Facts Are Stubborn Things

One of these statements is true.  It's important that you know which one.

Political news is slow, and I've been obsessed with the NFL Draft and Mel Kiper's truly amazing hair, so I haven't been posting much.

Eugene Robinson wrote a column here that has been largely quoted.  The line quoted is: To those deniers who can’t come to terms with the fact of the Obama presidency, I have nothing to offer but this: Yes, he’s smarter, richer, luckier and better looking than you, and he’s your president.

It's a good line, but it's not the important point.  I offer this line instead: I’m not talking about competing worldviews, I’m talking about a lack of agreement on what is provably, objectively true and what is not. Political polarization is old hat. Empirical polarization — a rejection of this nation’s founding Enlightenment principles — is something new.

Hell, Eugene, that's why I started blogging.  That's what has so disgusted me about this political moment and especially the modern GOP.  Bending facts and confirming bias is a natural if unpleasant part of politics.  But outright breaking of facts, the crushing of facts in the service of ideology does feel new.

As a teacher, I'm not just under assault by guys like Scott Walker who want to crush the idea of liberal education and an educated citizenry in order to transfer wealth up the ladder, I'm under assault by an ideological assault on facts themselves.

Here's a passel of facts for you:

A) Tornadoes are common in parts of the United States.

B) Tornadoes are caused by the interaction of warm and cold air.

C) Warmer weather means more and stronger tornadoes.

D) Tornadoes have just killed hundreds of people in the southeast.

E) The global climate is warming.

F) We can expect even more and stronger tornadoes in the future if the weather keeps getting warmer.

Nothing in that above sampling of facts is debatable.  It's not.

But my guess is that Jim Inhofe would deny some of them.  Or refuse to add up the facts into a policy that address global warming.

George Washington was not a genius, bright enough, but no Jefferson or Hamilton.  But Washington could change his mind, because he was a product of the enlightenment.

He would not recognize his country today.