The year 2007 will be remembered after the eventual demise of humans as the year we neglected to realize the scientifically justifiable consequences of human action. On April 11, The New York Times reported some of the first territorial casualties of global warming. Rising Indian Ocean levels have submerged 31 square miles of islands off the Indian subcontinent over the last several years.

While admittedly not all the land loss has resulted directly from global warming, a significant chunk has. The startling fact about this news report is that there remain those who continue to protest the validity of the global warming theory.

These people debate that human action (and recently, inaction) have caused a change in global climate, and along with those who oppose the theory of evolution, are inarguably, incontrovertibly wrong. In modern America, opposing scientific evidence has become almost a pastime of the radically conservative right. Those who do so not only ignore substantial evidence, but also reveal their incredible stupidity and ignorance. The populace of America needs to emphatically reject its neglectful policies and attitudes.

As an analogy, imagine an elderly family member has a serious and debilitating disease. To diagnose the disease and find out the best course of action to minimize its effects, or ideally eliminate them, the family brings the relative to the most accredited, best educated doctor they can afford.

They do not hold a family powwow to analyze the situation to determine for themselves the root cause and best remedy.

The former course of action describes that of rational members of all ideologies while the latter describes that of the narrow-minded Bush conservatives currently empowered in the White House (and, incidentally, emphatically rejected in the 2006 election).

Logic mandates that the family draws upon the best resources available to help their sick. Employing this analogy manifests that science has its realm of knowledge and responsible people avail themselves of this knowledge to their benefit. Why then, do Bush conservatives continue to hedge their language with respect to global warming, evolution, and other important sociopolitical issues?

In each case, these ideologues are wrong. The Stern Report details the negative socioeconomic consequences of global warming for Western society and the United Nations has recently issued a report detailing the future consequences of continued greenhouse gas emissions.

An even more updated U.N. report explains how human action has ALREADY resulted in geological and meteorological consequences like those illustrated in the Indian Ocean. The evidence is very plain for those educated and open minded enough to examine the raw data.

A similar line of analysis applies to evolution. While few can legitimately contest or support the mere possibility that God was the ultimate source of life in the universe, the evidence against Darwin’s theory of evolution is nonexistent at best.

While it may gall mindless demagogues that humans at some genealogical level may be related to monkeys and amphibians, the best analyses of evidence suggests that is our origin.

Scientists specifically refer to the conclusions of such analyses as theories for a reason: no one can prove theories, only support them. However, substantial evidence supports both global warming and evolution. In fact, there is sufficient evidence to refute nearly every argument against them.

Unfortunately, the current Administration has shut its analytical mind to well-reasoned science that contradicts its ideology.

As a result, political conservatives have received an unfair reputation as mindless, religious zealots who espouse nothing but scripture and ignore evidence. This simultaneously does an injustice to the “good” conservatives (who are increasingly in the minority) as well as those apolitical few who analyze evidence based on merit.

For our country to move beyond the Bush debacle, we need the populace to rise above the ignorance of the administration and recognize for itself the lies Bush & Co. have presented for the past six years. Some may argue that doing so advocates only liberalism.

But in fact, examining data and making selections based upon impartial analysis is quite simply called good governance, apparently a difficult concept in modern America.