QOTD: The War on Science

Charlie Pierce:

There are some decent liberals who wonder why some of their fellows jump all over every case, no matter how small, when some school board attempts of bootleg creationism -- or Intelligent Design -- are put into the science classes in some very small town. It's because creationism is the index patient for the triumph of the irrational over reason. If, in the face of all scientific evidence, we must Teach The Controversy in high school biology classes, why, in the face of all the available evidence, should we not Teach The Controversy about climate change, or about Liberal Fascism, or about vaccinations, or about Confederate nostalgia,  a self-regulating oil industry, or about supply-side economics, for all that. There is a concerted effort to make room for ignorance in our most serious public debates concerning our most pressing public policy problems. That effort is being made, consciously or otherwise, on behalf of a class of modern plutocrats whose profits depend on muddying the issues, and on injecting irrationality as a paralytic agent in our politics. And, believe me, there's a lot more of this to come.