Infant Observations: Democrats. vs. Republicans

This is what happens when a devoted scientist becomes a devoted parent. Endless observations and parallels.

As a continuation from the previous post, this was “more or less” what I meant to say given your perspectives. However, there are many very good ethical non-environmental scientists and other very intelligent people who want to leave the US out of “intellectual prosecution”. Just as our forefathers left Europe hundreds of years ago.

Replace 'conservative' for 'Republican' and 'liberal' for 'Democrat,' and I'll agree with you straight across.

However, there are many very good ethical non-environmental scientists

Hmmm. You might even use the word "moral". I am pretty sure I am not alone when I regard renewable resources as a natural crop to be harvested. While few balk at removing soybeans or wheat from the field before the crop starts sprouting or fungus sets in, a very vocal contingent out there cannot seem to understand that the same needs to be done with trees which have a prime harvest time, (species dependant) before they, too begin to rot.

The same goes for animals we commonly view as game animals, which, as their domesticated equivalents, have a 'window of opportunity' in which they can be harvested as a useable resource. Failure to manage their numbers only ensures their demise through starvation and disease.

In either instance, the failure to manage and conserve these resources has led to unimaginable waste, and that is the greatest sin of all.

Strange that the same folks who would have those who do not live in urban or gated communities, but on the interface between civilization and wilderness, suffer the vagaries of predation in order to attempt to restore a balance of predator and prey which has only been tenuous at best, at the expense of members of our own species, or at the cost of tremendous resources wasted.

Efforts by those same people to preserve dyanamic systems at some capricous static values have only increased the waste of resources, and then, ultimately, degenerated into an economic weapon for political purposes and financial gain.

Thus, the 'conservation movement' degenerated into or was hijacked by (for the most part--there are exceptions) a dirt/animal worshipping cult led by a corrupt cadre of high priests for financial/political gain and a sprinkling of 'true believers', much to the ill of all--human, animal, and plant alike.

It is ironic that the worship of 'nature' be a device for the accumulation of strictly artificial gain.

Certainly, no moral scientist would embrace the destruction of the planet, after all, we live here, too.

We also recognise, that, properly done, much can be harvested without permanent destruction--the resource is conserved, managed, harvested when appropriate, and renewed.

Unfortunately, as the cultists become ascendant in power, they often control the most important resource of all--the means of 'educating' our children, from infancy to college and beyond.

Young minds taught the false catechism of the environmentalists will seldom question the interpretations of the high priests of academia, and remedial 'education' is accomplished via the popular media for those who have insufficient background in science or personal experience (decried as 'anecdotal evidence'), or who are too innumerate to decipher the contortions of valid (and invalid) data to allegedly support a foregone 'conclusion'.

The attempt to seize control goes beyond mere recruiting via the educational industry, but to the point of weeding out those with opposing viewpoints early on as students to deny them accreditation, denying them funding for research if they are already the candidates for or holders of advanced degrees, or merely shouting them down instead of engaging in honest and open debate in the halls of academia and beyond.

Does this make me want to leave? No.

Do I live in fear that I or others like me will be rounded up with 'the intellectuals' and shot or herded off to a re-education gulag?

No. After all, we still enjoy the means to stop the juggernaut as long as we can expose the public to ideas which do not necessarily conform to the politically endowed 'consensus'.

We can debate global warming and its cause, we can decry the highly questionable practice of using embryonic stem cells (if for no other reason than the successes of using adult cells vs. th failures of the embryonic methods), we still have the freedom to speak, to do research, should we chose (and to find our own funding).

Otherwise, there would be no debate. Those who decry industry research as biased, also call attention to the fact that their own sources of funding might have reason for seeing certain conclusions gain prominence.

Instead, there is a counterculture of 'working' (industry employed) and research scientists, who quietly teach our children and grandchildren--and anyone else who is inclined to learn--the fallacies of bad (junk) science and how to spot them.

Unfortunately, as the cultists become ascendant in power, they often control the most important resource of all--the means of 'educating' our children, from infancy to college and beyond.

Young minds taught the false catechism of the environmentalists will seldom question the interpretations of the high priests of academia, and remedial 'education' is accomplished via the popular media for those who have insufficient background in science or personal experience (decried as 'anecdotal evidence'), or who are too innumerate to decipher the contortions of valid (and invalid) data to allegedly support a foregone 'conclusion'.

The attempt to seize control goes beyond mere recruiting via the educational industry, but to the point of weeding out those with opposing viewpoints early on as students to deny them accreditation, denying them funding for research if they are already the candidates for or holders of advanced degrees, or merely shouting them down instead of engaging in honest and open debate in the halls of academia and beyond.

So I'm not the only one who thinks this is what's happening.

Instead, there is a counterculture of 'working' (industry employed) and research scientists, who quietly teach our children and grandchildren--and anyone else who is inclined to learn--the fallacies of bad (junk) science and how to spot them.

Excluding religion, the world can be divided into two categories. Western culture is "deal focused" whereby its citizens live (social contract) and work (work contract) via an individualistic existence that can ideally be thought of as Freedom and Responsibility. This represents about 15% of the world's people. The rest of the world's people live and work via "relationship focused" cultures where life is very hierarchical and everything revolves around the family and established family social stature.

The problem is, the deal focused culture requires a lot of responsibility from its citizens. It is also becoming very difficult to raise children in a deal focused culture. I therefore (well, my wife) choose to raise a family in southern Spain, a country where deal focused Europe meets relationship focused Africa and the Middle East. I'm also genetically about 25% African, 15% American Indian and the rest European. My wife is 75% European and 25% Gypsy (she is from southern Spain). Therefore, our children tend to blend in with the genetically diverse children here.

It was a hard decision to make, but we think it's best for our children's future.

Interesting solution--and situation. A culture which focuses on responsibility cannot abdicate that responsibility every time something goes wrong, and there is a lot of that going on. Therein lies the difficulty.

The other problem is that the PC infection of the scientific community is global, funded by foundations which endow university chairs, fund research grants, and decry industry. Corporations contribute to the foundations to show how 'environmentally aware' they are, and government funding rounds out the budget.

There is no place to run, but some will be less affected than others.

Not, mind you, by the alleged problems, so much as by the imposition of 'solutions' based on junk science.

The answer to that is education, of ones' self, of entire communities, and especially of children to debunk the nonsense, to be able to understand the flaws in logic which allow those with an agenda to distort reality to their ends, no matter what side of an issue they might be on.

You will need that no matter where you are.

It is only in the past two generations that America has really strayed from familial heierarchies and the "mobile" concept has taken hold. I have to wonder if that was not promoted to undermine family structure to leave a vacumn for the socialists to try to sieze control of children. My wife is American Indian, so family ties are strong on her side, and on my side we date back to early colonial times in the Americas, and family remains important there as well (old families, not old money). There is no substitute for the support we can give our children and grand (and great-grand) children, nor for the support they can give to us. It is a prized system as old as people, and the most basic unit of government, one which needs little interference. We take care of our own.

I can see why you would be attracted to a lifestyle which is largely disappearing from the American cultural landscape, but regret that more here are not rediscovering it.

Perhaps we can keep the paradigm alive until the pendulum swings back.

Wow, I strongly agree with what you've said and you've expressed it much better than I probably could. So, I'll only comment on what I think I know, Spain and Europe.

It is only in the past two generations that America has really strayed from familial heierarchies and the "mobile" concept has taken hold.

This is also happening in the North of Spain (more "Deal focused") while the South of Spain ("Relationship focused") hasn't really been affected. The same can be said of northern Europe (very Deal focused) vs. southern Europe (less Deal focused). In Europe, I think it's more post-Religious modernism that is to blame than politics. However, there may be a trend towards viewing Religion as "philosophy" rather then "rules based", so conservatism my be resurrected. I think that's why the Pope is "taking action" to compare what Christian "philosophy" has contributed to humanity vs. Islam. Europe is also becoming center-Right so maybe there's hope.

I think that's why the Pope is "taking action" to compare what Christian "philosophy" has contributed to humanity vs. Islam.

Even for those who do not embrace Jesus as Lord, or those who decide they prefer another demnomination of Christianity, there is much in Christian philosophy which can make a culture a place to thrive.

If His Holiness can get those who are not Catholics to at least become more Christian in their worldview, then he has made the world a better place for Catholicism as well, and not just Catholics (or Christians) will benefit.

While the Church may be authoritarian in respect to the faithful, it can only color the secular government, not replace it.

It also values the family, and the heirarchy within it, and uses that to reinforce its own spiritual hegemony.

That basic building block, the family unit, is in any free culture the governmental molecule by which greater governments are formed.

In socialist cultures, the State is to be all, mother, father, and for Socialism to succeed requires the destruction of that family unit and the loyalties which bind it. Otherwise, the State will always play second fiddle to familial ties, and, where applicable, rank a distant third to God.

This is why there has been an all-out assault on both Christianity and the family by the Socialist Left in the U.S. Formerly soft spoken and behind the scenes, it has moved into the limelight and is shrilly screaming its demands seeking to accelerate the fulfillment of its agenda.

I believe that impatient shrillness to be a critical tactical error, as it has provoked a backlash against the destruction of the institutions which have been the foundations of American culture.

This is why there has been an all-out assault on both Christianity and the family by the Socialist Left in the U.S. Formerly soft spoken and behind the scenes, it has moved into the limelight and is shrilly screaming its demands seeking to accelerate the fulfillment of its agenda.

How often God must weep at humans' folly