Tuesday, June 15, 2004
The American Conspiracy Against Common Sense (ACACS) goes far deeper than just the Homeland Security Department.
I have been researching a science story for about a week, and I was hoping to write about it today. It was about "fugu," which is the Japanese delicacy known as blowfish (or pufferfish). The fish is very poisonous (especially it's liver), so only a few chefs are allowed to prepare it. Even then, there are deaths from eating fugu every year. Some scientists have found a way to make blowfish poison-free. It has even been offered that the liver from the new blowfish can be eaten, which is unheard of.
I was going to write about how this breakthrough was a practical application of science, and a good example of how wide the field of science has become. We are no longer just trying to develop weapons, cures for cancer, and space craft. Man's intellectual powers are stronger than ever, even allowing us to alter the very biology of animals on this earth.
BUT... that was before I read the article that came across my desktop today. Now I question if science and common sense aren't actually dying a horrible death. It would make sense, afterall all things are subject to entropy.
I have been purposely avoiding talking about the USA's political situation, as it is a mess. I have very strong thoughts about out current administration, and quite frankly do not trust the government to have my best interests in mind. Here is a non-Bush illustration of why.
The Agriculture Department (USDA) has declared and a court has confirmed that batter-coated french fries are able to be considered a fresh vegetable. In the immortal words of Gilbert Godfrey, "what the f%@*k?!"
Apparently there was some dispute over how the frozen "vegetable" was transported, marketed, and sold. French fry producers wanted to avoid the moniker of processed food. So they turned to the geniuses over at the USDA for help.
For my foreign friends, the United State's USDA has a long record of ignorance. They repeatedly use school provided lunches for children as barter in political arguments, and do very shady things to achieve their goals and budgets.
In the 1980's. the USDA once stated that ketchup (a watery tomato paste used to flavor food) could be considered one of the vegetables in the student's daily diets. Only fitting then that they return to the ketchup's main compliment, the french fry, for more ignorance.
As of now, the ruling does not make the fry classified as a fresh vegetable for school lunches, but that cannot be far off. Nutrition is such a ignored factor in American life, and it is not going to get better if we do not abandon our reckless diets.
So our government (or the people in it), the one we are supposed to put utter faith in, has done a lot of dumb things lately. From severe decisions such as going to war, to minor matters of nutrition, and serious oversights such as our policy of importing prescription drugs without FDA approval, our country is being led by people with great vacuous holes in their common sense.
Another giant leap backward in science came earlier this year. It was announced that many DVD manufacturers were finishing development of disposable movies. The DVDs are packaged in airtight sacks, and once opened, the surface of the DVD begins to oxidize. After 48 hours, the DVD no longer plays. This was someone's good idea to prevent Americans with the huge inconvenience of returning movies to a rental store, and rental stores from the inconvenience of having to maintain their inventory. This was one of the most ridiculous ideas I have ever hear, because it is built on laziness and wastefulness. Do you have any idea of how quickly our landfills are filling up with garbage as it is? How much plastic do you think we can burn, sink, and bury before the Earth is ruined for good?
The waste never ends. There are new "wet wipes" for washing dishes (as if dish rags are so inconvenient to wash), individually wrapped hot dogs for the microwave (what?), disposable mop heads (one use), disposable "sippy cups" for babies, and one-use (non-recyclable) cell phone batteries (allegedly for emergencies).
The city near mine, Omaha, has dug itself into real financial mess over the last few years. The answer to save itself from trouble is fire teachers, police officers, and fire fighters, and to raise taxes. However, the officials still get large salaries, with raises, and they built a giant convention center... and want to add on to it.
In my father's company, they hired too many mechanics to install elevators, so that they could boast that they finished a large project (ironically the same convention center mentioned above) before the deadline. Now those mechanics, including my father, are laid off (without work).
In my city we have three casinos, which is pretty rare in the middle of the USA. These 3 are allowed operate with the hopes that they will a) pay a lot of money back to the government in taxes, and b) put money into a fund to help pay for local projects. And they have done a very good job of paying for parks, renovation of streets, buying playground equipment for schools, and so on. But the schools desperately need funding for teacher's salaries and for text books. Can the Iowa West Foundation (the casino benevolence fund) help out? Nope. The government does not want gambling dollars to pay for things that directly influence our children. The money is there, and going to waste on beautification projects when it could be used directly for education.
In the hospital in which I work, the census (number of patients) is very low lately. The officials of the hospital have a goal to achieve 85% occupancy of the hospital beds. So how do they propose that? They are closing one entire floor, and changing the two bed rooms into one bed rooms. Viola, the occupation percentage has increased greatly... but the paying "customer" count is exactly the same. (Note: there are some benefits to this strategy... they now do not have to staff the closed floor, and many nurses will be without work... therefore the company has "made" money).
So as you see, ignorance is rampant.
This is why I was so pleased to hear about the fugu research. It may be wasteful in the eyes of some to spend money on researching blowfish, but in the end they have come across a discovery that will literally save lives (that is, if the new blowfish taste as good as the others). I say this somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but compared to the other things I mentioned, the fugu research is hard science.
I was also happy to hear that a Japanese citizen, and email friend of mine, had a bit of good news today. Her daughter scored very highly on a test to measure comprehension and knowledge of nutrition. It is very high academic achievement, and also a very practical one in our world of obesity and junk food. The exam was National Exam of Dietician, and my friends said that only 20% of those who take it pass it. She was one of only 3 in her city who passed! Good job!).
So there is hope in our young people that they become educated and practice smart living, smart eating, smart parenting, smart voting, smart purchasing, and smart governing.
But it seems even the Japanese citizens have a few people among them that are not ready to accept science's benefits. The Associated Press reported that one Health Ministry official in Japan is not anxious for poisonless fugu. "Nontoxic fugu is boring. Fugu is exciting because it's toxic."
Ignorance is therefore not an American patent. And I begrudgingly have to admit that the American government isn't the only organization led by a lack of common sense. But it does excel at it.
Get out of Iraq. Stop SUVs. Stop importation of Canadian pharmaceutics. Reform our health care. Stop treating homosexuals like lepers. Reform our voting system (see next blog). Allow NASA to continue exploration. Stop enforcing results-based research. Eat poisonless fugu. Don't destroy Alaska to feed NASCAR and tractor pulls. Learn more than one language before you expect someone else to. The government is not church, and the church is not government. Oh, and french fries are not a fresh vegetable.
See ya!
I was going to write about how this breakthrough was a practical application of science, and a good example of how wide the field of science has become. We are no longer just trying to develop weapons, cures for cancer, and space craft. Man's intellectual powers are stronger than ever, even allowing us to alter the very biology of animals on this earth.
BUT... that was before I read the article that came across my desktop today. Now I question if science and common sense aren't actually dying a horrible death. It would make sense, afterall all things are subject to entropy.
I have been purposely avoiding talking about the USA's political situation, as it is a mess. I have very strong thoughts about out current administration, and quite frankly do not trust the government to have my best interests in mind. Here is a non-Bush illustration of why.
The Agriculture Department (USDA) has declared and a court has confirmed that batter-coated french fries are able to be considered a fresh vegetable. In the immortal words of Gilbert Godfrey, "what the f%@*k?!"
Apparently there was some dispute over how the frozen "vegetable" was transported, marketed, and sold. French fry producers wanted to avoid the moniker of processed food. So they turned to the geniuses over at the USDA for help.
For my foreign friends, the United State's USDA has a long record of ignorance. They repeatedly use school provided lunches for children as barter in political arguments, and do very shady things to achieve their goals and budgets.
In the 1980's. the USDA once stated that ketchup (a watery tomato paste used to flavor food) could be considered one of the vegetables in the student's daily diets. Only fitting then that they return to the ketchup's main compliment, the french fry, for more ignorance.
As of now, the ruling does not make the fry classified as a fresh vegetable for school lunches, but that cannot be far off. Nutrition is such a ignored factor in American life, and it is not going to get better if we do not abandon our reckless diets.
So our government (or the people in it), the one we are supposed to put utter faith in, has done a lot of dumb things lately. From severe decisions such as going to war, to minor matters of nutrition, and serious oversights such as our policy of importing prescription drugs without FDA approval, our country is being led by people with great vacuous holes in their common sense.
Another giant leap backward in science came earlier this year. It was announced that many DVD manufacturers were finishing development of disposable movies. The DVDs are packaged in airtight sacks, and once opened, the surface of the DVD begins to oxidize. After 48 hours, the DVD no longer plays. This was someone's good idea to prevent Americans with the huge inconvenience of returning movies to a rental store, and rental stores from the inconvenience of having to maintain their inventory. This was one of the most ridiculous ideas I have ever hear, because it is built on laziness and wastefulness. Do you have any idea of how quickly our landfills are filling up with garbage as it is? How much plastic do you think we can burn, sink, and bury before the Earth is ruined for good?
The waste never ends. There are new "wet wipes" for washing dishes (as if dish rags are so inconvenient to wash), individually wrapped hot dogs for the microwave (what?), disposable mop heads (one use), disposable "sippy cups" for babies, and one-use (non-recyclable) cell phone batteries (allegedly for emergencies).
The city near mine, Omaha, has dug itself into real financial mess over the last few years. The answer to save itself from trouble is fire teachers, police officers, and fire fighters, and to raise taxes. However, the officials still get large salaries, with raises, and they built a giant convention center... and want to add on to it.
In my father's company, they hired too many mechanics to install elevators, so that they could boast that they finished a large project (ironically the same convention center mentioned above) before the deadline. Now those mechanics, including my father, are laid off (without work).
In my city we have three casinos, which is pretty rare in the middle of the USA. These 3 are allowed operate with the hopes that they will a) pay a lot of money back to the government in taxes, and b) put money into a fund to help pay for local projects. And they have done a very good job of paying for parks, renovation of streets, buying playground equipment for schools, and so on. But the schools desperately need funding for teacher's salaries and for text books. Can the Iowa West Foundation (the casino benevolence fund) help out? Nope. The government does not want gambling dollars to pay for things that directly influence our children. The money is there, and going to waste on beautification projects when it could be used directly for education.
In the hospital in which I work, the census (number of patients) is very low lately. The officials of the hospital have a goal to achieve 85% occupancy of the hospital beds. So how do they propose that? They are closing one entire floor, and changing the two bed rooms into one bed rooms. Viola, the occupation percentage has increased greatly... but the paying "customer" count is exactly the same. (Note: there are some benefits to this strategy... they now do not have to staff the closed floor, and many nurses will be without work... therefore the company has "made" money).
So as you see, ignorance is rampant.
This is why I was so pleased to hear about the fugu research. It may be wasteful in the eyes of some to spend money on researching blowfish, but in the end they have come across a discovery that will literally save lives (that is, if the new blowfish taste as good as the others). I say this somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but compared to the other things I mentioned, the fugu research is hard science.
I was also happy to hear that a Japanese citizen, and email friend of mine, had a bit of good news today. Her daughter scored very highly on a test to measure comprehension and knowledge of nutrition. It is very high academic achievement, and also a very practical one in our world of obesity and junk food. The exam was National Exam of Dietician, and my friends said that only 20% of those who take it pass it. She was one of only 3 in her city who passed! Good job!).
So there is hope in our young people that they become educated and practice smart living, smart eating, smart parenting, smart voting, smart purchasing, and smart governing.
But it seems even the Japanese citizens have a few people among them that are not ready to accept science's benefits. The Associated Press reported that one Health Ministry official in Japan is not anxious for poisonless fugu. "Nontoxic fugu is boring. Fugu is exciting because it's toxic."
Ignorance is therefore not an American patent. And I begrudgingly have to admit that the American government isn't the only organization led by a lack of common sense. But it does excel at it.
Get out of Iraq. Stop SUVs. Stop importation of Canadian pharmaceutics. Reform our health care. Stop treating homosexuals like lepers. Reform our voting system (see next blog). Allow NASA to continue exploration. Stop enforcing results-based research. Eat poisonless fugu. Don't destroy Alaska to feed NASCAR and tractor pulls. Learn more than one language before you expect someone else to. The government is not church, and the church is not government. Oh, and french fries are not a fresh vegetable.
See ya!
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