Science Daily reports that a new survey by a group at University of Wisconsin found that 70% of Americans consider nanotechnology research to be “morally objectionable”.  And it’s not because they’re too stupid to know the difference between nanotech and biotechnology research such as stem-cell work or cloning:

The moral qualms people of faith express about nanotechnology is not a question of ignorance of the technology, says Scheufele, explaining that survey respondents are well-informed about nanotechnology and its potential benefits.

“They still oppose it,” he says. “They are rejecting it based on religious beliefs. The issue isn’t about informing these people. They are informed.”

Time to go smack my head against the wall for a while.

There are valid reasons to have qualms about nanotechnology.  Many safety concerns remain unaddressed, and quite a bit is still not known about how the small scale of the chemical changes being made actually impacts the properties and behaviors of materials (although I did read recently that a new study shows that nanotubes are not toxic to mice).  But being opposed to this sort of research because your giant invisible grandpa wouldn’t like it is just plain stupid.

Our national tradition of anti-intellectualism is starting to get in the way of keeping things running.  Last week in Salon, Laura Miller wrote about Susan Jacoby’s new book “The Age Of American Unreason” and Jacoby’s claim that fundamentalist religion in the United States is directly responsible for what Jacoby calls “junk thought”, epitomized by the “intelligent design” debate.  Erich Vieth, posting at Dangerous Intersection, also writes about Jacoby, pointing out some factoids which should sound familiar to people reading here: 50% of Americans do not believe in evolution, 50% of Americans believe in ghosts, 15% of Americans do not know that the Earth revolves around the sun.

Stupidity and religious faith walk hand in hand.  We’ve got a Presidential candidate who will pray to end the budget deficit, schools that pray for good grades for their kids, people who believe in miracles, and a President who says God tells him to start wars.  I’ve had people ask me why I can’t just “live and let live” with regard to fundamentalists, and all I have to say is that it’s because these people imperil us all with their appalling combination of stupidity and willful ignorance.  I can’t write this sort of stuff off with a blithe “oh, ha ha, silly fundies” anymore because they are contributing directly to the rapid demise of not just social and political institutions but of enlightened civilization itself.  And they don’t care, because, in their world-view, they’re all going to fucking Disneyland when the Apocalypse comes.

You can’t make people who are willfully and deliberately opposed to knowledge and reason turn around and accept those things by sheer force of will.  I’ve mentioned Nietsche’s words before: “Faith means not wanting to know what is true.”  And consequently nothing will stop them, not even acceptance.  Maybe through resistance it might be possible to get the fence-sitters and the “live and let live” types to see the danger these people pose and convince them to take up the cause.

Okay, that magazine cover is from 2004, but I’m seriously wishing the Democrats would drum up a "Draft Dean" movement right about now.  The party regulars made him DNC chairman as a consolation prize for having screwed himself right out of the nomination last time, but also with the clear expectation that they could keep an eye on him there and he wouldn’t cause them much trouble…or at least not run against Hillary in 2008.  But he’s done nothing but irritate the Old Boy Network.  He insisted on a 50-state effort in the 2006 elections and put the party back into the majority in both houses, he’s developed grass-roots efforts that this year are paying off in vast increases in Democratic voter turnout not just in primaries but in caucuses, and he still manages to speak his mind whenever he gets out from under watchful eyes long enough.

The collapse of the Dean campaign four years ago had little to do with Dean’s positions as a candidate, or even his regrettable "YEAARRGGHH!" moment, but about a level of support that was a mile wide but an inch deep.  He fostered a lot of superficial enthusiasm from people not terribly involved in old-school politicking, especially younger voters who wanted "change".  So here we are four years later, and all those college kids who were sure Dean was unstoppable are now the young adult crowd that packs the halls everywhere Barack Obama goes, enchanted by the same nebulous notion of change, but only a little wiser about presidential politics.  Unfortunately, this time their dream candidate is just as superficial as they are.  Meanwhile, the older and more cynical crowd is jumping on the bandwagon out of their own unhappiness with the catch-phrase "Anyone But Clinton", without paying much attention to the point down the road where that chant is likely to bite them in the ass.

So, congratulations to Barack Obama for putting together a coalition of the unwilling and the unthinking but you’ll excuse me if I muster up no enthusiasm.  I’m not convinced that he has the nomination in his pocket because I am convinced that the Clintons will fight a scorched-earth battle to win the Pyrrhic victory of getting the nomination at the price of alienating all those newly-motivated Democratic voters who aren’t QUITE motivated enough to support whichever candidate gets the nomination, just their candidate.

Some people say this all means that the time has come for Al Gore to swoop in and save the day, but his obvious disinterest in returning to the world of electoral politics means the net has to be cast a little wider to snag a draftable candidate.  John Edwards could make a case for being that guy, and I would be okay with that, but why not Howard Dean?  Surely the political newcomers would thrill to the deus ex machina theatrics of a convention that resurrects a candidate that people were so enthused about.  Surely the media would have so much to write about that their heads would explode.  Surely the Republicans would be cast into confusion without their pre-cooked campaigns against "Billary Clinton" and "Barack HUSSEIN Obama".  And we would get a battle-tested, wiser candidate as the nominee, more committed to a progressive agenda than Obama or Clinton and perhaps a chance at real political change instead of just superficiality.

A common perception among Americans is that our country is “great” because of the capitalist economy that has been the driving engine of the country since the mid-1800s. This message is constantly reinforced by almost every media outlet since, after all, most media outlets themselves are controlled by capitalists (lest you forget, the vast American media industry is owned and operated by only FIVE corporations). Beyond that, every politician from the lowliest town councilor to the President of the United States, Republican or Democrat constantly reinforces the message with their words and deeds because they receive almost all of the money that they use to run for office (plus a little baksheesh) from corporations.

And yet, capitalism itself is a remarkably destructive system. Under capitalism, practically every imaginable thing that can be produced is commoditized as much as possible through whatever means can accomplish it — economies of scale, industrialization, offshoring, cost-cutting, and even outright crimes, lies, and cheating. As far as capitalism is concerned, anything and everything is fair game in the blind pursuit of one and only one goal: profit. And once something can no longer be mined for profit, it is discarded in favor of the next profitable thing. In this way, capitalism becomes a juggernaut that simply chews up and spits out everything in its path, blind to any other consideration. To borrow from Star Trek, if I may, capitalism is not the Borg Collective, which assimilates every culture or technology it finds, it is the Doomsday Machine that simply eats every planet in its path.

Barack Obama’s campaign theme is “Change”, and lately every candidate running for President has also tried to demonstrate their claim to be the One True Representative of “Change”, but not a one of them will make a single meaningful change to the corrupt relationship between corporations and government because they are too far co-opted. This essay by a student named Ned Resnikoff was one of the finalists in a competition held by The Nation Magazine and in it he says that curtailing corporate power over the government should be the single most important change that the next President brings, because as long as our government is rendered impotent by its relationship to Big Business, the juggernaut will remain unchecked.

It needs to be acknowledged that the overconsumption of goods and resources that has been the single biggest hallmark of the American Era actually threatens the continued existence of the human race. The death spiral of consumption, which the capitalist system props up to continue its own existence, was unsustainable from the outset, even if people were not as aware of it as they are now. As we can no longer ignore its manifestation in climate change, depletion of resources, diminishing of biodiversity, and even military conflict (hint: Iraq is about THE OIL), we are powerless and will grow increasingly so without genuine change in the way business and government walk hand in hand.

Even though Americans are deeply acculturated to see capitalism as a positive force, the destructive nature of this system is not entirely hidden to us. A recent Harris Poll reveals that 84% of Americans believe that corporations hold too much power in Washington, a percentage that has been consistent across similar polling for 14 years. Further, the poll shows that over 85% of Americans believe that the largest corporations (oil companies, health care and insurance companies, car makers, and pharmaceutical makers) are the least trustworthy.

Sadly, the likelihood of this sort of change is close to non-existent, and as a result an entirely different spectrum of change will be the reality of life for our children and the generations that follow them. The “planet-killer” will eventually live up to that name, rapaciously plundering whatever it thinks it can consume until there is nothing left.

Since the Michigan primary yesterday was a bit of a sleeper event (at least on the Democratic side), I’ll forego the little link-dump sessions I’ve been doing and instead post a bit about a couple of candidates in particular: Dennis Kucinich and Mike Huckabee.

“I took a quiz and Dennis Kucinich and I agree on everything but gun control. I’m short. I’m a little funny lookin’. Where’s my tall, hot, redheaded wife?” — SF media blogger Brittney Gilbert

I’m sure you know that this is Kucinich’s second campaign for the Democratic nomination. Early on Kucinich was branded as a “weirdo” by the media, a reputation he may or may not have actually earned. His unconventional personal views and associations with people like Shirley MacLaine no doubt are responsible for most of the name-calling; this time around the press seem obsessed with his admission that he thinks he saw a UFO. Politically, however, Kucinich’s positions and actions put him squarely in the progressive camp, far more so than any of the major candidates, and in a campaign season where the buzzword is “change”, it is worth noting that all of the other Democratic candidates and some of the Republican ones now claim much of the same territory that Kucinich has had all along: anti-war, anti-PATRIOT Act, anti-torture, proposals for global warming, nuclear disarmament and dialogue with Iran, and so on. Only the unshakable media label as “weirdo” separates him from Obama, Clinton and Edwards.

Kucinich has emerged as a voice of conscience in the Democratic Party at a time when one is very badly needed. His bill to introduce the impeachment of Dick Cheney was turned into a political football in the fall, but has been resuscitated and pushed forward by others. While the Democratic Congressional leadership refuses to take action, his voice has been consistent and clear. Last week, after the outcome of the New Hampshire primary caught most pundits and pollsters by surprise and led to vocal accusations (primarily from the Ron Paul crowd) of vote tampering, Kucinich was the only candidate to call for a recount, not to boost his own support but to help maintain the integrity of the election and of American electoral politics in general. Also last week, after the Bush Administration’s ham-handed attempt to gin up a laughably bad video of a “conflict with Iranian speedboats” and Bush’s own absurd declaration that Iran is “the greatest threat to world peace”, Kucinich was the only candidate to denounce Bush for his saber-rattling and his exaggerations. But he had to actually go to court to argue that he should be included in last night’s debate in Las Vegas (he was denied), while Republican candidates like Rudy Giuliani and Fred Thompson, who are also only drawing single-digit support, continue to be treated as “major candidates” in what has obviously narrowed into a 3-way race.

Even though I had a little fun at Kucinich’s expense about his tall, hot, red-headed wife, I admire Dennis Kucinich. I cannot say with sincerity that he would be a good president, but I think more Americans are probably in agreement with his positions than they realize, and I think that the more successful candidates, particularly Barack Obama, need to listen to him and align themselves in his direction. It’s my intention to vote for Dennis Kucinich on MegaTuesday, even though I completely understand that come November I will be voting for the inevitable Clinton/Obama - Obama/Clinton ticket.

Meanwhile…

Mike Huckabee would like to amend the Constitution “to meet God’s standards”. He also took a little time off from campainging in New Hampshire to stand up in the pulpit and remind his fellow Christians that they are the “army of Christ” and need to be prepared to give up some relationships to serve God. He’s also likened homosexuality to the plague, told Fox News that God was responsible for his success in the Iowa caucuses, openly denounces evoluition, and is the only candidate who supports denying citizenship to children born in the United State of illegal immgrant parents.

Now, you tell me which one is the “weirdo”.