Hopefully the University of Vermont’s president, Dan Fogel, has heard of Dawkins as well as Daniel Dennett, both of whom have written to Fogel note the alarming inappropriateness of a mendacious, saber-rattling loon delivering a commencement speech at this or any university where faculty and staff do not routinely dress in clown costumes.
I’m smiling as I write this because with two of the “Four Horsemen” already on the case, I’m naturally imagining what a letter (or simply a belch) from Christopher Hitchens to Fogel would look like.

Dr Daniel Fogel
President, University of Vermont
Daniel.Fogel@uvm.edu
Dear President Fogel
I am dismayed to learn that the University of Vermont has invited Ben Stein to give the Commencement Address, and to receive an Honorary Degree. I can only presume that neither you, nor anybody else responsible for this lamentable decision, has seen the film ‘Expelled’. Was anybody in the Biology Department consulted before you issued an invitation to a notoriously mendacious propagandist for creationism? Was anyone in the History Department consulted before you issued this invitation to somebody who seriously tries to blame Darwin for the Holocaust? For a deplorable consequence of the latter, see [this]. What kind of a signal do you think you will send to the world about the University of Vermont, if you honour this man?
You may think I am personally biased, as I am one of several evolutionary biologists who, in good faith, agreed to be interviewed by Stein and his team, on the basis of what turned out to be flagrant lies as to the true purpose of the film. In my case, Stein and his team then went on deliberately to distort my words, as I explain here.
So do not take my word for it. See the film for yourself and then consider whether you do not have a duty, to your university (whose reputation is in danger of being besmirched), to your graduating students (whose big day is in danger of being sullied), and to the other recipients of Honorary Degrees (who would have to shake hands with this odious liar), to withdraw your invitation.
Yours very sincerely
Richard Dawkins FRS

If you think America’s wingnuts are rabid when it comes to criticizing fellow citizens with whom they disagree, their attitude toward those from other nations with the temerity to criticize them is almost comically acidic.
A reader called Spinneyhead has been having a raucous exchange with Gribbit via Twitter, a “place” where Gribbit–when not generating ignorant off-the-cuff blog screeds chiefly for the benefit of the voices in his head and secondarily so that libtards can make fun of him and send him token bursts of traffic–evidently spends an unlikely amount of time fighting with “trolls” (anyone who points out his mistakes), complaining about Obama, Democrats, and various other things that tickle his neurofibrillary tangles, and rooting for people who disagree with him to die. (I’m on Twitter but refuse to look at it often; I waste enough time here and on Facebook already.)
Spinneyhead is from the U.K., which inspired this loveliness from the corpulent cartoon canine:

Read the rest of this entry »

If you think America’s wingnuts are rabid when it comes to criticizing fellow citizens with whom they disagree, their attitude toward those from other nations with the temerity to criticize them is almost comically acidic.
A reader called Spinneyhead has been having a raucous exchange with Gribbit via Twitter, a “place” where Gribbit–when not generating ignorant off-the-cuff blog screeds chiefly for the benefit of the voices in his head and secondarily so that libtards can make fun of him and send him token bursts of traffic–evidently spends an unlikely amount of time fighting with “trolls” (anyone who points out his mistakes), complaining about Obama, Democrats, and various other things that tickle his neurofibrillary tangles, and rooting for people who disagree with him to die. (I’m on Twitter but refuse to look at it often; I waste enough time here and on Facebook already.)
Spinneyhead is from the U.K., which inspired this loveliness from the corpulent cartoon canine:

Read the rest of this entry »

If you think America’s wingnuts are rabid when it comes to criticizing fellow citizens with whom they disagree, their attitude toward those from other nations with the temerity to criticize them is almost comically acidic.
A reader called Spinneyhead has been having a raucous exchange with Gribbit via Twitter, a “place” where Gribbit–when not generating ignorant off-the-cuff blog screeds chiefly for the benefit of the voices in his head and secondarily so that libtards can make fun of him and send him token bursts of traffic–evidently spends an unlikely amount of time fighting with “trolls” (anyone who points out his mistakes), complaining about Obama, Democrats, and various other things that tickle his neurofibrillary tangles, and rooting for people who disagree with him to die. (I’m on Twitter but refuse to look at it often; I waste enough time here and on Facebook already.)
Spinneyhead is from the U.K., which inspired this loveliness from the corpulent cartoon canine:

Read the rest of this entry »

I thought my alma mater had screwed the pooch pretty hard when it dropped men’s track and field a few years ago (the program has since been reinstated), but as it turns out the University of Vermont was only warming up its loins.
As PZ Myers reports, UVM has invited Ben Stein, myxedematous character actor turned “Darwin begat the holocaust” producer of Expelled!, to deliver the commencement address to the class of 2009. Note that the school press release makes no mention of Stein’s rightfully maligned and trivially debunked film.
I’m sure the choice of Stein thrills the faculty, in particular the biology professors whose lively instruction paved the way for me and many others to gain admission to graduate schools in the life sciences, and otherwise make hay of what these men and women made available to us. To me this is little different from Morehouse College asking Thomas Sowell to speak at graduation, or–just to turn things around a little for fun–Liberty University bestowing the same honor on Ken Miller.
Think what you will of the conduct on both sides of the creation versus evolution wars, but Stein has proven beyond any doubt that he is a shameless liar. To me it is stomach-churning that a publicly funded university–an institution ostensibly valuing intellectual honesty above all else (including publicity)–is hosting Stein.
I still receive the “Alumni News & Events” e-newsletter and other correspondence, but this won’t be the case as of next week. I do plan to write a letter to the school newspaper.
Hell, they at least could have asked pro athleles Kirk McCaskill, John LeClair, Judi St. Hillaire, or Martin St. Louis; actor Ben Affleck (didn’t graduate, but was there when I was); Jessica Sklar (Mrs. Jerry Seinfeld); or a wino on Burlington’s Church Street Marketplace to perform this task, assuming this hasn’t been done in the past. And if Stein is going, I like to think that it’s because the winos were asked and already had plans for the morning and afternoon of May 17.
Any UVM students or fellow grads out there? Sound off and maybe we can arrange for a coherent missive bearing a huge pile of names to land on the shores of Lake Champlain in a timely manner.

The other day, perennial political tool Rush Limbaugh was on CNBC defending his now infamous “I want Obama to fail” comment. His argument went something like this (paraphrasing):

Yes, I want him to fail. His policies are liberal policies and I want liberal policies to fail. I want conservative policies to succeed.

I find this to be a stunning argument because what it really says is “I am an unrepentant partisan ideologue. I am a political clown.” It’s a shinning example of us-versus-them, as-long-as-my-side-wins-at-any-cost hackery. I guess it’s nice to know that his position isn’t personal against president Obama, but how can you hope for failure when the national (and indeed, global) consequences of failure are so dire? Someone might argue that they suspect certain policies to fail, or fear that certain policies will fail, but that’s completely different from hoping that they do. There were a great number of Bush policies that I expected would fail (and they did), but I didn’t, for example, actively hope that the Iraq war would turn into the king of colossal clusterfucks.
Apparently, for Rush and idiots like him, it is more important that your political ideology and your personal biases and prejudices be confirmed true than for the myriad problems facing the country and its citizens come to a just and fruitful end. And while a bulbous red rubber nose makes a clown easily identifiable at 100 paces, statements such as Limbaugh’s are every bit as telling but much farther reaching.

The other day, perennial political tool Rush Limbaugh was on CNBC defending his now infamous “I want Obama to fail” comment. His argument went something like this (paraphrasing):

Yes, I want him to fail. His policies are liberal policies and I want liberal policies to fail. I want conservative policies to succeed.

I find this to be a stunning argument because what it really says is “I am an unrepentant partisan ideologue. I am a political clown.” It’s a shinning example of us-versus-them, as-long-as-my-side-wins-at-any-cost hackery. I guess it’s nice to know that his position isn’t personal against president Obama, but how can you hope for failure when the national (and indeed, global) consequences of failure are so dire? Someone might argue that they suspect certain policies to fail, or fear that certain policies will fail, but that’s completely different from hoping that they do. There were a great number of Bush policies that I expected would fail (and they did), but I didn’t, for example, actively hope that the Iraq war would turn into the king of colossal clusterfucks.
Apparently, for Rush and idiots like him, it is more important that your political ideology and your personal biases and prejudices be confirmed true than for the myriad problems facing the country and its citizens come to a just and fruitful end. And while a bulbous red rubber nose makes a clown easily identifiable at 100 paces, statements such as Limbaugh’s are every bit as telling but much farther reaching.

So the Illinois Senate just voted to wash the state’s hands of its cartoon character of a governor by a vote of 59-0.
I like the fact that once the tally had reached 40-0, thus establishing the two-thirds majority required for impeachment, the process continued in order to get everyone’s vote on record. This was akin to running up the score in a sporting event. Unlike the situation involving The Covenant School of Dallas, this clean sweep was hilarious.
It’s clear that by the time today’s proceedings rolled around, even any hypothetical senators who believed Blagojevich to be innocent of criminal wrongdoing had to recognize that the man is gloriously, unapologetically unhinged. Grandiosity, quoting of famous and notorious historical figures, affability, supreme and unfounded confidence–these things all suggest that Blago may well come to next week scratching his head, honestly confused as to why he is no longer an office holder.
Anyway, what comes next? The options, as I see them:

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Meatbrain points to a post by the indefatigably bloodthirsty and unapologetically dishonest nut called Cao, whose use of Sarah Conner of Terminator fame–every wingnut seems to require a hyper-agressive fictional character as a blog mascot–never fails to crack me up:

why shouldn’t innocents die in war?
If Barack Obama and his ilk are willing to attack our very own citizens such as Rush Limbaugh as the enemy, and if Billy Ayers the unrepetent [sic] terrorist is willing to applaud the actions of the 9/11 hijackers (because he felt he didn’t do enough) and leftists believe the civilians who died in the towers in New York deserved it because they were ‘little Eichmanns’, then what is the problem?

This is plenty dumb without any help, but check out the first comment below it:

Innocents die in mishaps every day — car wrecks, plane crashes, tumbles down the stairs. We don’t abolish cars, planes, and stairs because sometimes something goes wrong and somebody dies.
So it is with war. Sometimes you must take up arms against an aggressor. And, as with EVERY SINGLE HUMAN ENDEAVOR, sometimes something will go wrong.
If the occasional death is the price we pay for all the massive benefits of rapid transportation, the occasional civilian death is likewise the price we pay for the undeniable benefits of ridding the world of violent aggressors for whom the deaths of innocents is a goal rather than an unfortunate side effect.

So there you have it: Accidental deaths resulting from traffic and household accidents are qualitatively no different from the deaths of innocent civilians in wars. Problem solved; conscience clear.
The kicker? This commenter runs a pro-life blog.
Being against abortion is defensible. Being in favor of war is defensible. An incoherent mishmash of positions like this one is not. It’s the kind of garbage that typically springs from a mind in which evidence-based thinking has been permanently stanched in the usual American fashion.
I honestly wonder how many walls people like this woman smash into nose-first before collapsing into a chair in front of a computer for the apparent purpose of gunning for the Comprehensive Dolt of the Decade Award or some similarly dubious honor.

Meatbrain points to a post by the indefatigably bloodthirsty and unapologetically dishonest nut called Cao, whose use of Sarah Conner of Terminator fame–every wingnut seems to require a hyper-agressive fictional character as a blog mascot–never fails to crack me up:

why shouldn’t innocents die in war?
If Barack Obama and his ilk are willing to attack our very own citizens such as Rush Limbaugh as the enemy, and if Billy Ayers the unrepetent [sic] terrorist is willing to applaud the actions of the 9/11 hijackers (because he felt he didn’t do enough) and leftists believe the civilians who died in the towers in New York deserved it because they were ‘little Eichmanns’, then what is the problem?

This is plenty dumb without any help, but check out the first comment below it:

Innocents die in mishaps every day — car wrecks, plane crashes, tumbles down the stairs. We don’t abolish cars, planes, and stairs because sometimes something goes wrong and somebody dies.
So it is with war. Sometimes you must take up arms against an aggressor. And, as with EVERY SINGLE HUMAN ENDEAVOR, sometimes something will go wrong.
If the occasional death is the price we pay for all the massive benefits of rapid transportation, the occasional civilian death is likewise the price we pay for the undeniable benefits of ridding the world of violent aggressors for whom the deaths of innocents is a goal rather than an unfortunate side effect.

So there you have it: Accidental deaths resulting from traffic and household accidents are qualitatively no different from the deaths of innocent civilians in wars. Problem solved; conscience clear.
The kicker? This commenter runs a pro-life blog.
Being against abortion is defensible. Being in favor of war is defensible. An incoherent mishmash of positions like this one is not. It’s the kind of garbage that typically springs from a mind in which evidence-based thinking has been permanently stanched in the usual American fashion.
I honestly wonder how many walls people like this woman smash into nose-first before collapsing into a chair in front of a computer for the apparent purpose of gunning for the Comprehensive Dolt of the Decade Award or some similarly dubious honor.

When already confused, dull, and gullible and people become embittered and fully unhinged, the results can be devastating. A post at the perenially loopy websplotch Granite Grok contains the following complaint:

Washington – Just weeks after Rep. Carol Shea-Porter (D-NH) cast her vote to elect Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House, Pelosi made “no apologies” for her intention to spend hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars on family planning services to somehow “stimulate” the economy.
“Now we know what Carol Shea-Porter really meant on the campaign trail when she said she would protect the middle-class,” said NRCC Communications Director Ken Spain. “Carol Shea-Porter promised to protect New Hampshire’s middle-class values, but now her pick for Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, is trying to use taxpayer dollars to pass out birth control in what she calls an attempt to ‘stimulate the economy.’”
Nancy Pelosi’s defense of spending taxpayer dollars on contraception is just one egregious example of wasteful government spending included in the Democrats’ plan that ignores the needs of the middle class.

This is culled from a news release on the NRCC Web site, which actually issued the same form gripe to thirty-six separate congressional districts, with only difference between the being the identity of the representative who helped elect Nancy Pelosi Speaker of the House. The NRCC’s wording essentially implies that each of these representatives not only knew in advance what Pelosi would say about contraception and the economy, but stands by her words.
The release also cites the Drudge Report in support of its claims, epistemically akin to a creationist quoting the Bible in order to refute evolution. It just as easily could have quoted Pelosi from a legitimate media outlet, such as the U.K. Telegraph:

“The family planning services reduce cost. The states are in terrible fiscal budget crises now and part of what we do for children’s health, education and some of those elements are to help the states meet their financial needs.
“One of those – one of the initiatives you mentioned, the contraception, will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government.”

Pelosi has already been condemned for not specifying how expanding family planning services will benefit the economy, but far more questionable–though of much less relevance to the nation as a whole–is the title of the Granite Grok blog entry: “Stimulate the economy. Kill an unborn baby.” That’s right; preventing a pregnancy is no different than terminating one, and abortion is synonymous with infanticide. And to top things off, the Groksucker who wrote this post couldn’t resist comparing Pelosi to Hitler. What would these wingnuts do if lefty bloggers started equating, say, the incarceration of suspected terrorists with torturing them?
It’s hardly an extension of this blogger’s logic to suggest that masturbation is also infanticide, in which case each of the Groksters should be hauled off to jail every time one of them punches the “submit post” button in WordPress or whatever they use.
The merits of Pelosi’s statements are certainly debatable. But do people expect to be treated as at all credible when they let loose with this kind of undisguised crap?

That sounds like it could be a book, doesn’t it? But it need only serve as the title of a brief blog post.
Some television personalities are too feeble-minded to be truly annoying, and Glenn Beck is one of them. I’m sure his tripe carries weight with a discouraging number of his viewers, but what little footage I’ve seen of him reveals nothing more than a fat-faced guy with a crewcut and a loud voice who has even less wit and integrity than Rush Limbaugh.
Then there’s Focus on the Family head James Dobson, who is a genuine waste of one or more relatively sophisticated intracranial ganglia linked only to hypertrophic vocal cords, a set-up that affords “Doctor” Dobson no discernible afferent CNS input besides that from his shit- and acid-choked guts.
Both of these men are lying, outwardly religious idiots, which explains one hundred percent of their appeal to American viewers. But they differ in one respect that is both meaningless and critical: Beck is a Mormon, while Dobson is an evangelical Christian.

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