"It's Science" 7:40 PM

Hitchens, Christopher (2008, October 27). Sarah Palin's War on Science. Slate

Link here

Ok, so this article isn't exactly what one would call "unbiased." But it does raise a good point, and brings back fond memories of my undergraduate biology days. It has become the staple of the McCain campaign to single out "outlandish" pork spending and mock it publicly. Many of the projects he and Gov. Palin have cited are scientific studies such as bear and fruit fly research. They joke, like it should be apparent to everyone, that fruit fly research should not be funded by the government.

Unfortunately for Palin, Drosophila, better known as the fruit fly, has had a long and venerable history in scientific discovery. As the slate article points out, Drosophila studies led to the discovery that chromosomes carried genetic information. Since then, the fruit fly has been used to study embryonic development and patterning; essentially the very foundation of human development. These studies have helped doctors understand why many congenital abnormalities that are seemingly unrelated to one another (such as heart defects and a cleft lip) coexist. As the article rightly points out, Autism research is being done using Drosophila, and isn't Gov. Palin supposed to be a supporter of that, you know, special needs kids?

If anything, this really shows how uneducated Gov. Palin and Sen. McCain are when it comes to understanding how scientific research will translate into useful clinical information. Sure it's easy to write of "fruit fly DNA," that is, until they identify gene clusters responsible for autism and down syndrome, or the genetic basis of malignant melanomas.

Seriously, they call Drosophila research pork spending but Gov. Palin's 150 grand wardrobe is "no big deal?" The last time I checked, Neiman Marcus wasn't winning any Nobel prizes. I hope, for their sake, that they aren't as stupid as they sound when they talk, and they are really just trying to appeal to the masses.

And with that I leave you with a story about the current Republican president. Three years ago I was at a lunch with the chancellor of Duke medical school, Peter Agre. He had won a Nobel prize in science for discovering molecular water channels using genetically modified bacteria. He relayed a story of being at the White House shortly after winning the Nobel for a luncheon. When it was time for the token group photo op, President Bush took his hand and said to the room, "I'm so glad to be shaking the hands of all these Nobel peace prize winners." It's a shame no one let that member of the Republican party know that the peace prize is only one of many Nobel prizes offered. It's truly amazing to think that science has come so far in such a closed minded country.

A Motherf~@$%*! Tiger 10:45 AM

How badass is this. Putin got a tiger for his birthday. Seriously, I get socks and underwear and he gets a man-eating jungle cat. I think that makes him the most hardcore of all the world leaders; he could be a James Bond Villan with that tiger.

Lowered Expectations 3:49 PM

First things first, it's been a long while since I've written much of anything, and if you notice the date of my last post, you'll realize this is also when Med school started again. Go figure that my life has disappeared into the void.

But more importantly, and enough so to bring me up from my hovel of papers and books, is the subject of last night's Vice-presidential debate.

Surely many American's were watching; I've heard it reported that this debate drew more viewers than the Presidential debate. This shouldn't come as any surprise, both candidates have a track record of putting their feet in their mouths, so things could have gotten exciting. Much to my surprise, neither candidate did this.

So this morning as I drank my coffee and read the news I was surprised by how much credit was given to Gov. Palin. Now this isn't to say that you shouldn't give credit when credit is due. She succeeded insomuch as not sounding like the Gov. Palin from the Couric interviews. But really that's where the success stopped. Palin still seemed to grab hold of cliches and rehearsed taglines (joe sixpack, maverick, defeat in Iraq, etc etc) without defending her running mate when Biden unleashed on McCain being just like Bush, and not being a "maverick" when it counted most. She didn't go on the offensive or make Biden falter; a task that really shouldn't be too hard given that this guy once called Obama "clean."

I think many journalists are suffering from a case of lowered expectations. Palin has been so absolutely dreadful in front of the camera, and so absolutely inexperienced that we are thrilled when she does ANYTHING right at all. It's like getting excited when you finally get a three year old to sit quietly and not draw on the walls, it's not much of an achievement for mankind but hell it feels rewarding. I think, though, that we must, as a nation, keep in mind that Palin is running for the second highest office in the land, not some do nothing committee post. Just good enough isn't going to cut it. She's presented a very mixed personality to the public and we can't suffer through "good" Palin weeks and "bad" Palin weeks if she's elected. I think that we've had our expectations lowered so much by Palin that we don't know what good is anymore. Hell, our expectations have been lowered so much over the past eight years that we can't tell War and Peace from the Hardy Boys.

I think we could all benefit from revisiting history class and taking a look at the intellectual prowess of our forefathers. Would a Lincoln-Palin ticket have been acceptable? How about FDR-Palin? Regan-Palin? Most likely not and I don't think it should be any different in this election.