. These specialized areas of tissue occur at the tips of roots and branches as well as in the trunk of the tree, and are full of what you might call plant stem cells. They can differentiate to become any kind of plant tissue, which is exactly what you’d need to have wherever a plant needs to grow. The top of the tree, where a special meristem called the apical meristem occurs, is where height is added by these special cells dividing and differentiating.

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I always hate it when I am quietly watching a program and they do something that brings me up out of the willful suspension of disbelief we much have to enjoy a program like Psych (I mean, come on. A police department in Santa Barbara with a psychic who shows up to the station whenever, bills the department for his services, etc.).

My wife can attest to the fact that I did the same thing. Sputtered. Wait. Wait. That is so wrong!

Then I sat there all upset that Psych could do something so unbelievable. Well not for too long. I am an adult and I’ve learned to push down my nerd instincts that are simply not seen as beneficial by most of society.

But I am glad other nerds saw this and that we have the Web to discuss the unrealistic aspects of Psych.

How many more violations?

K-State researchers find independently owned ethnic restaurants have more food safety violations
[Via Eureka! Science News]

Diners who are skeptical of the food safety practices in ethnic restaurants have new research to back up some of their assumptions.

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The press release does not detail how many more violations are found in ethnic restaurants. I hate when that happens. And I can not seem to find the article on line. I really hate when that happens.

Oh well, makes a nice headline but not very informative.

Fixing the budget

Wait, how big is NASA’s budget again?
[Via Bad Astronomy]

I have mixed feelings about NASA, as is obvious if you’ve read my posts about it. But I think that they have done a simply fantastic and amazing job given how small their budget is. You might think NASA gets a huge amount of money — a lot of people do — but in fact they get only a tiny fraction of the federal budget.

The New York Times made this very very clear recently when they posted an interesting graphic depicting the national budget allocations. Take a peek:

[Click to enporkbarrelate.]

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This is a very nice visual for seeing just what parts of the budget can or can’t be eliminated. First compare it to the 2010 budget, as this was the last one that Bush had a hand in. Obama is only increasing it by $0.9 trillion. Not to outrageous form what he was given.

Now take away the mandatory programs. Here, we see that the National Defense is $738 billion out of a $3.7 trillion. So if we removed all spending on National Defense (like that will ever happen) the budget will still be about $2.9 trillion.

Quite a long way to go. No more spending on the NIH or medical care for vets or border security and that is another $95 million, leaving us with $2.805 to spend.

None of that is going to happen, nor should it. But those are the largest parts of the budget which would have any effect on lowering the total.

I simply do not see how we can get ourselves out from under simply by making budget cuts. There really is not any large segment of the budget that can be lowered without a very large constituency screaming bloody murder.

And it will get worse unless we get medical costs under control. Medicare will begin really exploding in just a few years, occupying a larger and larger part of the budget.

Maybe it was intelligent dinosaurs

The carbon cycle before humans
[Via EurekAlert! - Biology]

(Northwestern University) Two Northwestern University studies contribute new clues as to what drove large-scale changes to the carbon cycle nearly 100 million years ago. Both research teams conclude that a massive amount of volcanic activity introduced carbon dioxide and sulfur into the atmosphere, which in turn had a significant impact on the carbon cycle, oxygen levels in the oceans and marine plants and animals. Oxygen levels dropped so low that one-third of marine life died.

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I wonder if it is possible to tell the difference between sulfates produced by volcanoes and sulfates produced by other, more manufactured approaches? See my theory is that intelligent dinosaurs ruled the Earth 100,000 million years ago.

They polluted their air just like we have and then used geoengineering ideas to add sulfates to fix the atmosphere. But they miscalculated and really screwed things up, not only lowering CO2 disastrously but setting off evens that sequestered way too much carbon, ruining life in the oceans and destroying their environment.

At least for them. How is the devastation of one species of dinosaur going to be seen 100 million years later? Perhaps only one that came into its own in a relatively short time (say 25,000 years)?

All that was left were the ‘stupid’ dinosaurs who did not have any ability to do much at all to the environment, until they were pretty much devastated by the collision event 45 million years later.

See, this extinction event – the Aptian – is not counted as one of the 5 major extinction events because it really only affected marine life.

It makes me think. What signs of humanity’s existence could be seen after 100 million years? It would be ironic if the only real signs are found in a couple of inches of sediment.

Are pets on planes really a problem?

by jpctalbot

Pets on planes

[Via EurekAlert!]

(Canadian Medical Association Journal) The preferences of pet owners should not replace the well-being of their fellow passengers, states an editorial in CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal).

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As they state, people with peanut allergies had to be accommodated. Canada is deciding whether those with pet allergies should also be.

Flying is bad enough as it is. Having a pet allergy and being stuck on a plane would have to be really uncomfortable, not only for the individual but anyone that might be near them as they exhibit allergic symptoms (i.e. sneezing, runny nose).

But then remember, this discussion is happening in the nicest country on Earth, Canada. Here is what the FAA says about pets in the cabin:

I have severe allergies to pet dander. How can I be sure that there is no pet dander on my flight?

You will still be exposed to pet dander on every flight, even without any pets in the passenger cabin. This is because most allergens are carried into the cabin on the clothes of other passengers.

Pretty much “Tough!.” This makes me wonder, though. SInce people also carry these allergens with them outside the airplane cabin, shouldn’t people with pet allergies be unable to walk in public at any time, what with all those people carrying pet allergens?

The reasoning seems off here. Does direct exposure to pet dander cause a larger reaction than second-hand exposure? Unfortunately, my search on google only turned up sites that also sold filters to remove dander. Of course they are going to say second-hand exposure is a big deal because they want you to keep buying air systems to deal with pet dander.

Perhaps someone has more personal experience in the difference between direct exposure and second-hand?

Always work to do

by obo-bobolina

Further doubt cast on virus link to chronic fatigue
[Via EurekAlert! - Biology]

(BioMed Central) Researchers investigating UK samples have found no association between the controversial xenotropic murine leukemia virus-related virus and chronic fatigue syndrome. Their study, published in BioMed Central’s open access journal Retrovirology, calls into question a potential link described late last year by an American research team.

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Well, this is a shame. It is how science works but the inability to find the virus in the samples indicates that, at the very least, the situation is much more complex than initially thought.

It is very likely that there is really no correlation of virus and disease, although I still have a hope that the difference is in a selection bias that we have not quite figured out. That is, there is a correlation but only in a very specific subset of people, ones that we have not really gotten great criteria for to diagnose. As the researchers said:

Bishop and her colleagues point out that CFS likely encompasses a range of diseases, and it is still possible that some of them might be associated with XMRV infection. They say, “There has been much discussion and controversy amongst CFS researchers and patients alike, which highlights the need for additional investigations in this area. Following our findings, it would seem a prudent next step for subsequent studies to compare samples and protocols between different laboratories around the world”.

Lots more work ahead.

In many ways, these sorts of controversies create a lot of interest because something is going on that we do not really fully understand and each set of labs knows they will get lots of publications out on this as they narrow down just what is going on.

Controversies in science have huge risks (you night be wrong) but also huge upsides (you might be right). The Nobel prizes are full of examples of researchers who came out right on controversial questions.

I expect we will see more of this.

I hate these kind of press releases

by JAIRO BD

Genomic warfare to counter malaria drug resistance
[Via EurekAlert! - Infectious and Emerging Diseases]

(University of Montreal) Scientists battling malaria have earned a major victory. According to a Nature Genetics study, an international group of researchers has used genomics to decode the blueprint of Plasmodium falciparum — a strain of malaria most resistant to drugs that causes the most deaths around the world. The discovery may lead to advanced pharmaceuticals to fight the disease and prevent drug resistance among the 250 million people infected by malaria each year.

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Mapping the genomic sequence of an infectious parasite is great. But going from that to the “discovery may lead to advanced pharmaceuticals to fight the disease and prevent drug resistance among the 250 million people infected by malaria each year”!!?

That is one whole bucketload of hope. And maybe. And if. And humongous luck.

Laser-tracking devices to kill mosquitos probably has a greater likelihood of being effective in the short term than the genomic sequences of the malaria parasite. Great basic research but functonal translation to real people may be decaded off

When press releases attack

by therealbrute

Scientists transplant nose of mosquito, advance fight against malaria
[Via EurekAlert! - Infectious and Emerging Diseases]

(Vanderbilt University) Scientists at Vanderbilt and Yale universities have successfully transplanted most of the “nose” of the mosquito that spreads malaria into frog eggs and fruit flies and are employing these surrogates to combat the spread of the deadly and debilitating disease that afflicts 500 million people.

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Ohmigod. The noses of mosquitos are now in frog and fruit flies. It sounds like some really bad movie on Syfy. Like Mansquito.

What they did is put the genes that are used by the mosquito’s ‘nose’ (the antenna) to sense odors into frog eggs or fruit flies, allowing researchers to look at the molecules they react with.

RNAs can be injected into frog eggs, where they are translated into proteins which can be examined. This is really quick but somewhat articficial. With fruit flies, they inserted the mosquito genes into mutant flies that had their own similar genes removed, resulting in flies that express mosquito genes. This takes little longer but provides a more natural system for seeing what reacts with these specific proteins.

So now they can examine things like disruptive odors that would prevent the ‘nose’ from acting properly or by attracting the mosquitos to traps rather than to humans.

That sort of thing. But the way it is phrased, it makes it sound like these ‘Frankenfies” are going to be released to combat mosquitos. Or maybe it will be the Frankenfrogs?

Perhaps the Frankenflies get rid of the mosquitos and the Frankenfrogs get rid of the Frankenflies?

See, a great bad Syfy movie. And based on real science! It writes itself.

Something to watch out for – salivary cancer tests

Researchers find biomarkers in saliva for detection of early-stage pancreatic cancer

[Via EurekAlert! - Medicine and Health]

(University of California – Los Angeles) The genetic biomarkers of pancreatic cancer are present in human saliva, researchers at the UCLA School of Dentistry, the David Geffen School of Medicine and the School of Public Health reported today in Gastroenterology. The finding could lead to earlier diagnosis and treatment of this most lethal of human cancers. Early results suggest salivary diagnostics may prove superior to blood tests for the purpose of early detection.

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It will be really intriguing to see if this really pans out. It sure would be a lot easier to screen, particularly for something as deadly as pancreatic cancer.

Perhaps early enough detection by this route will allow us to do a much better job dealing with this cancer. In many cases, by the time it is discovered, there is not much to do.

A big factor will be how many false positive or false negatives show up in the screening. You want something that is specific and sensitive so that it really only finds those who will develop cancer, not just those who might. The numbers so far a pretty encouraging and indicate that this might be useful although there are some real barriers to overcome.

They are still a long way from a detection kit to use at home or in the doctor’s office but keep an eye on this idea.