Those ‘experts’ and their ‘fancy degrees’ can’t teach House Republicans anything

April 24, 2008

I’ve already done approximately 10 gazillion items about how and why abstinence-only programs — championed by the Bush administration and conservatives everywhere — don’t work, waste money, mislead young people about reality, and undermine public health. This is not another one of those posts.

Instead, it’s about Republicans’ reaction to the evidence on abstinence-only programs.

Yesterday, for example, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform held a hearing on the effectiveness of government-sponsored abstinence-only curricula. Not surprisingly, researchers, medical professionals, and scientists in the field explained to lawmakers that the evidence is overwhelming — abstinence-only doesn’t reduce teen pregnancies, doesn’t reduce sexually transmitted diseases, and doesn’t even lead minors to abstain from sex.

So far, so good. Then, of course, committee Republicans piped up.

Republicans said even if some abstinence-only programs do not work, others do, and it would be wrong to end the funding.

Rep. John Duncan, a Tennessee Republican, said that it seems “rather elitist” that people with academic degrees in health think they know better than parents what type of sex education is appropriate. “I don’t think it’s something we should abandon,” he said of abstinence-only funding.

That’s one of my favorite Republican quotes in a while. Just a few weeks after the so-called “bittergate” story prompted a media frenzy, the right has already taken to defining “elitism” down — it’s now apparently “elitist” for qualified experts to tell federal officials about available evidence while they consider how to spend federal resources.

As John Cole put it:

Damned elitists with their facts and figures and numbers and statistics and fancy degrees. What do they know about public health that a regular Joe from Tennessee doesn’t?

To hear John Duncan tell it, Congress should disregard the evidence entirely. It’s ideological policymaking at its most comical — start with the answer and then work backwards, looking for substantiation to bolster the conclusion. If you can’t find any substantiation, declare evidence-based decision making “elitist.”

Honestly, sometimes far-right lawmakers just become parodies of themselves. I almost feel bad for the guy.

Here Duncan is, at a congressional hearing, defending abstinence-only programs. Told that they don’t work and that we’ve wasted $1.3 billion of taxpayer money, he not only says he doesn’t care, Duncan argues he shouldn’t care.

Panel chairman Rep. Henry Waxman, a California Democrat, said, “We are showering funds on abstinence-only programs that don’t appear to work, while ignoring proven comprehensive sex education programs that can delay sex, protect teens from disease, and result in fewer teen pregnancies.”

And some Republicans are intent on keeping it that way.

I’m sure you can find an anecdote (that’s singular for data) from some “other” abstinence program that demonstrates it works, much like the claim that there’s a “cure teh gay” program that works to change sexual orientation. Whether it works in general is the question, and I highly doubt there’s evidence any “other” abstinence program does.

  • **Republicans said even if some abstinence-only programs do not work, others do, and it would be wrong to end the funding.**

    did they offer any evidence…of these supposed working programs..
    or..
    was this just another empty assertion?

  • Barack Obama is a Harvard-educated professor of Constitutional Law. What does this latte-driving, Volvo-drinking, sandal-hugging East Coast Elitist know about being President?

    Coming from a 527 near you, soon.

  • Maybe it would be better if the guy presenting the evidence would come in coveralls, Bible hanging out of the front pocket, with a couple of teeth blacked out and sporting a southern accent.

  • Probably the best reason for not wanting to put all of the John Duncans of the world up against the wall and letting the firing squad have at ’em is the fact that we cannot build a firing-squad wall that stretches from here to the moon.

  • You’re so off base trying to make this about evidence. Don’t you know it’s all about punishing. Until the night of your government sanctioned and well defined marriage, you shall abstain. You shall not be tempted by having contraceptives or information lying about, and should you fail to abstain, you will by god have your punishment to raise to adulthood in this free and glorious country!

  • Republicanism is a damn scourge on our democracy. Just once I would like to ask a hard core, right wing republican EXACTLY what they envision the ‘perfect’ America to be.

    I imagine that it would not resemble in any form or fashion a representative democracy that works for the majority of it’s citiens.

  • Next time Duncan needs some penicillin, he needs to be told that it was recommended by some elitist doctors

  • it seems “rather elitist” that people with academic degrees in health think they know better than parents

    People in the South are very sensitive about being called stupid, but sometimes it amazes me how well this theme plays here. And the true irony of it is that it works best when an educated person says it. In some ways it’s not so different from the street smart/book smart paradigm, but at least street smart indicates a different type of education.

  • A republican congressman from Tennessee should explain it all. You can’t get any more closed minded that that. Opens his mouth and removes all doubt that he is a fool. Strong evidence that dems should not even consider being bipartisan. Why compromise with proven idiots. Having knowledge is “elitist”? The bible tells me everything I need to know about sex right Tennessee? Why should “abstinence only” programs cost money? It never did before and doesn’t work any better now than it did before congress started spending money on it. It amounts to no sex ed program at all. It’s like paying for an insurance plan that just tells you, “Don’t get sick”. Maybe that is what the Tennessee congressman would like to use to cover his constituents. Charge them millions for health care ins that just says don’t get sick. Damn elitist won’t let him.

  • And these are the partisans who rail against relativism? If the scourage of relativism is a liberal evil, why is it the Republicans who when they don’t like the evidence presented simply choose to keep looking until the find some they prefer, no matter how specious? Sounds pretty relativistic to me.

    Oh yeah – I forgot. It is only Moral Relativism that is a problem. And it is never a problem for the Rhight, because they get to define what Moral means.

  • Republicans are about nothing if not taking words and turning them into pejorative emotional triggers. A partial list would have to include:

    liberal
    communist
    socialist
    left wing
    elitist
    Volvo (sorry, had to include that one, but only partially as a joke)

    Is your doctor an elitist because s/he has a fancy schmacy degree from a medical school? Or is s/he just meeting the requirements any sane person would expect of someone who claims to be a doctor?

    If people really fall for this Newspeak, they are clearly not capable of reasoned, independent thought.

  • Damned health care academic elitist don’t have children and certainly don’t know what parents think. Duncan assumes the parents he speaks of are really uneducated and stupid. Look at what he thinks of his constituents…they are too stupid to be informed.

  • Abstinence education would work fine, if only the mercury in vaccines weren’t making our teenagers horny!

  • “seems “rather elitist” that people with academic degrees in health think they know better than parents”

    This reminded me of the recent story of the young girl dying from diabetes because her parents refused medical treatment, Instead of listening to those “elite” doctors, they chose to pray.

  • Come on folks . . . Thems good ole boys from Tennessee and Kaintuck what don’t need book learnin to knows whats right . . . Theys real mericans what done learned from their pappys bout liberals and all them . . .

    The civil war never ended . . . The Confederates just became Republicans in the 1970’s and broadened the base of those they want to enslave. . . And it does seem that lots of white folks kind of like being field hands on the new American plantation – as they vote Republican and against their own family’s interests.

  • Remember when George Bush was running for President someone voiced their support by saying, “He sounds stupid, like me.” The Republicans began by courting and pandering to the lowest common demominator, then they were absorbed by them. Look how many of these rubes are now elected Republican officials. The Republican Party is now the anti-intellectual party. When you sell your sould, the Devil always collects.

  • I wonder if foreign degrees, in humanist subjects, will make the list of “elitist” titles any time soon; I always wanted to be “elite” and never managed to reach that goal. But US is the place where one’s dreams get realized, right?

  • Ignorance is our new badge of honor. Wear it with pride! Knowledge is the fruit of The Devil and stupidity the way of the righteous! Can I get a witness?

  • Quiz: Who said: “the primary reason that teenage girls abstain [from sex] is because of their religious and moral values. We should embrace this”

  • re Quiz @ 23: Ah, but she followed that with…

    But we should also recognize what works and what doesn’t work, and to be fair, the jury is still out on the effectiveness of abstinence-only programs. I don’t think this debate should be about ideology, it should be about facts and evidence — we have to deal with the choices young people make not just the choice we wish they would make. We should use all the resources at our disposal to ensure that teens are getting the information they need to make the right decision.

    I don’t know what it means either, but it sounds like it must mean something, eh?

  • With her presidential wedding just weeks away, First Daughter Jenna Bush will once again be the subject of celebrity and political gossip alike. Just a few years ago, the bar-hopping the Bush twin seemed destined to follow in her father’s footsteps as a Republican Party Animal. As it turns out, on abstinence policy and the election of John McCain – two issues near and dear to her GOP father’s heart – Jenna Bush may not be much of a Republican at all.

    For the details, see:
    “Two Cheers for Jenna Bush.”

  • Too bad more Republicans don’t practice abstinence, thereby reducing the number of Republicans.

  • Republicans practice keeping track of YOUR abstinence. Surely you can’t be seriously questioning theirs?

  • In a weird sort of way, the religious zealots I respect the most are the ones who reject science completely. All of it. Pray away all their aches and pains, and if Baby Junior Uncle Daddy gets penumonia and dies, it’s God’s will. I mean, it IS sadistic abuse disguised as religious zealoutry, but at least it’s consistent! Many of the Evangelicals who try to convince you that abstinence-only education isn’t working because you’re not trying hard enough will be the first to run screaming to their doctor if they or someone they love needed medication for an STD, or prenatal care for an unplanned “miracle” (unless a surreptitious hypocritical trip to Planned Parenthood suits them better). They only want the benefits of modern science if it benefits them and doesn’t contradict their beliefs.

    As far as I’m concerned, it’s an all or nothing proposition. You want health care to keep you alive, you have to believe in evolution. If you want access to quality health care for an unborn infant, you have to accept that the mother & father need to know how to remain healthy which includes knowing how to keep their no-nos and hoo-has disease free. Can’t have one without the other, and to accept one without the other allows me to constantly point and laugh at you.

  • who are facts to sit up there on their high horses, looking down on us, to dictate to us what’s true or not?

  • I wonder if there isn’t another possible explanation for the blind support of abstinence-only sex education. Where exactly has the $1.3 billion gone? Maybe this is a case of defending a huge windfall for a favored constituency. It also a back door way for right-wing religious groups to proselytize America’s youth and get funded by your tax dollar to do it.

  • It is once again time for the wingers to forsake all elitist book learning. No doctors for them. No federal health care for them. No modern weaponry for them.

    Put up or shut up.

    Idiots.

  • Abstinence only programs teach religion (abstinence) under cover of purporting to protect the public health. You don’t need science to prove your faith.

  • So now we know…when the GOP calls someone an “elitist” they mean “competent, knowledgeable in their field, trained, with the ability to do their assigned task efficiently, and use logic to come to a conclusion”…huh…good to know.

  • Reminds me of when (oh, what was her name? Amy Holmes I think…) Bill Maher’s favorite Republican reporter was on Real Time, discussing sex ed. She said that boys and girls should just be told “This is a boy part, and this is a girl part”. Uh – and that’s it. The looks on the faces of the other panelists were priceless.

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