Plame The Messenger?

I saw these links over on Boston Phoenix media critic Mark Jurkowitz's Media Log blog, and also based the title of this post on his. Jurkowitz brings up the continuing questions surrounding the Valerie Plame affair as prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, ostensibly, continues to investigate who leaked her name to columnist Robert Novak. The question I always had was why, if Novak spoke to the grand jury and offered them enough information that he doesn't face contempt charges, are other journalists going to jail? Wouldn't they only be able to give the same information as Novak apparently did?

Finally hearing what Karl Rove told Time magazine's Matthew Cooper didn't really resolve anything. Plenty of wiggle room for Rove in his statements to Cooper. Rove claims that he heard about Plame's CIA identity from some other media source, but he's not sure who it was. But the big questions revolve around Judith Miller, of The New York Times, who remains in jail for refusing to divulge her source. Apparently, it's a different source than Cooper's. Novak has said he first heard about Plame from some non-Rove source, but he hasn't publically stated who it was.

Many journalists have taken up Miller's cause, saying that the prosecutor is unjustly applying pressure to a journalist who is nobly trying to protect her source. But there are some contrary theories out there, notably from Arianna Huffington, who says that Miller is in jail because the source she is trying to protect is herself.

Huffington outlines a theory that Miller was trying to maintain the last shreds of credibility related to her Iraq stories. Like many other reporters, Miler trumpeted the Bush Administration call to war, complete with credibly reporting the now-discredited links between Iraq and the infamous Niger uranium. Joe Wilson puts out an op-ed piece blasting the White House for repeating these claims that he knew, from personal investigation, to be false. That calls into question her reporting. Huffington lays out the rest of the theory:

So she calls her friends in the intelligence community and asks, Who is this guy? She finds out he's married to a CIA agent. She then passes on the info about Mrs. Wilson to Scooter Libby (Newsday has identified a meeting Miller had on July 8 in Washington with an "unnamed government official"). Maybe Miller tells Rove too -- or Libby does. The White House hatchet men turn around and tell Novak and Cooper. The story gets out.

All very interesting and compelling, in a conspiracy-theory sort of way. But as Jurkowitz points out, the simpler explanation is usually the correct one. There's no actual evidence at this point to say that Miller leaked the information to the White House or even had the information to give.

For a polar opposite view of Miller, look to the Committee to Protect Journalists. The committee organized a visit to her jail cell with media celebrities, including Tom Brokaw. Miller is perceived as sacrificing herself for the principles of good journalism in this statement. That will remain the accepted view of her situation until and unless any evidence to the contrary surfaces.

A Corny Strategy

The House just passed a $14.5 billion energy bill, the main goal of which is apparently to send billions of dollars in tax breaks to energy companies but not really do anything to solve our nation's growing energy problems.

The insanely poor thinking in this bill would take too long to go over in detail. It doesn't reduce our oil dependence and it doesn't look for ways to reduce demand. Here's an overview from the Globe story:

Of the bill's $14.5 billion in tax breaks and incentives over 10 years, nearly $9 billion is earmarked for oil and gas, electricity and coal companies. Less than $5 billion will be spent on energy efficiency and renewable energy programs.

Well, you might say, at least some money is going to "energy efficiency and renewable energy programs." But one of the provisions that's been touted with extreme irrationality by some environmentalists is the bill's requirement to nearly double U.S. ethanol use by 2012. The Globe says that ethanol is mixed with gasoline to make it burn more cleanly, but environmental groups and the corn lobby say that increased ethanol use will actually decrease our dependence on oil, effectively replacing some of it with the corn product.

A couple problems here. First, 7.5 billion gallons of ethanol a year (as the bill requires by 2012) would hardly put a dent in our oil imports (we used 134 billion gallons last year). Also, when ethanol is mixed with gasoline, the mixture evaporates more quickly, which will force refiners to alter their product. This, according to a GAO report, will increase the cost of refining. Ethanol also contains only two-thirds the energy as gasoline. So blending it with gas reduces the heat content of the fuel, forcing you to buy more to do the same amount of work.

But here's the really troubling feature of ethanol. According to a recent report (PDF) by David Pimental of Cornell University and Tad Patzek of the University of California - Berkeley, it actually takes more energy to produce ethanol than the amount of energy you get back. Basically, they determined that it takes 29 percent more fossil energy to make ethanol from corn than it actually contains. So, increasing ethanol production will actually take more fossil fuel use than just using fossil fuels to make gasoline. Committing to more ethanol production will have the likely effect of increasing our need and use of fossil fuels. This makes no sense. (Note: The study was done with no money from the oil companies, and Pimental has no ties to oil companies. Patzek, however, runs the UC Oil Consortium, which is funded by oil companies. His ethanol research isn't funded by oil companies. The UC Oil Consortium seems to be mostly concerned with the geology behind oil drilling.)

At any rate, this so-called "energy bill" is mainly a handout to energy companies (though it does contain some subsidies and tax breaks for wind, geothermal and solar industries). It does little to put us on track to address our long-term energy needs. It's mostly just a tremendous gift to Bush's and DeLay's oil-industry friends.

I should also note that it does try to encourage more nuclear plants, which could help meet the country's energy needs. A lot of people are worried about nuclear power, of course, but we are a lot more knowledgeable about nuclear power than the Three-Mile Island and Chernobyl days. But regardless, there is also an argument to be made that we're a nation (and, increasingly, world) addicted to energy. It might be better to try to become more efficient rather than struggle to find more and more sources of energy.

More On Stem Cells

William Saletan continues his series, "The Organ Factory," in Slate. Yesterday, he examined the basis for setting 14 days as the cutoff point for harvesting stem cells from embryos. His argument is that the timeframe is arbitrary, not based on the actual development of the embryo, but rather arrived at backwards by determining when scientists thought was a good timeframe and then crafting an argument to show there are no ethical problems with that timeframe. Saletan's earlier entries showed that differentiated stem cells hold much more promise to treat illness, so a lengthier timeframe, in the seven-week range, would be more useful. So, can we do the same sort of backwards rationale to develop an ethics that allows harvesting at seven weeks?

That's exactly what Saletan does in today's piece. He examines each ethical criterion and shows how it can be extended to reach the pragmatic goal of allowing harvesting of differentiated stem cells. Of course, the argument starts reaching into weighty issues, such as, when does an embryo become a sentient human life?

It will be interesting to see exactly where Saletan takes the discussion. Adopt a cynical tone of voice, and you can imagine Saletan laying out a logical trap that leaves the reader bereft of morals in a world in which anything goes and the most precious life is the one that can pay to manufacture beings deemed less worthy of living. But Saletan is intensely analytical in his previous writings (including a well-received book on the abortion debate). He seems to look at this issue and similar ones as existing on a continuum, where we must balance legitimate needs with moral considerations. And so we get ethics, something that we can change to meet social needs and the truths revealed by science.

Manufacturing Organs

One of the big ethical questions of our time is focused on the debate over stem-cell research. Few lines of medical research have shown such promise to treat or cure a variety of chronic illnesses as stem-cell research. Some proponents have overblown its potential, but nonetheless, it's easy to reasonably draw the conclusion that stem-cell research could lead to treatments for Type I diabetes, paralysis and many degenerative diseases.

But ethics remains the big roadblock to research. And many of the ethical concerns are actually moral issues based on a poor understanding of the science involved. Many raise religious objections when an embryo is destroyed to harvest stem cells. Folks with these objections typically don't have a problem with using adult stem cells, but adult stem cells have not been found to be as adaptable as embryonic stem cells.

This week in Slate, William Saletan tackles a very interesting line of research that promises to really slap people in the face with ethical questions. In his series, The Organ Factory, Saletan examines how stem cells differentiate into the various organs of the body. If you can coax stem cells into forming, say, pancreatic islet cells, you can maybe transplant those into a diabetic, potentially curing their disease. But researchers have found that it is exceedingly difficult to successfully cause this differentiation in vitro, or, basically, in the lab. You can easily do it, however, in vivo -- when the cells are still in an embryo. In animal experiments, researchers have successfully grown differentiated stem cells and transplanted those cells when they've been grown in the embryo. Much less success for test tube differentiation.

Part one of the series describes the process while hinting at some of the ethical problems to come. Part two further explores the differences between in vitro and in vivo cell growth. The ethical problem still looms, and Saletan promises to get to it. In short, to cure someone of a chronic disease, would it be OK to create an embryo using their cells (a clone), let it grow for six or seven weeks, and then destroy it to harvest the tissues needed for the cure? As Saletan states, we already permit this, from an ethics standpoint, for the first two weeks. Why stop there?

Kowtowing To The Right

Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has said that he hasn't decided whether he'll run for president in 2008. He's always said that he plans to remain committed to the people of Massachusetts. His actions speak louder than his words.

Today, Romney vetoed a law passed by the state Legislature that would require hospitals to offer the so-called "morning-after pill" to rape victims and specially trained pharmacists to do the same for patients without a prescription. The pill is a hormone that prevents ovulation, stops the egg from being fertilized by sperm or stops the fertilized egg from attaching itself to the uterine wall.

With the veto, Romney exposes his hypocrisy by putting the lie to his campaign statement that he supported wider access to the pill. He seems to have fallen into the social conservative trap of equating this pill with abortion, or more specifically, with RU-486, the pill that will induce an abortion. This actually prevents conception and essentially acts like a birth-control pill.

With the veto, Romney sides with the extreme fringe of the right wing. The vast majority of Americans support the right to contraception, which is all this pill does. It seems that the Massachusetts governor is simply providing some padding to his Republican resume for a national run, especially since the actual effect of his veto is meaningless. Both the Senate and House passed the legislation by veto-proof margins.

A Gripe About Blogger

Just a point I wanted to make about my profile listed in the right-hand column. When you make your profile on Blogger, it has a place for you to enter your birthday. I just put in the date itself, not the year, in part because it's never really that good of an idea to enter too much personal information in online profiles. But Blogger then takes that information and presents it to the world as an astrological sign, rather than the actual birthday. So here I am, pitching a site dedicated to rationality, and I've got my astrological sign on it. Seems like a bit of a disconnect.

This does, however, bring to mind a story from a couple weeks ago related to NASA's Deep Impact mission. This was the one where they smashed a probe into the comet Tempel 1 in the hopes of learning more about what comets are made of, how they form, etc. But a Russian astrologist is now suing the agency for $300 million in damages because, she claims, the impact has changed the trajectory of the comet, thus altering her horoscope and future (and apparently everyone else's, too).

The astrologer, Marina Bai, must have an extremely complex chart if it includes such objects as comets in its calculations. It makes you wonder what the hapless medieval astrologers did back in the day, when they didn't even know of the existence of all of the planets (not to mention the recently discovered Sedna)!

File this as another example of ignorance and superstition costing people real money and time, as the Russian courts are obligated to take the time to dismiss the case, if nothing else.

In case you were wondering, as a Cancer, I'm supposedly very emotional and intuitive. Shrewd, imaginative and good at problem-solving. I also worry a lot, cling to others, have an inability to let go when something's over, and get moody. Relatives and friends take heart! I apparently give very inventive presents. Of course, "inventive" can have multiple meanings, not all good. I should apparently become a teacher, or possibly a psychic healer. I could be a doctor, or maybe work from home. I'm not supposed to be able to work well under pressure, so I guess I shouldn't have become a journalist.

Oh, and I'm drawn to organized religion.

Just like everyone, I see some hits and some MAJOR misses. With this rate of inaccuracy, I think Ms. Bai should have other concerns about her prognostication tool of choice.

Chips That Heal

There was a recent news story that was picked up by several stations across the country resurrecting the idea of a link between cell phones and cancer. As before, there is no proof of any link between cancer and whatever emanations come out of cell phones. The story was focused on some neurosurgeons who believe there is a link between cell phones and brain cancer. This is not based on actual evidence, of course, just some anecdotal evidence. Doctors quoted in the piece said that people who use cell phones a lot complain of headaches and have difficulty concentrating and memory problems.

Again, no actual evidence provided. The hypothesis, though, is that microwaves coming out of cell phones basically cooks your brain. Never mind that the amount of radiation coming out of phones is much lower than it used to be. Just a bit of fear-mongering, I suppose.

But that fear-mongering does allow some people to line their pockets. I turn your attention to this nifty Web site, which promises to protect you from the vile energies escaping from your cell phone (and any other electronic device). BIOPRO offers, among other products, a Unversal EMF Harmonization Chip, which seems to:

function as a harmonizer, a mediator between potentially damaging electronics and human life.

The chip supposedly changes the energy vibrations coming out of electronic devices into vibrations that match the vibrations in our own bodies. They really like vibrations over at BIOPRO. The way the chip does this is by taking advantage of the quantum phenomenon of "entaglement," in which two particles will exhibit the same quantum characteristics even if they are separated by a great distance. The creator of this product obviously does not know how entanglement works. The chip somehow just magically entangles passing particles of energy, causing them to "vibrate" in a new way.

Of course, the site is also filled with a slavish devotion to the junk science of homeopathy, a cure-all similarly based on magic and wishful thinking. The idea behind that is that water can be "energized" and take on properties of certain substances. A homeopathic remedy is created by diluting a substance in water so much that none of the original substance remains. The water, good old H2O, has somehow been changed to contain the "energies" of the substance. Bizarre.

BIOPRO adopts the teachings of a certain Dr. Masaru Emoto, who claimed that liquid water has a crystalline structure that's, essentially, prettier when subjected to -- once again -- good vibrations. Water seems to like Mozart and Beethoven, but doesn't particularly enjoy heavy metal. It also will magically respond when words written on paper are taped to its container. You read that right. He actually claims that by taping the words "thank you" (or even the Japanese "arigato") to a glass of water, it will assume a crystalline structure.

So these people have no idea how liquids, especially water, actually behave. They make magic products that mystically synch energy to your own body's "vibrations." And they use, of course, tortured quantum mechanics to try to give some semblance of science to the whole thing.

The cost? A single chip for your cell phone costs $27.95. But a cordless phone needs two chips, a car needs three, and a microwave needs a whopping four chips to be safe! Based on BIOPRO's handy chart, I would need 44 chips to protect my household, which would cost me $1,229.80, plus shipping. Family packs are available that could cut that price.

But that's not all! The chips can only protect me from my own devices! What about when I'm out in the rest of the world, filled with all those harmful EM fields? Not to worry, BIOPRO has the QLink Pendant, which zaps those nasty fields. Only costs $269 each. Only $807 to protect my household. Of course, I wonder if I would still need the chips...

And then you need to buy the BIONutratonic Drink to undo any damage. A four-bottle case seems like quite the bargain for just $215.

It's amazing that a company can get away with selling junk like this. It's even more amazing that people buy them. But you see celebrities and athletes wearing magnets and titanium collars all the time. They claim that the devices give them amazing energy. Like they've never heard of a placebo effect before.

So even in a case like this, when all the pseudoscience can be shown to be completely wrong, people still believe it. The modern-day snake oil salesmen take advantage of the pervasive lack of critical thinking skills...

First Post

This is my first post on Blogger. The intention is to get this up and running, and then possibly move it offsite once I have a design ready and hosting set up. And then it's on to podcasts!