With just over a week to go until Americans choose their next President, the McCain/Palin campaign has linkurl:again;http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=mccains-beef-with-bears lashed out at what they've called wasteful "earmark" spending on "pet projects" in the form of scientific research. This time Alaska Governor and Republican Vice Presidential nominee Sarah Palin leveled the charge, and she's picked a new target: fruit fly research. "Sometimes these dollars, they go to projects having little or nothing to do with the public good," Palin said during a policy speech focused on special needs children she delivered in North Carolina on Friday (Oct. 24), "things like fruit fly research in Paris, France. I kid you not." Mainstream linkurl:press outlets;http://in.truveo.com/Countdown-Palin-Doing-More-Harm-Than-Good/id/2232266654 and linkurl:bloggers;http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-seitzman/the-lyin-the-witch-and-th_b_137028.html have been pointing to the absurdity of Palin's comment vis-a-vis the role of fruit fly research in understanding human biology (and particularly disorders affecting special needs children). While her reference was vague, the Alaska Governor may have...

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