By Rod Rose
THE LEBANON REPORTER (LEBANON, Ind.)
LEBANON, Ind.— It’s not often the phrase “an ugly and ominous trend” is inadequate.
That’s how the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star-Tribune described the attack on scientific reason, launched by Christian fundamentalists and backed by the administration, which has metastasized since George W. Bush was elected president.
The Star-Tribune is far too kind.
Bush is fighting more than wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Whether from ignorance; political opportunism; manipulation or because he is a “true believer,” Bush is either the leader or the mouthpiece for a movement that seeks to discredit, destroy, and eviscerate scientific research in America.
That more than 72 percent of Americans think he is doing an inadequate job ought to send the president a message. But he’s said to take pride in not reading newspapers or newsmagazines.
A president who boasts of his ignorance is a dangerous man — who supports dangerous ideas.
The nation is distracted by the war in Iraq, and by what Bush terms the “war on terror.” Those wars are distracting Americans from what could be an even more dangerous war: The Bush administration’s war on science.
Congress’s inability and/or refusal to stand up to the administration isn’t helping either.
The enemies of scientific inquiry credit “Intelligent design” with the creation of the universe. They insist this is a rational “scientific” theory and carries no taint of religious dogma. That argument is disabused with one question: “Who is the designer?”
If the “designer” is one entity — or a design team — then “intelligent design” depends on faith — and that’s another description of religion.
In this guise, the Religious Right is no less a threat to U.S. security and freedoms that radical Islamists: Both would crush science in the name of a “divine being,” whether His name is God or Allah.
One example of the administration’s anti-science attitude is its treatment of James Hansen, a climate scientist at the National Atmospheric and Space Administration. He has been told to “shut up and be loyal to the president,” defendscience.org said on its Web site.
More than a year ago, Hansen told the New York Times that “what is on line is the future of the planet, and what we hand over to our children and our grandchildren.” The administration’s political stooges continue to threaten Hansen, who is one voice in a chorus that so far as been singing far too softly.
Go to defendscience.org. Read the material. If you are appalled by the threat to freedom poised by dangerous neoconservative ideologues and religious fanatics, sign the statement; send a donation if you can; become active in saving science in America.
If you are not appalled, you are part of the problem.
— Rod Rose writes for The Lebanon (Ind.) Reporter. He may be reached at rod.rose@reporter.net.
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SIDEBAR:
An excerpt from the Defend Science statement:
In the United States today science, as science, is under attack as never before.
“The signs of this are everywhere. The attacks are coming at an accelerating pace, and include frequent interventions by powerful forces, in and out of the Bush Administration, who seem all too willing to deny scientific truths, disrupt scientific investigations, block scientific progress, undermine scientific education, and sacrifice the very integrity of the scientific process itself — all in the pursuit of implementing their particular political agenda. And today this dominant political agenda is profoundly allied and intertwined with an extremist (and extremely anti-science) ideological agenda put forward by powerful fundamentalist religious forces commonly known as the Religious Right. These fundamentalists now have extensive influence and representatives in major institutions of the U.S. government, including Congress and the White House. This itself goes a long way towards explaining why science itself is under such unprecedented attack.”
To read the full statement, go to www.defendscience.org/statement.html
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Rod Rose