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The Ignorance Caucus - Paul Krugman
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/11/opinion/krugman-the-ignorance-caucus.html?ref=paulkrugmanLast week Eric Cantor, the House majority leader, gave what his office told us would be a major policy speech. And we should be grateful for the heads-up about the speechs majorness. Otherwise, a read of the speech might have suggested that he was offering nothing more than a meager, warmed-over selection of stale ideas.
To be sure, Mr. Cantor tried to sound interested in serious policy discussion. But he didnt succeed and that was no accident. For these days his party dislikes the whole idea of applying critical thinking and evidence to policy questions. And no, thats not a caricature: Last year the Texas G.O.P. explicitly condemned efforts to teach critical thinking skills, because, it said, such efforts have the purpose of challenging the students fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.
And such is the influence of what we might call the ignorance caucus that even when giving a speech intended to demonstrate his openness to new ideas, Mr. Cantor felt obliged to give that caucus a shout-out, calling for a complete end to federal funding of social science research. Because its surely a waste of money seeking to understand the society were trying to change.
Want other examples of the ignorance caucus at work? Start with health care, an area in which Mr. Cantor tried not to sound anti-intellectual; he lavished praise on medical research just before attacking federal support for social science. (By the way, how much money are we talking about? Well, the entire National Science Foundation budget for social and economic sciences amounts to a whopping 0.01 percent of the budget deficit.)
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The Ignorance Caucus - Paul Krugman (Original Post)
Bill USA
Feb 2013
OP
RainDog
(28,784 posts)1. this is a MUST read! n/t
longship
(40,416 posts)2. Posted earlier but well worth a repost.
A definitive must read.
R&
rurallib
(62,426 posts)3. kick
how long will we elect these idiots?