An Open Letter to John McCain

Dear Senator McCain,

Do you hate science and scientific research. I can conclude nothing else from your repeated comments about wasteful government spending citing a federally funded Grizzly Bear DNA research project. Do you have any concept of what the research was about? Do you know that it was a DNA based population estimation effort on a species protected under the endangered species act. This study is/was at the cutting edge of wildlife population estimation techniques, using DNA from individuals bears to to execute a repeated captures based population estimation. If done correctly this is an extremely robust and effective method for do population estimation. The best part and greatest benefit to the American people is that the resulting population estimate was 2.5 times greater than all previous estimates. Wowzers to do you know what that means? Possible de-listing of this Endangered Species! Loosening of restrictions on logging, and/or oil and gas exploration and exploitation in grizzly bear habitats in north west Montana. This measly 3.1 million dollars you have repeatedly complained about over the last 5 years could contribute to America's energy independence, create thousands of jobs in rural communities in the inter-mountain west, lead to cheaper gas at the pump, help in the development of population estimation techniques that can be applied to other endangered speices that might lead to more de-listing and fewer restrictions of natural resource extractive industries.

WHAT AN "UNBELIEVABLE" WASTE OF MONEY!!! (to paraphrase and quote one of you cmapaign commercials).

Not only does citing this example as pork barrel politics demonstrate your total disrespect for valid scientific research, it also demonstrates your total lack of understanding of how government budgets work. This was a 4.8 million dollar study (not 3.1 million as you always say) and only 1.1 million of was secured through the ear marking process, with help from Senator Conrad, your campaign chair in the state of Montana by the way. The other 3.7 million was funded though normal budget allocations of the Department of the Interior. See, the Congress gives the DOI a bunch of money each year and the DOI, who is in part responsible to the welfare of America's wildlife, divvy's up that money to protective measures, research, and status monitoring of that wildlife. The DOI decided that it would be good to do some research on bear population status, because it is an important issue to Montana's ranchers and natural resource industries.

So let us see if there was a 1.1 million dollar earmark allocation to bear research, and the government annually spends 18 billion on earmarks, what percentage of that is 1.1 million:

% = (1,100,000 /18,000,000,000) x 100

% = 0.0061

That is six one thousandths of the federal budget on earmarks alone. Wow!!! Cutting out the bear research would really reign in out of control earmarking. Think about it, Federal expenditure on earmarks would only be 17,998,900,000 dollars for last year (lets, for simplicity, forget that the project was spread over a 5 year period). I am not an economist, but it seems to me that the potential benefits arising from this paltry $1.1 million dollar earmark might far out way the societal cost.

Lastly, I can only conclude that citing this example is a putrid attempt to pander to uninformed western ranchers in Colorado (a 2008 battle ground state). Ranchers across the board have a fear of large predator animals like bears, wolves, mountain lions, even coyotes, because they eat sheep and cows. Even though Ranchers in Montana supported this research and are super psyched about the findings, Folks in Colorado, Idaho and Wyoming get excited when they hear politicians trash talk predators. So it seems to me that you Mr. McCain are making a very subtle nod to the western states that you think spending money on bears or any endangered species/predatory animal is wasteful.

The bottom line is that either you are stupid, or you think we are. This is either an outright disregard for Science, a seriously flawed understanding of government spending, or a desperate ploy to win the votes of rural folks in Colorado. I hoping that the American people see through your bullshit and em-bear-ass you and your party on November 4th.

Peace,

Dr. The Bird Man

YAAAY!! I had the first chapter of my dissertation accepted for publication yesterday! It went through two different journals and and three rounds of revisions but finally I got word that it has been accepted. The Editor of this journal has been difficult to work with....He is a bit of a micro-manager. He re-wrote a number of sentences throughout the paper, and even changed words that slightly changed the meaning and tone of a few statements in the Discussion section of the paper. At this point I am tired of arguing with him and I and super glad it is accepted.

I am pretty excited that Wake beat FSU the other day, but this is a little ridiculous. In fact it is a lot ridiculous. The fact that my alma mater goes to the trouble of printing up T-shirts because we won a regular season game is kind of sad. In my mind it takes all the glory and excitement out of the win because it just reminds me of how pathetic our football program has been for decades. Do they print up special T-shirts for every game? Where's my WE BEAT BAYLOR t-shirt? Or my WE LOST TO WEST VIRGINIA t-shirt? How about anticipatory t-shirts like WE ARE PLAYING NAVY THIS WEEKEND, I HOPE WE BEAT 'EM SO NEXT WEEK I CAN BUY A 'WE BEAT NAVY' T-SHIRT...That would be awesome.

It was much easier maintaining a blog like this when I had a seven year legacy to live up to. There was pressure to keep it alive for one more anniversary and keep it funny and entertaining like it was when the Hot Librarian was in charge. Now that Dis-traction is done Left Whorled seems to lack some level of importance. Realistically, I also started a real job back in May and I just don't seem to have the time to think of useful, clever or entertaining things to write about. When I do the blog is a long way off and I generally forget by the time I am in front of this machine. There have seriously been a few occasions where I had thought of a topically funny thing to write about but was beat to the presses by other funnier people. Like when I was going to write about how I was, as a tax payer, looking forward to getting my stock certificates for ownership Fanny Mae and then that night Stephen Colbert makes the same joke (much better than I) before I have a chance to write it up. If only I had my own show on Comedy Central (instead of this job as a research scientist) then I could stay on top the humorous thoughts in my head and get them out to the pubic in a timely and relevant fashion.

Is it too early to eat lunch at 11:20 am?

What do you think...should I apply for this position?

CEDARVILLE UNIVERSITY is a comprehensive, primarily undergraduate, Baptist university of arts, sciences, and professional programs with an enrollment of over 3,000. It combines a evangelical, non-charismatic, theological position. Faculty, who must be born-again Christians, must agree with our doctrinal statement, and Community Covenant and General Work Place Standards. In addition to teaching excellence, expectations include Biblical integration of faith/learning, student advising, scholarly pursuits, service activities, collegiality, and church involvement.

I have decided that ironing my clothes is out. It is a waste of precious energy resources to plug in that iron, let heat up for a few minutes, generate some steam and then push it back and forth over my clothes just to get a few wrinkles out. Somewhere a coal miner is risking black lung disease and the coal he digs out of the ground is polluting our atmosphere and poisoning our oceans fish just so I can have smoothed out clothes which pretty much get re-wrinkled during the 25 minutes commute to my office anyway. So I am taking a stand on behalf of that ailing coal miner and the mercury filled fish of the world by no longer ironing my pants and shirts. And just to be clear this is not because I am lazy or slovenly, this is a principled environmental stand I am taking.

I know it is a bit delayed, but here is my interpretation of John McCain's acceptance speech from last week's Republican convention:


Ehh...Hello? (Tap Tap) Is this thing on? (Turning to face the stage manager) Psst...Which button do I push? What's that? Oh it's ready to go? What? Sorry, I'm not used to these megaphone things...What's that? Oh Microphone...yeah sorry. (Turning back to the audience and the camera's) Hi Folks. I accept your nomination...thanks so much. You know what? Republicans Suck, and that is why I as the Republican nominee for president intend to sweep into Washington, where I have lived and worked and amassed oodles of governing and foreign policy experience for almost 30 years as a sucky Republican, to clean out and reform the government bureaucracy that I helped create, sustain, and screw up. Here, I took this speech from my failed 2000 campaign for the Presidency and I am just going to read that old thing for the next 25 minutes, and then I am going to talk about my great war record, don't worry folks its not a pussy ass - googoo doll-esque war record like the injury prone John Kerry, its different cause I got captured by the enemy...anyway like I said here is some stuff that used to talk about that got me this reputation as a Maverick...

As John McCain prepares to give what should be an extremely unispiring acceptance speech I thought I would post the bulk of an email that I just sent to my very conservative father in law regarding my choice for president in this election:

"It seems the Republican Party is more excited about their Vice Presidential nominee than their Presidential nominee; all because she has this thing described as “executive experience.” Executive experience means nothing to me. Bill Clinton had executive experience as governor of Arkansas, and I think you would argue that he completely mishandled the Al-Qeda threat in the final years of his presidency, mishandled his personal life, and made a series of poor decisions as President. George W. Bush had executive experience as governor of Texas before becoming president and we can undoubtedly see that pretty much all he did as president was make poor decisions. So, having the responsibility of making budgetary decision, veto decisions, or cabinet appointments or whatever in the past, has no bearing on the quality of decisions you’ll make in the future. I see that people in your generation are holding on to this notion that someone needs past executive experience in order to be a good executive in the future, and the Republican party is trying to exploit this idea once again by picking Sarah Palin as their Vice presidential nominee. But, that idea does not hold water with me because I see little to no evidence supporting it in our recent presidents.

I do not support John McCain’s candidacy for president, because I don’t trust him or believe a word he says. I question his motives, I question his intentions, and I question his ability to lead our country in a new era…a new kind of economy, a new kind of war, and most likely a new way of life. He is old fashioned and lacks vision and creativeity to meet the challenges we face.

I do support Barack Obama. I am excited about Obama. I think Obama has fresh ideas and will take a new approach to governing that will help us to meet the challenges we currently face as a society. I believe that he is smart and thinks deeply about the issues we face and solutions to our problems. For example, I think that meeting with and talking directly with Iranian leaders, a notion that Obama talked about during the primaries, rather than giving them the “silent treatment” as we have done for decades, is the kind of fresh new approach we need to take in the post 9-11 era to solve problems posed by potentially dangerous adversaries. I think that right now and over the next decade Americans need a president who is capable of inspiring them to take action for the betterment of our communities and our nation. I believe that more that any presidential Candidate I have ever seen, Obama is someone who, through his words at least, can move and inspire Americans to action. He’s demonstrated this ability in the presidential campaign by inspiring thousands of volunteers to work for his candidacy and inspiring millions of people to sign up to vote for the first time ever. Americans need to be inspired to care about their country and their future. We as a society need to wake up and stop focusing our energies on Britney Spears or Lindsay Lohan; for Christ’s sake only 30 – 40 % percent of even bother to vote in elections. I believe that Barack Obama is then man who can inspire us to better ourselves and better our society.

…And that is why I am voting for Barack Obama and not John McCain."