How Is It...?

Jon Stewart poses two very good questions... "How is it that Mitt Romney hasn't crushed this guy already?", and "How is it that Rick Santorum hasn't crushed this guy already?"

Which sends us to Paul Krugman, who sends us to Digby, who

 sends us to Chris Mooney on how conservatives become less willing to look at the facts, more committed to the views of their tribe, as they become better-educated.

I think Krugman should be careful about saying conservatives are less willing to look at "facts", as I think there's "no doubt about it" facts, and "we've sort of proven things but only in certain contexts" facts, and "your semantics are different from mine" facts.  More committed to the tribe, I'll buy.  Anyways...

The factually contested issue of Obama being Muslim is a bizarre one, I don't understand how anyone who has even just a high school degree would follow that one, but two of the notions are more on the fence for me.

While I think it'd be hard to disagree that people are putting more carbon dioxide and other pollutants into the air, and this is a serious concerns for climate change, climate is such a finicky thing that I think liberals need to be careful about being on their high horse.  While I agree that human actions are probably part of the reason that the planet is warming, the planet naturally warms and cools by itself.  How much of this warming is due to people?  We don't really have a non-treated planet, so it's hard (impossible?) to say.  Folks might point to increased tornado/hurricane detection, but technology has improved our ability to detect these disasters.  I've also read somewhere that the planet is actually at one of its coolest in recent history.

Second, the quote by Christy Romer needs to be taken with a grain of salt.  No matter how hard economists try, economics is still a soft science.  The evidence "is stronger than ever" that fiscal policy is buff, but it's not *trumpets blaring as angels descend from heaven* absolute.  Besides, politics is never as easy as agreeing that fiscal stimulus helps the economy adds jobs; fiscal stimulus increases the budget deficit, which might worry some people about their ability to borrow.  Politicians have many things to worry about, like socializing with their friends who own NASCAR teams.

Which, in conclusion, is why I sit on the fence.  If I had to be pigeon holed, I agree with global warming and fiscal policy.  But I'd rather not be pigeon holed; I like listening to all arguments and keeping an open mind and keeping things in perspective.  And arguing for argument's sake.