It's not dead. It's Pining. Pining, for the FJORDS!

Oh, how horrible. Another excuse for these folks to say that they never had a truly conservative set of leaders.

I'm not going to count conservatism out just yet. But I can't say I look at the morale boost these folks are looking for as the most constructive element of a recovery. It was the inability to admit defeat, or at least the lack of success, that led Republicans to this point.

When are they going to reconsider things? When will they see that you can clothe old principles in new policies, and that a failure to do so will only guarantee further removes from public opinion.

Republicans must realize that the strength of their own beliefs is not enough. They must convince other people of what they believe, and the way they're going about things, they're confirming the worse views of their party.

But with their tactics, they're only reminding people what stubborn, uncompromising, obnoxious political figures they are. The Republicans need humble statesmen, need people that encourage the party as a whole to make peace with the rest of the country. The Republicans neither do themselves nor the country a favor by heightening the volume and the anger of their politics. They failed to maintain the trust of the American people, failed to create the conditions to justify their ideology with results.

Personal Stakes

I can wear a number of hats concerning this issue. I'm diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, so I have a personal interest. I'm a science nerd, especially concerning neuroscience, so I wear the hat of somebody interested in the facts of the case. I'm also a political wonk, with a particular interest in how science translates to policy.

My opinion comes down to this: we're using the science to clear the B.S. explanations for why this happens out of the way. It's difficult, because taking a real world issue like this and plopping it down in a lab is impossible. You get likelihoods more than absolute laws and rules. It's not even clear here that Autistic conditions necessarily have to have just one cause or kind of cause, any more than heart conditions can be explained by just one etiology. There could be metabolic disorders, environmental exposures, genetics involved, and what for one person might be a good treatment could be useless or worse. For some, there may not fundamentally BE a treatment, other than learning to live with the pathology at hand.

Was it wise to investigate the Vaccine connection? By all means. But nobody has found any indication that Thimerosal or anything else in them is causing the epidemic increase. Even worse, the numbers have risen as vaccines with this mercury-based compound have been phased out. Simple inductive logic tells you that A cannot be the sole cause of B, if B continues to increase as exposure to A decreases.

If a negative relationship had been discovered, we would have been obligated in good conscience to change how we produce and use vaccines. But it has not, and until we've used the B.S. detector of science to clear away the misleading hypotheses, targeting vaccines as a cause is not only bad, but potentially counterproductive. Measles and other illnesses we vaccinate for are known to have potential neurological complications. From a speculative point of view, we could even pose infectious diseases as potential causes, but from a purely factual point of view, having a child dealing with the after-effects of such neurological complications is no picnic.

I understand the impulse people have to fight for their children. I understand that it can sometimes seem like corporations are just out to cover their asses. But at some point, we have to humble ourselves before the facts, and let the unsupportable explanations drop.

We need to know more about what can cause autistic disorders, not become fixated on explanations for personal and emotional reasons. With limited resources and the scientific uncertainties that come with investigating phenomena beyond the lab, we must sometimes make the difficult choice to look beyond our preferred explanations, and seek out the right ones, because the truth, preferred or not, is all that can set us free here.

The Telepresent Tribune: Why I'm starting it.

I've already got a political blog, Watchblog, and are a member (newly minted) of Daily Kos and another blog of my own, The Telepresent Texan. Hell, I even have an online novel going (or will get going once I get back on track)

The trick though, I'd rather keep the last blog pure of this stuff, and the other two blogs, though I get my stuff out through them, only allow me so many posts in a day. I'd like a bit more freedom to respond to events in real time, so I've decided to collect and distribute news, information, and opinion (both I promise will be clearly labelled for what they are) in this new blog. I've always admired other bloggers like Josh Marshall and Kevin Drum, who are absolute newshounds, so I guess this is my way of giving them the sincerest form of flattery for having kept folks like me informed about things. I hope I do this right.

In the interests of full disclosure, I am a Democrat, and I am a Liberal. And yes, a Progressive, a member of the Left (though not the Far Left, I'd think.) However, I do invite any and all to read this blog. Those who don't like what I have to say can at least keep themselves informed of what people like me know and really believe. Hopefully, I'll also challenge some of you who would call me a fellow Democrat, Liberal, Progressive, etc. Lord knows we need a shake up.

With all that explained, The Telepresent Tribune begins publication.