Jay Walker on the world’s English mania | Video on TED.com

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Viruses don’t care whether you are poor, or wealthy.  They could care less if you work hard or hardly work.  They aren’t concerned if you are Jewish, Christian, or Muslim; morally righteous, or full of sin; gay or straight, pro-gun or no-gun.  Viruses are only concerned with whether or not you are a fitting host for it to live and reproduce within.  Here is what they do, according to HowStuffWorks.com:

1. A virus particle attaches to a host cell.
2. The particle releases its genetic instructions into the host cell.
3. The injected genetic material recruits the host cell’s enzymes.
4. The enzymes make parts for more new virus particles.
5. The new particles assemble the parts into new viruses.
6. The new particles break free from the host cell.

As you can see, humans, as possible hosts, have discovered through scientific method, how viruses work – as well as prudently prepare for them as a society.

Unfortunately for humans, some people subscribe to the Beavis and Butthead style of governance, better known as the 21st century incarnation of the GOP. 

First, Governor Perry of Texas (who threatened to secede from the nation) requests Federal funds to help combat the Swine Flu, and now recall the following:

When House Appropriations Committee chairman David Obey, the Wisconsin Democrat who has long championed investment in pandemic preparation, included roughly $900 million for that purpose in this year’s emergency stimulus bill, he was ridiculed by conservative operatives and congressional Republicans.

Obey and other advocates for the spending argued, correctly, that a pandemic hitting in the midst of an economic downturn could turn a recession into something far worse — with workers ordered to remain in their homes, workplaces shuttered to avoid the spread of disease, transportation systems grinding to a halt and demand for emergency services and public health interventions skyrocketing. Indeed, they suggested, pandemic preparation was essential to any responsible plan for renewing the U.S. economy.

GOP Know-Nothings Fought Pandemic Preparedness

officially rad - I’ve stayed out of this argument until now, but…

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There are many examples of the failed philosophy of neo (new) conservatism, such as the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute , the Project for New American Century, and last but not least, financial ‘innovation’ in the economy.  You can argue until you are blue in the face about philosophy and theory, but some evidence is empirical.  It just can’t be argued.  The outcome, or the results, of particular programs and policies in action speak for themselves, similar to how if you mix water, milk, eggs, and Bisquick just right you get pancakes.

The WPRI was a group that had advocated for school choice vouchers in Milwaukee.  After the program was instituted and studied, they issued this report which said, among other things:

“The report you are reading did not yield the results we had hoped to find,” George Lightbourn, a senior fellow at the institute, wrote in the paper’s first sentence. 

On the same topic of vouchers but not from the same report, I spent a day in Jefferson City speaking with a local Republican State Representative at the time named Jim Lembke.  It was a very cordial conversation on education policy in the Missouri.  However, the conversation ended quite abruptly after I said to him:

My grandfather was a conservative.  (I like to call him an Eisenhower conservative.) And as I understand it, in his day, they believed that public tax dollars should not be used for private purposes.  In relation to vouchers, what ever happened to that conservative ideal?

Then there is The Project for a New American Century, a conservative think tank formed during the Clinton Administration and whose membership included the likes of Steve Forbes, Bill Kristol, William J. Bennett, Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, John Bolton, Robert Kagan, Richard L. Armitage, Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney, Jeb Bush, “Scooter” Libby, Dan Quayle, and more. They penned a letter that said some of the following (keep in mind, this was before 9/11 and a few years before W. was ever elected POTUS):

“That strategy should aim, above all, at the removal of Saddam Hussein’s regime from power.”

“Our ability to ensure that Saddam Hussein is not producing weapons of mass destruction”

“Such uncertainty will, by itself, have a seriously destabilizing effect on the entire Middle East.”

“a significant portion of the world’s supply of oil will all be put at hazard…”

“…removing Saddam Hussein and his regime from power. That now needs to become the aim of American foreign policy.”

“…If you act now to end the threat of weapons of mass destruction against the U.S. or its allies, you will be acting in the most fundamental national security interests of the country. If we accept a course of weakness and drift, we put our interests and our future at risk.

Of course, we know how all of that worked out.  $150 a barrel for oil, $10 billion a month in Iraq Afghanistan, oh, and no Weapons of Mass Destruction.  Notice how almost all of the people mentioned in the letter to President Clinton seen here ended up in the Bush Administration.

The phrase that freaks me out the most from the Project for a New American Century is an excerpt from the following paper:

Further, the process of transformation,
even if it brings revolutionary change, is
likely to be a long one, absent some
catastrophic and catalyzing event – like a
new Pearl Harbor. Domestic politics and
industrial policy will shape the pace and
content of transformation as much as the
requirements of current missions.

And last but not least, the financial market.  So far, we have talked about two of the items that the conservatives are traditionally given credit for as their strength.  Taxes, Defense, and now Finance.  It is clear that their strength in these areas is nothing more than a myth, and a very damaging myth at that.  Here is the latest from Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke:

“One would be forgiven for concluding that the assumed benefits of financial innovation are not all they were cracked up to be,” the Fed chairman said today in a speech at the central bank’s community affairs conference in Washington. “The damage from this turn in the credit cycle — in terms of lost wealth, lost homes, and blemished credit histories — is likely to be long-lasting.”

Bernanke Says Crisis Damage Likely to Be Long-Lasting (Update2) - Bloomberg.com

The Rotterdam Zoo is giving away cardboard glasses that make it appear that you’re looking off to one side; these are gorilla-viewing glasses, meant to avoid incidents in which gorillas attack visitors for making eye contact with them. The glasses’ introduction follows an attack on a woman by an escaped gorilla; the specs are sponsored by a local health-insurance company.

Boing Boing

I had planned to cover the local teabaggery for a while, but really only to livetweet it for posterity.  However, after arriving and taking a few pictures and such, they announced via megaphone, "Anyone who’d like to say a few words is welcome to do so."  Well, they did say anyone …

I worked my way up to the front … well, it wasn’t so much front as it was middle.  It ended up being like a "theater in the round," with the main action taking place in front of a bust of Andrew Jackson, once the governor of territorial Florida with its capital in Pensacola.  I took lots of pictures and videos there (some of which I hope to post shortly at Blast Off!), and I was thinking about what I might say if and when I got up there.  Still, I wasn’t sure I wanted to do it.  People were, well, rather rambunctious in their Obama hatred, and the shouting and craziness was, to be honest, a little unnerving.

But when a couple of my friends showed up, one offered to film my "speech," so I figured I’d go for it.  I gave a lot of thought to what I wanted to say, making sure to draw the crowd in so they’d listen carefully before bringing the rhetorical hammer down.  I guess it worked.  :)  After I spoke, the MC of the event calmed everyone down and said, "All opinions are welcome here.  And besides … he’s half right."  That helped defuse the situation a bit, as did the next speaker, who started by complimenting me on my hat (it’s a Baltimore Orioles hat — I was born in Baltimore and I’m a lifelong O’s fan).

Speaking Truth to Crazy at the Pensacola Tea Party

Watch this guy catch the ignorance red-handed:

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FYI: 75% say Governor Perry is pretty much an idiot.

Thirty-one percent (31%) of Texas voters say that their state has the right to secede from the United States and form an independent country.

However, the latest Rasmussen Reports poll in the state finds that if the matter was put to a vote, it wouldn’t even be close. Three-fourths (75%) of Lone Star State voters would opt to remain in the United States. Only 18% would vote to secede, and seven percent (7%) are not sure what they’d choose.

Texas Governor Rick Perry, in response to a reporter’s question about secession at a protest "tea party," said Wednesday, "We’ve got a great union. There’s absolutely no reason to dissolve it. But if Washington continues to thumb their nose at the American people, you know, who knows what might come out of that? But Texas is a very unique place, and we’re a pretty independent lot to boot." The comment was widely reported in the media.

Rasmussen Reports™: The Most Comprehensive Public Opinion Data Anywhere