As far as establishing left-wing think tanks to counteract the right-wing think tanks, maybe stepping outside the right/left frame in order to found them would be a good beginning.
Many of us are weary of these contrived and inaccurate dichotomies.

Jet – you’re acting like a troll.

So yeah, considering how politicized science has become, I’m with Gingrich and Inhofe, screw the middle men. All the vapid, yet rabid, rhetoric from the left over arguements of science have just made more people like me who think all the “experts” are filthy whores, selling their voices, and the only way to know where to stand is to listen to someone who has some logos (and maybe do some research yourself).

My political interventions have become increasingly fruitless and increasingly wearing on me, and I’m phasing myself out with a series inflammatory posts I probably wouldn’t have made while I still felt somewhat relevant. I deleted most of my political bookmarks several days ago, but I forgot Crooked Timber. I’ll correct that.

In 2001 I hoped and prayed that the Democrats had learned a lesson, but 2004 showed that they hadn’t. I hope and pray now that they’ve learned the lesson of 2004, but I doubt they have or ever will. Too little, too late, and too half-hearted.

I resign. Let joy be unconfined. (And it’s not just Henry, or mostly Henry.)

(1) statement that the post is an example of “left-liberal hostility to the idea of building up liberal media and liberal think-tanks.” It isn’t.

(2) Claim (or am I wrong) that I’m an example of the “prissy academic liberals who hate politics.” I’m not.

(3) Claim that this post was in some way an “Orwell and Gandhi” argument about “not sinking to their level.” It wasn’t.

(4) Claim that I was “insisting” on framing the post as “a question of one against the other.” I wasn’t.

I could go on. The flat out dishonesty was when you claimed that you weren’t trying to represent my views, but instead my framing. That is manifestly, and self-evidently not what you were trying to do in your earlier comments. Or do you deny this?

The most I will concede is that when I went from speaking specifically of your post, to speaking more generally of the tendency I say you’re part of, that some of the things I said about the tendency were not specifically true about your post, and that I didn’t make it clear when I transitioned. But for me your post is just exhibit #1395.

Do you deny that you’re treatment of Kelly’s post was concessive. Do you claim that “Although it may be a necessary political strategy…..” amounts to enthusiastic support, even of the political strategy itself?

To me, it’s as if one guy is throwing out a lifeline, and some kibitzer is explaining how there are also other things that need to be done. “Although it may be a necessary short-term plan to throw out that lifeline…..”

Fine, but right now let’s get the lifeline out there.

I think that “concessive” is a pretty good characterization of your treatment of Kelly’s main point. You didn’t reject it, you just said “Yes, but….” “Although it may be a necessary political strategy is not exactly a ringing endorsement. You couldn’t even say “We need to do this, but we should also remember…” You had to use the modal “may”, just to keep your distance.

Yes, I do have an agenda—and that’s OK, right?

And your post fit into it. It’s one more example of the compulsive need of many liberals and Democrats, mostly academics, to prove to themselves and others that they’re not hacks but are made of finer stuff and above the battle, and to distance themselves from the ordinary things that have to be done in politics.

I don’t see the need to have been concessive like that.

I don’t see the need for you to have framed your completely unexceptional support for the restoration of the the government research infrastructure, as a contrast to the proposal for desperately-needed Democratic think tanks. (Except that by doing so you bring a bit of zip into an otherwise rather banal statement).

I think that I’ve said my piece. I’m not conceding anything. I do not admit to representing your views; what I’m talking about is your rhetoric or framing, which is a big deal in politics.

What Kelly said is what a lot of other people are saying. To me this is the most important single question in American politics today, and what she said is about right. My main worry is that it’s too late.

This isn’t a time to say “Yes, but”. The thing to say is, “It’s about time”. This is something that needs to be done, and since it still might not be, we should do what we can to make it happen.

Instead of recognizing that what Kelly said was about right, albeit a truism, you insisted on coming in with a criticism. You conceded that Democratic think tanks would be, of course, a good thing, BUT…..

If you had simply directly stated your idea that the Office of Technology Assessment etc. should be restored, no one here would have argued. No one disagrees with that idea, except for all the Republicans in the US Congress. But an uncontroversial statement like that would be a bit flat and pointless. Juicing it up by framing a contrast to the Democratic thinktank proposal wasn’t the way to go.

Something like this happens WHENEVER the Democrats start talking about getting a media presence or building up a research infrastructure. A hefty chunk of the Democratic / liberal leadership, for reasons which I have never understood but about which I have been willing to speculate, has automatic reservations about doing the very thing that the Democrats need to do to survive. The dissociation is like clockwork. “Yes, but….”

To me, making the kind of thing Kelly talked about happen is the main thing that needs to be done, and as I said, the hour is getting late. I do NOT have confidence that it will be done. I’ve been waiting for over a year. Do not assume that it’s a done deal; it may well not happen at all.

And I do not think that your concessive “This is all very well, but…..” was a useful contribution in that respect. As I’ve said, you’re not the first and you’re far from the worst, but that kind of reluctant support is something I run into all the time, and I just don’t understand it.

But within academic Democrats there’s a tremendous resistance to this kind of thing. I think that they wish that Democrats would just contract for perr-reviewed policy-making from the various professional associations, without interference from dirty politicians.

John, that’s bullshit, pure and simple. You’ve started off in these comments by egregiously misinterpreting my post as saying something that it doesn’t. You’ve then gone on to use some quite specious argumentation to defend your interpretation. You’ve then, without quite fessing up to it, tried to retreat a little from that interpretation, saying that there are different problems to be addressed (true), and claiming that this somehow invalidates my post, which was very clearly addressing a different argument.” And now you’re coming back full circle to claim without quite saying so that “academic Democrats” (presumably me) don’t want to be associated with interference from dirty politicians. This is bad sloppy, argument by association and insinuation that directly misrepresents what I’m saying. Again, not only does my postnot say that left wing think tanks aren’t useful, it specifically does say that they are useful. I just say that they’re not a good substitute for the original panoply of institutions that provided disinterested scientific advice. That’s not what left wing think tanks are for. I don’t think that you’ve got an argument with that claim – or at least if you do, you haven’t advanced it to date. Instead, you’re accusing me of the apparently heinous, if rather vaguely defined, crime of “excessive contrastivity.” It seems to me that you came into this discussion spoiling for a fight, or, more precisely, wanting to reiterate yet again your argument that academic left-wingers are too concerned with playing fair. You’re trying to beat up on the straw man of “academic Democrats” and using my post for that purpose. Which, I’ll repeat, is bullshit. That’s not what the post was about – I’m talking about a different set of issues. I don’t especially want to get into a fight with you about this – I suspect that we agree on much more than we disagree about. But when you egregiously misrepresent what I’m saying in order to make me into an object-lesson in your long term mission to bring enlightenment to the left, I’m going to call you on it.