When one hears the phrase 'culture war' more than likely you'll think of the 1980's and 1990's.  However, I don't believe they ever went away as much as they went into hibernation until the election of President Barack Obama in the United States.  Although in Canada, it has only been in the last eight or so years that people here have felt what has been all to familiar to our friends in the South.

During the George W. Bush years we saw an organized attack on science with then President Bush limiting research on stem cells and coming out in support of teaching creationism alongside evolution.  The whole Terry Schiavo thing about whether or not it was useful to keep her body alive chewed up an insane amount of airtime and ink.

Meanwhile in Canada in 2002, a little known political animal named Stephen Harper came to power over the newly reconciled Conservative Party, a man who once said of the American conservative movement, "... your country, and particularly your conservative movement, is a light and an inspiration to people in this country and across the world."  It was this admiration which would lead Canada's future Prime Minister to collaborate with conservative American think tanks on communications and message.  This led to a grass roots effort, which has largely been successful demonizing Canada's public broadcaster the CBC, and the growth of a mistrust in news in general.  In fact, the mistrust of intellectuals and academia has grown considerably from a decade ago as is evidenced from the new Alberta law which gives parents the option of pulling their kids out of classes on evolution.

Other anti-intellectual and academia hate in Canada came recently in the form of the conservative government scrapping the mandatory long form census and muzzling scientists so that they couldn't talk to the media.  Before someone says complains that these issues don't have anything in common with the culture wars, I would argue that it is of primary importance for the religious leading this war to have reliable data removed from the equation.  Education and evidence are anathema to a world view based on nothing but nonsense.

In the United States, we have seen a resurgence of faith based craziness after it had gone into hibernation during the Bush years.  Perhaps it was because values voters had what they considered to be one of their own in the White House that they were mollified for a time, but they are back with a vengeance.  Many of these people are single issue voters over things like abortion, but they are just as anti-intellectual and anti-academia as their counterparts in Canada.  In Texas a long battle was fought and won by the culture warriors to change student text books, removing Thomas Jefferson and his philosophy on the separation of church and state, removing mention of slavery, and teaching creationism alongside evolution.

I don't think I'm over the top when I say it's shockingly stupid to be anti-education and anti-evidence, but here we are.  However, a loud and well organized minority of people who cling to mythology and are easily swayed to vote for unqualified candidates seems to me like a dream come true for conservatives.

Watch a clip from last night's Rachel Maddow on the return of the crazy:

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