Donald Trump isn’t the only Know-Nothing in this presidential race. Some days the field seems full of them. And it’s a bipartisan spectacle. Who says Republicans and Democrats can’t agree on anything? These candidates seem to agree on everything that’s not so. And it doesn’t seem to matter how many college and graduate degrees they boast. Call it the Attack of the Know-Nothings.
The other day Ben Carson, who’s a neurosurgeon in real life as opposed to presidential politics, dismissed the Big Bang theory as just a fairy tale. That’s the widely accepted theory of how the universe was formed. There may be disagreement about it even among astrophysicists, but just a fairy tale? You might as well call Galileo Galilei just a storyteller.
The good doctor has also lent his support to those arguing that childhood immunizations should be delayed. There’s no telling how much damage putting them off would do, but let’s not find out. Your family pediatrician is a much better guide to these matters than any physician-turned-politician.
Rand Paul is another doctor and presidential candidate, not necessarily in that order. He went along with Dr. Carson on this question.
Both seem to be competing with Donald Trump when it comes to spreading nonsense—dangerous nonsense. Lest we forget, it wasn’t too long ago that The Donald was repeating the unfounded rumor that vaccines cause autism—a theory as popular as it was dangerous at one happily forgotten time. The real epidemic out there would seem to be ignorance.
Beware, Gentle Reader, lest you leap to the conclusion that only Republicans reject modern science, for the Democrats in this presidential race haven’t done much better. Hillary Clinton repeated the same warnings about vaccines when she ran for president eight years ago, but seems to have caught on since. Good for her.
Unfortunately, she’s sticking with her stand against the Keystone XL pipeline on the curious ground that it’ll add to the danger of Climate Change, formerly Global Warming. As if one pipeline could make the difference between a green planet and a ruined one. At least our State Department, which Ms. Clinton used to head, however poorly, has concluded that the pipeline would have no significant effect on greenhouse gas emissions around the globe.
Bernie Sanders, her chief rival for the Democratic presidential nomination at this discouraging point, still wants to label genetically modified food, even though there seems to be no basis for such a policy except a fear of science.
Oh, yes, Senator Sanders, the Democrat-Socialist-Independent from New Hampshire, is also agin building any more nuclear power plants, which may be our best chance of keeping the planet as green as it is—for nuclear power offers a cleaner alternative to using fossil fuels like coal. Which is how the Chinese have managed to give Beijing’s air the consistency of pea soup. And just about the same sickly greenish-gray color.
Come, let us reason together. Instead of just exchanging our own favorite fears. To think of how many people take such candidates seriously is both sad and scary. All too little has changed since Goethe observed that “there is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action.”