The Unsatisfied Mind

Finally some sanity

WHO Warns of Dangers of Traditional Medicines

Most scientists know that homeopathic and natural medicines are bunk. Most are harmless, some are not. From Quackwatch:

Homeopathic "remedies" enjoy a unique status in the health marketplace: They are the only category of quack products legally marketable as drugs. This situation is the result of two circumstances. First, the 1938 Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, which was shepherded through Congress by a homeopathic physician who was a senator, recognizes as drugs all substances included in the Homeopathic pharmacopoeia of the United States. Second, the FDA has not held homeopathic products to the same standards as other drugs. Today they are marketed in health-food stores, in pharmacies, in practitioner offices, by multilevel distributors, through the mail, and on the Internet.

It is also well known that homeopathic mixtures are so diluted that they for all intents and purposes have none of the material advertised on the bottle. From the same link earlier (a great source for debunking health-related scams, such as homoeopathy and chiropractic therapy):

Homeopathic products are made from minerals, botanical substances, and several other sources. If the original substance is soluble, one part is diluted with either nine or ninety-nine parts of distilled water and/or alcohol and shaken vigorously (succussed); if insoluble, it is finely ground and pulverized in similar proportions with powdered lactose (milk sugar). One part of the diluted medicine is then further diluted, and the process is repeated until the desired concentration is reached. Dilutions of 1 to 10 are designated by the Roman numeral X (1X = 1/10, 3X = 1/1,000, 6X = 1/1,000,000). Similarly, dilutions of 1 to 100 are designated by the Roman numeral C (1C = 1/100, 3C = 1/1,000,000, and so on). Most remedies today range from 6X to 30X, but products of 30C or more are marketed.

A 30X dilution means that the original substance has been diluted 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 times. Assuming that a cubic centimeter of water contains 15 drops, this number is greater than the number of drops of water that would fill a container more than 50 times the size of the Earth. Imagine placing a drop of red dye into such a container so that it disperses evenly. Homeopathy's "law of infinitesimals" is the equivalent of saying that any drop of water subsequently removed from that container will possess an essence of redness. Robert L. Park, Ph.D., a prominent physicist who is executive director of The American Physical Society, has noted that since the least amount of a substance in a solution is one molecule, a 30C solution would have to have at least one molecule of the original substance dissolved in a minimum of 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,
000,000,000 molecules of water. This would require a container more than 30,000,000,000 times the size of the Earth.

So, any particular amount has, for all intents and purposes, NOTHING, ZERO, ZILCH, NONE of the active ingredient that is supposed to cure the particular malady.

This, of course, has not stopped homeopathics from selling these products, unregulated by the FDA, in supermarkets, pharmacys, and over the Internet.

There is hope, however. Today, the WHO released an announcement warning that

he World Health Organization says adverse drug reactions to traditional or alternative medicines have more than doubled in three years. The WHO warns the unregulated use of these medicines may cause harm or even death.

The World Health Organization says the consumption of traditional medicines is increasing in all countries. WHO Assistant director General Vladimir Lephakin says these medicines are sometimes beneficial, but sometimes cause harm. He says natural does not always mean safe.

"The assumption that traditional medicines, very often so-called natural medicine, is safe is not correct. There are a lot of examples when people suffer and not only suffer, but also die because of drug interaction or non-proper use of traditional medicine," he says.

Now, I am not saying that all natural medicines are homeopathic in nature. But the same tradition applies. And, in my experience, people that turn to natural remedies are usually not skeptical about homeopathic remedies.

First, the FDA needs to clamp down on both natural and homeopathic remedies sold over the counter. Second, homeopathic practitioners need to be regulated, and they need to prove, to the medical profession, that a)homeopathic remedies are non-interactive with western medicines, and b) that they understand that they will be lawfully responsible for harm that comes to patients under their watch, just as traditional doctors are currently.

You know, its funny. As with most pseudo-sciences, practitioners are always willing to make prescriptions (or predictions, in the case of astrologers, psychics, and other crackpots of that ilk), but never feel that they should be responsible for what they tell their clients, or what happens to their patients following administration of treatments.

Our health industry is going down the tubes because of malpractice insurance (a whole other topic), yet the people who profess to do as well (or better) than traditional doctors are unregulated and not responsible for the problems that they potentially cause. I wonder how many health issues attributed to doctors are actually the fault of unrevealed (to the doctor) natural interactions.

He he heheh

Classic. This is a line from Michael Moore discussing his appearances on the talk shows the week leading up to the release of Fahrenheit 9/11. It kind of says it all about O'Reilly:

[schedule of appearances precedes this] ...Next week, Jon Stewart and Conan. I'd go on O'Reilly but, like a coward, he walked out on a screening we invited him to (with Al Franken just a few rows away!). I personally caught him sneaking out. Embarrassed, he tried to change the subject. He said, "When are you coming on my show?" and I said, "Turn around and watch the rest of the movie and I will come on your show." He walked out. Fair and balanced.

O'Reilly really is lame. If this isn't reason number 1 (out of about 3,465) not to watch Fox news, I don't know what is. Every time I think of his explosion at Al Franken last year, I laugh internally. What a shill.

Follow-up to op-ed piece below

Following up on my critique of Jan Ireland's column here, I found on Michael Moore's website that there is documentation of the Moore/Fred Barnes spat. Here is the critical bit (it will make sense in the context of the first post linked above):

Fred Barnes did not complain when I published the interview with him 16-years-ago. He did not complain when the Washington Times article appeared in 1988. It was not until April 2002, when Stupid White Men came out, which recounted the Mr. Barnes interview, that Fox's Brit Hume reported, "Fred Barnes told me today that he never talked to Moore in his life, and that he has read both 'The Odyssey' and 'The Iliad' cover to cover in college."

Now that that my movie Fahrenheit 9-11 is receiving significant attention, Mr. Barnes has seen fit to publicly deny the whole thing again, even though I last referenced the interview in a book published two years ago.

(note: I made some minor html changes compared to Moore's site, for formatting)

I sent another email to Ireland (I still have not heard back regarding the first one) alerting her to this documentation. I doubt I'll hear back regarding this one either.

Your vice-president

Another incontrovertible lie from Dick Cheney:

Transcript, CNBC’s “Capital Report,” June 17, 2004

Gloria Borger: “Well, let’s get to Mohammed Atta for a minute, because you mentioned him as well. You have said in the past that it was quote, “pretty well confirmed.”

Vice President Cheney: No, I never said that.

BORGER: OK.

Vice Pres. CHENEY: Never said that.

BORGER: I think that is...

Vice Pres. CHENEY: Absolutely not.

Transcript, NBC’s “Meet the Press,” December 9, 2001.

Vice-President Cheney: “It’s been pretty well confirmed that he did go to Prague and he did meet with a senior official of the Iraqi intelligence service in Czechoslovakia last April.”

From MSNBC. Just not much wiggle-room here.

Another cognitive dissonance explanation for continued support for Bush

Awhile back, I wrote a piece about how people continue to support Bush because of cognitive dissonance. Lo and behold, on Newsday.com (via Daily Kos), we see another social psychologist (albeit a bit more well-known than myself:)) making the exact same point:

In research conducted in Australia and the United States, people watched a member of their group take an unpopular position on a political issue. Not only did the speaker experience dissonance, so did the audience. Being a member of the same group caused the audience to bond with the speaker.

The audience felt uncomfortable when the speaker took a position that was at variance with the facts and with his true attitude. The members of the audience changed their attitudes to make them consistent with the speaker's public statement. And the more the audience members identified with their group, the more they changed their attitude.

Many Republicans may well do the same. It is not that Republicans will change their opinions because they are convinced by the substance of the administration's argument; the substance of the argument is barely relevant. Seeing their leaders making statements that seem inconsistent with facts will cause group members to experience psychological discomfort, and they may resolve it by becoming adamant about supporting the Bush-Cheney position. The commission, they may conclude, is biased or ignorant, its report incorrect or flawed.

As time goes by, some Republicans may part company with the administration. They may take an alternate path to reduce dissonance by psychologically redefining their group and deciding that Bush and Cheney do not represent what it means to be a mainstream Republican. But for those voters who continue to identify with the administration, the result of the inconsistency between the president and vice president and the 9/11 Commission will lead to more polarization and hardening of attitudes.

In March of this year, polls showed that more than half of American voters thought that Hussein had given "substantial support" to al-Qaida. The 9/11 Commission's findings should lower that number considerably.

Read the article. It is a pretty good primer on CD.

Its about time

Don't get me wrong. I don't think that all SUVs are evil. I have one, a 2001 Ford Explorer Sport. 2 doors, four seats, and enough room for our 140 lb. Ridgeback in the back. It is our second car, behind our 2003 Diesel Volkswagen Golf.

I do believe that the vast majority of SUVs on the road are wastes of gas and material. Here in Houston, my informal counts have revealed that something like 5 of every 10 vehicles on the road are full-sized SUVs or full-sized Chevy and Ford trucks. These are invariably driven by a single occupant, around the city, while talking on a cell phone.

I am comforted, in a strange way, by the hike in gas prices. Assuming that they are not going to drop in the future (I'm guessing that gas will get to about 2.20$ for regular within the next 5 years, although I don't have any data to support it), people will be forced to get rid of these gas-guzzlers, and auto companies will have to get rid of them as well.

This article at MSNBC discusses the impact of gas prices on giant SUVs. Especially satisfying is the precipitous drop in sales of that paragon of extreme consumption, the Hummer H2. Hell has an especially painful place for the drivers of these behemoths.

...buyers are now turning away from last year's must-have model, the 11mpg Hummer H2. With sales down 27 percent this year, Hummer is running on fumes. GM says Hummer's woes are not related to gas prices (even though poor mileage is H2 owners' No. 1 complaint in J.D. Power surveys). Rather, GM chairman Rick Wagoner appears to acknowledge that his former star car is simply losing its luster. "They're a fashion statement," he told concerned investors at GM's annual shareholder meeting this month, adding that falling H2 sales were "completely predictable." GM hopes to revive Hummer with the smaller, more fuel-efficient H3 model next year. But consumers are already moving on. The new "it" car is Toyota's 60mpg Prius gas-electric hybrid, which is commanding $5,000 over sticker price and has waiting lists that stretch for two years. Toyota expects the market for hybrids to multiply ninefold, to 600,000 cars by 2006. Detroit artist Alice Frank just ditched her Mercedes SUV for a white Prius. "With the Mercedes, you could watch it guzzle," she says. "When I first got the Prius, I was concerned that the gas gauge wasn't working."

Perhaps the surest sign that SUVs are downshifting: car dealers are hedging their bets. They're ordering fewer big SUVs and thirsty V-8 engines. And for the first time in ages, their ads now tout gas mileage. "High gas prices hit all of us right between the eyes," says Dodge dealer Bruce Campbell, who threw a party at his Redford, Mich., store last week to roll out the new Magnum station wagon. Shoppers nibbling hors d'oeuvres crowded around the black low rider while a big SUV nearby went begging. A salesman pitched the Magnum as having all the benefits of SUVs—power, cargo room, brawny looks—with none of the drawbacks. Even its big Hemi V-8 has new technology that shuts off half the engine at cruising speeds so it gets 24mpg on the highway. As soon as the salesman finished, Sheryl and William Yeakey rushed up for a test drive. "This car has that gangster lean," says Sheryl. Why not an SUV? "Gas mileage," she says. "With all that's going on over there in Iraq, I don't want to put all my eggs into something I'll be sorry for later."

On a related point, wouldn't it be great, as SUVs are converted to hybrid, if our automakers worked a bit harder to reduce the weight, not only for fuel economy, but also to reduce the damage to both vehicles in a crash?

A laughable opinion column that popped up on Google News

Now, I know that Google doesn't mess too much with the pages that are found via the news page, and I think that, on the whole, I see more liberal opinion pieces on the page than conservative ones.

However, if this is the best the Conservatives can come up with, I can sleep better at night. From a columnist named Jan Ireland is this piece of drivel regarding Michael Moore's new film. You can read the link if you want, but I have nearly all of it quoted in my rebuttal below (that was sent to him or her this morning):

Dear Jan Ireland,

As a fellow teacher like yourself, I must say that I am chagrined by the quality, both in substance and subject, of your June 16th opinion column. Should a student of mine submit an assignment of this quality, he or she would most certainly receive a failing grade.

Opinion columns generally require research on the topic of interest, both current issues and an understanding of what happened in the past to get us to the current situation. Further, one must know the facts and be able to refer to them in his or her argument. These facts and details are used to bolster the position of the writer.

I think it would be a useful exercise to examine your opinion column, looking for facts, research, and any connection between those facts with your arguments. We will start at the beginning and work our way through.

"Michael Moore has found distributors for his film Fahrenheit 9/11 after Disney declined to allow their Miramax Division to handle it. Lions Gate Films and IFC Films will open the “documentary” on about a thousand screens later this month. Showtime is scheduled to bring it to paid television."

The first component of an opinion column is a statement of a basic premise or theme. The previous quotation is a statement of fact, and are not really a theme or premise, unless you are using these facts to create a springboard from which you will explain the central point of your column. Usually, this will occur in the next few sentences. Here they are:

"Moore’s past “work” is shoddy and anti-American in the extreme. To secure the lifestyle and attention he craves, the man former President George H. W. Bush referred to as “slimeball” seems willing to produce pretty much anything liberal dollars will pay for. And liberal dollars before a Presidential election in November will pay for quite a lot of George Bush and America bashing."

As far as I can tell, these are the main points of your opinion column:

Premise 1: Moore's past "work" (not sure what the quotes are. Either you don't consider making movies and documentaries work, or you are making a back-handed comment related to your personal views, as a personal attack) is shoddy and anti-American.

Premise 2: Moore craves "attention" and some form of "lifestyle", and the pursuit of that lifestyle leads Moore to "produce pretty much anything liberal dollars will pay for" (although I didn't know that dollars were conservative or liberal).

Premise 3: Moore's liberal agenda will be damaging to the Bush administration.

I submit that Premise 1 is flawed, to the extent that Moore's work is neither shoddy nor anti-American. I submit that Premise 2 is a personal attack, and has nothing to do with the merits of Moore's work. Further, the extent to which you include personal attacks indicates to me that this is not really an examination of the merits of Moore's work, but rather a smear attack. Premise 3 may very well be true, but not for the reasons, I think, that you are putting forward in this column. Be that as it may, I will now go through the rest of your column, pointing out flaws in your arguments. My points will be organized by issue.

Issue 1: Because this is a recurring problem in your column, I have put this point up front: personal attacks on Michael Moore do not, in fact, support your argument. Logically, it does not matter who Michael Moore is. The qualities of the speaker are not the issue here. The issue is whether the information in Fahrenheit 9/11 is accurate.

Issue 2:

"the man former President George H. W. Bush referred to as “slimeball”..."

George H. W. Bush's reference to Moore as a "slimeball" is an argument (such as it is, it is actually a personal attack) from authority, to the extent that GHWB is an objective authority figure on the subject. Moore tends to expose the same people who tend to support conservative politicians, so it is no wonder that GHWB would defend his friends and attack Moore. Of course, GHWB has never offered (nor have any of his friends) any evidence to the contrary of Moore's claims.

As an example, consider Bowling for Columbine, a scathing indictment of the gun industry and the NRA (another subject near and dear to the hearts and minds of conservatives). For all of the puffery and threats from the people skewered in that movie, NOT ONE has brought suit against Moore. Not one. Moore has openly said that he stands behind every second of his books and movies, and challenges anyone to submit evidence that he played fast and loose with editing, facts, interviews, or anything. Not one of his vocal opponents have ever stepped forward (I'll get to the single piece of evidence in your entire column, Fred Barnes, in a moment).

Although conservatives consider the "documentary" (there you go with the quotes again) outrageous, I have yet to hear or read anywhere of any substantiated claims of factual error or falsehood. Further, you base this statement on "widely reviewed early screenings". Have you actually seen the movie? From your column, I think not. If you have seen the movie, and you have found flaws in it, then I submit that your column is even more poorly written then I first guessed, since you could not be bothered to include any of the "lies, distortions, [and] selective editing" that you decried in Bowling For Columbine (none of which has been credibly disputed, as discussed above). If you have evidence of this, please present it. And don't cry "lack of space" in your column. If there is a choice to be made between evidence and opinion, I'll take evidence any day. And where is this discrediting that you (don't, actually) discuss? I haven't heard any, that is credible, anyway.

Issue 3:

"Moore himself makes no secret of [Fahrenheit 9/11's] anti-Bush and anti-military focus – incongruous, to say the least, in a time of war. But bashing all things American has so far been good for Moore’s career."

First, let me make this very clear: being anti-Bush or anti-military does not make you anti-American (although Moore may be both). This is typical conservative rhetoric: you are with us or against us, you either support the Bush administration or you are against America, etc. We have these wonderful documents, the Constitution and Bill or Rights, upon which our government is based, that provide us the freedom to question, dispute, and challenge what our leaders are doing and the decisions they make. Being "at war" or "at peace" does not change these freedoms. Thus, it is not "incongruous" to be critical of this administration or of the behavior of our armed forces at this moment in history. I posit that there is never a time when being critical is incongruous. It is one of our most basic rights.

A far as "bashing all things American", I argue that many of the things that Moore attacks would not be defined by most as "American": Corrupt power in our government, the lies of this administration (that, unlike the "lies" of Moore, are easily documented) regarding the reasons we went to war, the connection between al-Queda and Iraq, the connection between the Bush family and the Saudi government, the outing of Valerie Plame, the extreme positions and political influence of the NRA, the torture at Abu Ghraib (now clearly shown to be ordered that the highest levels of this administration), are most definitely NOT American, at least not in my book. I challenge you to show me how any of these issues could be construed as "American", and please, no spin.

Issue 4:

"In France recently, at the Cannes Film Festival, Fahrenheit 9/11 won a Palme d’Or, along with a record twenty minute standing ovation. France’s opposition to the war, its bribes from Saddam Hussein, and its attempts to become the “leader” of Europe make the Film Festival decision suspect. It is likely that honoring the film resulted from the anti-American feeling of liberal attendees and judges."

Yep, it is all France's fault. There is a giant French conspiracy to force the single French individual on the Judge's panel to influence the other judges.

By the way, I'm sure that you have heard by now that Bush was never mad at the French, and has always been our ally. He said this during the D-Day ceremonies last week.

Issue 5:

"Predictably Moore attempts to blame conservatives for his distribution problems, but a thousand screen opening certainly disputes that. There is every indication, however, that conservatives will not give the film – maker or distributors – dollars."

Moore did blame conservatives for his distribution problems, because Disney, a company who gets hundreds of millions in Tax breaks from Jeb Bush in Florida every year, refused to distribute the film. The "thousand screen opening" does not dispute this fact. The film is opening in on thousands of screens because Lion's Gate purchased the rights to distribute it. Yet you disingenuously attempt to create this connection with the structure of your writing, then attempt to pass it off as a fact to bolster your argument! Shoddy at best, consciously deceptive at worst. I call it pathetic.

Further, I would like to see the data that you have that supports your argument that "[t]here is every indication ...that conservatives will not give the film - maker or distributors - dollars". Did you administer a survey? Did you read something somewhere that would lead you to this conclusion? Or did you create it out of your own wishful thinking? Is this more of the air-tight evidence that you have that permeates this entire opinion column?

Issue 6:

"Moore’s rapacious appetite for money, limousines, travel, and attention is a stark contrast to the “working class” image he tries to cultivate, and causes him to make rash decisions."

Even if this is the case, what does it have to do with the arguments in his films and books? A personal attack used to defend this administration? Who would have thought?

Issue 7:

"Michael Moore is riding high right now. But tales of arrogance, outbursts, excessive demands, and hubris abound."

Again, another (tiring) personal attack (substantiated, as most conservative attacks tend to be recently, not at all ...oh wait, there are "tales") that has nothing to do with the arguments presented in the film. Do you have any evidence that Moore has engaged in deception, in Fahrenheit 9/11, Bowling for Columbine, or any of his books?

Issue 8:

Of course. The single piece of evidence that you put forward, that brings Moore's house of cards crashing down, is here:

"As so often happens with liberals, Moore’s lying has not seemed to harm his career. Nor has it been restricted to films. Fred Barnes, Executive Editor of The Weekly Standard, wrote in “Encounter With the Cannes Man” about a completely fabricated conversation Michael Moore inserted into his Stupid White Men book. Moore detailed a phone call where he “caught” Fred Barnes lying. The conversation never took place. Fred Barnes had never met or talked on the phone to Michael Moore. Such is the caliber of Michael Moore’s “work,” though the book remained on the NY Times Bestseller list for weeks."

So, your only piece of evidence is the word of the extremely conservative Weekly Standard editor, who, with no recorded evidence to back it up either way, denied saying something that Moore says that he did say? And because of this, all of Moore's "work" (again with the quotes) is faulty?

It is funny, because I know quite a few conservatives who have lied about what they said or didn't say. In fact, just recently, from http://www.davidsirota.com/blogarchive/2004_05_30_davidsirota_archive.html (you can get the direct links from his site):


CLAIM:

"I haven't had any extensive conversations with [Chalabi]. I don't remember anybody walking into my office saying, Chalabi says this is the way it's going to be in Iraq."
- President Bush, 6/1/04

FACT:
"They're not going to develop [an Islamic extremist government]. And the reason I can say that is because I'm very aware of this basic law they're writing. They're not going to develop that because right here in the Oval Office I sat down with Mr. Pachachi and Chalabi and al-Hakim, people from different parts of the country that have made the firm commitment."
- President Bush, 2/13/04

FACT:

“I did see Chalabi…I shook a lot of hands, saw a lot of kids, took a lot of pictures, served a lot of food and we moved on to see four members of the Governing Council -- the names are here. Talibani is the head of it right now, so he was the main spokesman. But Chalabi was there…We were there for about maybe a little less than 30 minutes.”

- President Bush, 11/27/03

This is just a single instance, and I am not making the claim that because Bush lied, therefore Barnes lied. What I am saying is that a he said - she said between two individuals does not constitute evidence. Of course, the one I present is corroborated, and thus becomes evidence, directly refuting Bush's words: the Moore-Barnes spat does not. And, let's not forget: the material in F9/11 and BFC is filmed. You get to read the faces of the people talking, and you get to see things for yourself. You get to make the choice about whether you choose to believe Moore's interpretation of events.

Finally,

"Liberals often overlook such things when they like the output, but there is always someone more daring or more fawning. Michael Moore has only a downfall to anticipate. Eventually liberals will notice that he is exactly what he rails against – a rich, fat, pale, stupid white man. Then they will realize that Michael Moore has lied to them. And liberals would find that…outrageous."

Again with the personal attacks. I will spell it out once again: even if Moore is a "rich, pale, stupid white man", this does not diminish the credibility of the facts and issues that he puts into his movies and books. Further, I would argue that the "rich, pale, stupid white men" that Moore attempts to expose are potentially more dangerous and more damaging to America than 100 lifetimes of work that Moore could put out. If you want support for this assertion, go to the second full paragraph in Issue 3 and choose any of the issues that I listed. Read up on them (preferably not on conservative sites), and then decide if my assertion is unwarranted.

As for Premise 3, I do agree that the "liberal agenda" (defined as the exposure of the lies and deception of this administration) will be damaging to the Bush administration. Every single day, the incremental findings of journalists, government employees, the public, bloggers, and other private and public investigators exploring and examining the wrongdoings of this administration are piling up. Not so strangely, this evidence is coming from both sides of the aisle. Call it a "liberal bias" or whatever you want, but facts are facts, regardless of whether they are reported by liberals or conservatives. I argue that your own words fit best here, with some minor modifications:

"Then they will realize that George W. Bush has lied to them. And Americans would find that…outrageous."

Thank you for your time. If you got to the end of this email, you are more of a journalist than I gave you credit for. I relish any rebuttal and/or discussion with you.

Andrew Perkins

Anyway, it is long, but kind of like the creationists, it takes 5 paragraphs to rebut 1 sentence of their posturing. Enjoy.

Sound science=pseudosciece
A pretty good opinion piece comparing the Bush adminsitration's current science policies to Trofim Lysenko's destruction of the Soviet science machine.

When politicians dictate science, government becomes entangled in its own deceptions, and eventually the social order decays in a compost of lies. Society, having abandoned the scientific method, loses its empirical referent, and truth becomes relative. This is a serious affliction known as Lysenkoism.

-snip-

Politics without objective, honest measurement of results is a deadly short circuit. It means living a life of sterile claptrap, lacquering over failure after intellectual failure with thickening layers of partisan abuse. Charlatans like Lysenko can't clarify serious, grown-up problems that they themselves don't understand.

-snip-

Trofim Lysenko was a funny case. He had the authority to reduce a major scientific-research power to a dismal Burkina Faso with rockets; he left behind practically no scientific achievement or discovery. As a scientist, he was a nonentity, but his menace is universal. Wherever moral panic, hasty judgment, arrogance, fear, brutal partisan ignorance, slovenly standards of research, overcentralization of authority, conspiratorial policymaking, jingoism and xenophobia, and spin-centric travesties of disinformation can flourish, Lysenko's spirit will never die.

"Prayer Study" found to be a fraud

From The Guardian:

It was a miracle that created headlines around the world. Doctors at one of the world's top medical schools claimed to have scientifically proved the power of prayer.

Many Americans took the Columbia University research - announced in October 2001 after the terror attacks on New York and Washington - as a sign from God. It seemed to prove that praying helped infertile women to conceive.

But The Observer can reveal a story of fraud and cover-up behind the research. One of the study's authors is a conman obsessed with the paranormal who has admitted to a multi-million-dollar scam. Daniel Wirth, now under house arrest in California awaiting sentencing, has used a series of false identities for several decades, including that of a dead child.

Wirth is at the centre of a network of bizarre scientific research, often working with co-researcher Joseph Horvath. Horvath has pleaded guilty to fraud, has used a series of false names and is accused of burning down his house for insurance money.

Many scientists are now questioning how someone with Wirth's background was able to persuade Columbia University Medical Centre to unveil his research in such a high-profile way. They also want to know why it appeared in the respected Journal of Reproductive Medicine, whose vetting procedures are usually strict. 'We are concerned this study could be totally fraudulent. It is an amazing saga,' said Dr Bruce Flamm, a clinical professor at the University of California.

The study claimed to show that a woman's chances of conceiving through IVF treatment doubled when someone prayed for them. 'IVF is a very difficult procedure. Increasing the success rate by 100 per cent would be a huge breakthrough, a revolution,' said Flamm.

The study was based on an IVF programme in Korea. Prayer groups in the United States, Canada and Australia were shown anonymous pictures of women on the programme and asked to pray. The subjects were not told they were part of a study, but the results claimed to show that the group had double the success rate of a group not being prayed for.

The research listed three authors of the study: Daniel Wirth and two Columbia fertility specialists, Dr Kwang Cha and Dr Rogerio Lobo. Kwang Cha has since left Columbia and now helps to run fertility clinics in Los Angeles and Korea. Lobo is still at Columbia. Neither returned phone calls and emails requesting an interview. Wirth's lawyer, William Arbuckle, also failed to return The Observer's calls.

On 18 May, Wirth pleaded guilty to multi-million-dollar fraud charges against US cable telecommunications company Adelphia Communications. While working for Adelphia, Horvath had steered $2.1 million of contracts to Wirth. The pair now face up to five years in jail and up to $250,000 in fines.

FBI papers filed during the case also show that Wirth has used a series of false identities over the years. In the mid-1980s, Wirth used the name of John Wayne Truelove to obtain a passport and rent apartments in California. The real Truelove was a New York child who had died as an infant in 1959.

He also used the name of Rudy Wirth, who died in 1998, to establish an address in New York and claim social security benefits. It is not clear whether Wirth and Rudy Wirth were related.

It has emerged that Wirth has no medical qualifications. He graduated with a law degree and then took a master's in parapsychology at John F. Kennedy University in California, where he met Horvath.

Wirth and Horvath have co-authored numerous pieces of research claiming to prove paranormal activities. Many of them are linked to a body called Healing Sciences Research International, which Wirth heads. However, the institute appears to be only a mail box with no telephone number.

Horvath also has a long criminal history and has used many fake identities, including Joseph Hessler, a child who died in Connecticut in 1957. It was as Hessler that he was jailed for fraud in 1990. But it was as John Truelove - using the same false identity as Wirth - that he was arrested in 2002 for burning down his own bungalow in order to claim the insurance. Horvath has also pleaded guilty to practising medicine without a licence after posing as a doctor in California.

Sceptical scientists liken the two to a pair of conmen, similar to the character played by Leonardo DiCaprio in the film Catch Me If You Can. 'They seemed to think they were cleverer than everyone else. It was maybe the love of the game that spurred them on,' said Professor Dale Beyerstein of the University of British Columbia, who has been investigating the pair's research for several years.

Columbia University would not comment on the Wirth case. However, shortly after the prayer and fertility study was published, the Department of Health began an investigation into the university's research. It found numerous ethical problems. Lobo, a respected scientist who was named initially as the lead author of the research, had only provided 'editorial review and assistance with publication' on the study.

Scientists are pressing Columbia and the Journal of Reproductive Medicine to disown the research. But the JRM still has the study on its website. Phone calls to the journal were not returned. Columbia removed the press release announcing the study from its online archive shortly after receiving requests from scientists for comment after the Wirth fraud charges. But the university has not officially commented, ignoring clarification requests from the Commission for Scientific Medicine and Mental Health.

Unfortunately, the damage has already been done. Columbia University's foot-dragging only exacerbates the problem.

The best part is that the pro-paranormals will trumpet this research as "proof" for years after it has been shown to be fraudulent. Same as the Creationists and IDers.

Of course, they are all in the same boat. Deluded and fanatical.

Juan Cole on Tenet's resignation

Juan Cole has a great gift for not mincing words. His matter of fact description of the possible reasons why Tenet resigned rings plausible (see, even I can beat around the bush).

Tenet should have resigned when Bush insisted on trumpeting an Iraqi nuclear weapons program at a time when Tenet was denying there was any such thing. (Tenet did think Iraq had chemical and biological programs, about which he was wrong). The nuclear claim helped convince the country to go to war. It was false. Tenet knew it was false. He told Bush that. Bush either knew it was false and said it anyway, or he disbelieved Tenet. Either thing should have produced Tenet's resignation.

I have said it many times, but history will look at this administration as a debacle.

Uhhh, what????

From Slate:

In his comments accompanying the release of the Padilla document, Deputy Assistant Attorney General James Comey offered the following weird little tribute to the joys of suspending the Constitution at will: Had the government charged Padilla criminally, he said, "He would very likely have followed his lawyer's advice and said nothing, which would have been his constitutional right. ... He would likely have ended up a free man." Comey's point seems to be that constitutional protections produce bad evidence, in which case we should probably get rid of the Constitution in every criminal case. What he was really saying was that if you permit them to perform unconstitutional interrogations, the administration can get the accused to say exactly what we all wanted to hear.

Honestly, the rape of our Constitution scares me a hell of a lot more than a 'dirty bomb' or some other attack on our soil. Who cares about protecting America if this administration destroys it? What is the point of sacrifice if what we are sacrificing for is taken away?

Never thought I would be quoting the CSM:

We went to war in Iraq to destroy its weapons of mass destruction. But it turned out there were no such weapons. In his speech at the Army War College last week, President Bush ignored the weapons issue, as well as his oft-expressed desire to depose Saddam Hussein.

In the current version, we went to war to defend our security. Without the weapons of mass destruction, where was the threat to our security? Have we created a new threat in the effort to stamp out a nonexistent one?

What is wrong with this war is that it violates the principles that the Pentagon drew up for foreign interventions after the Vietnam War.

The most important of these principles was the requirement for clarity - of objectives and of an exit strategy, as well as of planning, cost, and allies. All of these were in the context of upholding American values. Once we start compromising on these values, on our standards of personal and national conduct, we start becoming more like the enemy and less like our former selves.

-Snip-

Even less are we being true to ourselves in the broader war on terror. This does not mean we should abandon it - only that we should narrow our objectives. In the same speech - indeed, in the same paragraph - in which the president said he sent troops to Iraq to defend our security, the president also said he sent them there to make "its people free." American security and Iraqi freedom are unrelated. Iraqi freedom is probably unattainable as a part of US policy.

The administration would have us believe that the roots of the prison scandal are in a few low-ranking, inadequately trained, and supervised personnel. This doesn't deal with who was responsible for such training and supervision - nor do we yet know how high that responsibility goes.

What we do know is that in the White House there is a dismissive attitude toward the Geneva Conventions regulating treatment of prisoners. In a memo for the president, White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales wrote off some of these provisions as "quaint." That is part of the abandonment of American values in the name of realism. Abandoned simultaneously are protections for Americans who may be prisoners.

Alberto Gonzales, by the way, gave the graduation speech at Rice University this spring.

A really good article on Shrub's ability to create straw men (free registration required) during his speeches. But, as digby
eloquently puts it:

The problem is that Junior isn't really making straw man arguments. He's spouting lies and half truths that were spoon fed to him by his staff in small bites that he can understand and remember. By saying that Bush has any awareness of the concept of a logical fallacy serves only to make him seem to have some sort of mental agility when, in fact, he is barely sentient. If Laura circled this article in red crayon for him this morning and he had a look at it between counting the box scores on his fingers and toes, I have no doubt that his response was "Ya' mean like a scarecrow?"

Of course, something I missed earlier, but does W. give speeches with a bug in his ear? As soon as I find the page...

EDIT: Found it: