Drug recalls, crime bills, and a double dose of foreign policy after the jump.

• The FDA issued a press release advising citizens to stop using certain Zicam products.  Why?  Because this supposed cure for the common cold can cause the loss of one's ability to smell.  The press release also reminds concerned consumers that "the loss of sense of smell can adversely affect a person’s quality of life, and can limit the ability to detect the smell of gas or smoke or other signs of danger in the environment."  So stop using Zicam or else you might go smell-blind and die in a fire.

Science bites back. Science doesn't like Sarah. At all:

"This idiot woman, this blind, shortsighted ignoramus, this pretentious clod, mocks basic research and the international research community. You damn well better believe that there is research going on in animal models — what does she expect, that scientists should mutagenize human mothers and chop up baby brains for this work? — and countries like France and Germany and England and Canada and China and India and others are all respected participants in these efforts.

Yes, scientists work on fruit flies. Some of the most powerful tools in genetics and molecular biology are available in fruit flies, and these are animals that are particularly amenable to experimentation."

Last night, on Countdown, a Newsweek reporter who usually can be counted on to spout dull Conventional Wisdom declared that Sarah Palin's quip that fruit fly research is a joke may in fact be the Dumbest Thing Sarah Palin Has Ever Said.

Via Coates.