William K. Wolfrum Chronicles

National Public Radio’s “Intelligence Squared U.S.” started in October and has been an interesting series of Oxford-style debates covering topics ranging from “Debating a Nuclear Iran” and “Hamas: Government or Terrorist Organization?” to “Is America Too Damn Religious?”

The series features a wide variety of noteworthy and often eclectic debaters - three to a side on each issue - and is held in front of an audience. Each member has opening and closing statements, along with time to debate each other, as well as answer questions from the audience. The audience is polled before and after the debate in order to determine a “winner.”

On March 22, a group gathered together to debate the question: “Global Warming Is Not a Crisis” and judging by the results, it is quite obvious that in the ultimate debate over Global Warming, we’ll all likely be losers.

Author Michael Crichton, MIT professor Richard S. Lindzen and University of London professor Philip Stott were for the motion “Global Warming is not a crisis,” while Climate scientist Brenda Ekwurzel, climate modeler Gavin Schmidt and Scripps Institution of Oceanography Richard C.J. Somerville were against the motion.

Prior to the debate, the audience’s opinion was thus: 30 percent agreed with the motion, with 57 percent against and 13 percent undecided. How those numbers changed by the end of the debate shows how the debate over Global Warming has been framed, as well as the overwhelming amount of work over convincing the public at large that Global Warming is a serious issue, and that changes need to be made.

Schmidt’s opening statement shined a light on the unholy relationship between science and politics.

“Particularly when scientific results are perceived to have economic or moral implications, it’s common for political debates to get shifted into the scientific arena. It makes the political argument seem much more scientific, and therefore logical. But since the basic disagreement is still political, this is a disaster for any kind of action.

Let me give you a few examples of how that works - creationists have argued that the eye is too complex to have evolved. Not because they care about the evolution of eyes, but because hey see the implications of evolution as somehow damaging to their world view. If you demonstrate the evolution of eyes, their world view won’t change, they’ll just move on to something else.

Another example, when CFCs from aerosol cans and air conditioners were found to be depleting the ozone layer, the CEO of DuPont, the main manufacturer, argued that because CFCs were heavier than air, they couldn’t possibly get up to the ozone layer, so there was no need to regulate them. That was pure fantasy, but it sounded scientific. …

… These arguments are examples of pseudo-debates - scientific-sounding viewpoints that are designed not to fool the experts, but to sew confusion and doubt in the mind of the lay public. This is a deliberate strategy, and you’re hearing it tonight.”

As the debate progressed, an audience member asked a question, framing it in such a way as to show that this deliberate strategy of the politically motivated has been a resounding success.

“My name is Heather Higgins, I’m not a scientist, so pardon my ignorance when I hear ‘the scientific establishment believes in something’ I immediately think of flat-earth consensus, and the fact that there’s no geography that should be admitted as science, and that women are all hysterics not to be bled. So that assurance that the scientific community believes something does not take me very far.”

Crichton, who literally spent the majority of his speaking time arguing that the world needs to help those in poverty instead of battling Global Warming, was the last to give a closing statement on the issue.

“There is a time when I worked in a clinic and one day a young woman came in. She was in her early 20s and in for a routine checkup, I said ‘what’s going on with you?’ and she said ‘I’ve just become blind,’ and I said, ‘Oh my gosh, when did this happen?” and she said “just coming to the clinic, just walking up the steps to the clinic, I became blind.’ And I said ‘oh’ and by now I’m looking through the chart and I said ‘well, has this happened before?’ and she said ‘yes, it’s happened before, I’ve become blind in the past.’

What she had, of course, was hysterical blindness, and the characteristic of that is that the severity of the symptom is not matched by the emotional response that’s being presented. Most people would be screaming about that, but she was very calm, ‘oh yes, I’m blind again.’ And I’m reminded of that whenever I hear whether you want to call it a crisis or not, a significant global event of importance where we’re going to have species loss and so on and so forth, but that we can address this by changing our light bulbs. Or that we can really make an impact by unplugging our appliances or not using them.

It’s very much out of whack. And so if we’re going to only do symbolic actions, I would like to suggest a few symbolic actions that might really mean something. One of them is very simple, 99 percent of the American population doesn’t care, is to ban private jets. Nobody needs to fly in them, ban them now (applause). And in addition, let’s have the NIDC, the Sierra Club and Greenpeace make it a rule that all of their members cannot fly on private jets, they must take their houses off the grid, they must live in a way that they’re telling everyone else to live. And if they won’t do that, why should we? And why should we take them seriously?”(applause)

The truly disturbing part of it all? Upon polling the audience following the debate, here is how the numbers changed: 46 percent agreed with the motion, with 42 percent opposed and 12 percent undecided.

So while we are bemused at the audience member’s extremist lack of trust of scientists, and while we scoff at Crichton’s rambling non-sequiturs, keep in mind one vital thing that this meeting of the minds taught us - they are winning this debate. And if the public can be so easily swayed on whether or not Global Warming is actually a problem by a barrage of logical fallacies, then what hope is there to actually slow it down or stop it?

Click here to listen to the debate in full.

crossposted at Shakesville

–WKW

Historians will look back and wonder how in the hell U.S. citizens voted in a man who treats the Presidency as if it were a used-car dealership.

But the fact is this: If you do a favor for the President, as Sam Fox did by helping to smear John Kerry, then you reap the benefits, in this case, the ambassadorship to Belgium.

Swift Boat donor’s appointment sidesteps Congress

President Bush named Republican fundraiser Sam Fox as U.S. ambassador to Belgium on Wednesday, using a maneuver that allowed him to bypass Congress where Democrats had derailed Fox’s nomination.

Democrats had denounced Fox for his 2004 donation to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. The group’s TV ads, which claimed that Sen. John Kerry exaggerated his military record in Vietnam, were viewed as a major factor in the Massachusetts Democrat’s losing the election.

Recognizing Fox did not have the votes to obtain Senate confirmation, Bush withdrew the nomination last month. On Wednesday, with Congress out of town for a spring break, the president used his power to make recess appointments to put Fox in the job without Senate confirmation.

This means Fox can remain ambassador until the end of the next session of Congress, effectively through the end of the Bush presidency.

U.S. soldiers are treated as pawns and fodder by this President. The people of New Orleans are told to fuck themselves on a daily basis by him.

But if you’re a Republican who spreads around his money and helps him out, George W. Bush will take care of you. It’s how he was raised. And when you’re as desperate a failure as Bush has been, there are a lot of fat cats willing to help out, who now are getting their payback.

–WKW

When the Medicare Prescription Drug Bill was passed, the stench coming out of Washington was foul. It really should have been much fouler, however. Basically, what happened was this - a large group of U.S. politicians literally sold their soul to Big Pharma lobbyists to get a nightmare of a $500-billion (or up to more than $1 trillion) bill pushed through Congress, using means both fair and foul.

“The pharmaceutical lobbyists wrote the bill,” said Sen. Walter Jones. “The bill was over 1,000 pages. And it got to the members of the House that morning, and we voted for it at about 3 a.m. in the morning. … I’ve been in politics for 22 years, and it was the ugliest night I have ever seen in 22 years.”

Steve Kroft hosted a 60 Minutes segment on the bull rush toward pushing this bill through Congress and showed the Congressmen that have a price tag on their soul, and are for the most part are all now Big Pharma lobbyists themselves, and see very little wrong with that. If there is a more perfect example of U.S. politicians selling out their constituents, I have yet to find it. The actions of these politicians is exactly the same as their third-world counterparts. Utterly shameless.

Here’s something President George W. Bush had to say upon signing the bill:

I appreciate the hard work of the House Majority Leader, Tom DeLay, in seeing that this bill was passed. I also appreciate the hard work of the Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, Chairman Bill Thomas, for his good work. The Chairman of the Finance Committee in the Senate, Senator Chuck Grassley, did a noble job. And he was joined in this task by the Ranking Member of the Finance Committee, Senator Max Baucus of Montana.

And the entire Senate effort was boosted by the efforts of a man from Louisiana, Senator John Breaux. And speaking about Louisiana, Billy Tauzin of the House of Representatives did great work on this bill. Senator Orrin Hatch from Utah made a significant contribution. Nancy Johnson, the House member from Connecticut, did a great job. Mike Bilirakis from Florida worked hard on this piece of legislation. I want to thank all the other members of the Congress and the Senate who have joined us. Thank you all for taking time out of your busy schedules to share in this historic moment.

Every last name Bush mentioned is a traitor to the American people. As is Bush for signing it. There is just no other way to view it. They whored themselves out at the expense of U.S. citizens, pure and simple.

You can (and should) watch the 60 Minutes segment by clicking here (via Crooks and Liars).

–WKW

Taking the first steps of what will be a marathon campaign, Republican front-runner Rudy Giuliani admitted that his social views may be too pro-human for many Conservatives.

“I am against abortion, I think it’s wrong, but ultimately I believe it’s an individual choice. People should know that, they should evaluate that and decide how important that is,” said Giuliani, campaigning in Iowa.

But while some believe Giuliani’s social views may be too liberal, his views on government have raced passed conservative and blitzkrieg’d all the way to pro-Dictatorship.

In just month or so, in two separate incidents, Giuliani has shown that either he’s truly ignorant of the U.S. form of government, or that he truly believes that an all-powerful Executive Branch was really what the Founding Fathers were shooting for back in the day.

First, when asked by Cato Institute’s President Ed Crane whether he believed the President should have the authority to arrest U.S. citizens with no review, Giuliani said he’d likely use that authority infrequently.

Then, showing his belief in an omnipotent President is no fluke, Giuliani actually made the National Review’s Rich Lowry squirm when talking about the President’s “inherent ability” to completely ignore Congress when it comes to war funding.

I asked Rudy whether he was saying Bush could veto the supplemental and, in the absence of a deal with Congress, fund the troops in Iraq under his own authority. “If he vetoes it, he’s going to have to find a way to support the troops,” Rudy said. “They have given him the authorization to fight the war,” and “Bush has the power to redirect the money and time to work something out” with Congress. The last bit suggests that maybe Rudy is thinking in terms of only the next few weeks and not making a broader claim about presidential authority (although he kept on saying “inherent authority” over and over).

But it wasn’t quite clear what he meant, and his statements could be seized on by his critics to argue that he has a dangerously out-sized view of presidential powers.

More than anything, Giuliani’s beliefs are lockstep in line with today’s GOP. You can argue what conservatism is and whether it’s a failed ideology or not, but you just can’t argue anymore that Republicans despise the rule of law. Nixon, Agnew, Liddy, Haldeman, Dean, Reagan, North, Bush, Cheney, etc., have made it completely clear - the law of the land is something to maneuver around wherever it’s deemed necessary, and sometimes even when it isn’t.

Coming on the heels of a scofflaw presidency that has made the U.S. a dangerous laughingstock, a Giuliani presidency could be the final brick in a fundamental change in U.S. thinking, as a whole generation will have grown up expecting the President to be an all-powerful daddy figure.

And it’s by no means out of the realm of possibility. At this point, Giuliani is as electable candidate as the Republicans have, and the base loves him despite his social views.

“What Obama is to college-age Democrats, Rudy is to middle-age Republicans. They eat him up. Rudy was funny, up-beat, and convincingly hit his key theme of leadership,” wrote Lowry.

You don’t become a Republican Mayor of New York twice by accident. Giuliani has what every candidate longs to have - charisma. Now it remains to be seen whether that charisma will carry him to the office that he apparently believes has powers akin to a dictator.

–WKW

Isn’t adorable when Neocons notice flaws in plans, and figure they can be easily solved? Like the poppy problem of Afghanistan. Hell, just legalize the stuff.

At least, so says Christopher Hitchens and Mickey Klaus in Slate:

A simpler, more promising solution to the poppy harvest would seem to be Christopher Hitchens’: legalize it and tax it. And, presumably, let the Afghans sell it to whomever they want. The price of heroin would fall. There would be more addicts. But fewer American British soldiers would have to die in Afghanistan–and we might actually win the war they’re dying in …

You see, Kaus isn’t your typical neocon. He cares about the troops! Screw the Afghans. Give them their heroin and Taliban and get out declaring victory. That couldn’t possibly come back to haunt us later.

The main thing I draw from this, however, is the fact that it’s easy to see that Neoconservatives are really not conservatives, and they sure as hell aren’t liberals, regardless what other conservative extremists say. Because, you see Mickey, real Conservatives damn everything they deem as bad for the masses, whether those masses are huddled in Afghanistan or the U.S.

So remember:

A true conservative will gladly cut off his nose to spite his face. A neocon only cares about matters war.

P.S.: Don’t miss Klaus’s brilliant backpedaling as he tries to explain why In-n-Out Burger hiring people for $9.50 is a sign that the economy is really picking up steam. A true classic of the Internet Pundit genre.

–WKW

Just wanted to notify one and all (or just one) that I’m jumping in as a contributor over at Shakesville, the new and improved site for Shakespeare’s Sister herself, Melissa McEwan.

I’m really excited to be joining a great crew over there, as well as the legendary online community of Shakers. It’s been great thus far, and I really think we’re starting off that site in full sprint, with everyone on the same page.

Here are a couple of my first posts at Shakesville:

Newt Gingrich: Now, more than ever

Get to know Bill, Part 1: The Bats

Get to know Bill, Part 2: The Ratdog

I still plan on posting here, as well as obviously at WorldGolf.com, as well, but will be posting over at Shakesville quite regularly, as well. I have quite a bit to say, it seems.

–WKW

Towelie

• Designed to automatically be able to adjust his absorbency level depending on the dampness of the surface he is used on

• Created to be a nearly worthless character

• Baked all the time

• Claims drugs make him smarter

• “I’m so high right now, I have no idea what’s going on.”

Vs.

John McCain

• Designed to automatically be able to adjust his conservativism level depending on the extremism of those near him

• Created a nearly worthless candidacy

• Quite possibly baked all the time

• Claims the media refuses to report improved security in Iraq

• Has no idea what’s going on.

–WKW

Note this post from the National Review:

Crane says he was disappointed with Romney’s answer to his question the other night. Crane asked if Romney believed the president should have the authority to arrest U.S. citizens with no review. Romney said he would want to hear the pros and cons from smart lawyers before he made up his mind. Crane said that he had asked Giuliani the same question a few weeks ago. The mayor said that he would want to use this authority infrequently.

“… the authority to arrest U.S. citizens with no review.”

Not terrorists. Not terrorist enablers. Not murderist, sociopathic, rapist genociders. Just U.S. citizens. If you happen to be one of the above, great. But when the distinction already gets blurred over while in the hypothetical stage, it shouldn’t be too hard to see how easily the lines between “terrorist” and “disloyal to the State” will get blurred.

It’s not about blurring a line, however. It’s about many in the U.S. despising democracy and wanting an authoritarian leader. Provided said authoritarian leader does things the way they want, of course.

Glenn Greenwald and Andrew Sullivan have more.

–WKW