Got another “scientific report” (read that with ‘finger quotes’) from the folks at the conservative thinktank The Heartland Institute. If you actually read my blog much (don’t worry, I have no illusions that anyone really does) you might remember an entry I made last December titled Lies, Damn Lies & the Heartland Institute (still love that title) when I got another report from them. I did some research then on who they were then since a quick glance at the letter and report they sent me then made me quite suspect as to the ‘real science’ it claimed to contain.
“A nonprofit organization devoted to discovering, developing, and promoting free-market solutions to social and economic problems”.
Yeah those free-market solutions always do the best thing for society and making the world a better place. Capitalism is infallable. Continue Reading →
I got up early in the morning yesterday (4:40 AM) to get on a bus to go to Augusta to a public hearing on Maine’s proposed Law for “An Act To End Discrimination in Civil Marriage and Affirm Religious Freedom” (aka the ever so scary “Gay Marriage”) LD 1020. Through e-mails from EqualityMaine I learned supporters of the bill were encourage to wear red, so the night before i went to pick out my clothes and chose a big red shirt that belonged to my late-stepfather Gilbert W. Hart. My mother had given me this at xmas and since Gil was an outspoken and passionate advocate for many issues, especially gay rights. I figured he’d like to have that shirt there and be present at the event
It was really pretty incredible, the event was held at the Augusta Civic Center, which got close to full (one newspaper estimated around 4000), and a majority of the people, like 70%+ were wearing red. Later in the day I think it was closer to 90%. Seeing the ‘Sea of Red’ in the room was amazing in itself, let alone the standing ovations. The testimony was moving and amazing, at least from the supporters. Supporters all spoke about hope, love, life and tangible examples of how civil unions are not the same. I remember one woman yelled into the microphone ‘Separate but equal is NOT EQUAL!’
The opponents had sad tired arguments based on fear, the bible, the ‘defense of marriage’ from being ‘taken over’ by the ‘gay agenda’. “it’s not a slippery slope we’re on the edge of a cliff!’ yelled one person, trying to make it seem like our entire planet would collapse into chaos if gay people could be legally married in Maine. Wow.. so goes the planet, eh? Their statements, often prefaced with ‘I don’t hate gay people .. but … ‘ or ‘I’m not a bigot but… ‘ (if you ever find yourself prefacing your comments with such statements, perhaps you should re-think the comments?) were filled with small definitions of family, parenting and marriage, I almost feel sorry for them if they weren’t so annoying and, often contrary to their preface, bigoted.
I don’t know how the law will do but the hearing was a big win for ‘our side’ and Gil’s shirt was part of it
Video from the event is available here : http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/1417871 .
It starts with a speech by State Senator Dennis Damon, our representative actually, that’s pretty great in itself. Continue Reading →
I work at a research lab in Bar Harbor, Maine as a System Administrator. My name and title have been in my e-mail signature, not to mention various websites for over 10 years now so the various snail junk mail places can harvest it. Most of the time this just means I get little postcards about the latest backup library or some fancy brochure from HP telling me all about their latest servers (which we don’t use) or other useless junk from Microsoft, etc.
Last week a package arrived from the ‘the Heartland Institute‘ addressed to “Matthew Baya, Administrator” and then my workplaces address. Ok.. I’ll admit just the name ‘Heartland Institute’ raised my skeptic alarms (been listening too Skepticality too much perhaps ) but I opened it and pulled out a 40 page booklet called “Nature, Not Human Activity, Rules the Climate’ that is the ‘Summary for policymakers, Nongovernmental International Panel On Climate Change’. There was also a 10 minute DVD called ‘Unstoppable Solar Cycles – The Real Story Of Greenland’ included with it. The cover letter that came with it had the Heartland Institute logo and short summary of them below it;
“A nonprofit organization devoted to discovering, developing, and promoting free-market solutions to social and economic problems
Free-market solutions? To social problems? er.. like what?
Also, I note there is no scientific mission in their charter, so why are they the ones sending this 40 page booklet by the ‘Science and Environmental Policy Project’ to me? and why me?
My heckles were raised enough at this point and as my high school english teacher Mr. Joseph Porpora would say (paraphrasing, it’s been many years)”<SNIF><SNIF>This paper smells like bullshit to me, go rewrite it so it doesn’t stink so much’” so really I was about to toss the whole thing but curiousity got the better of me so I just had to look a little deeper to see if my 30 second assessment was correct. Continue Reading →
