The House GOP Found Their Johnson

 

You know, usually I like to make link-heavy blog posts that substantiate all the facts I drop in one of my screeds, but I will leave the research on this one to my readers because I had limited connectivity to the internet this week and have a whole carton of huevos to fry. But here's the funny thing to me: 

Look at the happy-ass motherfuckers in the picture above.  They think they just got their shit together and ended a long national nightmare. They just picked the most problematic of dudes to unify themselves around. He doesn't look like a whole lot, but whoo, this dude right here. 

This is a Christian nationalist of the kind it's been my whole life's business to want to take down. He's anti-science: a young earth creationist who doesn't believe in climate change. That right there is an air raid siren for me: he does not care about facts and doesn't care whether facts are even useful to the betterment of life for other people. He talks in terms of "belief" because empirical knowledge is inconvenient to his worldview. He is a 2020 election denier: that right there--he cares about power, and GOD DAMN the facts. 

He says he finds his proofs in Scripture: people write books all the time, but if you "believe in" God--who do you think put facts in the world? It feels very much to me like people who deny empirical knowledge are the ones really denying a revelation that can be understood and made accessible, and instead support a kind of false-witness bearing of twisting Scripture to one's own ends. 

Anatomy of a Panic Featuring Chris Rufo

 

Chris Rufo was the guy who brought us the "CRT" moral panic, when he didn't actually know anything about CRT, but decided that if it made people uncomfortable, that was his angle--their discomfort, not whether the theory was right. Now I could be biased: when I see Discovery Institute and Claremont Institute in someone's bio, I immediately feel some kind of way. The Discovery Institute is the kind of people who will genuinely lie in your face that intelligent design is not some kind of creationism, when all they did is rebrand it. Claremont Institute always gives me mad "David Barton but without the ugly shirts" vibe. Historical revisionist think tankery about how maybe "Save babby makes Christofascist possible?? If states rights definitely???"

Roy Moore Won The AL Senate Primary Despite Trump's Strange Endorsement

It's easy to look at the picture of Roy Moore, above, and just see a man with a big flag, a tiny gun, and a middling hat. But he is a genuinely fascinating creature in that he seems to be entirely the worst of old-fashioned Bible-banging demagoguery. He's virulently anti-gay.  He seems confused about geography, current events, religion, and law, despite once upon a time being a judge.  He's of course anti-choice when it comes to women's reproductive choices, and he's also a creationist who even considers the teaching of evolution incompatible with the Constitution.  He is mostly known as the judge who took on the "Establishment clause" regarding religious speech to the effect of basically offering himself up in service to a graven image, which sort of cluster-fuckedly makes a mockery of both the First Commandment and the First Amendment. He thinks the 9/11 attacks were a punishment from God (which I think would align quite nicely with what Osama Bin Laden thought, too.) And he has nice words for Vladimir Putin. 

He's almost a parody of fringe right-wing whackadoodledom, and was endorsed by Ben Carson, Steve Bannon, Sarah Palin, and not by the actual US President, Donald Trump, who gave a rally for "Big Luther" Strange.

I don't pretend I know what this means. This is Alabama, which is not my neck of the woods at all. But if Moore's genuine unfitness* for anything at all could be adequately articulated, I'm thinking this culture war grudge-vote against the "DC establishment" might have maybe made a Doug Jones win vaguely possible? He's a civil rights lawyer and seems like a real stand-up guy.

*No, I am serious, this guy should not be a Senator.

UPDATE: Trump is purging Tweets about his support for Strange like a sad loser-baby:

UPDATE ALSO, TOO: Roy Moore was also a Birther, just so we can fully take in his up-fuckedness.  But that, at least, he has in common with Trump.

The Knucklehead Constituency

You know, reading Charles Pierce is a pleasure for me--he has a wicked way with a phrase and I agree with him on a thing or two. So, I was interested in expanding upon a concern of his that touches on one of my own persistent puzzles--how it happens that people running for office are not called out when they seem to be dabbling--nay, professing, or at least out of one or more sides of their faces--in sheer and utter batshit. There are people who are by no means political neophytes who seem to have been delinquent on their reality bill--they are totally disconnected. I think it would be meaningful if objective reality could be entered into a political debate to actually determine who is more legitimately competent to deal with actual issues and not group hallucinations experienced by FOX News viewers and the WND readership, but I find myself altogether cynical about it.

I found myself not that long ago mourning the reality that there is no penalty for basically racist or conspiracy theorist views in some districts. (Hell, it seems to work, to some degree, to maneuver the "squeaky wheels" into higher profile positioning.) It bothers me to no end that theres a genuine likelihood that this mid-term election might even bring a bumper crop of "knuckleheads" into Congress that makes the 2010 freshmen look like fucking Solons.

But I get the reticence of Democratic challengers to call the whackadoodles out, I genuinely do. You take a contest like Tom Cotton vs incumbent AR Senator Pryor. Now, Cotton has a whole raft of signifying nonsense that has come out of him (blaming Obama for the Ukraine situation, carping on food stamps like they only started being part of farm bills since 2009--not since always), And he's down the line a social conservative--anti-abortion, anti-gay marriage. But he's kind of funky in that Rand Paul, not understanding social contracts kind of way. But you know why Pryor can't call him a whackadoodle, even if the name kind of fits?

Maher, Noah, and the Paradox of Blasphemy

I watch Bill Maher--I don't agree with him all the time, and sometimes I think he can be crude (heh, me too, come to think of it), but what I find fascinating is the way he gets up the nose of fundamentalists. Here's Maher the other week regarding the bad image one might get about God from that Book people are always talking about:



And just between you, me, and the rest of the Internet--he has a point. Old Testament God is very smitey and doesn't seem to be especially discriminating about who he does the smiting against. And people to this very day use that kind of smitey Godhead to harsh the mellows of other folks the whole world round, whether it's saying Gays or Boobs cause earthquakes, or even personal messages of how people done asked for it by not forgiving their abusive parents.

So maybe it shouldn't be surprising that some followers of Smitey Godhead want Maher to be punished for blasphemy:

The evangelical activist said Maher is known for his anti-religious views, but Emmanuel said “this time he’s gone too far.” 

“He may have protection under the First Amendment to say whatever slanderous thing that comes out of his toilet bowl brain, but that does not mean Christians should turn the other cheek,” Emmanuel said. 

He agreed with the Psalms 14 passage that questioned the character of anyone who would believe in his heart there was no God, suggesting Maher and outspoken atheists Richard Dawkins and the late Christopher Hitchens had much in common with the Devil.

Creationists Would Like Equal Time with Cosmos

I have been very much enjoying the Seth MacFarlane-produced, Neil DeGrasse Tyson-hosted Cosmos, in large part because I am a fan of observed things. If you see a thing, and others see the thing, and you can share relevant data that your thing exists--that is a good thing. Science is about looking at things and trying to see them as they are and observing what their facts are.

This past episode was great to me because it was a narrative about how science (specifically in this instance, the Enlightenment era Royal Society blokes) reveals truth and dispels fear. I have to admit, in part, because I am a big Neal Stephenson fan and and read and re-read the Baroque Cycle, I kind of just felt at home with Robert Hooke and Edmund Halley and Newton and them. Like they were my brothers from another era.  But the thing is--science is cumulative. When we look back at what the scientists who came before did--we know their work and where they were coming from. People built on what they did. If any bit of it was wrong, it couldn't even be the foundation for what came after.

This isn't true for Creationism. There isn't anything to build on. There isn't any foundation. It is, simply, "God did it". It isn't based on any observation of "God doing it". Instead, it is a bunch of dumb quibbles about how evolution, as theory, isn't so totally complete as to convince narcissists who need to have God as an artisan making their own personal asses special order.

That's why I chuckle a little--no, hard, when they suggest they should have equal time.  No seriously? What if the episode looked like the Kitzmiller v Dover trial?  Should creationists really want to have their pseudoscience torn apart on the regular? It might cost them in private school money and text book pimping.

Maybe they should be glad enough they have the 700 Club and "all that".

Oklahoma is Just Raising Questions in the Classroom

By which I mean, questioning the foundation of several centuries worth of scientific inquiry by providing students with the options of a "Build Your Own Bullshit" Bar at the old studiatorium we used to consider a classroom.

Here's the gist:

In biology class, public school students can't generally argue that dinosaurs and people ran around Earth at the same time, at least not without risking a big fat F. But that could soon change for kids in Oklahoma: On Tuesday, the Oklahoma Common Education committee is expected to consider a House bill that would forbid teachers from penalizing students who turn in papers attempting to debunk almost universally accepted scientific theories such as biological evolution and anthropogenic (human-driven) climate change. 

Gus Blackwell, the Republican state representative who introduced the bill, insists that his legislation has nothing to do with religion; it simply encourages scientific exploration. "I proposed this bill because there are teachers and students who may be afraid of going against what they see in their textbooks," says Blackwell, who previously spent 20 years working for the Baptist General Convention of Oklahoma. "A student has the freedom to write a paper that points out that highly complex life may not be explained by chance mutations." 

HB 1674 is the latest in an ongoing series of "academic freedom" bills aimed at watering down the teaching of science on highly charged topics. Instead of requiring that teachers and textbooks include creationism—see the bill proposed by Missouri state Rep. Rick Brattin—HB 1674'scrafters say it merely encourages teachers and students to question, as the bill puts it, the "scientific strengths and scientific weaknesses" of topics that "cause controversy," including "biological evolution, the chemical origins of life, global warming, and human cloning."

If someone wants their kid to be a nice little coddled egg or shit-fed mushroom, why is it so difficult to just homeschool the little larva without trying to impose one's vast ignorance on everyone else's brat? I mean, really! Making up stuff as you go along is to science as drinking cleaning fluids found under mother's sink is to eating. In other words--that's just wrong, son. The freeedom to write a paper claiming that the earth is held up by an infinite number of turtles is the freedom to step out in traffic--just because you can, doesn't make it right. To understand science is to be able to ably defend your propostition because it has been tested and you understand what the tests meant and what the results meant. Parroting back the bullshit you were raised with is no more science than a dog shaking hands means that the canine in question is attempting to introduce itself into human society--except that a dog, at least, might expect a treat. Or petting. But a child who parrots nonsense and expects an A for failing to be educated isn't introducing hirself to science. That child is rejecting it. And is no more educated that a child who rejects spelling or claims 2x2=a million.

Making bullshit a law doesn't make it anything more than bullshit. They might as well call ice cream a vegetable.

(X-posted at Rumproast.)

Oh For the Love of Science...

What the--? I can't even with these people anymore.

Via Mother Jones:

Late last month, Rick Brattin, a Republican state representative in Missouri, introduced a bill that would require that intelligent design and "destiny" get the same educational treatment and textbook space in Missouri schools as the theory of evolution. Brattin insists that his bill has nothing to do with religion—it's all in the name of science. 

"I'm a science enthusiast...I'm a huge science buff," Brattin tells The Riverfront Times. "This [bill] is about testable data in today's world." But Eric Meikle, education project director at theNational Center for Science Education, disagrees. "This bill is very idiosyncratic and strange," he tells Mother Jones. "And there is simply not scientific evidence for intelligence design."

A "huge science buff".  What is it they say--"You always hurt the ones you love"?

But no, that actually gets worse--

Because God, is why! Or Santorum's Prebuttal.

While reading Paul Krugman's Op-Ed piece, Republicans Against Science, I couldn't help but think of some comments made a few days ago by former Senator Rick Santorum:

We are going through this debate right now by somebody who’s in the Republican field talking about people who believe in certain scientific theories, whether it’s global warming or evolution. And somehow or another if you believe that we are creatures of a loving God, that that is somehow anti-science,” Santorum said. “It’s not anti-science. It’s an affirmation of what we view in the world. Which is, we see God." (Emphasis mine.)

Most creationists seem to make a point of using the word "theory" in a way quite different from what is meant when one says "scientific theory". "Theory", the way they use it, is just an idea that one might believe in, the way one might believe the CIA killed JFK, or that the moon landing was faked.  Scientific is much more authoritative--such as the germ theory of disease, or the theory of gravity.  A theory in science is not an affirmation of belief, but the most coherent explanation of observable facts not yet disproved. Understanding and accepting a theory isn't an exercise in belief, but Santorum's  comments show a reaction to the claim of being "anti-science" as if the charge was an attack on his and other Republican's beliefs for not accepting (or understanding) the scientific theories.

Bill Maher throws another one out of the plane:

Okay, my natural reaction is "cringe". Not just because someone might get into the Senate who has a really bizarre idea about evolution being a "myth." Actually, a part of my "cringe" reaction has to do with people who even sort of do buy into evolution not really understanding what it's about. I'm reposting my reaction to seeing this vid at DU because I'm fundamentally lazy and I think I got in most of my problems with the whole thing:

The endpoint of evolution for primates is not "human". Humans are, just like any other life form in existence right now, one pretty successful DNA spin-off. But even if we were to identify evidence of "microevolution" amongst our fellow primates, there's no saying that it would be toward a more human-like phenotype, if that wasn't beneficial to that species in their given habitat. Whale evolves from an earlier species that was more adapted to land. The motto of evolution isn't "goal-directed". It's more like "Shit happens."

The best retort I can think of to the "Well, if people evolved from apes, why are there still apes?" would be something along the lines of: "If you are your grandmother's grandkid--why would you have cousins?" It's about the same, not that we exactly evolved from apes, per se, or that they are as near to us as "cousins". Although modern DNA testing can give a good idea of just how related we actually are.


"It takes a long time"--the retort to what she said in the above clip, is generally true for evolution. It normally takes a long time before we can observe that a given population is significantly changed from some other, apparently static iteration of that gene pool. But we can observe microevolution for some species occurring over mere decades. However, the predictive model of evolution of modern apes doesn't necessarily have to be humaniform, at all. First of all, it presupposes that the environment is uniquely favorable, currently, to species similar to humans, and it also implies that as an adaptation, humans are "all that". Neither of which may be true, regardless of the relative success and ubiquity of humans on this planet.

(Just a small grouse of mine; I'm fairly pro-science and like to see it factually represented. As to the larger question of accepting evolution as the correct, scientifically-verified model describing the diversity of life on this planet being a pre-requisite for office--yes. Unlike religious litmus tests, which have to do with opinions about stuff you can't easily quantify or test, actual data exists for the theory of evolution. It is tested. And calling it a "myth" or alleging that as much evidence exists for creation is, frankly, nonsense.)

Rand Paul and the Age of the Earth--hmm.

I note that while he brushes off the age of the earth question as one he won't answer, he does respond eloquently regarding his committment to anti-abortion activism. And I think I understand why.

From the Christian home-schoolers, that question seems to have been rooted in finding out to what level Paul was willing to express his bona fides as a committed literalist Christian. Was he going to go all in and give the "Young Earth" answer? Would he invoke science?

By shrugging it off, I think he might have been tipping a hand to the recognition that he'd get flak either way he answered it. But by addressing his anti-abortion cred, he established that he was right there in the same pew in a way that spoke to policy without speaking to belief. I think that was pretty canny of him, although I of course don't share his beliefs. Me--I take it as fairly documented that the earth is about four and a half billion years old and consider that reproductive issues are for a woman to decide with her partner and her medical practioner if need be, because they are very much a part of her personal business: physically, emotionally, socially, financially and morally. So long story short--I found both his answers to the early two-part question pretty much unsatisfactory.

Belief in evolution is....liberal?

Wow, the guy thinks the Bible might be only partially true and agrees with scientists and other pointy-headed intellectuals that evolution best describes the diversity of life on earth....what up, my comrade?

I'm not really sure how support of evolution became "liberal", but I think it has a lot to do with the sort-of "brand conservative" Republican party being the one the religious right feeds off of prefers. It's symbiotic. The zealots support the GOP, and they, in turn, whisper sweet, wedge-issue nothings into the religious right's shell-like ear. But since support for evolution grows in the youth demographic and among the religiously unaffiliated (which is a growing demographic) and since evolution actually is the best explanation of the progress of life on earth, maybe they should think about getting off the creationism racket?

Just saying.

Also, the claim that another candidate doesn't believe that the whole Bible is actually true--that strikes me as a bit of a religious litmus test. I don't care for it. And really, I think a candidate who makes such a claim better be prepared to explain just what sort of big freaking fish Jonah was swallowed by, and how Noah broke up fights between zebras and kangaroos.

In other words--what the hell? Was that bit code for "not a Christian"?

Darwin Foes Add Warming to Targets

Darwin Foes Add Warming to Targets

The linkage of evolution and global warming is partly a legal strategy: courts have found that singling out evolution for criticism in public schools is a violation of the separation of church and state. By insisting that global warming also be debated, deniers of evolution can argue that they are simply championing academic freedom in general.

Yet they are also capitalizing on rising public resistance in some quarters to accepting the science of global warming, particularly among political conservatives who oppose efforts to rein in emissions of greenhouse gases.

In South Dakota, a resolution calling for the “balanced teaching of global warming in public schools” passed the Legislature this week.

“Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant,” the resolution said, “but rather a highly beneficial ingredient for all plant life.”

The measure made no mention of evolution, but opponents of efforts to dilute the teaching of evolution noted that the language was similar to that of bills in other states that had included both. The vote split almost entirely along partisan lines in both houses, with Republican voting for it and Democrats voting against.

The relationship of the evolution-denialists and the climate-change-denialists should surprise no one. Both propositions seem to include the somewhat contrary idea that scientists are the last people you would want to ask about science. I've highlighted the snippet about carbon dioxide in the South Dakota resolution just to point out how really not-at-all adept the thinking is with this denial crap.

Yes, plants need carbon dioxide. Just like people need oxygen. But it has been established that too much oxygen is harmful to people. To put it more simply, water is completely natural, and we need it to survive, but you'd be foolish to think that means you can't drown. This should be obvious. It just fails to be obvious to someone who has decided that science is necessarily wrong because it doesn't confirm their own biases.

The creationism vs. evolution debate doesn't pose any real immediate concern for us as a society. Some children will have a thorough science education, be able to understand the concepts involved in natural selection and some won't--so what? But understanding of how chemical reactions occurring in our atmosphere can affect the overall climate is a more immediate concern because it affects how people will vote, the choice they will make regarding carbon output, and because the choices they make will actually be seen in our lifetimes. Because we already have seen changes in the environment during our lifetimes. Even if there was a question regarding the time-frame in which, say, Himalayan glaciers disappear, it has no bearing on the fact that we are already witnessing the erosion of the ice shelf of the Arctic and Antarctic.

The Canadian Northwest passage is navigable. Kenyan coffee-growers are moving their crops to higher elevations. And don't get me started on the polar bears.

The story of evolution, although wonderful, took place largely in the past. It happens on a micro-level that can be witnessed experimentally if you are looking at bacteria, for example, but generally, it takes a great deal of time to see significant change within a population. But this climate change thing--it isn't necessarily a slow process. The worse things get, the worse they can get. Take this story:

Prodigious plumes of planet-warming methane are bubbling from sediments across a broad region of Arctic seafloor previously thought to be sealed by permafrost, new analyses indicate. The resulting increase of methane gas in the atmosphere may accelerate climate warming, scientists say.

Though immense amounts of carbon are known to be trapped in the peatlands of Siberia, a larger, often unrecognized carbon reservoir lies hidden just north of that frigid region, says Natalia Shakhova, a biogeochemist at the University of Alaska in Fairbanks. The East Siberian Arctic Shelf — a 2.1-million-square-kilometer patch of Arctic seafloor that was exposed during the most recent ice age, when sea levels were lower — is three times larger than all of today’s land-based Siberian wetlands. When the region was above sea level, tundra vegetation pulled carbon dioxide from the air as plants grew. That organic material, much of which didn’t decompose in the frigid Arctic, accumulated in the soil and is the source of modern methane.

Because of warming, there is less ice, and because there is less ice, there is more of a gas that increases the warming, which....and so on. Not to sound like a doom-sayer--but that is bad.

And it is also bad, and intellectually dishonest, and political hackery, for people to glom onto this denialist business. For crying out loud--let real scientists set the debate about what real science is!

US too squeamish for a Victorian-Age historical film?

The movie is called Creation. Does it sound scary, yet? So it's about Charles Darwin. Big deal. It's a movie. People will be wearing period costumes and I am given to believe there may even be acting and scenes with angst and questions of faith and um....

Sigh. I've heard the reviews are quite good. But this is what the article says:

The film has sparked fierce debate on US Christian websites, with a typical comment dismissing evolution as "a silly theory with a serious lack of evidence to support it despite over a century of trying".

Jeremy Thomas, the Oscar-winning producer of Creation, said he was astonished that such attitudes exist 150 years after On The Origin of Species was published.

"That's what we're up against. In 2009. It's amazing," he said.

"The film has no distributor in America. It has got a deal everywhere else in the world but in the US, and it's because of what the film is about. People have been saying this is the best film they've seen all year, yet nobody in the US has picked it up...."

Somehow, this country has weathered Inherit the Wind, The Last Temptation of Christ, and two, count'em, two cinematic works based on the novels of that blasphemous popular author, Dan Brown. I really don't see why what looks like a well-made and balanced treatment of a scientist whose theory, explained over a hundred years ago, is taught in schools today and whose work is considered to be mainstream science, should cause anyone any agita.

Unless, of course, there are some religious leaders who are afraid of their flock being taught the controversy? (But that must be laughable, surely! Isn't their faith stronger stuff than that?) And naturally, they aren't worried that a fictionalized account would rehabilitate and humanize for creationists, the image of someone they've done their damnedest to portray as a godless, pseudo scientific cult leader? Pish, and tosh, even, for that matter--

It wouldn't be a problem at all for them, unless it was plausible, sympathetic, and true.

Oh yeah. That problem.

I think this problem, in practice, in this country, was best summed up by something I read today on HuffPo, by Frank Schaeffer (whose posts I pretty much read religiously--small pun, and whose Crazy For God I'm just now reading since it came out in paperback--very interesting read and I may get to a review of it). He wrote, appropos of the 9/12 marchers:

The fact of the matter is we now know what the experiment in raising children outside of the American mainstream means. It means that there's a whole subculture within American culture that mistrusts facts precisely because they are facts. They glory an alternative view of not just politics but of reality.

They frequent the creationist museum and look at dioramas of dinosaurs cavorting with humans. They believe that gay people choose to be gay just stick it to the rest of us and could change if they invite Jesus into their hearts. They believe that before you run for governor of Alaska, for instance, you should get a preacher specializing in "casting out the spirit of witchcraft" to anoint you so you can win against the demonic forces of secularism -- as was the case with Sarah Palin when she first ran for governor. They believe that the NRA was telling the truth when they claimed that Obama would "take away your guns" and so have loaded up with more guns and ammunition. They think the time has come to rise up and overthrow the government. And yes, most of them also believe that black people are inferior to whites, so to have a black man in the White House is itself "proof" of American's fall from grace.

We have a vocal minority of people in this country who are like this--maybe some of the creationists aren't racist and some of the racists aren't creationist, and maybe we could flesh out a Venn diagram to show where global warming denialism and New World Order-ism fall in. But there is an anti-intellectualism, and even an anti-factualism, which can be daunting. Addressing topics that set this group off can be a headache. Truly.

And yet, just because something can be headache doesn't mean it shouldn't be done, and yes, they are a minority--well, yeah, I know there have been polls that say something like half of the US is some kind of creationist, but no matter--

Controversy can sell tickets, and if a movie is good, word of mouth does a lot.

I'm totally getting it on Netflix, anyway.