In response to my column last week about hormesis — the theory that some radiation can be beneficial to humans — liberals reacted with their usual open-minded examination of the facts.

According to Noel Sheppard at Newsbusters, MSNBC’s Ed Schultz devoted an entire segment to denouncing me. He called me toxic, accused me of spreading misinformation and said I didn’t care about science.

One thing Schultz did not do, however, was cite a single scientific study.

I cited three physicists by name as well as four studies supporting hormesis in my column. For the benefit of liberals scared of science, I even cited The New York Times.

It tells you something that the most powerful repudiation of hormesis Schultz could produce was the fact that a series of government agencies have concluded — I quote — that “insufficient human data on hormesis exists.”

Well, in that case, I take it all ba -– wait, no. That contradicts nothing I said in my column.

Liberals should take up their quarrel with the physicists cited by both me and the Times. I’m sure the Harvard physics department will be fascinated to discover that the left’s idea of the scientific method is to cling to their fears while hurling invective at anyone who cites evidence.

The fact that liberals chronically wet themselves over science wouldn’t be half as annoying if they didn’t go around boasting about their deep respect for science, especially compared to conservatives.

Apparently this criticism is based on conservatives’ skepticism about global warming – despite the findings of distinguished research scientists Dr. Alicia Silverstone and Dr. Woody Harrelson. (In my case, it’s only because I’m still waiting for liberals’ global cooling theory from the ’70s to come true.)

The left’s idea of “science” is that we should all be riding bicycles and using the Clivus Multrum composting latrines instead of flush toilets, to save a universe that’s been around for billions of years. Anyone who dissents, they say — while adjusting their healing crystals for emphasis — is “afraid of science.”

A review of the record, however, shows that time and again liberals have been willing to corrupt public policy and allow people to die in order to enforce the Luddite views of groups such as the Union of Concerned Scientists (original name, “Union of Concerned Activist Lawyers Who Took a Science Course in High School”).

As I described in my book “Godless,” both the government and the entire mainstream media lied about AIDS in the ’80s by scaring Americans into believing that heterosexuals were as much at risk for acquiring AIDS as gays and intravenous drug users. The science had to be lied about so no one’s feelings got hurt.

In 1985, Life magazine’s cover proclaimed: “NOW, NO ONE IS SAFE FROM AIDS.” In 1987, U.S. News & World Report reported that AIDS was “finding fertile growth among heterosexuals.” Also in 1987, Dr. Oprah Winfrey said that “research studies” predicted that “one in five heterosexuals could be dead from AIDS at the end of the next three years.”

In 1988, ABC’s “20/20” claimed the CDC had discovered a shocking upsurge of heterosexual infections on college campuses. It struck no one as odd that 28 of the 30 infections had occurred in men (all of whom had alphabetized spice racks and at least three cats, one named Blanche).

Two years later, CNN broadcast the exact same 1988 study, proclaiming: “A new report from CDC indicates that AIDS is on the rise on college campuses.”

A quarter-century later, and we’re still waiting for the big heterosexual AIDS outbreak.

But at least science achieved its primary purpose: AIDS was not stigmatized as a “gay disease.” Scientific facts were ignored so that science would be nonjudgmental. That was more important than the truth.

Liberal activists also gave us the alar scare in the late ’80S based on the studies of world renowned chemist and national treasure Meryl Streep.

Alar is a perfectly safe substance that had been used on apples since 1968 both to ripen and preserve the fruit. It made fresh fruit more accessible by allowing fruit pickers to make one sweep through the apple grove, producing ripe, fresh fruit that could be distributed widely and cheaply.

But after hearing the blood-chilling testimony of Streep, hysterical soccer moms across America hopped in their Volvos, dashed to their children’s schools and ripped the apples from the little ones’ lunch boxes. “Delicious, McIntosh and Granny Smith” were added to “Hitler, Stalin and Mao” as names that will live in infamy.

The EPA proposed banning alar based on a study that involved pumping tens of thousands times more alar into rats than any human could possibly consume, and observing the results. The rats died — of poisoning, not tumors – but the EPA banned it anyway. Poor people went back to eating Twinkies instead of healthy fresh fruit.

Meanwhile, the World Health Organization advised against an alar ban and Europeans continued to eat fruit with alar in their nice warm houses powered by nuclear energy (halted in the U.S. thanks to the important work of Dr. Jackson Browne and Dr. Bonnie Raitt).

Other scientific theories developed in the laboratories of personal injury lawyers and TV networks included the left’s “cancer cluster” thesis in the ’80s. The Centers for Disease Control investigated 108 alleged “cancer clusters” that had occurred between 1961 to 1983 and found no explanation for them other than coincidence — and a demonstrable proximity to someone with deep pockets.

As Yale epidemiologist Michael Bracken explained: “Diseases don’t fall evenly on every town like snow.” Random chance will lead some areas to have higher, sometimes oddly higher, numbers of cancer.

But just to be safe, we all better stop driving cars, eating off of clean dishes and using aerosol sprays.

Some of the other scientific studies and innovations that make liberals cry involve: vaccines, IQ, breast implants and DDT.

After decades of this nonsense, The New York Times’ Paul Krugman has the audacity to brag that liberals believe the “truth should be determined by research, not revelation.” Yes — provided the “research” is conducted by trial lawyers and Hollywood actresses, not actual scientists.

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