mikethemadbiologist

Here's one example, unintentionally brought to you by NY Times columnist Frank Rich, of how writing political narratives instead of discussing data leads to unsupported conclusions (italics mine): The continued political import of Iraq could be found in three different polls in the past six weeks…

No, I'm not referring to the Jetsons. By way of Phronesisaical comes this story about an air-powered car: BBC News is reporting that a French company has developed a pollution-free car which runs on compressed air. India's Tata Motors has the car under production and it may be on sale in Europe…

A tale of two political videos. First, girly: Now, manly: Here endeth the snark.

Francisco Ayala in the most recent edition of The Proceedings of the National Academy of Science makes a good distinction between religion and science (italics mine): Science and religion concern different aspects of the human experience. Scientific explanations are based on evidence drawn from…

First, before I make too much of the differences between, I agree with Orac that the decision by the OHRP to curtail an excellent healthcare intervention that could prevent thousands of deadly hospital-acquired infections annually is murderously stupid. Like Orac, I have had a couple of ridiculous…

I'm not sure why people are shocked by last night's results; it wasn't that surprising: As I laid out here, Iowa had a much higher percentage of 18-29 voters than did New Hampshire, probably because the calendar, combined with the time involved in caucusing, meant that students home on break would…

If more stable exit polls come in, and younger voters did show up, I'll take back what I'm about to say (I dig data): The percentage of younger voters in Iowa was absurdly high. I told you. According to ABC News, it looks like about 17% of the New Hampshire electorate was under 30, while in Iowa,…

By way of Phronesisaical, this story about a lithium-based nuclear reactor sounds too good to be true: Toshiba has developed a new class of micro size Nuclear Reactors that is designed to power individual apartment buildings or city blocks. The new reactor, which is only 20 feet by 6 feet, could…

Apparently, Matt Stoller, like the Mad Biologist, wants to hear a dog whistle from Obama too (italics mine): 74% of young caucus goers self-identified as Democrats, and 73% self-identified is liberals. Yeah, that's some post-partisan and post-ideological generation coming through the ranks. This is…

In most cases, assuming that the Bush Administration is up to no good and plans to do the exact opposite of what it claims to be doing is a good first principle (unless you have a "kick me" sign staple gunned to your ass). The CDC alerting passengers that they were seated near a symptomatic TB…

There's been a lot of yap about Obama's slogans of "change" and "hope." Didn't we go through this once before? By way of maha, I came across this post by Niall Stanage\: But one important sentence near the end of her [Clinton's] reply was largely overlooked: "We don't need to be raising the false…

I guess the thing that's bothered me about Obama is that I can't get a read on him. Clinton I get, and she has a track record. Ditto Edwards (his record is why I'm only leaning towards him, and not endorsing him). But Obama is a complete cipher. I've argued before that a good politician acts as…

But Obama supporters should keep something in mind that Jon Swift wrote: The biggest loser of all was Hillary Clinton. If she can't win in Iowa, where can she win? In every contested race since 1972 (Bill Clinton ran unopposed in 1996), the winner of the Iowa caucuses for the Democrats has gone on…

Lots of evil liberalism over at the Neural Gourmet. Check it out.

Who ya gonna believe? The Mighty Pundit-ji or your own lyin' eyes? Matthew Yglesias writes (italics mine): Everyone's gotten to the fact that Newsweek's Evan Thomas is factually wrong to say that increased partisan polarization turns people off from politics. It's worth stopping to pause the fact…

PhRMA, the lobbying group for the pharmaceutical companies, claims that drug companies spend more on research than on advertising. A recent study from PLoS Medicine debunks this claim: The value of our estimate over these others is that it is not based on extrapolating from annual reports of firms…

You would think after the sound thrashing Michael Egnor received due to his mangling of the basics of evolutionary biology, the Discovery Institute might want to find someone else to quote in a guide for students. Nope: "Microbiology tells us that bacterial populations are heterogeneous.…

Nature magazine has a good summary of where each of the candidates (Democratic and Republican) stand on a variety of science-related topics. It might be useful.

Beta-lactam antibiotics, penicillin and all of its subsequent derivatives, are critical, life saving drugs. One way bacteria protect themselves from these antibiotics is by producing enzymes known as beta-lactamases that cleave the beta-lactam, rendering the beta-lactam antibiotic harmless.…

Say hello to Jon Swift. Speaking of Jon Swift, the start of 2008 seems like a good time to have another Blogroll Amnesty Day. If you're not on my blogroll, and I'm on yours, leave me a link below and I'll add you (note: racists, creationists, and flat-out weirdos won't be accepted).…

...and scuttle one of the best efforts going to reduce the problem of antibiotic resistance. I discussed before how the antibiotic resistance problem is, in the context of hospital infections, an infection control problem: One of the hidden stories in the rise in the frequency of antibiotic…

A lot of irrelevant, has-been politicians are making noises about the need for bipartisanship, now that there's even a remote possibility that a moderate Democratic agenda could be enacted. Just say no to Compulsive Centrist Disorder; be partisan! From the New York Times, here's what I'm talking…

And thank you to everyone who reads, comments, and links to the blog. I don't have time to respond to everything, but I do read it all eventually (I have science stuff to do....). Now back to our regularly scheduled ranting.

That would be William Kristol, their new op-ed writer. It's nice to see that stupid people are being mainstreamed into society. Of course, I never thought of them as a historically oppressed minority...

Because nothing says compassionate conservatism like cutting funding for poor disabled children. From the Washington Post: The Bush administration issued a new rule Friday that eliminates Medicaid reimbursement for certain transportation and administrative tasks undertaken by schools on behalf of…

Happy two days before New Year's... Anyway, I've got a whole mess of posts for you. Science first: Here's a favorite of mine about E. coli, Shigella, and creationism. ScienceBlogling Brian Switek bashes creationists and tells us about convergent evolution. Speaking of creationists, Ron Paul is…

...and start doing it. Chris Bowers writes: Few things irritate me more about prominent DLC types than their tendency to preface virtually everything they propose for Democrats with how that something will help Democrats get elected. They do it all the time. I know that an election is close, and…

Fortunately, the Lakota don't seem to have a lot of neocons, so there probably won't be an outbreak of waterboarding. From Agence France-Presse: The Lakota Indians, who gave the world legendary warriors Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, have withdrawn from treaties with the United States, leaders said…

Revere proposes a simple healthcare plan: "Medicare for all." He bases this on the finding that the healthcare outcomes of people aged 55 to 64 don't become worse once they turn 65, even though that would be expected with chronic conditions. Why? Access to healthcare through the Medicare system…

One of the lesser known microbiology facts is that the pathogen Shigella is actually E. coli. Since I'll be writing more about this cool bug soon, from the archives, here's an explanation (with a little modification). As I mentioned in a previous post, Orac has two very good posts on MDs and…