Tag Archives: Ikonokast Podcast

How Science Can Resist Trump

Politics, , ,

The March for Science, in April, may be a June to September romance between academia and and political activists, but prior experience in Canada suggests we are in it for the cold hard winter.

march_for_science_shirtA conservative government in the land of the maple leaf took wide ranging action to shut down and control science and science communication. The populace became outraged, and the politicians were put on ice. The fight continues, and it looks like the position of science in Canada will end up more secure than it ever was before. Don’t mess with Canadian scientists and the citizens that respect them.

Meanwhile, in the United States we have good news and bad news. The bad news is that the Republican Party has taken over the country, led by an oligarch by the name of Trump, and science is under more severe threat than ever before. The good news is that the United States has Canada to serve as an example, and, as Katie Gibbs notes, the US also has a large number of powerful institutions already in place to fight the new repressive regime.

So, now it is a race. How fast can the Republicans remove voting protection and continue their ongoing gerrymandering, so a small right wing majority can continue to rule? How fast can Progressives shift the Congress so Trump can be stopped and the Republicans, ultimately, pushed out of government? (And, make no mistake: we can no longer have a two party system where one of the parties is Republican. They are traitors and we must fully marginalize them.)

DC20130915-01-300x169I assume that by now you know that I have a podcast, with Mike Haubrich, called “Ikonokast.” We interviewed the aforementioned Katie Gibbs, Executive Director of Evidence for Democracy, which took part in organizing the Death of Evidence March of July 2012. Dr. Gibbs gave us the lowdown on what happened in Canada, and we discussed what we might to in the United States to Resist Trump. Please go listen to our podcast, which is available here, on iTunes, and Google Play.

Genetics and Food Security

Uncategorized, , , , , , ,

There is a food crisis sneaking up on us right now. A lot of them, actually. A lot of little one, some big ones. There are always places in the world where food has become scarce for at time, and people starve or move. You’ve heard of the “”Syrian refugee crisis,” and the often extreme reactions to it in Europe and among some in the US. That started out as a food crisis, brought on by human pollution induced global warming in an already arid agricultural zone.

Nearly similar levels of climate change related pressure on agricultural systems elsewhere has led to very different outcomes, sometimes more adaptive outcomes that won’t (at least for now) lead to major geopolitical catastrophes as we have now in the Levant and elsewhere in West Asia. What’s the difference? The difference is how agriculture is done.

Are GMOs a solution? Are GMOs safe, and can the produce a small or medium size revolution in crop productivity? What about upgrading traditional agriculture to “industrial agriculture”?

And speaking of GMOs, what is the latest in GMO research? How should GMOs be regulated, by the method they are produced, or by the novel or altered traits they have? How do we communicate about GMO research and GMO crops? What about labeling?

These and many other questions are addressed ad Mike Haubrich, me, and Anastasia Bodnar talk about “Genetics and Food Security” on the latest installment of the Ikonokast Podcast. GO HERE to listen to the podcast. Also, if you go there, you can see a picture of Anastasia holding her latest GMO product, a corn plant that can see and talk!

Also, Iknokast has a Facebook Group. Please click here to go and joint it!

And, if you have not yet listened to our first podcast, with author and science advocate Shawn Otto, click here to catch up!