O n Labor Day weekend, just as the presidential campaign was shifting into high gear, the Gore-Lieberman “war room” in Nashville faced a meltdown unthinkable even a few years ago. The computer system’s server went down, isolating the press operation from the outside world. The fax machine was no help: In the 2000 race, “blastfaxing” […]
Chris Mooney
Chris Mooney is a Prospect senior correspondent and, most recently, author of Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatened Our Future (with Sheril Kirshenbaum).
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Political Science:
Most people are demoted for poor performance. Dr. John H. Marburger, President Bush’s newly confirmed science adviser, was kicked down a notch before he even started his job. For over a decade, the national science adviser–who heads the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP)–has been a near-cabinet-level position. Officially, the designation is […]
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Political Matching Made Easy
Which statement more accurately describes your political outlook: “We will all be called before God on Judgment Day to answer for our sins,” or “I don’t believe we will have to answer for our sins on Judgment Day”? It may seem like an odd question. But if you choose the second option, you’re well on […]
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Libertarians are Right!
You may have heard the liberal aphorism, “Libertarians are always half right.” Their sometimes obsessive free marketism aside, libertarians can be particularly good at pointing out the flaws and excesses of leftist thinking — like those that the libertarian You may have heard the liberal aphorism, “Libertarians are always half right.” Their sometimes obsessive free […]
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The New York Times Magazine: Cloned!
In terms of shock value, February 4th’s In terms of shock value, February 4th’s The New York Times Magazine feature, “A Desire to Duplicate” by Margaret Talbot — or, as it was titled on the comic book style front page, “Lab of the Human Clones!” — will almost certainly live up to expectations. The story’s […]
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The Clone Wars
The Clone Wars The next skirmish in the battle over human cloning has begun, and the intellectual and moral arguments from the anti-cloning camp are as poor as ever. Perhaps we should all simply wait for the next Star Wars movie — Attack of the Clones — and let George Lucas tell us what we […]
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Holy War
When “Ibn Warraq,” the pseudonymous Muslim apostate, visited the United States after September 11, one of his first stops was the White House. There, he enjoyed an hour-and-a-half lunch with President Bush’s chief economic speechwriter, David Frum. Though Warraq confirms the meeting and has told supporters about it, Frum refuses to discuss it “in any […]
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You Gotta Have Faith
“President Bush has selected John J. DiIulio Jr., a political science professor, to head a first-ever federal office for integrating religious institutions more fully into federally financed social services, several Bush advisers said.” — The New York Times January 29, 2001 Dear President Bush, Thank you so much for offering me a position as director […]
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Crankwatch
Amidst accusations of war profiteering by the German pharmaceutical company Bayer, it’s important to recall that times like these can give rise to another sort of profiteering as well — one that attempts to cash in on people’s grief. I’m not just talking about fake charities trying to bilk those generous enough to donate to […]
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Muddled Muggles:
Perhaps jealous its sales may trounce those of the wildly popular Perhaps jealous its sales may trounce those of the wildly popular Left Behind novels — the evangelical publishing phenomenon scribbled by fundamentalists Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins — many religious conservatives have been up in arms over J.K. Rowling’s phenomenally […]
