Joe the Plumber Says Things About Guns and God and all.

Guns are magical things, apparently, that will cure prejudice and prevent minorities from from being oppressed because obviously--bigoted nationalists would root for a marginalized person or persons shooting at representatives of the government--right? That is maybe one of the dumbest opinions I can imagine.  But there is more:



I don't really have a problem with Sam Wurzelbacher's being a Christian--it's just the simple-minded dichotomy of "either science/or the Bible" I object to. Science isn't some devilish errant nonsense constantly being revised because it's fake--books are revised because knowledge is cumulative.  Math books are revised sometimes too--which doesn't mean that suddenly 2 x 2=5. And science doesn't exist to be the opposite of religion.  To  go all Stephen Jay Gould on the subject, they're just different things. And stating that the Iron Age collection of just-so stories hasn't ever been revised is just ignorant. (Really?)

It's not that I'm contemptuous of faith, per se (or rather, I've toned my act down regarding it considerably), but I remain agape at people who, to paraphrase Inherit the Wind, don't think about the things they do think about. I think it's that kind of acceptance of premises without critical thought that leads to ideas like "guns would have prevented the Holocaust".

But hey--Joe the Plumber is running for an elected office!  Surely being the McCain/Palin 2008 mascot should count for something in this mean old world.