Palin Flaunts Her Scientific Ignorance

I haven’t commented much on the ‘08 election on this blog yet, because I would rather stick to the science and keep it non-political. However, Sarah Palin recently gave an interview where she said some things that were just so appalling it deserves some comment. 

So she basically talks about how she thinks scientific projects are expensive, and then she says this:

 You’ve heard about some of these pet projects they really don’t make a whole lot of sense and sometimes these dollars go to projects that have little or nothing to do with the public good. Things like fruit fly research in Paris, France. I kid you not.

Oh. My. God. Did she just say that? How ignorant can a person get? And this person just happens to be running for VP! Yeah, scientists do a lot of research on fruit flies. Would she rather they did it on humans? Fruit flies, or more specifically Drosophila, have been extremely valuable for scientific progress. Where would genetic research been without it? Just as an example, a search for “Drosophila” on PubMed yielded an astounding 65480 articles…. Nothing to do with public good, she says? Is she for real? Seriously? How ignorant can you get?