Originally posted by: Vic
It's hard for anyone with the slightest hint of the ability for critical thinking and who is not monarchist to be able to badmouth the word 'liberal' all day (as though the political philosophy of representative govt tempered by the rule of law is something evil). And because the latter is what the GOP currently requires of its members, people with objective thinking skills (like scientists) are going to be hesitant to admit their membership.
Yes, hesitant to admit GOP membership, or outright hesitant to become GOP members. Either way 6% is interesting.
I know quite a few scientist-most of my friends and co-workers are such- and I have yet to meet one that had any kind of distaste for the title of liberal. Most embrace the characterization as a complement.
Far from character assassination, scientists are clearly not the kind of people whose knees convulse violently at the mere mention of the "L" word.
Specious, facile and superficial Rush-type arguments and discourse (lots of e.gs. in this thread) are inherently unsatisfactory and often insulting to scientists. They may even be seen as attacks against science. Attack logical coherent thought, and you attack science in general.