I'm sorry if this offends you, but I think Kate brings up a number of points that we need to think about. Polite comments very welcomed.

Pat

Not only does this egomaniacal, undereducated, under-read, overinflated windbag dare to poach on MLK's territory, but now he tells us that "TODAY, America turns back to God". Like... with his help. Like... he's Moses, taking us out of Egypt to the Promised Land. If it's the latter, he'd better go back and re-read. Moses got egotistical, God didn't like it, Joshua came in from the bull pen. God got the victory, Joshua got the save. > Once again the mouthpiece for the Radical Right claims ownership to religious purity and good old flag lapel pin patriotism in a way which we mere mainstream mortals could never know. Without his help, we'd never have known there were Nazi Icons emblazoned on Rockefeller Center either.

> Listen up, Glenn. Obama was born in Hawaii. A majority of American citizens voted for him. The French health care system (single payer, government run) is rated "best in the world" by the WHO. In Canada it costs more to take your dog to the vet than to take yourself to the doctor. And you don't have to wait five years for that appointment. Shipload after shipload of immigrants landed on these shores, including many to Oglethorpe's penal colony of Georgia. It was not until generations later that the descendants of these undocumented aliens began to demand something called a greencard.

> And... for hundreds of years, Americans of every faith have found their way to God without your help. Our churches have preached social justice. Our churches have searched deeply into their collective souls, and found a home for the disenfranchised, for people of color, for people whose lives are challenged by their gender, or their sexual orientation. You tell us "if your church preaches social justice, run the other way". And yet, you hold yourself up as a paragon of American Religion. Perhaps this is your Waterloo, Mr. Beck. There is no such thing as "American Religion" There is religion. It takes many forms. We have Christian churches of infinite variety, all of whom have preached some form or another of political position over the centuries. In the middle ages, the Catholic church sent warriors into the Crusades, against the "infidel" Muslims, without any regard at all for the Jews who had lived there forever. Our country was begun in part by settlers who were fleeing religious persecution. Young women in Salem MA. might have made the case that once their own skins were safe, those Christians began flaying others. From Quakers in eastern Pennsylvania, down the coast to Creoles and Cajuns, then heading west to where the Catholic faith had been flitered through the Mexican experience... wildly different from the French Canadian influence in the East. Pockets of Native Americans held out... and religions from afar joined us. Asians brought us Buddhism, Shinto, Hindu. Although most Africans became Christian while held in slavery, elements of their former faiths stayed with them, and as more Mediterranean Africans and Middle Easterners came to America, we gained Coptics, Chaldeans, Muslims of varying types, and Orthodox Christians whose practice was greatly different from that of the Roman church.

There is no American Religion, Mr. Beck. There is no American Church, there is no God who singularly blesses America. This is what our founding fathers wanted, this is what they tried to guarantee for us. That no way, no how could any single religious group ever impose their faith on all the rest of us.

Founding Fathers, Mr. Beck - Washington, Jefferson, Hancock, Adams, Madison,Gerry, Hamilton, Franklin, so many more, whose names are on the Declaration, on the Constitution. They were supported by their faith, yes, of course. By whatever faith worked for them. And they tried their best to save us from idiots like you.
> The Right keeps talking about grass-roots. What they seem to mean is the Tea Party, funded largely by Dick Armey's lobbyist corporate money. This diatribe is purely grass roots. It's me, that's all. If it's at all you too, then send it on. Can we flood the internet with anti-beckian common sense?

We are just back home after a very, very rainy weekend in NY, sadly we got flooded out on the Taming of the Shrew (outdoor tent production-- worst rain I've ever seen-- rain beating on the tent so loudly that the actors couldn't be heard and then the tent started to leak...) I was really bummed because it was set in the 60s (Kate burned her bra (I know I know it never happened in life but it was effective on stage); just before they stopped Pertrucio and his servant came in on motorcycles (ok fake but cool fake motorcycles)). Since the director consulted with Dar Williams (who lives in the area) about how to deal with the epilogue, I really wanted to see that.

My friend:

OK. Sorry about the play but reread your email. It is hilarious. You can see a play anytime but how often do you get a story like this to tell everyone? Hell, I'd burn my bra to have watched the tent start leaking in the middle of the play.

Well at least the leaking tent didn't put out the burning bra!

However I still want to see how they dealt with the epilogue. BTW thanks to the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival for this and all the other plays I've enjoyed over the years. The rain-- not their fault.

Broadening Participation

The Committee denies the NSF's request to merge initiatives to broaden participation by consolidating three existing programs, the Historically Black Colleges and Universities Undergraduate Program [HBCU-UP], the Louis Stokes Alliances for Minority Participation [LSAMP] and the Tribal Colleges and Universities Program [T-CUP]. These three programs each have different purposes and engage students and colleges and universities in a different manner. One size will not fit all. The Committee directs NSF to maintain HBCU-UP at $32,000,000; LSAMP at $44,750,000; and T-CUP at $14,000,000. Any remaining funding available for Undergraduate/Graduate Student Support may be used for an integrated broadening participation of undergraduates in STEM that includes institutions eligible for these three programs as well as institutions eligible under section 7033 of the America COMPETES Act (Public Law 110-69).

My very cool new friend Monica Gaughan said today "all research training is federally subsidized" and you know she is right. The Appropriations Committee just helped to make sure that the subsidized training remaines available to students at colleges like Johnson C. Smith and Fort Belknap College just as it is for students at places like Johns Hopkins and MIT. "One size will not fit all."

Their goals:

* Enabling public philanthropy through tactical funding of small pilot research projects up to $50,000.
* Educating and walking the public through the research process by providing direct interaction between researchers and their donors.
* Applying open source methodology to aid program participants in the research process through simple collaboration tools.

Fund Science was started by a graduate student David Vitrant who was concerned about the lack of research and funding opportunities for young scientists (42 is the average age of scientis receiving their first major NIH grant.)

The Chronicle of Higher Ed article about Fund Science explains that Fund Science gives each research project 10 percent of its proposed budget and expects young scientists to raise the rest through the online platform Fund Science has created for the researchers to explain their work.

Making researchers explain their work to people outside of the scientific community, ah that makes my FairerScience heart so happy; especially the researcher who ran her presentations of her research by her grandmother first.

See I told you it was a really interesting idea. I'm off to check out the studies.

FairerScience friend and io9 guru Annalee Newitz has written a column on "How the Google/Verizon proposal could kill the internet in 5 years"

I'm not going to do an excerpt, just read this, it's important. Ok fine I know I said this before but just read this, it's important.

Is there a secret to helping minority students succeed in science?

The answer:

It's the faculty. It takes researchers to produce researchers. That's the difference: faculty involvement paired with nurturing, high standards and high expectations.

The wise responder:

Freeman Hrabowski

You can read the whole interview here.

So why am I grumpy? Well this post from the July Advocacy and Public Policy Newsletter from AWIS might explain some my grumpiness:

The University of Texas welcomed Arthur Day as the new appointed professor, Vice Chair of education in neurosurgery, and Program Director of the medical school's residency program, despite having three gender discrimination lawsuits filed against him in recent years. In sworn affidavits during one of the lawsuits, female hospital employees said that Day often called the women he worked with "girls," would sometimes display an 8-inch phallic statue on his desk, and downloaded sexually explicit images onto a nurse's personal digital assistant. He is quoted in the testimony as saying to a colleague during surgery: "You are just a girl, are you sure you can do that?" This suit resulted in a $1.6 million award to the plaintiff, when the jury found him /responsible for > creating a discriminatory and hostile work environment. As a result of this verdict, he resigned his job as chief of > neurosurgery at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.

Unfortunately, this discriminatory baggage did not seem to hinder his ability to find work in a supervisory position in Houston. In this economy, when employment is highly coveted, it seems that outright sexism is less of a concern than an impressive CV. What an outrage!

So I thought (ok perhaps hoped is a better term), this must be an aberration-- so I sent it off to a couple of FairerScience friends. Their responses:

The old boys club exists and is perpetuated, I have seen it time and time again when I worked in INSERT UNIVERSITY NAME HERE. Often, these remarks and the climate it created were made by a doc in a position of authority that enabled him to demean female residents and/or undergraduates and they did not feel they could retaliate in anyway. One of the worst offenders was promoted to Dept Head of Surgery, of course.

The INSERT OTHER UNIVERSITY NAME HERE was going to hire a dean who had several sex and racial discrimination lawsuits pending and it was a group of women in positions of authority who did the due diligence and got him dropped from consideration as the new dean. It took a huge effort and many meetings to get this accomplished. Am I surprised at the Texas situation. No.

Unfortunately, my experiences here suggest that this could be a larger cultural problem within the field that is accepted, and apparently rewarded as we see with this example. They are a very powerful network that holds on to the old guard that allows the"boys will be boys" attitude. There are major issues at our own institution that no one seems willing to address.

So I guess the UT choice wasn't so much of an aberration after all; sigh.

scientiae-carnival

Tribal Colleges and University Program (TCUP);
Historically Black Colleges and Universities Undergraduate Program (HBCU-UP).

Well FairerScience friend Lorelle Espinosa has given us an update on what is (and isn't happening) including her concern that:.

NSF—an agency scientific in its orientation—has presented a plan with little to no empirical basis as to why a consolidated program will serve the nation’s underrepresented students in ways better than what is currently in place.

Ah NSF, you've made so many good choices, but killing TCUP and HBCU UP is not one of them. NSF support for minority serving institutions has been an important piece of efforts to broaden STEM participation and it needs to continue. We've made progress but there still is a long way to go.

PS folks, there still is time to let NSF know how you feel. Click here to comment.

And it worked. Well at least I thought it worked until I read an article in yesterday's New York Times Magazine. Turns out that, at least when it comes to research on exercise, I was wrong.

Yup much of the research that has been done, is based on male samples and applied to women as well as men. And wait, yup, lots of times the results don't transfer. Go figure.

Anyway here's a radical idea-- study women and men and look at similarities and differences. An until that happens, quoting article author Gretchen Reynolds:

female athletes should view with skepticism the results from exercise studies that use only male subjects.

And so should everyone else!

Like most of you, I've recently received many "patriotic" email messages, urging me to pass along my allegiance to the flag, my desire for God to bless America; even my body, dressed in red, white or blue, lined up in a field somewhere, becoming an huge human flag. Possibly the most laughable was the diatribe which informed me that there is more than one verse of the National Anthem, and it proves that we are a Christian country. Huh???... I've known that verse for 50 years. It proves nothing but that F.S. Keyes needed to write another verse to a really bad song!

Okay... if that 's your thing, then fine. I do not believe that God blesses America. I tolerate that song only because it's Irving Berlin. I have not pledged Allegiance for... perhaps 20 years?. I'm a patriotic American citizen. I love my country. I wish my country well. I do not need someone else's words to prove that. I will not put on my red shirt and go out and stand in a field somewhere, hoping that a camera from overhead is recording this living flag moment.

I will celebrate Independence Day quietly. I will most certainly help my husband hang our flag. I will probably wear some form of red, white and blue. We will probably grill our dinner, before watching fireworks. I will try not to gag when the music which accompanies those fireworks goes into "Proud to be an Amurrican".

I will, and I hope all thinking Americans will... give some thought to the real intentions of our founding fathers. Most of them were Christian, at least having been baptised such. Most did not often attend church. Most gave lip service to their faith, but did not particularly adhere to it. The Adams' were probably the most devout, and Abigail more than John, I think. Franklin... not devout at all. Washington... lip service. Jefferson... no more devout than Franklin... if UU had existed, he would have been SO There!

We are so NOT a Christian country. We are a melting pot, many faiths, many colors, many beliefs. God... or Allah, or Yahweh... or... whomever... does not bless us, as a country. If we are devout, we may hope to be blessed by our deity. If we are not devout, we should stop asking someone else's God to bless our country. I am always appalled at so many of the emails which I receive.. from friends who never cross a church door step... and who are horrified that "in God we trust" might be taken off our coins.

Let's all grow up. It's our country... it's our job to make it work. God is not going to do it for us. Only our own hard work and attention to our political situation will help us now.

Thank you, Sons of Liberty. Thank you, all of you who suffered in the snow at Valley Forge. Thank you, all you who fell at Gettysburg. Thank you, you who were gassed in France, you who sank with the Arizona, you who planted the flag on Iwo JIma. Thank you Women's libbers... and those who were there at Stonewall... and of course, thank you Dr. King.

Please, in this Independence Day weekend, let us not ever forget that smugness has no place in our national facade. If those who most invoke the almighty choose that path... let them. God/Allah/Jaweh.. etc. knows better. Humility is our better path. We need help. We need the help of our creator. We need the freedom to plead for that help from which ever creator we worship. If they are not all the same, they will work it out somehow.

Oh yes-- that whole acknowledging thing-- makes a difference for women in science too!

The non-profit (A Matter of Trust) is asking

all salons, groomers, alpaca, llama, sheep, buffalo fleece farmers, feather donors, individuals, & pet owners to sign up to be a part of this recycling system for hair, fur, fleece, feathers, nylons... and to volunteer to make booms.

Dale and Rob have already sent 10 pounds of hair and are filling another box (and I chose a shorter hairstyple-- hey anything for a good cause).

I signed up and am breathlessly waiting for an address so I can send them all my old pantyhouse (they stuff the hair into pantyhose to make a boom).

So please, if you get your hair cut, ask your hair-cutters to join the effort and if you are like me and have a draw full of pantyhose you don't wear sign up yourself to send them in. Right now there isn't much we can do about the oil spill but this is something (BTW, these folks have been using hair, fur and pantyhose to clean up oil spills since 1998.)

PS Check out some of their You Tubes-- our hair is impressive!