I have written several times about Manjoo's sloppy analysis of this issue in past articles. This one is no different. His insistence on taking an issue by issue approach to the problem, rather than weighing the evidence as a whole, taking it synthetically as a scientist would, makes his conclusions suspect from the start. Perhaps a greater problem is that he sees any spurious rationale for a problem as proving that there were no seedy, and perhaps illegal influences on this election.

Whether consciously or not, his analysis fits itself right into the Right-Wing talking points about "conspiracy theories." They like to argue that there could have been no large-scale conspiracy focused on stealing the election--and to a certain extent they're right. The idea that there were shadowy figures guiding armies of conspirators to steal the election is somewhat silly. Of course, this argument is also nothing more than a strawman. It's not a matter of coordinated conspiracy, but rather coordinated interests, and a willingness to do whatever it takes to enact their messianic vision that unites the activities of diverse Right-Wing actors who have worked to steal this election at the local, state and national levels.

Kennedy's arguments point to problems, inconsistencies, not conspiracies. These problems and inconsistencies can identify the motives of a large number of individually operating agents who do not coordinate their activities, but who have similar goals and use whatever means they posess to accomplish those goals (including, for example, allowing the inertia of the bureaucracy to swallow valid votes by not taking the lead to ensure proper allocation of voting machines on election day). Citing spurious arguments to explain away each one of these problems might satisfy someone who has a perverse need to believe that the system is operating as it should (a category that includes a large portion of the population, as Manjoo would know if he had ever taken any sociology or empirical psychology courses, and maybe watched the Milgram films). However, it should not satisfy those who seek the truth--which is, I think, what most enlightened readers look to Salon for.

I really wish Salon would refuse to allow Manjoo to publish these poorly written, poorly reasoned pieces. It degrades your publication and diminishes its credibility. Giving Manjoo a keyboard is about as responsible as giving a three year-old permanent markers and then leaving the house.

Andrew says: "The complexity of such interactions is vast, and is one primary reason to be skeptical of all blanket assurances from industrial representatives declaring, with arrogant certainty, that something is 'safe.'"

In fact, this is the ultimate reason why "safe" is not a word that should ever be associated with genetically modified organisms grown outdoors without pollination controls. The nucleotides in a species' genes are like a complex novel, written over millions of years in an economic, yet subtle style our best comparison to which, perhaps, is Hemingway. In the contours of this novel are recorded all of natural history, the influence of geography, the meanderings of climate, the pressures of droughts and plagues and wild fevers; more importantly, though, this novel tells the story of a species' hopeful and energetic response to these pressures, these events. All of the words from the sundry species' chapters in this novel exist in delicate tension with with each other--the more successful, long-term responses becoming a larger part of the story, while the less successful responses, including the most arrogant refusals to adapt or change to new conditions, fade into oblivion. Now, scientists want to edit these words without having understood (or even read) the entire novel. They want to change words here and there, but reassure us that since it doesn't change the plot line of the chapter, it doesn't change the quality or nature of the work as a whole. _Of course, it does._

This process is the very opposite of proverbial monkeys pounding on typewriters until Shakespearean prose is spit out: it's letting monkeys take Hemingwayean manuscripts and write over passages with their typewriters, until nothing of the sublime whole is left. And the most dangerous part of this hubris is that there is no auto-correct, no spell check, no white out and no going back. Once these genes enter the wild, as they have done at least with corn, the edits are irreversible, and the delicate tension of the novel begins to collapse in on itself. Expect more "mysterious" species events, to go along with the "unusually warm" weather.

In a nation enthralled (literally) by Sophists, Glenn is a breath of Socratically fresh air.