The reality of global climate change

(Tom Toles)

Are you bored yet with articles about global warming? After all, we've been talking about it for years, and half the country has been moving steadily to a denialist position.

Heck, cap-and-trade used to be the Republican position - as late, in fact, as John McCain's 2008 presidential bid - in opposition to the more effective and rational idea of a carbon tax. Now, only one Republican running for president (Jon Huntsman) even admits that global warming is anything but a hoax, and even he no longer calls for us to do anything about it.

Now the conservative position of cap-and-trade is called "cap-and-tax" by the increasingly fanatic GOP (just as the Republican plan on health care reform is now dubbed "Obamacare"). As the Democrats have moved to the right, the Republicans have moved even further to the right, leaving our nation more polarized than ever.

And what about the scientific consensus? That gets stronger every year. Climatologists - the experts when it comes to this particular scientific issue - are overwhelmingly in agreement that climate change is real, that it's caused by human beings (notably by increasing the amount of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere), and that it's likely to cause immense problems for human beings and other life on this planet.

But the American public seems to be moving in the exact opposite direction - not because of any particular knowledge or expertise, and certainly not because of any evidence. No, it's all just a gut feeling. Even obviously intelligent people like my anonymous commenter here, too smart to dismiss the scientific consensus entirely, are convinced it's all been "blown out of proportion."

Well, I hope that's true. But on what does he base that? As far as I can tell,... nothing, really. Just the "he said/she said" of climatologists on one side and political pundits and talk show hosts on the other. Obviously, if there's that much disagreement, this can't be anything really serious, right?

So this recent article in Newsweek really struck me:

(Valentina Abinanti / Polaris)

Joplin, Mo., was prepared. The tornado warning system gave residents 24 minutes’ notice that a twister was bearing down on them. Doctors and nurses at St. John’s Regional Medical Center, who had practiced tornado drills for years, moved fast, getting patients away from windows, closing blinds, and activating emergency generators. And yet more than 130 people died in Joplin, including four people at St. John’s, where the tornado sucked up the roof and left the building in ruins, like much of the shattered city.

Even those who deny the existence of global climate change are having trouble dismissing the evidence of the last year. In the U.S. alone, nearly 1,000 tornadoes have ripped across the heartland, killing more than 500 people and inflicting $9 billion in damage. The Midwest suffered the wettest April in 116 years, forcing the Mississippi to flood thousands of square miles, even as drought-plagued Texas suffered the driest month in a century. Worldwide, the litany of weather’s extremes has reached biblical proportions. The 2010 heat wave in Russia killed an estimated 15,000 people. Floods in Australia and Pakistan killed 2,000 and left large swaths of each country under water. A months-long drought in China has devastated millions of acres of farmland. And the temperature keeps rising: 2010 was the hottest year on earth since weather records began.

From these and other extreme-weather events, one lesson is sinking in with terrifying certainty. The stable climate of the last 12,000 years is gone. Which means you haven’t seen anything yet. And we are not prepared.

For what has become such a political football, this is a pretty strong article, don't you think? Of course, I don't really know. Maybe it was paired with a denialist column? But there's no sign of that on the web page.

But what will people like my anonymous commenter think? Here's what he said previously:

Recently I got into a conversation with some teenagers who were convinced that if we did not do 'something' (very vague on what that something should be though and certainly not something that should change their own personal life style at all) then we would all face a 'Day after tomorrow' scenario soon.

And this is the problem as I see it. Virtually every natural disaster is put down to 'climate change' from Katrina (which was a humans being in the wrong place and poor engineering problem) to droughts being declared in one of the wettest places in the world (because the water companies allow so much leakage from their pipes problem).

The thing is, I wouldn't necessarily listen to a random bunch of teenagers, either - or anyone else, for that matter. And I wouldn't automatically believe a published article. But I would listen to the scientific consensus, especially when pretty much every year sets new global temperature records and when their forecasts of increasing and increasingly severe weather events seem to be taking place before our eyes.

No, you can't say that any particular storm, drought, or flood was caused by global warming. Some storms will happen anyway. Global warming predicts that we'll see an increasing number of such events and/or events of increasing severity, and that's exactly what we're seeing. It's not proof, of course, but science isn't about proof. And for Jeebus sake, why take that risk?

Why, after all, would you just assume that things won't be as bad as scientists say? You don't know that. You can't know that. Maybe they'll be even worse. A runaway climate change disaster hasn't happened while human beings have been around (with the possible exception of the last ice age), because otherwise we might not be here. And that's no coincidence, because there's nothing natural about this one.

But given even a chance of utter disaster, why take that risk? Why just shrug it off? Why wouldn't we listen to the experts in a clearly scientific matter like this? The scientific consensus may indeed be wrong, but that's sure as hell not the smart bet!

Here's an article in Scientific American about a current weather event:

One of the driest spring seasons on record in northern Europe has sucked soils dry and sharply reduced river levels to the point that governments are starting to fear crop losses and France, in particular, is bracing for blackouts as its river-cooled nuclear power plants may be forced to shut down.

French Agriculture Minister Bruno Le Maire warned this week that the warmest and driest spring in half a century could slash wheat yields and might even push up world prices despite the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization's predicting a bumper global crop due to greater plantings.

Was that caused by global warming? Who knows? No one can say, not for sure. You just can't claim that any particular weather event was caused by increasing global temperatures. But this sort of thing is consistent with what scientists have forecast. Aren't we smart enough to understand something like that? It doesn't seem so difficult to me.

Apparently, scientists and our more capable government leaders - those who don't choose their gut feelings over the scientific consensus - are beginning to give up on humanity being smart enough to do the right thing. Now, it seems they're beginning to look at emergency measures.

From The Guardian:

Lighter-coloured crops, aerosols in the stratosphere and iron filings in the ocean are among the measures being considered by leading scientists for "geo-engineering" the Earth's climate, leaked documents from the UN climate science body show.

In a move that suggests the UN and rich countries are despairing of reaching agreement by consensus at global climate talks, the US, British and other western scientists will outline a series of ideas to manipulate the world's climate to reduce carbon emissions. But they accept that even though the ideas could theoretically work, they might equally have unintended and even irreversible consequences.

This is crazy. No one really wants to experiment with geo-engineering, especially since we can't know what might happen. It's insane to risk our only planet like this. But it might be our only choice, if we're just too stupid to change our ways.

Well, it's already too late to prevent dramatic global warming. We've dithered too long already. And it's only going to get worse the longer we delay. The Earth's atmosphere, the Earth's climate, can't be turned around on a dime. Unfortunately, this is a long-term problem, the kind we humans are the worst at confronting.

But when it becomes a true emergency, it will definitely be too late. It will certainly be too late for doing the right thing. At that point, we may be left with an unproven and very dangerous geo-engineering experiment, where the cure might end up worse than the disease.

All because we're just too dumb, just too short-sighted, just too willing to believe what we want to believe. I really hope the scientific consensus is wrong. I hope the forecasts are wrong - and not in the wrong direction, either. But hope is a piss-poor response to something like this. We could be doing something about it. And even if the scientific consensus were wrong, we'd end up with cleaner, more efficient energy sources. Big problem, huh?

So why aren't we that smart?

The truth about the economy

Not bad for only two and a half minutes, huh? So why is this so hard for people to understand?

The question doesn't matter...

(Mike Luckovich)

... Because the answer is always the same. This saves wear and tear on the brain cells, since you don't have to think first.

Ayn Rand's serial killer hero

There are a couple of things I find interesting about this. First, it surprises me that so many Republicans can idolize this woman, while completely ignoring the fact that she was a staunch atheist.

Oh, I can understand getting ideas from everyone, while not agreeing with them about everything. But so many people on the right really seem to worship Ayn Rand. That's a little different.

Now from my perspective, I think she gives atheists a bad name. But we atheists are a diverse bunch with diverse views. We have no dogma. In the latest video from The Atheist Experience, for example, one of the callers is an atheist opposed to gay marriage.

Yes, much of the opposition to gay rights is based on religion, but that doesn't mean that all atheists will automatically take the other side. Atheists don't believe that a god or gods exist. Period. Any other similarities are, at most, a side effect of that. (Since most of us base our non-belief on the lack of evidence, most of us probably use evidence and reason when it comes to our other opinions, too. But unfortunately, that's not inevitable.)

So the fact that Ayn Rand was an atheist makes no difference to me in evaluating her other positions. But at a time when pretty much any deviation from right-wing orthodoxy gets Republicans accused of being traitors - from others within their own party - I'm amazed that these people can completely ignore Rand's position on religion.

You know, I suspect that this shows the factionalism hidden in the seemingly-monolithic GOP. Many Republicans are religious fundamentalists, culture warriors determined to turn America into a Christian nation, as they imagine it. But many others are equally determined on turning America into an oligarchy, a nation of the wealthy, by the wealthy, and for the wealthy.

Many Republicans are eager supporters of both factions, no doubt - believers in that nonsensical prosperity theology (which would seem to contradict most of what the Bible says about wealth). But I suspect that most, on both sides, are simply willing to use the other side in order to gain political power.

Thus, the theocrats are willing to give tax cuts to the rich, because the rich fund the party. Ayn Rand supporters - the wealthy and their hangers-on - are willing to let the religious nuts rail against homosexuality and the separation of church and state, because those true believers are their the foot-soldiers. That's where the votes come from to get those tax cuts for the rich. It's an unholy alliance.

Well, that's my hypothesis, anyway. Of course, I don't think any of these people are too rational, so I wouldn't actually expect them to be consistent. In both cases, they're faith-based, so I suppose I shouldn't expect that holding contradictory beliefs would bother them much. Still, this distinction would explain why Rand's atheism hasn't been a problem for them.

The other point that interests me about this video is that it demonstrates perhaps my biggest problem with libertarians. As I've said before, I've never known a libertarian who didn't go completely off the deep end, following their philosophy to its most absurd conclusions. Well, Ayn Rand clearly seems to show this tendency, too.

Leaving aside the question of whether William Edward Hickman can really be considered a "serial killer" (the truth is plenty bad enough!), it's just absurd that Rand could have found anything admirable about him, let alone consider him a "superman." Hickman was a complete sociopath. That's not a good model for a human being. (I can't believe I even have to say that!)

But this is where Ayn Rand - and her libertarian followers - really get it wrong. Human beings are social animals. We evolved as social animals and we remain social animals. We live in groups. We survive as a group, not as individuals.

Our fundamental characteristic, speech, was the key development that made human societies wildly successful. Other animals use tools, but only human beings can talk to each other. Sociopaths aren't the ideal humans. They're aberrant individuals. They're sick. They're missing what's essential in normal human beings.

Even hermits are aberrant human beings, really. For better or worse, we are social animals. And our modern governments are only the latest manifestation of social organization that's been the key to human survival since humans first evolved (and even before that - look at chimpanzee societies, for example).

Ignoring all that for some theory of a selfish hero, striving only for himself, is completely nuts. But even crazier is following this thinking off a cliff, so that you consider a murdering sociopath - a man who kidnapped a 12-year-old girl and then, after the ransom had been paid, returned her dismembered and gutted body to her parents - a "superman," simply because he had no conscience!

Hickman was about as far from a "superman" as you can get. How did Rand go completely off the deep end like this? Well, that's one of the problems with using reason without evidence. Reason without evidence can end up in a complete flight of fancy. Rand was right about the value of reason, but it must be reason and evidence, together. That's the only way to stay grounded in reality.

Unfortunately, Rand's followers tend to suffer from that same flaw. All too often, they'll follow their "reason" into complete idiocy. (Just look at Paul Ryan's budget plan. Or Tim Pawlenty's tax proposals.)

Reason can become just as crazy as faith, if it's not kept restrained by evidence. That's been the gift of the modern scientific method. Even the ancients, often enough, recognized the value of reason. But by and large, they didn't match that with real-world evidence.

Indecision 2012 - The Awakening

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Yeah, it's that time again. Be afraid, be very afraid.

Tim Pawlenty's tax cut proposal

(Center on Budget and Policy Priorities)

Do you think the Bush tax cuts came near to bankrupting America? Just look at Tim Pawlenty's tax cut proposal. As TPM notes, it's Bush's plan on steroids!

An independent analysis found that it would cost the Treasury over $11 trillion over the course of a decade -- nearly three times the cost of the Bush tax cuts -- most of which would benefit the wealthiest Americans.

Crazy, isn't it? How can the Republicans still be pushing this kind of thing, given how disastrously the Bush tax cuts have already exploded our budget deficit?

And how can Republicans continue to push such giveaways to the wealthiest of the wealthy, without paying a penalty at the ballot box from the other 99% of us? It's just incredible, don't you think?

Not a smart way to evolve

From The Philadelphia Inquirer:

Today, our most fearsome natural enemies aren't big, fierce animals. They're microscopic invaders, with names like O104:H4. Their weapon is evolution.

O104:H4 is the label given to the strain of E. coli responsible for the food-borne outbreak currently sweeping through Europe. The organism is so good at infecting us that a deadly case could start with just 10 to 50 cells. Once ingested, this new E. coli multiplies into the billions, using various tricks to evade the immune system.

A benign form of E. coli inhabits all of us, but unlike these friendly bacteria, the new strain forms clumps that adhere to human intestines, where it secretes a deadly substance called Shiga toxin. In the worst cases, the toxin invades the bloodstream, where it massacres blood cells and eventually destroys the kidneys.

I was just thinking that this isn't a smart way to evolve.

Of course, evolution isn't directed. There's no goal, not for bacteria and not for us. And nothing shows it better than this.

If bacteria were intelligent, if they planned their evolution, they wouldn't become deadly at all. The "smart" strains of E. coli are those benign forms. They thrive without giving us any reason to attack them. Indeed, when we accidentally kill off our intestinal bacteria, as a side-effect of medication, we often take deliberate steps to repopulate them again. That's because they're not just harmless, but beneficial.

That's the way bacteria would evolve, if they were smart, and if evolution were directed in the first place. A deadly form of bacteria gets our attention. For our own survival, we must fight our hardest to destroy it. But even before we had the capability to fight with science, when we were still in the same boat as other animals, being deadly was not a smart move for bacteria, not in the long run.

The more deadly a bacteria, the quicker its host will evolve defenses - or go extinct, entirely. Neither is good, from the point of view of the bacteria. Ideally, you'd want to help your host survive and reproduce, because then you'd do well, too. At the very least, you should hope to do no harm.

But evolution isn't like that. Evolution isn't a guided process, and it doesn't look at the long term. Evolution will take life down a dead-end path if that's what works over the short-term, at every step along the way.

Bacteria can't look at the long-term, and can't choose, one way or another. Human beings can do that. We have the capability to look at the long-term, to even sacrifice over the short-term for our long-term benefit.  We're smart enough to have that ability. We're not smart enough to actually do it, normally, but we could.

It's a shame, isn't it? Unlike bacteria, we have the ability to make smart choices. But all too often, we don't. We have the ability to recognize global warming and the ability to do something about it, but we simply refuse to do either. It's easier, over the short-term, to follow the path of least resistance.

It may be a path that leads to disaster - it's certainly not the path to an optimal result - but we take it anyway, because we don't choose to use our intelligence. Evolution brought us to the point where we can make conscious decisions, so it's up to us now. We even have the ability - or will have it, shortly - to guide our own biological development - not natural selection, but self-directed artificial selection.

But will we make the right decisions? Will we make any real decisions at all? Bacteria don't have this choice. No other life on Earth has this choice, just human beings. So it really seems a shame to squander it, to automatically do what's easiest over the short-term, despite having the capability to do otherwise, don't you think?

Bacteria are tough competitors, but I wouldn't bet on this new strain of E. coli. I'd bet on human scientists, instead. Some humans will die, but we'll likely defeat these new enemies in the long-run. This is not a smart move for them. But there's nothing willful about it. They simply don't have a choice.

We do.

Maybe I should stop feeding them?

(from Cute Overload, via the Lincoln Journal Star)

No, this isn't one of my squirrels, but I don't know why not.

Great Games #5: Pool of Radiance

Pool of Radiance (1988) was the first of SSI's classic "Gold Box" games, and the first computer adaptation, apparently, of TSR's Advanced Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game.

I loved it. I never completed the game - I rarely complete any game - but I played the early part of the game several times over the years. And the CRPG Addict's recent play-through brought it all back. (Note that the posts are shown in reverse order there, with the last post on top. To read them through, start at the bottom.)

The above video is his, too, and shows a very tough battle early in the game. I remember it well, since I had to fight it several times before finally winning. But before I get to that, let me first explain the setup:

This is a party-based, turn-based RPG. When the game begins, you create up to six characters of your choice of race, gender, and class. I always liked that, creating just the party I wanted from scratch, since there's a lot of strategy involved in it. Unfortunately, that kind of game is getting harder and harder to find, these days.

[Ironically, better computers have been a big part of the problem. When game developers spend a fortune on detailed graphics, they need to know what the characters will look like. When they spend a fortune hiring actors to speak lines, they need to know which characters will appear in a game, and what their personalities are like. So big-budget games become more like movies, where gamers passively accept the developer's vision, rather than actively choosing these details themselves.]

Your characters in Pool of Radiance are rank beginners, answering the call for assistance from Phlan, along with other adventurers who also hope to make their fortunes in the city. There are a couple of things I like about this. First, I like the fairly mundane assignments, since it seems more plausible that a city would hire random mercenaries for such things (and that my characters would accept odd jobs while working for them).

But second, I really like starting at the very bottom in an RPG. Low-level characters generally need everything they can find, so even the most minor loot is valuable and very welcome. Everything matters to low-level characters, which makes it all great fun. And when they do level-up (that's how you increase skills in this game), or just find better equipment, it makes a huge difference, since they're starting from such a low baseline.

High-level characters usually only improve incrementally. A better weapon is usually only slightly, not significantly, better than what they had before. And better skills don't make such a big difference, either - not as they do for low-level characters.

Anyway, your first assignment in Pool of Radiance is to clear the monsters out of the slums, part of Phlan's project to restore the town. The above video shows part of that. There are fixed battles in most of the rooms there, and the monsters don't re-spawn afterward. There are also random battles, as your characters proceed through the area, but only to a certain extent. Once you've fought enough of them, they don't occur again in that area.

You really are clearing the slums here. That's exactly what it feels like. And when you've finished, the whole area is safe. You can walk through it, or even camp there, without risk. (Unfortunately, that's the only result you see. I'd always hoped that the townspeople would start moving in, once I'd cleared the slums for them. But that never happened. In fact, it almost never happens even in modern games. That's always a disappointment.)

As you can tell from the video, the corridors and rooms look completely bare. When you first enter a room, you generally get a good description of it, but you never see any of that (and you only get the description once). Well, that was one of the limitations of computer games back then (basically the result of limited processing power). Graphics and sound are very basic.

The battles, though, felt like a huge advance from earlier games, because tactical positioning was so important.. Unlike games that just abstracted all that, Pool of Radiance set the battle in your current location, and tactical positioning was critical. And that kind of combat is still my favorite.

The above battle, for example, was fought in a long corridor. That meant that heavily-armored fighters could keep the enemy from getting to your more vulnerable characters in the rear. And those trolls in the back, without ranged weapons, couldn't attack at all until they could move up, after some of their number had died. In a more open area, the heroes might have been surrounded.

As I say, this was a really tough battle for low-level characters. Notice how both sides kept missing? Well, low-level characters do miss a lot, and you really need the monsters to do the same. When trolls or ogres did hit, they hit hard. And their opponents went down, because none of the adventurers had many hit points yet.

The CRPG Addict was lucky enough to put an ogre to sleep right away, when his mage cast a spell. Sleeping creatures are sitting ducks, easily killed with a single strike from any weapon. And he was lucky enough - or skilled enough - to finish the fight before the trolls started regenerating. (After awhile, if you take too long, they'll stand up again, with full hit points!)

Notice how the last two trolls tried to run away? Running creatures are easy to hit, and if they turn and run from a character, that character gets a free melee strike. Again, the terrain matters here. If the trolls could have run to the edge of the screen, they would have escaped. But they were in a dead-end corridor, so they were quickly killed.

Obviously, the graphics and the sounds seem very primitive these days, but that doesn't affect the gameplay. The worst thing about the game, certainly by today's standards, is the awkward interface - not just during battles, but afterward (especially when needing to heal your characters), too. Well, games have improved in that respect.

But games have diminished in other respects. "Real-time" games can be fun, certainly, but I still prefer these old party-based, turn-based games. There's a lot of strategy involved, in selecting and preparing your team, and the combat is very tactical. And as the CRPG Addict points out, turn-based combat lets you see everything that's going on. That's lots of fun.

It's slower, true. And in these really old games, it's slower than it should be. Really, the interface is not great. And I get tired of nothing but combat, anyway. It's not just this game, but all of them ("real-time" games, too). They're fun at first, but I tend to get bored after awhile. I'd really prefer less combat and more exploration, I think.

So I never did finish Pool of Radiance, though I still have fond memories of it. But, heck, it's a game! It's supposed to be fun - and it is fun - but I have no interest in turning such things into a chore. When I get a little bored, I move on.

If you're curious about the rest of the game, check out the CRPG Addict's play-through. He does a great job with it. It certainly brought back a lot of great memories for me.

Strawberries

My strawberries are ripe, and this week, I've been spending hour after hour on my knees in the hot sun (temperatures approaching 100°F) picking them - and then until midnight each night cleaning and preparing them in freezer bags.

Well, they're worth it. I don't pick them until they're dead ripe, and they're absolutely delicious! And they're a lot less work than most of my fruit. But still, I'm glad it's raining today, because I really need a break!

Strawberries are one of the easiest fruits to grow here, requiring no spraying at all. I have to net them, to keep the birds off, but I have to net everything. And strawberries are easier to net than anything else I grow. I've got a low-powered electric wire to keep the squirrels out of them, and although that doesn't work well for anything else (squirrels quickly learn to avoid the wires), it does work for strawberries, at least so far.

You see, I put strawberry juice on the wires. They seem to learn pretty quickly from that. Heh, heh. So even when squirrels get into the yard, they don't touch the strawberries, not anymore. (Sadly, this tactic doesn't work for peaches or any of the other fruit I grow. I don't know why.)

I give away the early strawberries, since they're always the nicest. I give them to friends, relatives, neighbors, and even sometimes to people just walking past, when they express interest. After that, I like to freeze the rest, so I can eat strawberries on my oatmeal all winter. (I finally used up the last of last year's strawberries in April.)

I tried growing ever-bearing strawberries to extend the period when I'd have them fresh, but a long bearing period doesn't work for me on any fruit. It's hard to keep netting up for such a long time, and when birds do get inside the net - which happens occasionally, no matter how good a job you do - it's helpful if there's too much for them to eat all at once. Also, insect damage keeps increasing the longer fruit is available.

So I grow June-bearers (Earliglow is the exact variety), and they've been great. True, this year, one of my strawberry patches didn't do too well - the berries, right from the start, were really small, and that made them an even bigger job to pick and to pick through. I'm wondering if I didn't water them enough last summer - strawberries are very shallow rooted, and it's hot and dry here in the summer. I don't know. I guess we'll see what happens next year.

I do tear out half of the rows each year, after they finish bearing, and let runners fill it in with new plants. So far, that's worked well. My newer patch is along the north side of the house. Unlike most plants, strawberries will fruit well in partial shade - not as abundantly as they would in full sun, but still quite well. And they don't dry out as quickly there.

It looks like a poor year for the rest of my fruit, though. I had apricots - for only the second year ever, since they bloom too early here - but the squirrels destroyed the whole crop more than a month before they would have gotten ripe. (They don't eat the fruit of the apricot, but they chew them up to get the pit.) And I didn't spray enough this spring, so my apples, pears, and plums look horribly, disgustingly infested with bugs. Well, that's entirely my fault.

But some things just didn't set on fruit. For some reason, I don't have a single nectarine on the tree this year, and one of my pluots (a plum/apricot cross) doesn't have fruit, either. And only a couple of my gooseberries have fruit, and not nearly as much as usual. My peaches look OK, but I had to cut out a lot of dead branches this year. And I had a lot of winter kill on my black raspberries, though I still should get a good crop.

Admittedly, the grapes still look very good. Like strawberries, grapes seem to be very easy to grow here, even without spraying. Most of the year, I can just ignore them. (But they do have to be netted, and that's a real pain!)

Well, I just give away the vast majority of what I grow, so even in a bad year, I'll have plenty of fruit for myself. But strawberries are always the first fruit of the year - unless you consider rhubarb a fruit - and one of the most welcome. And since I try to freeze a bunch of them, a good strawberry crop can make up for lots of disappointment elsewhere.

Plus, they're really, really tasty.  :)

Corporations moving into our public schools

From The Washington Post:

In the mountains of southwestern Virginia, Gequetta Bright Laney taught public high school students this spring about a subject of keen interest to the region’s biggest employer: the economics of coal mining.

“Where there’s coal, there’s opportunity,” Bright Laney told her class at Coeburn High School in Wise County.

Her lessons, like others in dozens of public schools across the country, were approved and funded by the coal industry. Such efforts reflect a broader pattern of private-sector attempts to influence what gets taught in public schools.

We already have corporations controlling our political system - increased immeasurably by last year's Supreme Court decision legalizing unlimited, anonymous corporate contributions to political campaigns. Now corporations are moving into our schools, too.

Well, with the constant mantra of tax cuts, tax cuts, tax cuts, and the disinterest of Americans in actually paying for their children's education - or anything else, apparently - money talks louder than ever. And since Republicans are actually proud that corporations hold their strings, politicians in many states are actually eager to see children taught the corporate message.

I guess we shouldn't be surprised by this, although it does surprise me that anyone still votes for the GOP. Jeebus, why?

“We’re talking about catering our public school curriculum to those who can pay for it,” said Josh Golin, program manager at the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, based in Boston. “It raises questions about the foundation of our public education system.” ...

... critics say the energy industry often goes much further than the typical school donations. Groups with a stake in oil, gas or coal frequently train teachers and shape lesson plans on controversial subjects.

In the Appalachian mining communities of Kentucky, Virginia and West Virginia, the Coal Education Development and Resources foundation, known as CEDAR, offers small grants to teachers whose lessons dovetail with its industry-driven mission.

Jeff Perry, the Wise County superintendent, gave teachers permission to apply for the grants.

“With our ever-dwindling revenue, we’re very appreciative of the coal industry’s contribution,” Perry said. “They’re providing opportunities for teachers that would otherwise never exist.”

This is scary stuff. We've already got corporations dominating our political system, as well as spending a fortune on TV advertising. Now, we've got them teaching our children the corporate line in our public schools. What's next, corporate religions?

Sarah Palin's "gotcha" question

(Tom Toles)

Heh, heh. I posted about this yesterday, but just for the record, here's that "gotcha" question that Sarah Palin flubbed:

"What have you seen so far today, and what are you going to take away from your visit?"

How dare they ask hardball questions like this, questions clearly designed to trip up America's Alaskan Barbie! It makes your blood boil, doesn't it? That's even worse than asking her what newspapers she reads!

From now on, she'd better stick with Fox, where they'll treat her right and not ask "gotcha" questions like this!

Sarah Palin's history lesson

My brother says that this is a lot like Palin's famous "all of them" flub when asked what newspapers and magazines she reads, and I agree. Just note that deer-in-the-headlights look, and the flustered way she attempts to reply while clearly having no clue.

Honestly, this is just astonishing, don't you think? Wouldn't she expect some questions about these places she's visiting? Wouldn't she prepare for that, just a little bit? She's already labeling this a "gotcha" type question, but obviously, it's not. It's even less so than asking her what newspapers she reads, since she's the one choosing the places she's visiting on this bus tour of hers.

So why wouldn't she prepare just a little bit? Heck, I can't imagine that it would take too much preparation, since this is nothing more than grade school stuff. But wouldn't she expect questions about Paul Revere? But no, apparently not. And now she complains that it's a "gotcha" question! Heh, heh. It's almost too crazy to believe, even for her.

And now, Sarah Palin's fans are busy trying to rewrite Wikipedia to agree with her version of history. Yeah, that's all we need. Rather than expecting our leaders to know something about America's history, we'll just change our history to agree with whatever dumb things they say. Well, that's the approach in Texas, I guess.

My brother expects to see this on Saturday Night Live, with Tina Fey once again using Palin's own words to humorous effect. So the final piece in this hilarious situation is Fox "News" mistaking a picture  of Tina Fey spoofing Sarah Palin for Palin herself. Heh, heh. Could it get any funnier than that?

After all, Palin works for Fox "News." Well, yeah, most Republican leaders work for them, but Sarah Palin is actually getting paid - and lavishly, too. Basically, they pay her to run for President, and in their eyes, she can do no wrong. So you'd think they'd know what she looks like, wouldn't you?

Unfortunately, another Democrat - and a good one, too - has been thinking with his penis, so this will probably all get lost in that mess. It never fails, huh?

Well, when it comes to sex, even smart men do very dumb things. (That's not an excuse, just an observation.) Personally, I couldn't care less about the sex lives of our political leaders. I think their knowledge of the issues - and of our history - is far more important, but I seem to be in a real minority on that, don't I?

Homeopathy

(Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal)

Academagia: The Making of Mages - initial impressions

I'd never even heard of Academagia: The Making of Mages until I read that it was half off at Impulse this weekend. But it sounded intriguing, and for $12.47, I was willing to take a chance.

Academagia is "a whimsical fantasy life simulation and role-playing game" where you're basically Harry Potter spending his first year at Hogwarts. No, it's not called "Hogwarts," and Harry Potter is nowhere to be seen (unless that's how you name your character), but those trademark issues aside, that's the game.

You're lucky enough to get an invitation to attend the Academy of Magic in Mineta and, with no more idea what to expect than Harry Potter had, you start your first year absolutely clueless and nearly overwhelmed with options. You must pick your college - no Sorting Hat here - and your classes, get to know your fellow students, and struggle to learn what's presented to you in bits and pieces.

Note that I've only had the game two days, so these are merely my initial impressions. (I wanted to post something while the sale at Impulse was still on.) But the game is almost unbelievably complex, with countless options at every turn. And you really won't have a clue which options are optimal.

It's also slow-moving to the point of tedium. But it's still intriguing. I haven't been tempted to stop playing, even though I don't seem to be really getting anywhere. (Well, better skills do start to make a difference after awhile.) But let me warn you that this is really a niche product. I'm quite sure it won't appeal to most people, and I'm not even sure that it appeals to me,... but I think it does. So, how's that for a recommendation? Heh, heh.

OK, let me start at the beginning. It took me almost two hours just to create my character. There are just so many, many options for that! And while you can read about each one - there's a lot of reading in this game, often in very tiny type - that's not as helpful as you might think.

Frankly, I think that's deliberate. I think that discovering all this stuff is part of the game, that you're supposed to be clueless. Furthermore, I think you can play the game no matter what choices you make. In a typical RPG, you want to know what does what, so you can create a capable character. But in this one, you just need to play your character, whatever he (or she) might be like. Because there are so many different ways to accomplish things, there is no "best" way.

And there's no possible way you can choose everything in this game, not even close. In fact, I'm already wondering what my experiences would be like playing a different character. I created a magic nerd, basically - a boy who's smart and studious, but not strong, not charming, not lucky, and certainly not rich (unlike most of my classmates, I've broken off all relations with my family, so I don't even get an allowance).

But I could have played a rich bully, if I wanted. Or a charming, lucky social butterfly. Really, you just need to play whatever character you create. (I do recommend that you have some idea in mind, whatever it might be.) There are also hundreds of skills in the game, and 17 different classes to choose (of which you can actually attend only six). So you can't possibly learn everything on one play of the game, not even close. But it's still rather overwhelming, even for me (and I like complicated games).

My character started with a decent level in "reason," for example, which sounds good, but I have no idea what it really does. And how does it differ from "logic," which is another skill? Well, sometimes there's an option to use "reason" and sometimes an option to use "logic," but there are always other skills you can use, instead, and those will work perfectly well, too - provided you're skilled enough. If you expect to understand this stuff, it's just frustrating. But if you just go with the flow, it's fun.

Anyway, I created my character, got my familiar (an owl is one option, but I chose an exotic animal and got a howler monkey, of all things), chose my college and my coursework, and moved into my room. Each weekday is separated into morning, afternoon, and evening, and you're scheduled to attend classes most mornings and afternoons.

So you've got one period each day where you can either study or explore the school or rest (which is often necessary) or train one skill (out of hundreds) one step higher or sit in detention (required, if you've gotten into trouble with a professor) or any of the myriad other things that you really need to do all the time. You can cut classes occasionally - how often is one of those things I just don't know - but there's never enough time for everything, especially since you often have to try something just to see what it's all about (and if you fail, you can usually try again until you succeed).

On the one hand, that's really frustrating, and it makes the game move at a snail's pace. But on the other hand, it's kind of neat that you have to make real choices all the time. There is not anywhere near enough time for everything, so you have to choose carefully. And you're never sure - or at least I'm never sure right now - that you're making the right choice.

I'm not even sure there is a right choice. As I say, I'm beginning to think that you just have to play your character. My character isn't charming, so he's not concentrating on glamour spells or making friends, but if he was charming, he probably would.

My character is smart and studious - and poor - so he's working hard at being the best mage he can be. But as a first-year student only a couple of months into his classes, he clearly has a long way to go. And not all of his classes seem to be directly related to magic. Two of his six classes, the two required by his particular college, are in Arithmetic and Zoology. Yeah, this is a school, if a weird one.

There are adventures I can choose (in my extremely scarce free time), and there are also random incidents that occur while going to class. You can get through each of these in many different ways, depending on your skills. So you don't have to learn - you can't learn - all of the hundreds of different skills in this game. You need a broad selection of skills - and you often have to fail at something before you can even begin to learn the skill at all - but you also need to become good at a few of them.

How much to specialize... well, that's another thing I don't know. But I like the fact that, though I choose to specialize in some skills - partly as a result of how I created my character in the first place - others are entirely a result of chance. I seem to be getting rather skilled in traps, for example, and that's entirely a result of random incidents.

The idea behind this game is really neat, but I'm not so sure about the execution. Part of it, I think, is that the game is designed to be different from what you normally expect in an RPG. As I mentioned before, I think that being completely clueless is actually a design choice. I think you're supposed to be clueless and to struggle to learn in this game. That's certainly an interesting gameplay element, but it always threatens to be frustrating instead of fun.

Really, there's a lot about this game that's right on the edge. This is a turn-based game, and everything takes place on that screen in the image above. And you don't see any of it happening, but just read about it. That's fine with me, at least in theory, but the image doesn't expand to fit my widescreen monitor, and the type is often very small (the tiny italic type in the shops is almost completely unreadable for me).

You can increase the size of some text in the game, but not all of it. And it's all in a very tiny text area, so you have to scroll or page down to read it all. (Infuriatingly, some text scrolls down line by line and some page by page, so you can't just use your mouse wheel without thinking about it, and checking, every single time.) And then, when you switch subjects and start reading about something else, it often starts at the bottom of the text, not the top. In a really terrible interface accident - I assume - you have to remember to scroll up again after you finish reading something.

Really, the interface isn't the best. There's a really neat game in here somewhere, but it's not presented very well. And oddly enough, attending a school of magic isn't nearly as much fun as you'd think, either. This really isn't Hogwarts. You know that's the intention, but there's almost more tedium than fun here - it's a lot like a real school in that respect, I guess.

I expected to have fun incidents in my Zoology class, but that doesn't happen. Things don't ever happen in class. Random incidents just happen whatever classes you happen to be taking. So I encounter magical creatures sometimes, but it's always just a brief encounter, all in text, and it has nothing to do with my classwork. And they're such incredibly minor incidents, with creatures I never hear from again, that they seem completely inconsequential.

Well, that's the problem with random incidents. So far, there doesn't seem to be any continuing storylines, no thread connecting isolated incidents. I haven't made any friends yet - I don't even know how to make friends - and the game doesn't seem to make much use of house rivalry (not like, er, Hogwarts). Yeah, we "compete" against the other colleges, technically, but it's all extremely remote and bloodless. It never feels like a competition.

And yet, and yet, it's an intriguing game. I really like the idea behind it, and I don't just mean the college of magic part (although that's certainly a great idea, too). I like games with tons of options. I like games with hundreds of different skills to learn. I like complicated games that make you think. This game is interesting enough to keep me coming back, though I do think it could be more fun.

But the biggest problem, other than the interface, is probably just that the game doesn't make it clear how different it really is. Before you start the game, you need to know that being clueless is a design choice, that you're not supposed to know what's going on. (Or, at least, that's my current assumption.) You need to know that there aren't really any right or wrong choices, that you just need to play your character as you've imagined him.

Figure out what kind of student you want to play, and then create him - attributes, skills, interests, background. Then play that student. Is he studious, friendly, tough? Does he come from the top of society or the bottom? Is he a hero, a practical joker, a bully? What motivates him? I suspect right now that any kind of student, with pretty much any set of skills, can work in this game.

But I don't really know that. So far, this game has been fun - well worth the money - but it's also been very close to frustrating and very close to tedious. I believe that Black Chicken Studios is expecting to make sequels taking your "Harry Potter" through year two, three, four, etc. of this magic school, and I'm very interested in seeing that play out. But I'm worried that this game won't be successful enough to continue with that.

Frankly, although I'm enjoying the game, I can't think of anyone I'd recommend it to. Partly, that's because of its flaws, but partly, it's just because of the kind of game it is. This is a niche product, and I wonder if the niche is big enough.

Well, I'm glad I bought the game. It's not perfect, but it's really different. And I love to see really different games. There's also a lot that appeals to me here. It needs work, but it's a fascinating beginning. If you think it might appeal to you, too, give it a try.

But if you think it just sounds tedious and boring, it's almost certainly not for you. This is not a game that will appeal to everyone - and most likely, not even to the majority of gamers.

Dancing on the debt ceiling

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This is all political theater, yes, but they're playing with fire. It's a big deal to default on your loans. For most of our history, the full faith and credit of the United States of America has been as good as gold. The U.S. dollar is the standard of international commerce, and for good reason.

When things get scary, people worldwide flock to the dollar. And we can fund that massive debt (brought to us by Republicans, I might remind you) because our borrowing costs are so low. That's what having superb credit does for us. But let this become a political football and that will change.

So this really is playing with fire. But Republicans have two bases of support. First, they've got ignorant Tea Party yokels fired up on Fox "News." Thanks to constant rants about the deficit (since they're desperately trying to pass the blame onto the Democrats), they've got to pretend they're going to do something about it - and without raising taxes. (It's right-wing dogma that taxes are always bad.)

But their Wall Street base, which normally demands only deregulation and continuing tax cuts for the rich, knows what a complete disaster failing to raise the debt ceiling really would be. So Republicans have to assure them that this is just political theater.

OK, this is dishonest, of course, but that doesn't bother me. It's the GOP, after all. What do you expect? What's scary is that political games can easily get out of hand.

I'm sure the Republicans expect Democrats to fold. After all, they always have. (Please note, Democrats, that you're in a terrible position for negotiating when you've got a reputation for never standing up for anything.)

But playing chicken is dangerous. It really is. Really! Even when you're playing with Democrats. After all, you've just told the Democrats - and everyone else - that this is just political theater, that you don't really intend to block raising the debt ceiling. I know it's unlikely, but maybe even Democrats will develop a spine after that.

Jeebus, aren't there any adults left in the GOP?  This is complete insanity! They are playing political games with America's entire economy!

Maybe if a tornado wiped out a rich neighborhood?

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"When it comes to helping Joplin, Missouri, residents, actual elephants are more useful to them than the GOP. That's just insane!"  No kidding!

Crazy, isn't it?  We can give tax cuts to the rich without worrying about the deficit, but disaster relief is another story? How can anyone still support the Republican Party these days?

I mean, they were a complete disaster the last time they held power, with every single Republican policy failing horribly, leaving us with two ongoing wars, Osama bin Laden still free (until Barack Obama took care of that), record-breaking budget deficits (no, tax cuts for the rich do not pay for themselves), and the worst economic collapse since the Great Depression.

After a performance like that, you'd think the GOP - if it continued to exist at all - would be more careful. But no, they're getting crazier than ever, proposing to end Medicare and refusing to fund disaster relief, all to continue giving tax cuts to the rich. It's just incredible, don't you think?

"But the good news is that Dad's car is getting a new laser cannon." Think that was just an idle joke?  Not at all. Remember that six-month spending bill Republicans made a big stink about in April? Remember how they were demanding spending cuts before they'd pass it?

Well, it turns out that their bill increased federal spending by $3 billion, thanks to an increase of $7.5 billion for defense programs. Yeah, I guess spending seven times as much on defense spending as our nearest rival - at a time when our only enemy is a rag-tag band of religious nuts - isn't enough.

Does anyone really think Republicans will cut spending if they take power again?  Oh, sure, they'll cut Medicare and Social Security, they'll cut disaster relief, they'll cut scientific research, but spending in general is likely to go up, just as it did during the Bush years. And thanks to continued giveaways to the rich, the deficit will skyrocket, just as it has because of their policies then, too.

Tell me why anyone still votes Republican? It's hard to imagine why, isn't it?

Will Clarence Thomas recuse himself?

From Mother Jones:

Following a time-honored Washington tradition of dumping required but embarrassing information on a Friday night before a major holiday, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas finally released the details of his wife's income from her year or so working for the tea party group Liberty Central, which fought President Obama's health care reform law. His new financial disclosure form indicates that his wife, Virginia, who served as Liberty Central's president and CEO, received $150,000 in salary from the group and less than $15,000 in payments from an anti-health care lobbying firm she started.

The disclosure was apparently prompted in part by Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), who had been needling Thomas (including on Twitter) for months to disclose how much money his wife earned from Liberty Central. That's because challenges to Obama's health care reform law are likely to end up before the Supreme Court sooner rather than later, and if Thomas and his wife benefited from her income working against the bill, the justice has an enormous conflict of interest in hearing any legal challenge. Thomas had failed to disclose Virginia's income on his financial disclosure forms for 20 years; under pressure from Weiner and others, he had recently amended old disclosures to reflect hundreds of thousands of dollars she had earned working for the Heritage Foundation, the conservative think tank that also opposed Obama's health care plan.

The Thomas family gets big bucks from opposing health care reform. How can this not be a conflict of interest? Unfortunately, Supreme Court Justices are expected to police themselves., so Clarence Thomas can do anything he likes.

And Thomas isn't a judge as much as he's a right-wing political activist. Well, we're still paying for past years' mistakes. Past Republican Presidents are gone, but their Supreme Court picks live on for decades. This court, in addition to other crazy decisions, has decided that corporations are just people, too. What's next?

The wildly successful Bristol Palin

Who would have thought that getting knocked up in high school was such a great career move? Candie's Foundation, which promotes abstinence-only sex education - and has hired the world's most famous failure of abstinence-only sex education as its figurehead - has released its tax information for 2009.

These tax forms show that Bristol Palin was paid $262,500 in 2009. Yes, more than a quarter of a million dollars in one year for demonstrating to sane people what a failure abstinence-only sex education really is. Nice work, if you can get it.

This "non-profit" foundation spent another $165,000 on advertising, including that hilariously inept video of Palin and "The Situation." But guess how much money actually went to pregnancy prevention? Only $35,000. Yeah, they paid Bristol seven and a half times as much as they spent on what was supposedly their purpose.

This whole foundation - which is tax-free, remember - seems to be nothing but a promotional vehicle for Bristol Palin, the perfect role-model for young girls.

Yes, little girls, you, too, can make the big bucks and join "Dancing with the Stars." All you need to do is get pregnant while in high school. Oh, and have Sarah Palin for a mom, too. But maybe if you just change your last name to "Palin," that might do well enough. Your fans won't be too bright, after all.

Bristol Palin is a perfect example of the shallow end of the gene pool in America. She's a celebrity - basically, someone famous for being famous - and that's all it takes. She has no talent and little education. But like her mother, she's a relentless self-promoter.

Think about it. She's a highly-paid spokesperson for abstinence-only sex education, despite being a perfect example of the failure of abstinence-only sex education. But none of that matters, since she's a celebrity - and, frankly, because the abstinence-only sex education movement isn't actually about teen pregnancy. No, it's all about the "culture war" in America.

The fact that abstinence-only sex education doesn't work is completely immaterial. This is a faith-based project, and it's supported by the same ignorant hicks who cheer wildly at Sarah Palin rallies. Bristol Palin has the right name, and she's a celebrity because she's a celebrity. Apparently, that's all it takes.

And like her mother before her, Bristol Palin is milking it for all she can get. Sadly, that's a lot. She's actually moving into televangelists' kind of money. Well, there's a sucker born every minute, I guess.

The Lyin', the Witch, and the Wardrobe

John Cole at Balloon Juice has been collecting potential titles for the new Sarah Palin movie. Here are a few of my favorites:

From Here to Inanity
Citizen Vain
Red Yawn
The Aleutianist
The Scum Also Rises
Chariots of Liar
From Within Sight of Russia With Love
Not-Hur
The Devil Wears Mukluks
Swindler’s List
John McCain’s a Series of Unfortunate Events
The Lyin’, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
Driving Miss Crazy
Inarticulate Proposal
Chariots of Bile
Jackass 4
The Lying Game
The Woman Who Knew Too Little
True Grift
Clueless
Fahrenheit All of Them
12 Million Angry White Men

Read the rest of them here (note the comments, too).

Or check out #palinfilmnames on Twitter. Some of my favorites from there:

Honey I Refudiated the Kids
It Came From Wasilla
Every Which Way but Moose
Nones With Guns
Half-Baked Alaska
Flaws
The English Challenged Patient
Million Dollar Barbie
Raging Bullshit
Attack of the 50-IQ-point Woman

Funny, huh? Maybe I should try. Hmm,... I'd suggest "Psycho" or "The Hustler," but I think they've been taken. So how about "It's a Wonderful Lie"?  :)