An update on the Bush administration’s war on science: More than half of Environmental Protection Agency scientists who responded to a recent survey said they experienced political interference in their work, reports the Los Angeles Times.
EPA scientists have complained bitterly about Bush administration flacks who repeatedly water down language on climate change or ignore toxic chemical findings that impose costs on industry.
The survey shows that the agency is “under siege from political pressures,” according to the Union of Concerned Scientists.
Filmmaker Michael Moore endorsed Barack Obama last week, linking what he sees as Hillary Clinton’s failure to the moment she “voted to start this bloody war” and decrying her reference to Louis Farrakhan in the Pennsylvania debate. “How sad for a country that wanted to see the first woman elected to the White House. That day will come — but it won’t be you,” Moore told Clinton, writing on the Huffington Post blog. “We’ll have to wait for the current Democratic governor of Kansas to run in 2016 (you read it here first!).”
When asked by The Eagle editorial board about Moore’s prediction, Sebelius joked, “With friends like that. . . .”
The editorial board of Alabama’s Press-Register declared a new leader in the “Boeing political hyperbole contest over the selection of Northrop Grumman-EADS and Mobile for the $40 billion Air Force refueling tanker” — the statement by Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Wash., that “Congress has a responsibility to correct one of the worst decisions in modern history.”
Its editorial went on: “Presumably that covers wars, pestilence, dictators, assassinations, environmental disasters, economic errors, political gaffes and the University of Alabama’s hiring of Mike Price as football coach.”
ll this would be funny, the board said, if Rep. Todd Tiahrt, R-Goddard, weren’t “threatening congressional legislation that would essentially take the contract away from Northrop Grumman-EADS. Now that would be a disaster.”
The latest pop culture comparison of the Democratic presidential candidates is that Barack Obama is a Mac and Hillary Clinton is a PC. It started out as a style comparison, with Doug Kendall writing in the Huffington Post how Obama is young, hip and inspiring, while Clinton is “like that old-reliable PC that we keep on our desks.” But the New York Times reported that the analogy also works with the candidate’s Web sites. Obama’s Web site is much cooler and more harmonious than Clinton’s site.
While the comparison isn’t flattering, Clinton can take comfort in that PC far outsells Mac. As the Times noted, “PC, no doubt, would win the Electoral College by historic proportions (with Mac perhaps carrying Vermont).”
Aging boomers clinging desperately to their youth should take note: Researchers say old age is actually the happiest time in life for most people.
Despite the inevitable pains and sorrows of aging, the University of Chicago study found that older people are more satisfied — the odds of being happy increase 5 percent with every decade. In part that’s because older people have lowered expectations about life. They’ve found the secret of happiness: being content with what you have.
An update on the Bush administration’s war on science: More than half of Environmental Protection Agency scientists who responded to a recent survey said they experienced political interference in their work, reports the Los Angeles Times.
