This would have
been hard to write, if Mother Jones magazine hadn’t written it for me. Many thanks! Here are their nominees:
#1 “Basically anything said by Donald Trump,” with marqee mention of calling global warming a “hoax” that’s merely a result of scientists “having a lot of fun.” But Trump’s indictment also includes: (a) claiming vaccines cause autism, (b) objecting to bringing health workers infected by Ebola to the U.S. for treatment, and (c) just being a dumbass in general. (Okay, I added that last one myself.)
#2 “Unnecessary Ebola quarantines.” This is a group photo, with Republican governors Chris Christie and Paul LePage crowding into the front row, with a host of medically ignorant GOP legislators standing and grinning behind them.
#3 “Lamar Smith’s war on the National Science Foundation.” Rep. Smith, “in an unprecedented violation of the historic firewall between the lawmakers who set the NSF’s budget and the top scientists who decide where to direct it,” sent staffers to claw through NSF’s grant files to ferret to out projects he himself deems ungrantworthy, which is anything that doesn’t “directly benefit the American economy.” This is of a piece with the frequently heard rightwing mantra that the only legitimate college majors are those with immediate and direct vocational relevance.
#4 “Battles over Texas textbooks.” The book burners are baaaack. In Texas, where conservatives run everything, the state board of education “has long been a hotbed of science denial” on such issues as evolution and climate change.
#5 “Bill Nye schools creationist Ken Ham; John Holdren schools Congress.” You’ve probably heard about the Nye-Ham debate; if you haven’t, go to YouTube and watch it. It fell to Holdren, as White House science adviser, to explain “elementary school-level concepts to members of the House Science Committee.” That’s what presidential advisers are for — to do the dirty jobs a president won’t touch.
#6 “Senate overrun by climate deniers,” all of them Republicans. For example, Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK) believes “global warming is a hoax orchestrated by Barbra Streisand.”
#7 “I’m not a scientist” is a phrase increasingly used by Republican politicians like this: “Although the fact of climate change seems irrefutable, I’m not a scientist, so I can’t say it’s real.” Now that they can’t get away with outright denial of something that has become scientifically irrefutable.
#8 “Anti-vaxxers are still a thing.” I’ve already introduced this subject under the rubric of Donald Trump, the biggest science ignoramus and denier of them all. (Trump, in case you missed it, also is a world-class birther and a serial bankrupt.) When I was a kid growing up in the 1950s, rightwingers assured us that flouridated drinking water was a commie plot. It would be interesting to know how many of those Birchers et al. who are still around have any teeth left. Here and now, in 2014, measles and other preventable diseases are spiking, and “a surprising number of people across the country continue to be preoccupied with the totally debunked fear that vaccines will lead to autism or other maladies.”
#9 “Contraception = abortion.” Special recognition in this category goes to the 5 conservative Supreme Court justices who ignored scientific and medical facts in concluding that intrauterine devices and ‘morning-after’ pills don’t just prevent pregnancy but also cause abortions.
http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2014/12/worst-science-denial-2014