When Big Posts Go Small. (REDACTED)

UPDATE: After giving this post some thought, I have decided that I never properly proved any relationship between people's literal Biblical views and what the Administration is getting away with. So I take it back! Perhaps when I've had a chance to think things through more completely, I'll re-post something more convincing. In the meantime, I'm going to post the 2nd half of my redacted post, re-edited so that I'm simply very angry about B***'s rape of science.

I had a huge post I was working my way through about why people's belief in a literal interpretation of the Bible is a very, very bad thing for this country. Then I read something that made my hair stand on end, so I'm just going to summarize:

It's bad because believing in a literal Bible is incompatible with believing in science. This is the whole evolution/creationism thing. And creationism/intelligent design/whatever stupid name they come up with next is silly and wrong. And when you spend your time believing things based on dogmatic religious doctrine instead of on the scientific doctrine of skepticism and query, your brain dies. And when your brain dies, the president gets to do stuff like ignore broad scientific consensus in multiple areas, including but definitely not limited to:

• Global warming


• Stem cell research


• International AIDS and family planning


• Lead pollution levels in drinking water


• Abstinence education


• Endangered Species Act

And on the note of how much industry-masturbation-passed-off-as-science the administration has gotten away with, things have gotten so bad that the Union of Concerned Scientists today issued a letter signed by 20 Nobel Laureates (60 scientists altogether), claiming, among other things:

...the administration has distorted and suppressed scientific findings at federal agencies that contradict administration policies; undermined the independence of science advisory panels by subjecting panel nominees to political litmus tests that have little or no bearing on their expertise; nominated underqualified individuals, or individuals with industry ties, to advisory panels; and disbanded some science advisory committees altogether.

Okay, I’m sure we can all say it in unison: “THIS IS BAD.” But wait. There's more:

The nation's nuclear waste dump proposed for Nevada is poorly designed and could leak highly radioactive waste, a scientist who recently resigned from a federal panel of experts on Yucca Mountain told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

Paul Craig, a physicist and engineering professor at the University of California-Davis, said he quit the panel last month so he could speak more freely about the waste dump's dangers.

I've got nothing else, except to cross my fingers and hope that this time, in spite of all the accumulated evidence, that B*** does right by science. But if he doesn't, I'm going to start praying for the rapture.