Why should we ask John McCain harsh questions? Because we need to even the playing field. You see, if Barack Obama had McCain’s background, ignorance and bad character, the election would have been over months ago. The news media is holding back, though. Those media barbecues appear to be paying off.

So it’s time to even the playing field. Since the media keeps asking these sorts of disparaging and insulting questions to Barack Obama, it’s time to ask these same sorts of questions to John McCain. I admit that a few of these are outrageously unfair, just like many of the questions repeatedly posed to Obama.

Most of these questions are fair, though, and the news media has refused to dig deep and really get the answers Americans need. If you have additional questions that the media needs to ask John McCain, please submit them in the comments. I’d like to make this post a place where reporters are free to visit for ideas. As you can see, I’ve attached explanatory links to most of the proposed questions.

Unlike Barack Obama, McCain has a lot of explaining to do about what kind of person he has shown himself to be and portrayed himself to be. Let’s get started:

Generally Puzzling
Isn’t it true that you personally now oppose several bills that you yourself co-sponsored?

Why is your smile so creepy and fake?

Do you really believe that the President of the U.S. virtually functions as a dictator?

General Character Deficits

Isn’t it true that you aggressively courted your current wife, a 25-year-old beer heiress while you were still married to your first wife?

Is it true that you obtained an Arizona marriage license on March 6, 1980, while still legally married to your first wife?

How is it that being imprisoned in Vietnam or being shot down while flying a plane qualifies you to be president? Why shouldn’t we think that Vietnam messed up your head and made you erratic?

I notice that you aren’t wearing a crucifix around your neck. Is that because you hate Jesus or is it because you think you are better than God?

You have said some harsh things about a black man who is running for President. Prove to us that you and many of your supporters are not bigots.

Isn’t it true that you are not born again? How many times have you even been to church this year? How does that compare with last year, which wasn’t an election year?

How can we be sure that your wife won’t abuse drugs at the White House if you are elected President, or cover up her abuses of drugs?

Did you marry your current wife more for her great wealth or because she offered you social connections that advanced your career as a politician?

During the Vicki Iseman scandal, your wife Cindy suggested that because you were a man of character, you would never have an affair. But isn’t it true that you started dating Cindy while you were still married to your first wife?

Why did you work so hard to help spread false anthrax stories in 2001? Isn’t it true that your conduct in spreading those stories that Iraq was responsible for that anthrax enabled the Bush Administration to expose the lives and well-being of our soldiers in Iraq?

Isn’t it true that you broke your promise by not being in isolation while Barack Obama was questioned by Rick Warren?

Did you have any moral qualms when you left your first wife - a former swimsuit model - after she was disfigured in a car accident and put on a few pounds?”

Does the Religious Right know that you give talks before gatherings with dubious family values, including suggesting that your wife enter a topless beauty contest?

Aren’t you too old and forgetful to be President?

Why won’t you release all of your medical records? What are you trying to hide?

How many letters did you send for the purpose of interfering with an FCC investigation on behalf of your beautiful lobbyist friend, Vicki Iseman?

How much financial help have you and your supporters given to your lobbyist friend Vicki Isley to help her disappear since your close relationship was revealed?

Have you been sexually faithful to your current wife?

Shouldn’t you be concerned that your wife is too “icy” to effectively serve as First Lady?

Shouldn’t it raise huge red flags when people who run for high office refuse to make their family’s tax returns public? Why should your wife Cindy be an exception?

To be president, is it enough that one is an old wise-cracking, hot-tempered, and often confused and forgetful guy?

Ignorance of facts regarding major issues
Give us the names of some prominent economists who really support your “economic plan.”

Why do you seem to know so little about Iraq?

Tell me everything you know about the history, culture and religions of Iraq. You can have as much time as you need.

Out of touch with ordinary people
Didn’t your wife say that the only way to get around Arizona is by private jet? and see here.

You don’t even know how many houses you own, do you?

Tell us about some of the ways we could have wisely invested one trillion dollars in America had we not wasted it in Iraq? Take your time and talk about how we could have improved American with that vast sum of money. (more…)

As with many rationalists, I’ve always assumed that Atheism and Rationalism were intertwined. But recently I conversed with an ardent atheist who believes in reincarnation.

Suddenly I realized that Atheism is not commutative: Rationalism generally leads to atheism, but not vice-versa. One can deeply believe that there is no sky-daddy, no invisible overlord, no disembodied afterlife, and no divine plan, but still follow paths of woo. Visualize atheistic ufologists, for example. Perpetual-motionists and homeopaths can also live completely God-free lives.

Conversely (and here is where I differ from Dawkinsians), perfectly good scientists can cling to the gods of their upbringing, as long as their particular temple doesn’t require obeisance to rationally disproved ideas. This example of compartmentalized rationalism is very common. Most people apply their learning of rational process only to the particular field in which they were explicitly taught to apply it. It takes particular training to understand that all aspects of experience can be approached rationally. Churches seem to do all they can to prevent this idea from spreading.

In conclusion: An atheist bumper sticker or t-shirt is not a certain indication that a rationalist is inside.

There was to have been a broadcast debate today between a Creationist and a Biologist. Ray Comfort (of the Banana Proves Creationism fame) against PZ Myers (a.k.a Pharyngula). But the station wimped out, and broadcast Comfort in relative quiet comfort today, and will allow Myers to respond tomorrow morning (Weds. Aug. 6, 2008 10:00 CDT (GMT-5)) on WDAY

Here is Pharyngula’s play-by-play, blogged during the first 40 minutes of the broadcast.

The first response comment was:

A friendly reminder to turn all irony meters and bullshit detectors to the lowest sensitivity, lest they be vaporized.

with a reply at comment #73 that I appreciated

Try our new line of Comfort-standard(TM) industrial grade irony meters. 2-ga. internal wiring, 3×10^6:1 step-down transformers, military-grade ICs, massive dual-blade fast-trip circuit breakers and Safe-Shatter(TM) non-shrapnel-producing casings. Each unit is hand-assembled and burned in on a steady diet of AM radio and Bush administration ‘We’re turning the corner… really now, honest’ press releases. Autoranging, and rated to 30 TeraHaggarts. Don’t browse the web without one!

I’ve blown up electronic panels with inadequately specified parts in the past, with actual noise and smoke. So I “get” each of these units. Except, how many MegaDubyas are there in a TeraHaggert?

I collect quotes (who doesn’t?). Really, it’s a good hobby. It’s cheap and often interesting. When they are really good quotes, it’s like a novel condensed to a mere sentence.

The first two of this set are about one of my favorite topics, rampant materialism. The others all relate closely to one another, but only if you have a wild imagination or if you think of a very broad topic like “meaning of life.” Without further ado:

Who is content with nothing possesses all things.
– Nicolas Boileau Despreaux

Wealth is the number of things one can do without.
– Feodor Dostoyevsky

The trouble is that you think you have time.
– Zen Master

Observe your enemies, for they first find out your faults.
– Antisthenes

A hole is nothing at all, but you can break your neck in it.
– Austin O’Malley

War is when the government tells you who the bad guy is. Revolution is when you decide that for yourself.
–Anonymous

Never mistake motion for action.
– Ernest Hemingway

(more…)

There is yet another story going around about dinosaur and human footprints found together in ancient (maybe 4,000 years old!) rock. Here is the local credulous Texas take on the find.

All the previous pictures of contemporaneous dinosaur and human footprints provided by these people showed that humans used to have 19″ long feet with only 3 toes. This new isolated sample, long removed from its secret setting, is available to view in person by true believers. The dinosaur track might be real, but any anatomist or gait specialist could tell you what is wrong with the human footprint, and its intersection with that of the dinosaur. Any paleontologist want to comment on the dino-print?

If they really wanted actual paleontologists to believe the evidence, they would invite them to the site of the find to seek the rest of the footprint trail. As an attempt to gain credulity, they claim that over 800 x-rays were taken of the rock (one CAT scan?) after the human footprint was “revealed”. Um, I guess they need to prove that it is a rock through and through. Actually, the claim is that fossil footprints are made by compressing layers of rock, rather than in a soft single sediment layer where they are usually found. The scans reportedly show that both footprints distorted underlying layers.

The daughter of the discoverer has studied some geology, so she is skeptical of its evidentiary value as proof of a Young Earth. But Dr. Carl Baugh, the founder and director of the Creation Evidence Museum in Texas, hopes to get these pictures into Texas textbooks (and therefore all other states) under the Strengths and Weaknesses doctrine of the Discovery Institute.

MSNBC has recently reported on the prosperity gospel of Televangelist Kenneth Copeland, which appears to be benefiting mostly—Kenneth Copeland and his relatives.

Kenneth Copeland, 71, is a pioneer of the prosperity gospel, which teaches that believers are destined to flourish spiritually, physically and financially — and share the wealth with others.

His ministry’s 1,500-acre campus outside Fort Worth is testament to his success. It includes a church, private airstrip, a hangar for the ministry’s aircraft and a $6 million, church-owned mansion.

I shake my head when I read these corporate media reports about these upstart religions. That’s because many long-established religions also allow their leaders to live in wanton opulence. Consider, for instance, the Catholic Church (in which I was raised). When is the last time the Pope or any of the Cardinals or Bishops missed a meal because they couldn’t afford it? Although I know of frugal (and morally admirable) priests and nuns, I have yet to hear of any high-ranking Catholic clergyman who had to scrape by. If you doubt this, check out the opulent living quarters of your local Cardinal or Arch-Bishop.

It’s also pathetic to watch the mainstream media attacking newly-established religions for preaching the prosperity gospel. You can almost hear the sneering and snarling when the big media outlets report that preachers like Copeland (or, another example, Joel Osteen) teaches that there’s nothing wrong with being rich or enjoying a life of conspicuous consumption.

It’s a rare religion, though, that has ever ejected any member for being rich or for consuming conspicuously. It doesn’t matter that Edward or Susan or Walter has five vacation homes or a private jet or pays 27 times more to eat at fancy restaurants than most people pay for food. Here’s what being rich does for members of organized religions: they get more deference and more respect than lower earning members of the church. Never are they scolded from the pulpit. I beg you—if anyone reading this knows of any rich person being asked by any mainstream church to stop living so lavishly, let me know.  I assume that it occasionally happens in tiny or fringe sects, but not in Big Church USA.  For instance, do you think the Catholic Church has ever told any of the Kennedys that they should sell their lavish property at Martha’s Vineyard or that they should otherwise cut down on their conspicuous consumption? Their whirlwind vacations or their fancy cars or their fancy jewelry?  Churches are utterly obeisant to rich people.

Here’s the real-life gospel every Sunday: “No matter what we say up here, it’s OK for you to keep the vast majority of your money and to blow it on any luxury you care to dream up.”

Mainstream certainly preach the gospel that “Blessed are the poor,” but they actually push their members to act on it. I’ve yet to see it. Therefore, why does the mainstream media pounce on churches that allow its leaders and members to flaunt their wealth?  Jealousy?  Schadenfreude? For rich people (and for many poor), church is for Sundays only.

Most churches founded by organized religions are country clubs with steeples. They are happy to accept most anyone who walks into the door, especially if that person has some resources he or she might donate to the church. In return, wealthy members of mainstream churches have grown accustomed to a substantial return benefit. Never will a church leader suggest that those wealthy members need to actually change anything about their lifestyle unless it involves something about family planning or sex for pleasure.

It’s less likely that a mainstream church will scold a member for conspicuous consumption than it would be for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle.

Tonight I watched “It’s Bad For Ya,” George Carlin’s final nationally televised performance. The entire show is available on YouTube (Below is Part I of VII). The show was broadcast live on March 1, 2008, only a few months prior to Carlin’s death (due to a heart attack, on June 22, 2008).

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Carlin opened the show by announcing that he was 70 years old. In Parts I and II, he speaks bluntly about society’s failure to deal frankly with death. It’s impossible to watch this performance without feeling the irony. At one point, he states:

So don’t be afraid to get old. It’s a great time of life. You get to take advantage of people and you’re not responsible for anything! You can even shit in your pants!

He dissects many other topics, including law, religion, children, education and national pride. He shows no patience for the way our culture handles any of these issues. His performance gets especially dark when he asserts that there is essentially no hope for us, ecologically speaking—he predicts that in 40 or 50 more years, the entire planet will be a massive ball of pollution. At many points in the performance, it’s not easy to tell whether Carlin retains any personal optimism. Is his performance intentionally injected with hyperbole or is this really and truly what Carlin thinks. I suspected the latter, but I don’t really know.

I heard many gems during the performance (meaning that I heard many things with which I agree wholeheartedly). Here’s my favorite, this one delivered during the topic of society’s often-stated goal that “we should teach our children to read.”

It’s not important to get children to read. It’s much more important to teach children to question what they read. They should be taught to question everything. Everything they read and everything they hear. They should be taught to question authority . . .

Amen.

Here’s a standard account of autism, from Wikipedia:

Autism is a brain development disorder that first gives signs during infancy or childhood and generally follows a steady course without remission or relapse. Impairments result from maturation-related changes in various systems of the brain. Autism is one of the five pervasive developmental disorders (PDD), which are characterized by widespread abnormalities of social interactions and communication, and severely restricted interests and highly repetitive behavior.

The manifestations of autism cover a wide spectrum, ranging from individuals with severe impairments—who may be silent, mentally disabled, and locked into hand flapping and rocking—to less impaired individuals who may have active but distinctly odd social approaches, narrowly focused interests, and verbose, pedantic communication.

Here’s the cause of autism by a popular right-wing radio talk show host, Michael Savage (reported by Media Matters):

On the July 16 edition of his nationally syndicated radio show, Michael Savage claimed that autism is “[a] fraud, a racket.” Savage went on to say, “I’ll tell you what autism is. In 99 percent of the cases, it’s a brat who hasn’t been told to cut the act out. That’s what autism is. What do you mean they scream and they’re silent? They don’t have a father around to tell them, ‘Don’t act like a moron. You’ll get nowhere in life. Stop acting like a putz. Straighten up. Act like a man. Don’t sit there crying and screaming, idiot.’ ” Savage concluded, “[I]f I behaved like a fool, my father called me a fool. And he said to me, ‘Don’t behave like a fool.’ The worst thing he said — ‘Don’t behave like a fool. Don’t be anybody’s dummy. Don’t sound like an idiot. Don’t act like a girl. Don’t cry.’ That’s what I was raised with. That’s what you should raise your children with. Stop with the sensitivity training. You’re turning your son into a girl, and you’re turning your nation into a nation of losers and beaten men. That’s why we have the politicians we have.”

If you want to hear it for yourself, click on this link:

How popular is Michael Savage? According to Media Matters

Talk Radio Network, which syndicates The Savage Nation, claims that Savage is heard on more than 350 radio stations. The Savage Nation reaches at least 8.25 million listeners each week, according to Talkers Magazine, making it one of the most listened-to talk radio shows in the nation, behind only The Rush Limbaugh Show and The Sean Hannity Show.

You might be wondering how it was that Michael Savage was ever put onto the national airwaves. Good question, because his opinions are often incredibly ill-informed. Nonetheless, Savage’s show actually replaced Phil Donahue’s show in 2003. And see here. MSNBC killed Phil Donahue’s show when Donahue had the audacity to question why the U.S. was about to invade Iraq. Now we have Michael Savage to tell us how the world really works. What is the world view of Michael Savage? Here’s a report by FAIR (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting):

Savage routinely refers to non-white countries as “turd world nations” and charges that the U.S. “is being taken over by the freaks, the cripples, the perverts and the mental defectives” (San Francisco Bay Guardian, 9/20/00). In a recent broadcast he justified ethnic slurs as a national security tool: “We need racist stereotypes right now of our enemy in order to encourage our warriors to kill the enemy,” he explained (San Francisco Chronicle, 2/6/03).

Although the above quote was from 2003, Savage has continued spewing his venom and he has been allowed to do this through mainstream corporate sponsorships. It’s almost unbelievable.

But now, you actually can do something about this hate-monger by taking away his advertisers.

–

Epilogue: I wanted to recognize that there is sometimes a grain of truth to many talk show rants.  Hence, I wouldn’t deny that some parents might hide behind medical/psychological diagnoses to deflect blame from their poor parenting skills. I bet that this happens regularly. Maybe it even happens in some of the cases of the “extremely mild” cases of autism. Even to the extent that this is true, however, Savage is nonetheless way out of bounds arguing that the diagnosis of autism is a fraud in 99% of the cases. His reckless accusation hurls needless blame at thousands of excellent parents; it is incredibly hurtful and insensitive. Such a charge belies deep and credible mounds of medical literature. To make this horrid accusation demonstrates that Savage hasn’t researched his topic responsibly and that he certainly hasn’t spent any meaningful time with children diagnosed with autism.

This example involving Savage is yet another example of how many media outlets feed on manufactured conflict to sell ads. I’ve written about this recently, calling this tactic “conflict pornography.”

I intend to listen to one of Savages shows someday soon to see exactly which companies are still sponsoring his vile attacks. I will publish that updated list in a comment to this post.

I wrote about complacency once before. I focused on the complacency of most Americans in the face of the energy crisis that is clearly upon us. We have no assurance that gasoline won’t double or triple in price over the next five or 10 years, throwing our economy into a massive depression. With stakes like these, you would think that prolific energy wasters like us would immediately jump on our energy consumption problem by enacting a national conservation plan to cut our petroleum use in half. This could be accomplished by modifying our wasteful energy usage in dozens of ways. For instance, we really could carpool. We could build up our mass transit systems and encourage their use. We could walk and bike more. We could make our homes much more energy-efficient. Instead of building new homes in existing farm fields, we could renovate homes that already exist. While we’re at it, we could cut our use of all other forms of energy in half too. For instance, the technology already exists to make zero-carbon footprint buildings.

Others have written extensively regarding many methods by which we could reduce energy use. Due to the widely accepted law of supply and demand, cutting our use of energy would also have the effect of lowering the price of energy (relative to whatever it would have been had we not taken such measures), thereby diminishing the financial damage from our perennial trade deficits and budget deficits.

My concern is that so many people (including many people I know personally) are absolutely complacent about the need to change the way we produce and use energy. I keep hearing people say that “they will make our gasoline out of corn” or “we have plenty of coal” as though some unspecified “corn plan” would produce net energy without causing people to starve or some fantasy “coal plan” could be a foolproof substitute for petroleum, without somehow contributing massive amounts of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere.

People are finally buying more energy-efficient cars, but that is only in response to the spiking costs of gasoline. It’s like we need to be kicked in the shin in order to get our attention. Many mainstream news articles discuss that this price jump of gasoline occurred “suddenly,” as though it was impossible to see that high gasoline prices were in our future. We still don’t get it, though. For example, many news articles are currently talking about the high price of gas as though gas will continue to be five dollars per gallon five years from now, as though we’ve hit a stable plateau.

As I suggested in my prior post about complacency, I sense that there’s a rampant attitude that most of the big things in life are not under our control. Rather, they simply “happen.” According to many people, the “free market” decides what will be available for sale and at what price it will be sold. Similarly, “God” makes decisions about disasters and diseases such as heart attacks and lung cancer (even though people cause many of their own problems through climate change in lifestyle at choices). The people who are big believers in the free market and a sentient God see humans as powerless children who simply react to situations. We act like there’s nothing we can do to root corporate corruption out of our national political system.

From so many people, I hear this solution: “They” will come up with something to solve our energy problems, our medical problems, our food production problems, our natural resource supply issues and our pollution problems, as though these problems don’t start with each and every one of us. As though we are not responsible for what “they” need to do. As though we don’t make the messes that “they” need to clean up.

I have no doubt that we could cut our energy usage in half. We could substantially reduce our risks of certain diseases by changing our lifestyles. We could eat foods that are friendlier to the planet, such that the average item of food would not actually need to travel 1000 miles or more to our plates. We could start making difficult decisions that would ensure sustainable supplies of water well into the future, at least for many communities (Las Vegas might not be in the plans). By using much less of everything we consume we could substantially cut the amount of toxic waste we generate. When “we” live more responsibly, “they” have less work to do to save us.

Admittedly, some bad things do seem to just happen to us. On the other hand, many of our biggest problems are caused by us. Therefore, to act complacently as a general rule is a huge cop-out virtually guaranteeing disaster. The real solution is to force ourselves to follow the chain of production through our use of our products and resources so that we can see that our local actions often have tangible national and global consequences. We are incapable of assessing these big problems to the extent that we allow ourselves to overlook problems that have solutions that would be expensive or inconvenient to us.

Sacrifice is a dirty word these days. No politician wants to tell the citizens that we will need to give up some of our wasteful ways. The same thing goes for the many “greenwashing” articles out there. For instance, I read several “green” magazines, including Plenty; they are extremely light on the need for self-sacrifice. (more…)

Paul Slansky is frustrated that conservatives have captured the American Flag as their symbol.

The emblem of the country’s highest aspirations was mindlessly ceded to the holier-than-thou zealots who used it as a bludgeon against the less fanatical.

Here’s Slansky’s solution: Progressives should take the American Flag back by displaying it ourselves. He argues that when everyone starts wearing the flag, it will be neutralized, a la The Sneetches.

Barack Obama, who earlier took some flack for his empty lapel, is on the cover of the latest Rolling Stone with flag pin gleaming. We should follow his lead. Everyone who’s voting for Obama — and especially those who are public figures (i.e. Keith Olbermann, Jack Cafferty, Rachel Maddow) must immediately procure a flag pin and not be seen without it before November 5th. If you can’t do it with pride, do it as an act of subversion.

I understand Slansky’s frustration. I feel it myself. I often feel like a stranger in my own country, especially when xenophobes parade around while waving my flag. I understand Slansky’s strategy too, and it just might work. But there are a some principles that much bigger than the American Flag.

One of those principles is that we shouldn’t give in to thugs by agreeing we must display cheap little flags to be patriotic. Being compelled to wear those little flag pins is the first step on a slippery slope toward abject stupidity. Look, here’s a photo of Abraham Lincoln not wearing a flag pin. Here are several photos of Ronald Reagan not wearing a flag pin. Here’s a painting of George Washington not wearing a flag pin. I don’t hear any conservatives hyper-ventilating out there. Therefore, this issues of patriotism is not really about the flag. If it were, conservatives would have dug up the remains of those dead Presidents and added little plastic flags to those remains.

The flag is merely a symptom of a much bigger problem. The real problem is that too many Americans are becoming simple-minded. Americans need to start focusing on things that are truly important. Let’s show our fellow citizens some real respect by challenging them to look past those little plastic flag pins. If progressives start wearing little flag pins, then conservatives will each wear two of them, which will launch an arms race of faux patriotism. Where will it end? Fifty foot flags waving in every conservative’s front yard? Now that’s some real patriotism, eh?

Displaying the image of the American flag is not important except to simpletons and thugs. If we have learned anything over the past few years, isn’t it that wearing the flag is a cheap and therefore unreliable display of patriotism? Haven’t we seen that unpatriotic people (those who have turned the Constitution on its head for the past seven years) can easily wear a flag while damaging the United States? It’s easier for thugs and simpletons to spy on their fellow citizens or to waterboard their perceived enemies while wearing little flag pins than it would be for them to really honor the Constitution.

Isn’t this also what Zahavi’s work has clearly demonstrated, that signals are not reliable unless expensive? Shouldn’t we be paying much more attention to expensive signals of patriotism? Shouldn’t we be looking for those who honor the Constitution through their sustained intelligent efforts, especially when it isn’t convenient for them to do so? Working hard to abide by the principles of the Constitution would be a reliable signal of patriotism. Such reliable displays (e.g., taking steps to stop torture and to return control of the public airwaves to the public) leave the multitudes of modern day fake patriots in the dust. People wearing little flag pins is the functional equivalent of turtles wearing little signs on their shells that say “I’m fast.”

If some wizard stole every image of the American flag, we could still have a great country. We could even change the flag into something else (e.g., a triangular cloth flag emblazoned with the image of the moon) and we could still have a great country.

“Where did that old stars and stripes go?” someone might then ask.

“We changed it into a triangle-shaped flag with picture of the moon,” we might respond. “We found that the traditional American Flag was turning into a mere fetish for too many fake patriots. We’ve got a new flag now and we’re striving to make the United States even better than it was before. For example, we have publicly financed our elections to almost eliminate the corrupt influence of corporate money on politics.”

“But you couldn’t possibly be a real American –you don’t even wear a flag pin.”

“Actually, we focus on our democracy rather than our flag.”

The American Flag is only a symbol of all the things that many of us collectively strive to be. The American Flag is only important because we’ve agreed that it represents certain things. To think otherwise–that the American flag is something intrinsically important–is to commit the sin of reification. People who reify symbols are fundamentalists. Let’s not be fundamentalists.

I can think of a better way of approaching this problem of flag-waving Neocons than by playing their game. How about showing the Neocons (and the timid, the thugs and the simpletons) that we can run this country in a thoughtful and efficient way, in accordance with our proud history and our great Constitution, without pretending that we’re doing a better job simply by wearing plastic flag pins.

Actions speak louder than little flag pins and all thoughtful citizens already know this.

About some things, Americans are incredibly stupid. For instance, I’ve kept an eye on science and religion related ignorance for years. 15% of Americans don’t know that the Earth revolves around the sun. Half of the people in the United States (an allegedly “Christian Nation”)  can’t name Genesis as the first book in the Bible.

There are a lot more statistics where those came from. If you’d like to read a few dozen zingers, read Rick Shenkman’s article in Alternet, “Ignorant America: Just How Stupid Are We?” There are some real head-shakers in Shenkman’s article. Several might have you wondering whether we should require citizens to pass rudimentary intelligence tests in order to vote. Shenkman’s compilation of stupidity had me wondering this. I know that this is an extremely controversial idea based on the way it has been misused in the past. It is clear, though that huge numbers of people have no idea how their government is designed to work, who is running their government, the basic characteristics of the scientific method, the basic facts of the religions to which they cling, or rudimentary principles of geography, history or economics. Now really . . . should such a person vote? This question makes me squirm.

I’m not really suggesting that we should take official government action to keep people from voting based on their intelligence levels. On the other hand, reading Shenkman’s article makes me wonder whether our “Get out the vote” campaigns should be focused on getting people to vote only if they know something other than their favorite TV shows and sports stars. Rather than “get out the vote,” perhaps we should have “vote only if you’re informed” campaigns. Here’s one of Shenkman’s many statistics that especially got me thinking in this entirely unacceptable way:

In the election of 2004, one of the hot issues was gay marriage. But gauging public opinion on the subject was difficult. Asked in one national poll whether they supported a constitutional amendment allowing only marriages between a man and a woman, a majority said yes. But three questions later a majority also agreed that “defining marriage was not an important enough issue to be worth changing the Constitution.” The New York Times wryly summed up the results: Americans clearly favor amending the Constitution but not changing it.

What is stupidity? Early in his comprehensive article on the lack of comprehension, Shenkman designates the five types of stupidity:

First, is sheer ignorance: Ignorance of critical facts about important events in the news, and ignorance of how our government functions and who’s in charge. Second, is negligence: The disinclination to seek reliable sources of information about important news events. Third, is wooden-headedness, as the historian Barbara Tuchman defined it: The inclination to believe what we want to believe regardless of the facts. Fourth, is shortsightedness: The support of public policies that are mutually contradictory, or contrary to the country’s long-term interests. Fifth, and finally, is a broad category I call bone-headedness, for want of a better name: The susceptibility to meaningless phrases, stereotypes, irrational biases, and simplistic diagnoses and solutions that play on our hopes and fears.

Although the article at the top of this post, “Ignorant America,” is full of compelling statistics, it (like many articles documenting American stupidity) is also riddled with many questions that confuse trivia for knowledge. How important is it for most Americans to know the name of the Secretary of Defense? Isn’t it possible that someone can be rather up to speed about America’s military policies without actually knowing the name of the Secretary of Defense?

America is obsessed with trivia and it is not unusual for trivia to masquerade as something important for tests that purport to measure intelligence. Knowing lots and lots of facts, though, especially the inert facts common for trivia buffs, is not the same thing as being intelligent. If these two things (knowledge and facts) were equal, we would regularly have great insights and discoveries occurring as a result of Trivia Nights, yet I don’t believe that has yet happened even once.

The problem with many intelligence tests is that they only measure ability to recall bits of information rather than detecting true understanding, much less wisdom. For this reason, many of the questions used to illustrate how “stupid” we are resemble the same problems found in many formal “intelligence tests.” A thorough review of those problems with IQ tests can be found in Stephen Jay Gould’s Mismeasure of Man (1996).

I recognize that we all have our focus when it comes to understanding the world. Someone who is dedicated to one field of study might not know as much about other fields of study. It is also important to remember that all of us have huge gaps in information. If we have dedicated our lives to understanding nanotechnology, how much are we actually going to know about the history of classical music ? If you work as a professional athlete, should we really be expected to know all five of the specific legal rights granted by the First Amendment? (Did you know that one of those rights is the right to petition the government?). Having written this, I think it’s more likely that those who truly excel at a field tend to be rather well-rounded.

There’s probably more than a few people who would insist that the scientific method is the be-all and end-all of intelligence because of its insistence on proof. There is an uneasy truce between belief and proof, however. In the area of religion, belief is often said to be justified even in the absence of proof. But don’t forget that even very smart people find an irresistible urge to believe many things that they cannot prove.

Here’s another caveat for those who walk around wagging their fingers (like I do) at the large number of “stupid” Americans. Howard Gardner has put forth a strong argument that there were actually multiple intelligences. He holds that the concept of “general intelligence” is highly suspect and that there might not be such a thing as GI. There are those who are incredibly talented at reading the moods and motives of other people (he calls this interpersonal intelligence), but who don’t do well at mathematics. There are people who are terrifically talented in musical ways (e.g. Hillary Hahn), but might not be very good at biology (I’m not suggesting that Hillary on is not good at biology– because I am deeply infatuated with Hillary Hahn, I assume that she is excellent at everything she does!). Many of us do know some “absent-minded professors” who can talk for hours on esoterica such as Immanuel Kant’s categorical imperative but who seem inept at coping in the real world on a day-to-day basis. In the category of super-intelligent, I would quickly place my plumber (who can talk knowledgeably about almost anything, it seems) and a carpenter who has done work at my house, who has a superhuman grasp of his profession. I can’t imagine being as good as he is at the many arts of transforming a house, even if I trained for 20 years at the foremost “carpenter school.” (more…)

Hardly a day goes by when you don’t hear yet another Republican claiming that the “surge” is working in Iraq. And see here and here.

If the surge is really working, let’s see daily videotape showing Western reporters strolling freely through Baghdad’s neighborhoods, outside of the Green Zone, chatting with Iraqis.   Better yet, let’s celebrate the “surge” by having a parade in downtown Baghdad. Perhaps George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Condi Rice and John McCain can lead the parade.  Let’s count the number of McDonald’s in Iraq.  Let’s consider the number of Westerners going to Iraq for vacations.  Consider, also, that strong-arming the Iraqi government to build 58 permanent military bases in Iraq. That’s our long term “solution.”  Isn’t that like saying domestic violence is a “solution” in an abusive relationship?

More important, let’s count the number of Iraqis who have been permanently displaced.  If the surge is working, why are so many Iraqis still living in places like Syria?  Consider this report from DemocracyNow:

Refugees International estimates that up to five million Iraqis have been displaced since 2003. That’s one-in-five Iraqis who have had to flee their homes since the US-led invasion of their country. Two-and-a-half million Iraqis have been internally displaced, and an equal number have managed to leave the country to Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Turkey, the Gulf States and, most of all, Syria, which hosts 1.5 million Iraqis.

Consider, too, how the “surge” is working. You won’t see this in the American corporate press.  You’ll hear a host of lies, including lies from the mouth of John McCain.

American citizens are now being conned about the “surge” just like they were conned about WMD.  Here’s the truth about the “surge.”  If we dared to freely publish photos from Iraq for only one week, that “war” would be over and the American soldiers would be on their way home.

The list has grown too long to ignore.  We are a country that exercises almost no foresight.  We wait for disasters to occur and only then (if then) does it occur to us to do something about the problem.

Here’s an especially heinous example: our government hires numerous financial experts, of course.  Alan Greenspan was one of them.  Why couldn’t any of them see the subprime disaster long before it occurred?  Instead, our government’s experts allowed unscrupulous mortgage companies to lend out far too much money to homeowners in the form of “exploding ARMs” such that it was entirely predictable that the borrowers would fall behind on their payments after only a few years, and that many would lose their homes through foreclosure.  Our government stood by while these loans were hyper-securitized to the point where the unscrupulous mortgage companies would go belly up, tranch-laden real estate trusts (who ultimately purchased the loans) would throw their hands and claim that they were innocent and Wall Street would laugh all the way to the bank.  That is, until Wall Street failed and successfully begged the federal government to bail out Bear Stearns.  All of this was entirely foreseeable.  The real disaster is that we failed to use our brains.

For another example, think of the Minnesota Bridge collapse. Let’s see… what might happen if you don’t allocate proper federal funding to fund sufficient bridge inspections?  Of course, it’s only after a huge bridge collapses or a major levee breaks that we start thinking about the resulting disasters here in America.

Do you want another example?  There are hundreds.

Remember when our president manufactured the need to go to war and all of the allegedly patriotic people (including many of your neighbors and friends, I’m sure) imposed group-think upon each other?  Voices trying to raise important concerns and objections were muzzled in the name of “freedom.”  What were we thinking?  That we were better off to parrot the President?  What we got is what we deserved: the low point was when Colin Powell lied to the American people, who patriotically nodded affirmatively, encouraged by their patriotic daily newspapers from coast to coast.  In retrospect, who couldn’t see that this type of “patriotic” group-think behavior would endanger our democracy?

Who couldn’t end see the problem with electing, as President of the United States, a man who lied about his military service and who had failed miserably in almost everything he had ever attempted, repeatedly covered up by his family?  What would you expect if you elected such a person to be president?  Why couldn’t we see all of this coming?

And look how we conduct “debates” to evaluate the next president.  They are largely substanceless and xenophobic, relying on soundbites and concocted personal attacks.  Why is it so hard to see that this is a terrible way to evaluate a President?

And why can’t we see that allowing large corporations to pour their money into the coffers of politicians will cause our politicians to do corporate bidding rather than responding to the needs of citizens?  Why is this so hard to anticipate or understand?  The fact that this legalized bribery goes on should be the front page headline in almost every newspaper almost every day. (more…)

Jeffrey Klein has made a compelling case that there is something McCain is not telling us about his military service or, rather, that he is not being forthright about some of the claims he is making.   Since McCain has made this campaign about character, let’s talk about character.  Let’s start be looking at McCain’s entire military file.  He should release all of his military records, just as John Kerry did and just as George W. Bush should have done.  Here’s how Klein wraps up his detailed article on Huffpo:

Is McCain now getting away with more by hiding his official history and by having his national security adviser inflate McCain’s resume with a bogus promotion to admiral humbly declined? If so, McCain may be attempting to hide why the Navy was in fact slow to promote him upwards despite his suffering as a POW and his distinguished naval heritage.

One possible reason: After McCain had returned from Vietnam as a war hero and was physically rehabilitated, he was urged by his medical caretakers and military colleagues never to fly again. But McCain insisted on going up. As Carl Bernstein reported in Vanity Fair, he piloted an ultra-light, single propeller plane — and crashed another time. His fifth loss of a plane has vanished from public records, but should be a subject of discussion in his Navy file. It wouldn’t be surprising if his naval superiors worried that McCain was just too defiant, too reckless and too crash prone.

Regardless, McCain owes it to the country to release his complete naval records so that American voters can see his documented history and make an informed decision.

As the mercury rose past 90 on this sunny Sunday, I biked over to see the Pagan Picnic in Tower Grove Park. I attend this event regularly, and it gets a bit bigger each year. There are many booths selling fair foods and drinks, and psychic readings, acupuncture, massage, crystals galore, and anything else out on the loose edge of New Age (”Ancient Wisdom”) Credulity.

It’s fun.

What I like most about the event is its disorganized ability to weird the normals. Does a top hat go with a black leather skirt and army boots? That guy seems to make it work. One post-apocalyptic sort with a blond Mohawk is videotaping the Creative Anachronisms/ Dungeons and Dragons/ Swords and Sorcery crowd beating each other about the limbs with padded swords and staffs. And the damsels. I admit that it is fun to see what young women wear to scandalize their elders. In the flesh, as it were. Well, one man with bones through his earlobes only had on “primitive” jewelry and a loincloth. But his tan seemed up to the job.

Yes, that woman is sitting under the tree spinning her own thread from wool she probably carded herself. Does Dr. Pepper go with a pterodactyl leg? Why not? Well, turkey, actually. But the hawker is convincing. Do glacier spalled obsidian needles make good wind chimes? Ya bet! I bought. And there are many drums. Several booths provide different sorts of handmade drums with wood or skin tops.

Various musical and dance troupes perform in the Bardic Circle, one of the pavilions in the park. Somewhere there is a schedule posted. But this crowd is anarchistic. No one seems to be in charge, but it works.

What is the entry fee? Well, free. But donations to a local food bank are suggested, and bins for collecting cans of food are provided.

Charity, like honor, mercy, and tolerance, are basic pagan family values.

I stumbled onto this fellow as a respondent on other blogs or the subject in yet others. Herman Cummings is an active proponent of Biblical truth over Scientific Inquiry. Why don’t I just say “Creationism”? Because Herman argues against them, as well. He has nothing good to say about “Intelligent Design”.

He is heir to a higher truth. He knows “The Observations of Moses” that are revealed in a book called “Moses Didn’t Write About Creation!” that was written by … Herman Cummings. In every blog response I can find by him, he cites this book as the final authority. He won’t deign to respond to any direct arguments unless it is predicated by an affidavit of of having read his book.

Here are some Cummings Quotes:

• My name is Herman Cummings. I am the foremost terrestrial authority on the book of Genesis.
• I am the only person I know or ever heard of presently on this Earth that is qualified to teach Biblical Creation. Many school districts are grappling with the doctrine of “Intelligent Design”. Unfortunately, “ID” is an inept and shallow doctrine that merely says that life on Earth is too complex to have developed by chance.
• I’ve already written the governor and members of the education committees of every state legislature. I have hope that officials will introduce legislation that will free the public schools to teach all viable theories of origins, and explanations of the ancient history of life on Earth, removing the threat of (atheist) lawsuits.

Why is this guy different than the folks at the Discovery Institute? Because he takes as his authoritative text, the root of all his arguments, a book that he himself wrote. At least the DI ID’ers claim to have external evidence, although they never produce any when asked. Also, Herman is a columnist for theConservativeVoice.com, home of other luminaries such as Ann Coulter.

Another name to watch out for.