American scientists celebrate end of the Dark Age

[kevinbgoode]

The Globe and Mail has a fascinating article on how the election of President Obama has affected the American scientific community - and the effect it may have on Canadian research, since the country apparently benefited from quite an exodus of American scientists and professors from the United States while the wingnut junta held power.

"Scientists across America are celebrating the passing of the Bush administration as the end of a dark age, a bleak stretch in which research budgets shrank and everything — stem cells, sex education, climate change, and the very origins of the Grand Canyon — became a point of conflict.

President Barack Obama has ignited a new optimism among the white coats. In his inaugural speech, he promised to "restore science to its rightful place," hinting at nothing short of a renaissance in the fields of health, energy, the environment and America's schools."

snip. . .

"There is little question that the brain drain of the Bush era was Canada's gain: The number of American educators who received permits to work here grew by 15 per cent between 2002 and 2007, according to Citizenship and Immigration Canada. That figure includes a 27-per-cent jump in the number of university professors and assistants who moved north during the same period."

and. . .

"The NIH approved about 25 per cent of grant applications in 2000, Dr. Nislow estimated. But today, he said, that number has dropped to about 8 per cent.

"The scary thing was that colleagues at Stanford and Harvard and places like that who were funded for 20 years had to close their labs," Dr. Giaever said.

Many observers, inside and outside the U.S., believe the NIH budget cuts cost the country a generation of young scientists. The average age of a first-time operating grant recipient at the NIH is now 43, Dr. Nislow said."


Ok. . .I'm already pushing the post limit. . .:-(. It is an interesting article that really gives us an idea of just how much damage the last eight years of flat-earth society rule caused America. It is embarassing.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090124.wresearchweb0124/BNStory/National/home


How did this nation ever allow a coalition of fringe groups which despise intellect, scientific progress and innovative leadership to ever hold so much power in this country?

[anonymous171]

1. Easy. They were afraid.

Afraid of: Terra-ists, minorities, homosekchuals, (non-existent) taxes, and having their guns taken away.

[valerief]

2. It was a way for the wealthy to get even more obscenely wealthy.

So after decades of prolefeed on the boob tube and religious despots dumbing down America, it was easy.

[david13]

3. "How did this nation ... "

You tell me! That is what I would like to know.
dc

[glinda]

4. They better hurry fast cuz the Republicans are going to make it difficult.

[chill_wind]

5. The Bush theo-fascists' demon-haunted world. I've thought many times of Carl Sagan's words.

"I worry that, especially as the Millennium edges nearer, pseudoscience and superstition will seem year by year more tempting, the siren song of unreason more sonorous and attractive. Where have we heard it before? Whenever our ethnic or national prejudices are aroused, in times of scarcity, during challenges to national self-esteem or nerve, when we agonize about our diminished cosmic place and purposes, or when fanaticism is bubbling up around us — then, habits of thought familiar from ages past reach for the controls."

The candle flame gutters. Its little pool of light trembles. Darkness gathers. The demons begin to stir."

Apt fears.

[nebenaube]

6. uh... the war on pot?

It's had a surprising impact. Those smart enough to know they were being lied to were eventually destroyed.