Cutting off your face to spite your nose (aka funding weird science at the expense of useful ones)

More than 700 scientists sent a petition on Monday to the director of the National Institutes of Health protesting what they said was the shift of tens of millions of dollars in federal research money since 2001 away from pathogens that cause major public health problems to obscure germs the government fears might be used in a bioterrorist attack.

-- excerpt from Defense Tech.

Commentary: I think its fairly obvious. Part of problem with a perpetual war on terror is that it diverts political, military and social 'might' (for a lack of a better word) away from actual tangible threats to the potential threat of terrorism. That distraction is, imnsho, part of the modus operandi of fourth wave of terrorism: infrastructure disruption.

FWIW, I think 'superbugs' pose more of a threat, bodycount wise, than does terrorism or global warming or even asteroids. The whole paradigm is wrong. We stuff our bodies full of antibiotics consequently weakening our immune system and strengthening the bugs. Seems the wrong way around to me.