Obama Kills with Nobel Peace Prize Acceptance Speech

Looking at each camera cut to audience members during President Barack Obama's Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech, one could see the eyeballs running astray, the looks of anguish, the feigned expressions of interest. Gone are the days of Obama stirring his audience with hope.

To be fair, while boring, Obama stood up to the issues surrounding his award. He acknowledged his wars, confronted his detractors, and took the money. And, he did it in that way he has, his glib manner of completely revising history.

"And yet I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge the considerable controversy that your generous decision has generated. In part, this is because I am at the beginning, and not the end, of my labors on the world stage."

By my calculations, Obama has been president about a year now. Before that, Obama was a U.S. Senator for about four years. Given his soon to be one-term presidency, I'd say Obama is closer to the end of his world stage endeavors.

"Still, we are at war, and I am responsible for the deployment of thousands of young Americans to battle in a distant land. Some will kill. Some will be killed. And so I come here with an acute sense of the cost of armed conflict—filled with difficult questions about the relationship between war and peace, and our effort to replace one with the other."

Obama's speech contained 4,120 words, where 1,258 of these words were unique. He used the word war 35 times and the word peace 28 times. Our last two current wars, which Obama has the power to end, has cost more American lives than the reason we invaded these lands in the first place.

And so far the Iraq and Afghanistan invasions have cost the U.S. over $941 billion U.S. tax dollars on the front end. The cost on the back end that we've paid via corporate subsidy is unknown. If we divide the known number by the number of years since 2001, then we get about $105 billion per year. Obama has promised $4 billion for education.

"The concept of a 'just war' emerged, suggesting that war is justified only when it meets certain preconditions: if it is waged as a last resort or in self-defense; if the forced used is proportional, and if, whenever possible, civilians are spared from violence."

Let's see: neither Iraq nor Afghanistan was a war of last resort. Technically they weren't self-defense, but instead, retaliation. Well, sort of. Iraq was actually neither self-defense nor retaliation; Afghanistan was retaliation, but not against Afghanistan, but against Al Qaeda, who happened to have bases in Afghanistan at the time of the attacks on American soil. The force was in no way proportional. Many more Americans have died since the initial attacks than during the attacks. And we must also acknowledge that many times this number of non-Americans have died due to our retaliatory actions. This includes many civilian deaths which were not spared.

"In the wake of such destruction, and with the advent of the nuclear age, it became clear to victor and vanquished alike that the world needed institutions to prevent another World War. And so, a quarter century after the United States Senate rejected the League of Nations—an idea for which Woodrow Wilson received this Prize—America led the world in constructing an architecture to keep the peace: a Marshall Plan and a United Nations, mechanisms to govern the waging of war, treaties to protect human rights, prevent genocide, and restrict the most dangerous weapons."

Should I even go here? The Marshall Plan was the beginning of massive unnecessary and damaging bailouts. Marshall, like Obama, subsidized the status quo, the current failed institutions. A continuum of economic disasters or crisis can be traced back from Obama and the Bushes, through Regan, all the way back to the Marshall Plan.

Further Marshall divvied up the booty of war and haphazardly redrew the world map. The result laid the groundwork for the Cold War and many of so-called "civil" wars and localized wars throughout Europe and Asia.

And the United Nations? Their governance of war did a hell of a lot of good for Iraq. We don't have time to mention all the other world conflicts that they did little about. Their treaties to protect human rights tend to extend to protecting corporate cheap labor rights. Those who die in lands with little resources get little attention. Preventing genocide? Um, yeah, sure. And restricting "the most dangerous weapons?" Let's face it, the only purpose of the U.N. is to maintain the status quo. It's purpose is to keep strong countries strong and delay by any means possible smaller countries from acquiring an actual voice on the world stage. I'm not completely against this purpose, but let's agree to call a duck a duck, ok?

"Moreover, wars between nations have increasingly given way to wars within nations. The resurgence of ethnic or sectarian conflicts; the growth of secessionist movements, insurgencies, and failed states; have increasingly trapped civilians in unending chaos. In today’s wars, many more civilians are killed than soldiers; the seeds of future conflict are sewn, economies are wrecked, civil societies torn asunder, refugees amassed, and children scarred."

And the roots of much of this can be directly traced back to the Marshall Plan. When you force people, who at least have strong cultural differences or possibly have been enemies, within one border, eventually there is going to be some breakdown and people die. Add to this the infusion of cash into corrupt economies and the result is discord and often atrocities.

"I do not bring with me today a definitive solution to the problems of war. What I do know is that meeting these challenges will require the same vision, hard work, and persistence of those men and women who acted so boldly decades ago. And it will require us to think in new ways about the notions of just war and the imperatives of a just peace."

Wait, what? You don't have a definitive solution to the problems of war but you just sent 30,000 troops off to fight one? So what you are in effect saying is that sending more troops to Afghanistan was little more than a guess and a lot of that hope you've been talking about? Didn't you ever learn that when you gamble the house usually wins? And now you're talking about a "just peace?" What happened to a "just war?" Are you saying you have to justify peace rather than war? "A just peace" makes absolutely no sense. When is peace unjust? Give me an unjust peace over a just war any day.

"We must begin by acknowledging the hard truth that we will not eradicate violent conflict in our lifetimes. There will be times when nations—acting individually or in concert—will find the use of force not only necessary but morally justified."

The former is true. Our only chance of humans to stop fighting each other is if/when we discover other intelligent life in the universe. Only then will we unite to try to fight them. The latter scares the crap out of me. Obama's use of the phrase "morally justified" reminds me of Dubyah's use of the word crusade in referring to Iraq. Morality is nothing more than opinion that has been forced on the masses. This is the bane of democracy, that the cult of personality can dictate the lives of everyone.

"I make this statement mindful of what Martin Luther King said in this same ceremony years ago—“Violence never brings permanent peace. It solves no social problem: it merely creates new and more complicated ones.” As someone who stands here as a direct consequence of Dr. King’s life’s work, I am living testimony to the moral force of non-violence. I know there is nothing weak—nothing passive—nothing naïve—in the creed and lives of Gandhi and King."

Mindful but not practicing. Intent means nothing. You are the sum of your actions, and you, my friend, are no Dr. King, though you drop his name a lot. And no, you are not testimony to a moral force of non-violence, you are testimony to the inevitable force of economics. Dr. King was a factor of economic transition and growth as we all are. If there wasn't a Dr. King, then we would be citing another. The proof is in the fact that when Dr. King died, the force behind him continued. Change is not the result of leaders, leaders are the result of inevitable change. This change is amoral and occurs despite any personal morality, not because of it.

"But as a head of state sworn to protect and defend my nation, I cannot be guided by their examples alone. I face the world as it is, and cannot stand idle in the face of threats to the American people. For make no mistake: evil does exist in the world. A non-violent movement could not have halted Hitler’s armies. Negotiations cannot convince al Qaeda’s leaders to lay down their arms. To say that force is sometimes necessary is not a call to cynicism—it is a recognition of history; the imperfections of man and the limits of reason."

Evil does not exist in the world. Differences of opinion exist in the world. Ignorance exists in the world. Evil does not. And likewise, good does not exist either. Both of these are merely words used in propaganda to create an us and a them. The last line is very nice: To say that force is sometimes necessary... That should of been his lead (send me your speech next time and I'll fix it for you—regardless of policies, I'll always support good writing.)

"Yet the world must remember that it was not simply international institutions—not just treaties and declarations—that brought stability to a post-World War II world. Whatever mistakes we have made, the plain fact is this: the United States of America has helped underwrite global security for more than six decades with the blood of our citizens and the strength of our arms."

Yeah, but. Great point in here. In a world full of pacifists, one of them would eventually figure out they can kick everyone else's ass with little resistance and take over by force. Pacifists forget they live because there are people willing to fight. Yet while it is true that America has underwritten much of the global security, we must also acknowledge that this was done with our own end in mind. We chose that role in exchange for becoming a superpower. We chose then and choose now the number of Americans that will die for the cost of this power. Obama has just upped this cost to a potential 30,000 more American troops. Maybe it's time to reassess the cost benefit ratio.

"The service and sacrifice of our men and women in uniform has promoted peace and prosperity from Germany to Korea, and enabled democracy to take hold in places like the Balkans. We have borne this burden not because we seek to impose our will. We have done so out of enlightened self-interest—because we seek a better future for our children and grandchildren, and we believe that their lives will be better if other peoples’ children and grandchildren can live in freedom and prosperity."

Yeah, self-interest, but enlightened self-interest? Are you kidding me? Do you get how elitist this sounds? Such smugness as this makes me a bit ashamed as an American that my president would say this. We are enlightened? Because you, World, don't get that, sorry, but y'all aren't enlightened yet. Don't worry we'll continue to protect you until you become just like us.

What an arrogant ass.

"What might this evolution [of human institutions] look like? What might these practical steps be?

To begin with, I believe that all nations—strong and weak alike—must adhere to standards that govern the use of force. I—like any head of state—reserve the right to act unilaterally if necessary to defend my nation. Nevertheless, I am convinced that adhering to standards, international standards, strengthens those who do, and isolates and weakens those who don't."

So Obama is stating that all nations have the right to defend their nations? This implies that it is the leaders’ of these nations prerogative to define exactly what defending their nation means. Hitler thought he was defending his nation from Jews, minorities, and homosexuals when millions were brutally killed in the name of nationalism.

Obama, like most other politicians, is attempting to create a standard that only applies to the good guys, which happens to be him, not his country, but him personally. Bush was notorious for doing this when he would sign bills into law but include exceptions with his signature. In other words, like morality, these are rules for others, not the self.

Like the U.S. invasion of Iraq, these standards that Obama talks about will be used when his enemies break them and ignored when he breaks them. Let's face it, Obama is closing Guantanamo Bay, but he's keeping the prisoners. Obama is saying we should have rules but extraordinary rendition is still quietly endorsed by Obama.

"The world rallied around America after the 9/11 attacks, and continues to support our efforts in Afghanistan, because of the horror of those senseless attacks and the recognized principle of self-defense. Likewise, the world recognized the need to confront Saddam Hussein when he invaded Kuwait—a consensus that sent a clear message to all about the cost of aggression."

Correction: much of the world rallied. Some of the world was involved in attacking us. Others in the world applauded this attack. To imply everybody in the world was on our side would negate the necessity of this peace prize. Yes, true, much of the "world recognized the need to confront Saddam Hussein when he invaded Kuwait." But, it is also true that much of the world did not recognize the U.S. invasion of Iraq, but we did it anyway.

Obama is attempting to define those who sympathize with American political goals as "the world" and those who do not as something else, perhaps something barbaric, so it is easy to "justify" retaliation, or in many cases, aggressive exploitation.

"I believe that force can be justified on humanitarian grounds, as it was in the Balkans, or in other places that have been scarred by war. Inaction tears at our conscience and can lead to more costly intervention later. That's why all responsible nations must embrace the role that militaries with a clear mandate can play to keep the peace."

Many of the problems in the Balkans were a direct result of the Marshall Plan which Obama invoked in name earlier in this speech and in practice during his presidency. Early in his career "Senator J. William Fulbright wrote that the Marshall Plan stopped the Soviet Union from possibly taking over Western Europe 'through the manipulation of Communist parties, military intimidation, economic strangulation, and even more direct military action'" (see The Marshall Plan of 1947).

During the Carter administration, the U.S. followed a policy of intervention in Afghanistan to help Afghanis fight the Soviets. This effort is often credited for leading to the collapse of the Soviet Union. Of course the side effect of our involvement was the attacks against the U.S. on 11 September 2001. As far as I know, the cost of this later incident has been more than one trillion dollars. Here is one of many examples we can illustrate to point to the fact that Obama is spouting propaganda that has no bearing on history or reality in general.

"That's why we honor those who return home from peacekeeping and training abroad to Oslo and Rome; to Ottawa and Sydney; to Dhaka and Kigali—we honor them not as makers of war, but of wagers—but as wagers of peace."

Oh. Now that makes sense. That is why the U.S. changed the name of the Secretary of War to the Secretary of Defense, coincidentally around the time of the Marshall Plan. And that explains why the U.S. embraces religion so much, we aren't killing people, we are freeing them of their Earthly baggage. Now I get it. Yes. We are spreading freedom in this way. That explains why Kissinger won the Nobel Peace Prize also.

With this logic, might I suggest that when Obama comes home he gives a speech on how the U.S. government will not be increasing taxes to cover their obscene spending, but instead they will be relieving the average American's potential debt burden. Might I also suggest that the Internal Revenue Service be renamed the Spending Relief Service.

"I believe the United States of America must remain a standard bearer in the conduct of war. That is what makes us different from those whom we fight. That is a source of our strength. That is why I prohibited torture. That is why I ordered the prison at Guantanamo Bay closed. And that is why I have reaffirmed America's commitment to abide by the Geneva Conventions. We lose ourselves when we compromise the very ideals that we fight to defend. (Applause.)"

Granted Obama prohibited torture, but extraordinary rendition may be expanding under his watch. So while technically American agents may not be torturing, who knows where these people go and what is being done to them. And as I've already mentioned, Guantanamo Bay itself is simply a location. Obama misses the point completely when he closes the prison but keeps the prisoners. Guantanamo Bay came to represent a great injustice. Getting rid of the representation does nothing to the injustice itself. This moment of the speech was the only one besides the courtesy in the beginning and end for which Obama received a group applause.

"I have spoken at some length to the question that must weigh on our minds and our hearts as we choose to wage war. But let me now turn to our effort to avoid such tragic choices, and speak of three ways that we can build a just and lasting peace. First, in dealing with those nations that break rules and laws, I believe that we must develop alternatives to violence that are tough enough to actually change behavior ..."

What happen to all of Obama's promises of diplomacy during his campaign? Obama is stating the same tired strategy that his predecessors have tried and failed at. Sanctions create an underground market and lead to greater problems like nuclear proliferation, for if there are sanctions, then how in the world are these small sanctioned nations being supplied?

The U.S. (and most other Western nations) has (have) a long history of violating sanctions. Selling under-the-table arms. Violating our own policies. And on and on. I shouldn't be surprised when a politician offers as a solution to follow old failed policies.

"This brings me to a second point—the nature of the peace that we seek. For peace is not merely the absence of visible conflict. Only a just peace based on the inherent rights and dignity of every individual can truly be lasting."

Here is that "just" peace again. In other words, the world must follow Obama's definition of peace, even if this definition includes sending 30,000 troops to potential death for what was once considered a strategic piece of real estate. Technology makes this a moot point.

During his second tedious point, Obama states, "America has never fought a war against a democracy."

Technically Obama is correct if we consider there never existed a true democracy, a government run by the people. One came close; most others rely on representative democracy. Now if Obama meant a looser connotation of democracy then, like most other riffs on history he is prone to expound, he is most definitely wrong as usual.

The earliest case would be the Native American peoples that inhabited our land prior to us. Many of their nations were forms of democracies. Ok, technically we were under English rule then. But then that points to England itself. The colonists (us) rebelled against a democracy. Granted England had a king, but historians will state that by this time the king was subject to parliament.

Ok, once again we can argue we weren't really the United States at that point. Shortly after we were the U.S. though, we entered the Franco-American Naval War with France who was also a fledgling democracy. Oh, and let's not forget we got back into it with England in the War of 1812. We didn't have France on our side this time so didn't exactly win, but we got a heck of a song out of it.

Obama's obvious faux pas was forgetting the U.S. Civil War. This is one of the few wars that the U.S. actually won all by ourselves. Of course we technically lost this one too. Politicians like to say we were fighting for the end to slavery, but that isn't true by a long shot. We were fighting for federalism, the strengthening of a central federal government and the weakening of individual state powers. Technically the winning side fought for less democracy.

One might even consider our fight with Germany during World War II against a democracy. Hitler was actually elected. Sure we can point out the concentration camps, but America had its own full of Japanese American citizens. This illustrates that democracy does not equate to good. Democracy can be positive or negative the same as every other form of government.

I'll end on Vietnam. Remember Vietnam was a French colony for a long time and as such had certain democratic elements. Further, Vietnam was seeking independence and its leaders went so far as to read the U.S. Declaration of Independence at a public gathering with U.S. officials present to show our support. This, of course, was before we realized that France would be a better ally against the Soviet Union and decided to switch sides.

The irony of Vietnam is that not only did we lose in a big way, but if we maintained our loyalty to Vietnam, it is credible to believe we would have maintained a large influence on Vietnam and established it as a democratic nation rather than a communist nation. It is also possible that Vietnam would have acquired its independence with little bloodshed given our past relations with France.

Because democracy isn't anything that we can concretely define, Obama's statement is only true because a true democratic nation has never existed. History tells us that the United States has many examples in our past where we've fought against the principles of democracy, such as freedom and liberty. Of course we are not alone, as we have the rest of the world governments for company in this practice.

Another statement in Obama's second belabored points was:

"In light of the Cultural Revolution's horrors, Nixon's meeting with Mao appeared inexcusable—and yet it surely helped set China on a path where millions of its citizens have been lifted from poverty and connected to open societies."

Today China holds a position similar to the position the U.S. held after WWII. They are America's biggest lender. Nixon's meeting "appeared inexcusable" because most politicians favored sanctions over diplomacy, the same type of policy Obama advocates earlier in this speech. If you've read one of Obama's books, you'd recognize this as Obama's tendency to exemplify a part of history that counters his own statement in a manner to portray it as supporting his philosophy.

"Third, a just peace includes not only civil and political rights—it must encompass economic security and opportunity. For true peace is not just freedom from fear, but freedom from want."

And I thought Obama had just left the U.S. How long has this guy been out of the country? Doesn't he know what's going on here? And if he does. Does he have the audacity to really make a statement like this?

"It is undoubtedly true that development rarely takes root without security; it is also true that security does not exist where human beings do not have access to enough food, or clean water, or the medicine they need to survive. It does not exist where children cannot aspire to a decent education or a job that supports a family. The absence of hope can rot a society from within."

Obama speaks to the world but has not accomplished these tasks in his own backyard. Our water is filled with toxins and traces of pharmaceutical drugs. Free trade only exists for large corporations, and the average American cannot take advantage of lower cost prescription drugs across our border. And education only gets a promise of $4 billion, a fraction of the many many subsidies Obama has and will grant in the name of "saving our economy," "reforming health care," and "protecting our environment."

Obama calls on hope again. The same tactic he used during his presidential campaign. But it seems that's all he knows how to do is hope. We don't need hope. We need action. The time for hoping for change is over. Change will come, but not from Obama. It will come from every individual with little help from our governments.

Obama's Nobel Prize acceptance speech is banal, dull, and full of hypocrisy. It is the same vague notions that Obama has come to represent. Little substance. He invokes the name of Martin Luther King Jr many times. He invokes the name of Gandhi. He invokes the name of John F. Kennedy. The only name he doesn't invoke is his own. The reason? Winning the U.S. presidency is his only major accomplishment.

Unfortunately, the state of our U.S. politics is such that Obama, despite his broken promises, his making a bad situation worse, was still the best choice in a selection of bad choices. Yet what made him the best choice was the one factor which was beyond his control. His mixed race made him the first real representative of the American people.

For that, he will have a legacy. The black-white tension in America finally comes full circle with President Obama. Granted our ancestors also have a bad history with the Native Americans who proceeded us, with Japanese-Americans, with Mexican-Americans, tensions with races we've long forgotten; but the black-white tension in America greatly surpassed other racial tensions here.

For once in our history our nation is united, for better or worse, behind one man. We are united in our support of him, or we are united in our distain for his ineffectualness. Either way, he has brought us together as we have never been before.

For this reason alone, President Barack Obama deserves the Nobel Peace Prize. Not for his own actions as president, as a U.S. politician, as a world figure. He deserves this award for something completely out of his control, for something he rarely speaks about, for being a U.S. president who happens to be both black and white.

In this way, Obama has restored a measure of peace. He's rekindled opportunity, part of that American dream. He removed a fear. Yet ironically, he's accomplished this in the same manner that he's failed on the economy, health care, and education, by doing nothing.

Those Who Use Science Only When It Is Convenient; Religion, Swine Flu, and Bill Maher

A few weeks back I watched an episode ("Truth or Consequences") of the television show Lie to Me. Anyone who knows me could probably guess why I like this show; it's all about analysis. This episode, though, had me bothered.

On this episode, Eli Loker (Brendan Hines) and Dr. Gillian Foster (Kelli Williams) have the following dialog:

Loker: "Wacky religions, they don't bother me because they're no more wacky than the mainstream ones. Do you really believe there's a man in the clouds who will solve your problems if you make a wish to him?"

Foster: "So being a scientist means I can't believe in God?"

Um. Duh.

Ok, granted, I get it, semantics. Sure you can create your own definition of scientist and then include superstitions within this definition. But that's a bit like those self-help gurus who teach success when their only real success has been taking money from gullible people down on their luck.

If you want to get technical though a scientist is one who practices science. And of course science depends on two important denotations:

1. a branch of knowledge or study dealing with a body of facts or truths systematically arranged and showing the operation of general laws: the mathematical sciences.

2. systematic knowledge of the physical or material world gained through observation and experimentation (Dictionary.com).

In other words, science is a systematic analysis of empirical data. Science is the practice of defining reality based on human observations. Belief in science is limited to hypothesis. And in good science, hypothesis is no foundation for reality.

Of course I've run across my fair share of so called "religious scientists." Oxymorons, all of them. Yet we are all human and have vivid imaginations so can never quite escape it completely. A good scientist acknowledges this human tendency and keeps it well in check.

So no, you cannot call yourself a proper scientist and believe in gods or leprechauns. No unicorns either I'm afraid. The good news is that you can believe in dinosaurs, but sorry no, people weren't around yet.

Yes there probably was a guy whose Greek name was Jesus, Joshua, I believe in Hebrew. If fact, I'm sure there were hundreds of them. A few were probably also so-called prophets. But none of them had superpowers. And sorry no, Superman and Spider-man, while there are probably real people named Clark Kent and Peter Parker, these people don't have superpowers either.

No miracles, only good and bad luck. Wait, actually no luck either, only chance, which isn't actually random but only so complex as to seem random to the human mind. No ghosts and no vampires that want to make passionate love to our women (sorry ladies). And while there is a statistical chance that intelligent life exists in the universe, so far we are the closest thing to it that anyone on Earth has experienced.

Emphatically no, you cannot be a proper scientist and believe in gods, alien abduction, or those pills that promise to make your penis bigger. You can still be a poor scientist though. We've got lots of them. That explains why eggs are good for you on odd numbered years, and bad for you on even numbered years.

That brings me to Bill Maher. I have a great respect for Maher. I generally catch his show Real Time whenever I can and enjoy listening to what he has to say. If I had to throw out a number, I'd say I tend to agree with him 60-75 percent of the time, though often for completely different reasons.

Like me, Maher is non-religious in the popular sense of the term. Unlike me, he is an atheist in the vain of Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens. In other words, he's traded in religious belief for a secular religion.

People often get confused by me because I openly state that I am without belief. Yet in that same breath I state I am not an atheist. I acknowledge that I am a Christian by culture and then religious people get excited and think that I can be saved. I assert that atheism is nothing but a secular religion and atheist get angry.

Simply stated, I don't accept the labels of others and find it ridiculous to define oneself by a negation. The only label I willingly accept is heretic because I completely deny the tenets of the religion I was born into. I don't believe in the non-empirical. No, not even a tiny bit.

Atheism is odd because people form solidarity based on a arbitrary non-belief. If you really lack belief, then it makes just as much sense to join anti-unicorn groups. I believe atheism is a step toward true non-belief, but a step that confuses cultural artifact of religion that we cannot avoid with a personal theory of knowledge.

And yes I'm on a bit of a religious tangent because understanding religion and belief is critical to understanding our actions. The practice of abandoning mainstream religion for atheism is akin to abandoning a Western religion for an Eastern one. When one does this, one isn't being more rational, but simply exchanging one belief system for another, even if it be a secular one.

Most self-proclaimed atheists are guilty of this because our human tendency once again triumps. Here is where I pick on Bill Maher, though it is with affection.

On the one hand, Maher pleads to his listener with a constant barrage of appeals to science. Religion is crazy. It isn't rational. That's why we have science. He is a self-identified atheist. Yet when his own irrational, albeit secular, belief system emerges, science be damned.

Maher has gotten some extra press regarding his recent statements on Real Time regarding his mistrust of the Swine Flu vaccine. His PETA/eco-radical/neo-hippy pseudo-philosophy trumps science in this and many other matters. (The password is hypocrisy.)

That's cool if he has his own belief system that stems from mindlessly following secular cult movements. As I've stated elsewhere and often, I am a non-believer in everything, but actually support other people believing in made up stuff. Hey, if it gets you through the day, right? And can you image what these people would do if they didn't have some of these limits imposed on them?

But when someone imposes their belief on others, I have to call them out for their logical flaws. I'd expect nothing less than the same consideration for anything I state.

Bill Maher is outspoken against religion. He is outspoken against many conspiracy theories, especially those centering on the 11 September attacks. Yet when he speaks of vaccines, science leaves the studio, while political-corporate conspiracies rush in. So for Bill Maher's sake, and the sake of everyone else, let's have a little review:

1. About 36,000 people die from the normal flu each year inside the United States.
   
   
2. So far, within the U.S. anywhere from a few to 1000 people have died while having the Swine Flu depending on source and their methods. Most deaths are complications of other conditions.
   
   
3. In 1918, an H1N1 variant resulted in the worldwide deaths of about 50-100 million people. Again this is a very large range to consider. About 30 percent of the population became infected and about 10 percent of those infected died.
   
   
4. In 1976, another H1N1 variant emerged in the U.S. Because of typical government inefficiency, the handling of this resulted in a panic and general fiasco. Considering the 1918 outbreak, concern in 1976 and today is rational. What troubled the '76 handling was the 532 cases of Guillain-Barré syndrome that were linked to the vaccine. Because 48,161,019 Americans were vaccinated, this number represents 0.001 percent, or one-thousandth of a percent, of those vaccinated. Of course people panicked as they always do and stopped taking the vaccine. The '76 outbreak quietly went away without much spread.
   
   
5. Since 1976 several studies have been conducted and data does not show a correlation between modern vaccines and Guillain-Barré syndrome. Because of technology, newer vaccines have a tendency to be safer than their predecessors.
   
   

It's easy to get caught up in fear. Let's face it, America invaded two countries because 2,993 of us died on 11 September, and this has resulted in several thousand more Americans dying as well as over one hundred thousand non-Americans dying and millions suffering. And still the normal flu quietly kills 36,000 of us each year.

Being a father of two young boys, I know the panic one feels when the safety of our loved ones is jeopardized. If one or both of my sons had died in New York that day, then I could easily imagine myself wanting to invade anywhere and kill anyone I thought might be involved. I can only hope that others around me, sympathetic though detached, could respond more reasonably and keep my emotions in check.

Yet even if one son died at the hands of terrorists, I could never imagining being so emotionally distraught that I would sacrifice my other son to avenge the first. Fear, though, penetrates rationality, and as a nation, this is what we've done.

And now we face that latest Swine Flu. We face more fear because fear is a symptom of ignorance, of the unknown. We've already experienced a few cycles of panic here in the States as the media drones on about the Swine Flu, for which the pork industry wishes they call it H1N1 despite this name being less specific.

That brings us to my current reality. Recently my boys' elementary school, via the government, offered free Swine Flu immunizations for both my children. As a parent I had to decide whether to give them permission to administer these. I could, like Maher, abandon science and rationality for some quasi-secular belief system, or I can keep my inherent fear as a parent in check and analyze the data.

While vaccines are the safest they have ever been, there will always be side-effects. The rational question is: What is the greater risk, complications from the vaccine or complications from the Swine Flu? The good news is that both numbers are statistically low, so your current odds are decent with either decision.

The bad news is that we can't predict the future. The Swine Flu could become a pandemic, doesn't look like it now, but possible. Or, the Swine Flu could quietly go away like its kin did in 1976. Whatever the case, the statistical odds are better with the vaccine than without it.

Yes, we can expect deaths that people will claim are associated with this latest vaccine. I could potentially die from a penicillin shot because I'm allergic, but I don't blame the penicillin. Should everyone else shun penicillin because of my own condition? Gosh, I'd feel kind of special, but bad at the same time if you pass on a case of V.D.

My advice to all'y'all is to talk to the best doctor you have available and ask his/her advice. Don't listen to me. Don't listen to the media. Don't listen to politicians. Listen to people who are in the best position to give advice based on the reality that you and I seem to share.

The general advice will be that high risk people definitely get vaccinated. The rest depends on the doctor's disposition. Healthy people tend to build up immunities to common colds and flus naturally and vaccine efficacy can be as low as 20 percent in some cases. This basically means for some people a vaccine does absolutely nothing.

Personally I prefer the injection over the nasal spray even though I hate needles. I've signed up both my boys for injections for the Swine Flu vaccine, but canceled their appointments to get the normal flu vaccine because my doctor only had the nasal sprays available at this time.

The Swine Flu works a bit differently than the normal flu because it causes your immune system to over-react. This is why young people are most at risk, because they have stronger immune systems and therefore more of a risk against themselves. But even for those who catch the Swine Flu, most will not experience these severe symptoms.

I guess you can live your life by belief. In most cases you should be statistically safe. But somebody usually wins the lottery. Unfortunately it is often Shirley Jackson writing the story. I prefer to involve myself in life using rationality rather than wishful thinking or ignorant skepticism.

Science should not be used like religion, only when it is convenient. Yeah, I know, it's hard to give up old habits like professing a profound faith in your god's will from behind the bullet-proof glass of your Pope Mobile. Science doesn't sell indulgences. You either follow it or you don't.

How Bandwagoning Generalizations Destroy the Fabric of Society; or Why Warren Buffett, Michael Moore, and Modern Science Are Often Full of It

Like an ex-high-school athlete watching professional sports on television, I too yell at my TV. Ok so I don't watch much sports. I'm yelling at "educational" television and news programs. Yeah, I know, it's kind of sick.

I thought about writing about each of these incidents on my other blog where I don't apply the same sort of linguistic restrictions that occur here. But I found a common thread. In all of these cases, those on the other side of transmission were guilty of gross generalizations. So I thought this a perfect opportunity to pick on Buffett, Moore, and modern science, and heck, let's thrown in abortion, gay marriage, and environment issues.

Flipping through the channels, I'm the kind of person to stop dead when I see Bill Gates and Warren Buffett talking on a stage. I have enormous respect for these people, but not so much that I won't call them out when they obviously say something completely stupid. I'll spare Gates this time and focus on a statement of Buffett.

The show was Gates and Buffett on stage in front of an auditorium of business students who were given the opportunity to ask these gentlemen questions. One of the questions asked was, "Do you support a flat-tax system." Buffett responded and Gates, with puppy-dog eyes and bobble-head kinesthetics, simply nodded along.

Basically Buffett said no, he did not support a flat-tax system. This is not what flummoxed me. His reason for not supporting a flat-tax system was that our current graduated-tax system (here in the U.S.) did not work because people like himself (the insanely rich) could still end up paying less taxes than those making much less money because of loop-holes in the system.

Stay with me here. Buffett believes, or at least states in public, that the rich should pay more, acknowledges that our current system which is supposed to support this doesn't work, yet quickly states he does not support a flat-tax system.

He rambled on a bit, but this is the substance of what he said that day. He completely ignored the fact that a flat-tax system would greatly simplify taxation, and thereby, make it more difficult to avoid paying taxes. In practice, the rich would actually end up paying more than they do now in our convoluted tax system.

I won't go on about taxes here, taxation is another future post. My point here is that Buffett exemplifies with this statement the danger of gross generalization. He conveys a conviction that the rich should be paying more and that currently they don't, but then supports the status quo because the current system should follow this belief. This leaves his listener with a couple of possible conclusions.

Either Buffett really doesn't believe what he is stating. Buffett may simply be courting popular opinion here and saying how bad the current system is while not really wanting to change it. Or. Buffett has fallen prey to generalization. And he is blindly following a principle that has failed miserably in practice.

Only when we get past the generalizations of what is supposed to happen in given systems can we properly analyze what works and what doesn't. That is the focus of this post. Yes, at some point in my life I'll cover each topic skimmed here in greater detail, but let's save that for a future discussion, and focus here instead on how generalization makes each of these issues murky rather than bringing the clarity needed for rational discussion.

Number two on my hit list is Michael Moore. Moore is an odd character because many, including myself, might state that they agree with much of what Moore states. On closer examination, this ends up being due to Moore never really stating anything specific. His M.O. is to follow pre-Technicolor standards.

Back in the day of poor quality television, when the world was literally black and white. The good guys were arbitrarily given white hats and the bad guys were arbitrarily given black hats. Yes, we can argue issues of racism, but I've found the simplest explanations are most often the closest to the truth. Somebody has to wear one hat, and somebody has to wear the other. We'll move on.

The reason behind this white hat/black hat decision was simply to allow the audience to follow along easier. Remember way back in the day when theater performers wore those exaggerated masks? Same thing. Unfortunately, despite Technicolor and hi-definition television, many people, including Michael Moore, are stuck in this mentality.

Moore sets up a black hat, then he sets up a white hat. He places everything he is against under the black hat and everything he is for under the white hat. In his latest documentary for which he spoke about on a recent episode of Real Time with Bill Maher he calls the black hat capitalism and the white hat democracy.

To be fair to Moore I haven't yet seen his film. All I can analyze are his statements on Real Time. There he stated we must move away from capitalism and toward democracy. Only when people have a say in the market will the "good guys" win. My first thought was: if capitalism is so bad then why is Moore showing his latest documentary in movie theaters rather than showing it on public television?

This is a bit like a fat guy talking about good health care. It generalizes an argument so far that it makes absurd statements possible. Maher, to his credit and with my great respect, told Moore that he disagreed with him. Moore in response told Maher that the capitalism that Maher thought of was an old version that no longer existed.

I just hope Moore isn't talking about that bastion of democracy that the classical Greeks employed. You know that one we all still look back to where only the men had a vote while their women and slaves stood at home. You know, that democracy where their leaders extorted all the city-states and horded all the wealth in Athens. Moore does describe this, but he calls it capitalism.

What people often forget when they talk about big business, government, religion, etc., is that people run all these institutions. To simplify things let's think of a gun. We can manufacture a gun and place it on a table. It will stay there and not hurt anybody. Only when someone decides to pick it up and does something with it do good or bad things happen. We can defend a nation or principle with that gun, or we can rob a liquor store and murder someone.

What politicians will not state and what talking heads will avoid stating is that the underlying problems of society are not caused by artifacts or institutions, they are caused by people. In other words, we cause our own problems. Any system of government has the potential to work effectively so long as the people support it. And here is the problem, random deviation. Capitalistic principles most closely account for these deviations, but like any other system is prone to problems.

More on capitalism in another post. My point here is that neither democracy nor capitalism is deserving of a white or black hat. Nothing is. Either can work; either can fail. In reality, many of the principles within each and other institutions overlap and are part of both systems. Our focus should not be on the institutions, but on people and their behavior.

Modern science. My intellectual lineage stems from John Locke. So when I hear scientific method I think Locke and empiricism. I think of our external physical senses as our only bridge between what we think of as our shared reality and our individual minds. Then I am often faced with the travesties of modern academic science that is driven more by publication than rational analysis.

The result is a "scientist" on television "explaining" how a certain species of animal "evolved" in order to "take advantage" of a certain food stock. Examples like this of either pure ignorance or abuse of established principles is exactly why the Egyptians invented steam power thousands of years before anybody got around to doing anything about it. Statements along these lines set us back again to humans being the center of the universe.

And then we wonder why creationism has such a large following. Our own scientific community doesn't even understand basic evolutionary principles. There is no conscious effort in evolutions, no creative mind. A species doesn't one day think, if only I had a longer beak, then I could get at those insects better, and poof. No. Evolution is dumb. Evolution is freaks of the establishment for which most actually die. But every once in a very long while, one of those freaks gets an advantage.

But the term evolution has been given a connotation, a generalization (which is completely misguided and wrong), of purpose. When we make the statement: "He/She needs to evolve," what do you think of? Most think of a higher standard. In reality most cases of evolution fail miserably. The basic principle is that so many mutations occur that eventually through blind chance, one comes out with an advantage over the norm. How many mutations must occur for this to happen? I don't know exactly. All I know is that it's going to be a lot.

We forget about all the failure in evolution and focus on the one rare exception that has succeeded and call that one freak incident evolution. This is where the nut-cases come in and think this something divine rather than random. And "scientists" support this false generalization by making such asinine statements as a species evolves because... Idiots. Thanks for once again setting us back a century.

Oh, and on this show, the real topic was how each night when we go to sleep our brains "play back" the events in the day in order that we engrain this in our long term memory. It was an example of an academic scientist desperate to get published. It was a fairly arbitrary interpretation of some vague data. Much of modern science is exactly this: an arbitrary interpretation of vague data in order to secure publication. Forget that there is no actual evidence that should lead one in this direction. It is good enough that there is no evidence to refute what the good doctor(s) is/are saying.

If you recall this is the same standard that the "Sun is pulled across the sky by a chariot" and "Earth is the center of the universe" proponents employed. The current data could support these theories, and currently nothing refutes them. So there. It must be true.

A real scientist would state something like, hey, there is a correlation in brain activity here and here. And that's it. You can't make conclusions from correlations. This is what separates the world of reality from that of generalization. In reality correlations have nothing to do with causality and therefore, not much can be stated about them. For those who generalize, everything is causal. Flat taxes will cause economic disparity, capitalism causes misery, a need for change causes change.

No. No. And no.

My point here is that if you want to make an argument, then start with a real premise that you are ready to support with evidence and data. If you want to go back to the days of black and white television, then you really have nothing to say and perhaps it would be better if you shut up, and maybe wait until the day you have specific points that can be debated on individual merits.

And for those listening to all the talking heads out there: start listening for individual points. Don't blindly agree to a vague notion like capitalism, democracy, or freedom. Find out specifically what this talking head means by each of these. Find out what each talking head believes about specific issues. What you will find is that you will both agree and disagree about something with just about everyone on the planet. But, likewise, you will never completely agree with everything one person believes. Consider this before giving away your money.

So let's see how we can harpoon the bloated generalities that suffocate modern issues like abortion, gay marriage, and the environment by introducing simple specifics:

The traditional stance of a Christian when it comes to abortion is to be pro-life. Yet if we look at some minor details one can reasonably conclude that the proper stance of a Christian would be to support the government not interfering in a person's choice of whether to have an abortion or not.

What I would ask is that if a god exists, then why does free will seem to exist? For if free will did not exist then there is no need for debate and people will do what they must. So this argument tacitly assumes free will exists. A Christian tacitly believes a god exists. Therefore, my question: Why does free will exist?

Why would a god give one a choice to believe in it or not? The basic Christian answer is that one must choose this god rather than be forced to choose because it is only through this choice that you become close to this god. Most people should see where I'm going with this.

Based on Christian faith, to remove choice from a person's life is to remove the basis of Christian faith. Regardless of whether it is legal we all have a choice whether to kill someone or not. It is a Christian's choice not to, and to honor their god's covenant that makes them Christian. Without this choice, there is no faith and Christianity becomes irrelevant.

Therefore, a true Christian would support all matters of freedom of choice. This includes abortion-rights. For a real Christian would have the right to have an abortion, but would choose to honor their faith by choosing not to.

Like-wise gays should be against gay-marriage. I believe any politician worth their salt wouldn't care one way or the other whether gay marriage is legal or not. What counts is that the people are asking the government for permission. Either way the current power structure wins, not the people.

The moment we ask the government to decide, the people lose. It becomes by your leave, my lord, rather than by our choice. It is not the government's business how I or you define our personal relationships. Modern common law doesn't even follow government standards because contemporary relationships vary to such a large degree.

The government does not need to define marriage. It is a personal matter where religions should be free to set their own standards as are the non-religious. It would be a simple matter to set up social practices where individuals could legally define how others affect their lives, but this has nothing to do with any notions of marriage or the real underlying issue of sex.

For example, medical rights often correlate to marriage but are not restricted to it. Single people may want to grant certain rights to others in their family or to lifelong friends. Granting rights such as these have nothing to do with marriage other than that correlation I wrote of.

And the environment. A while back on Bill Maher, Maher complained about cows farting and polluting the environment. I wondered why peoples' farts were any better. Then I thought, well that's just PETA talking.

The big argument is that the environment is good and industry is bad. And like most poor arguments, this comes from jumping to invalid conclusions based on scientific data. For some time back a core sample was taken from one of the cold sides of the planet and scientists discovered that the amount of carbon in the atmosphere greatly increased during the time we refer to as the Western industrial revolution. Looking at the data, I myself was impressed by how drastic the change was.

Industry bad, right? Sun revolve around the Earth, right?

Because I lacked better things to do, I poked around other data. I also found that during this same time, the amount of people alive followed this same trend. In fact, if we ignore scale, the number of people alive was almost identical to carbon emissions.

Then I got to thinking. What did the industrial revolution allow? Well it allowed most people to be sustained more efficiently, and it allowed these same people to live longer lives. So yeah, maybe industry is bad for the environment, but only because it allows more people to live. Now we run into a bit of a problem.

I'm going to ignore the whole valid argument that the planet is changing despite us rather than because of us because other valid contradictions can be found even by ignoring this. With our industry argument, the real thorn is people, not factories (nor cows farting for that matter).

This makes much more sense because within a confined system (such as Earth), greater consumption inevitably leads to exhaustion of resources. In many ways this reflects the state of our environment because one may argue our environment suffers from over consumption. And the most obvious issue is greater populations living longer lives.

The average pro-environmentalist doesn't like where this leads because it places them in a position of making statements they don't want to make. War becomes a positive factor because it keeps population in check. Let's not forget that industry has the effect of making nations more likely to protect their assets so less likely to engage in war (at least locally). How about birth control? How about the death penalty? Anything we can do to reduce our numbers and save the environment, right?

The environment is our greatest case study in why blind generalization does not work. There are no generalized solutions down that road. Universal health care in the U.S. is likely to have a similar effect on the environment as the industrial revolution did. Therefore should we not move forward on this? Is it better that some people die so others can live?

These are questions that can never be answered by generalizations. And that is why the U.S. and many of its allies are so slow at getting anything done. Most of our inventions have been invented many times over in the past. The real challenge for change is getting past the social mindset of pre-World War II television.