Do Our Souls Require a Gender?
11 months ago
Sunday, December 7, 2008
Friday, December 5, 2008
I've got a bad case of the Super AIDS
It forces me to continue to post Daily Show clips.
Hilarious around 1:40 in and onward. Poignant around 2:40 in and onward. High point: "proud arachnosexual relationship".
Hilarious around 1:40 in and onward. Poignant around 2:40 in and onward. High point: "proud arachnosexual relationship".
Post-Abortion Syndrome: Yea or Nay?
As you may or may not have heard, there was a recent meta-analytical study that has occurred pertaining to the post-abortion syndrome and literature involved in the subject. It wasn't favorable.
Interesting objections. But, by this logic, there is no way of disproving the existence of these women, because they are (conveniently) completely unwilling to affirm their existence to anyone for a period of extended scrutiny. They are like phantoms, apparently; that is the extent of their psychological damage. I'll admit, though, that your objections are fair, and similar problems would conceivably exist among populations of any person with some form of post traumatic stress, or who had been a victim of a crime (rape victims specifically). It would be interesting to see whether these factors were relevant.
2. You already mentioned dropout rates, so that would be interesting information here. [Turns out, only 500 stayed on board, link above].
>3. How were they "traced", and could it not just be that those with such a depression or proclivity for depression is somehow the cause of the abortion, rather the caused by it? Or some other such circumstance which happens to be the reason why we say that "correlation doesn't necessarily mean causation". [He says elsewhere that this was accounted for, but I have yet to find anywhere that mentions how. Let alone anywhere presenting the abstract and such].
4. He is dealing with women who got pregnant and had abortions from an age interval of 15 to 25 (and measures them for depression and suicidal the last time before ending the study at age 21) . There are going to be other factors going on for women who got pregnant that young, including the stress of getting pregnant to begin with.
Despite unclear evidence on such a phenomenon, adverse mental health outcomes of abortion have been used as a rationale for policy-making. [ain't that the truth] We systematically searched for articles focused on the potential association between abortion and long-term mental health outcomes published between January 1, 1989 and August 1, 2008 and reviewed 21 studies that met the inclusion criteria. We rated the study quality based on methodological factors necessary to appropriately explore the research question. Studies were rated as Excellent (no studies), Very Good (4 studies), Fair (8 studies), Poor (8 studies), or Very Poor (1 study). A clear trend emerges from this systematic review: the highest quality studies had findings that were mostly neutral, suggesting few, if any, differences between women who had abortions and their respective comparison groups in terms of mental health sequelae. Conversely, studies with the most flawed methodology found negative mental health sequelae of abortion.Rather telling. Of course, since it was just a study of the quality of previous studies, rather than actual research to give evidence to the contrary, it isn't that worldshaking. But, didn't stop pro-lifers from sloppily pouncing all over it.
First, the JHU researchers don't include any of the major studies showing abortion's link to subsequent substance abuse problems. While studies show women who have abortions are more at risk than those who don't of abusing drugs or alcohol, the JHU authors fail to include a single study on the topic in their review.Because those studies weren't relevant, and substance abuse, in the absence of any other indications of mental health problems, is a tangential issue.Coleman calls that "one of the major mental health concerns of women who have aborted and for women in general" but "no explanation is provided for this blatant omission."
Secondly, Coleman says the ranking system the JHU researchers employed ignores two of the most central methodological considerations when conducting reviews of prospective research designs: the percent consenting to participate at baseline and retention of subjects over time.
As Coleman explains, "Obviously when women are more harmed by an abortion they are less inclined to want to continue to participate. Further, women who are suffering from an abortion are likely to have less stable lives and are therefore more likely to be unavailable to be assessed."
Interesting objections. But, by this logic, there is no way of disproving the existence of these women, because they are (conveniently) completely unwilling to affirm their existence to anyone for a period of extended scrutiny. They are like phantoms, apparently; that is the extent of their psychological damage. I'll admit, though, that your objections are fair, and similar problems would conceivably exist among populations of any person with some form of post traumatic stress, or who had been a victim of a crime (rape victims specifically). It would be interesting to see whether these factors were relevant.
Another good point, actually. A lot in the realm of psychology is subjective, even if you toss in numbers to make it seem otherwise, but I would like to see what criteria they had for each to attain a given rating.Meanwhile, the JHU researchers developed five quality indicators to rank each study analyzed from “Excellent” to “Very Poor” in terms of its quality.
Coleman says these rankings are arbitrary and subjective and points out that the JHU team never explained how a study was given a certain ranking.
Do you have any objective evidence of your subjective claim that objective evaluators would side with your assessShe also tells LifeNews.com that she and her colleagues would disagree with the high rankings JHU authors gave to studies showing no abortion-depression link that she believes were of poorer quality.
"There is no way that several of the studies listed as 'Very Good' would have met 4 out of 5 of the quality indicators necessary for the rating if rated by an objective evaluator who was not invested in deriving a conclusion that is consonant with pro-choice ideology," she said.
Coleman also noted that a seminal study that is highly regarded, conducted by pro-abortion New Zealand researcher David Fergusson in 2006, was only listed as "fair" by the JHU team.Oooo. Do I get a study to dissect now?
Fergusson's study of 1,265 children born in the 1970s traced women and their pregnancy decisions. Of those having abortions, twice as many women were likely to suffer from severe depression compared to those who had never been pregnant and they were 35 percent more likely to be depressed than those who carried a pregnancy to term.1. No details about how sampling occurred (i.e. whether socioeconomic backgrounds and religious backgrounds were varied). [Apparently, according to this link, all subjects were born in Christchurch, New Zealand...hell of a random sample...]
2. You already mentioned dropout rates, so that would be interesting information here. [Turns out, only 500 stayed on board, link above].
>3. How were they "traced", and could it not just be that those with such a depression or proclivity for depression is somehow the cause of the abortion, rather the caused by it? Or some other such circumstance which happens to be the reason why we say that "correlation doesn't necessarily mean causation". [He says elsewhere that this was accounted for, but I have yet to find anywhere that mentions how. Let alone anywhere presenting the abstract and such].
4. He is dealing with women who got pregnant and had abortions from an age interval of 15 to 25 (and measures them for depression and suicidal the last time before ending the study at age 21) . There are going to be other factors going on for women who got pregnant that young, including the stress of getting pregnant to begin with.
Finally, as LifeNews.com previously noted with regard to three new studies that were released this week and show abortion's link to adverse mental health outcomes, Coleman says the JHU team didn't include all of the studies it should have to give a proper overall analysis."The review 'missed' numerous high quality studies that meet their inclusion criteria. The result is an extremely biased selection," she said.
And, as it turns, one is the previous paper, and one of the others is one of Coleman's own papers.
The purpose of this study was to examine associations between abortion history and a wide range of anxiety (panic disorder, panic attacks, PTSD, Agoraphobia), mood (bipolar disorder, mania, major depression), and substance abuse disorders (alcohol and drug abuse and dependence) using a nationally representative US sample, the national comorbidity survey. Abortion was found to be related to an increased risk for a variety of mental health problems (panic attacks, panic disorder, agoraphobia, PTSD, bipolar disorder, major depression with and without hierarchy), and substance abuse disorders after statistical controls were instituted for a wide range of personal, situational, and demographic variables. Calculation of population attributable risks indicated that abortion was implicated in between 4.3% and 16.6% of the incidence of these disorders. Future research is needed to identify mediating mechanisms linking abortion to various disorders and to understand individual difference factors associated with vulnerability to developing a particular mental health problem after abortion.Association being the operative word in all that. I cannot believe that there major complaint is simply that the overlooked some New Zealand papers and Coleman's pet projects. Oh well. It isn't important anyway...
eHarmony eSucks
You've all heard about the legendary match making site that is eventually going to open up a version for homosexual couples in the next few months, I assume. Well, turns out that it is free, and the process that they put you through to match you up is a massive online personality quiz (a kind of quiz that I have a long history with). Buuuut...that's about the bulk of it for some people. Let me explain.
It serves as a Big Five Personality Test, determining agreeableness, openness, extraversion, emotional stability, and conscientiousness according to your own self-assessments, giving you those results after spending a good 40 minutes slogging through the massive thing. But, they are assholes, and admit at the end of taking the huge damn thing that they are so particular about their methods of matching you up with other people, that they outright refuse to give ANY matches to 1 out of 5 people because they just don't precisely match anyone. What complete and utter bullcrap. Dearest eHarmony: you aren't selling yourself as a personality test, of which I have taken at least a dozen before and had no desire to take another. I wanted to be given profiles of random ass internet people who are within a 200 mile radius and who are roughly similar to myself. That's it. I probably wouldn't even have given a damn after seeing the results, because I usually never do. But, you couldn't even do the sole thing that you advertise site as doing, and admit that you actively don't do it 20% of the time. Only doing your job for 80% customers....what the hell is this, the DMV?
Whatever. It's a mild annoyance. And getting the personality test results, that explains why being a self-centered, chronically shy, unemotional, and ever-apathetic bastard is a good thing was the highlight of my day.
Oh, and pornography wins the poll. Lust and philosophy were a close second. My favorite, anal fissures, went shamefully ignored.
It serves as a Big Five Personality Test, determining agreeableness, openness, extraversion, emotional stability, and conscientiousness according to your own self-assessments, giving you those results after spending a good 40 minutes slogging through the massive thing. But, they are assholes, and admit at the end of taking the huge damn thing that they are so particular about their methods of matching you up with other people, that they outright refuse to give ANY matches to 1 out of 5 people because they just don't precisely match anyone. What complete and utter bullcrap. Dearest eHarmony: you aren't selling yourself as a personality test, of which I have taken at least a dozen before and had no desire to take another. I wanted to be given profiles of random ass internet people who are within a 200 mile radius and who are roughly similar to myself. That's it. I probably wouldn't even have given a damn after seeing the results, because I usually never do. But, you couldn't even do the sole thing that you advertise site as doing, and admit that you actively don't do it 20% of the time. Only doing your job for 80% customers....what the hell is this, the DMV?
Whatever. It's a mild annoyance. And getting the personality test results, that explains why being a self-centered, chronically shy, unemotional, and ever-apathetic bastard is a good thing was the highlight of my day.
Oh, and pornography wins the poll. Lust and philosophy were a close second. My favorite, anal fissures, went shamefully ignored.
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
The Horror....the horror...
Oh, lookee here! Expelled is online for free now. As you all know, I am a glutton for punishment. And I like to ramble. So, I am going to summarize the film as I go through it. [Deep breath]. Alright, here we go!
Film starts out playing old footage of East Berlin to the sound of a violin while running the credits. Appropriately enough, the last portion of the black and white footage is the film name itself. Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, written on the screen like the title of one of those old, classic, smultzy and factually sloppy films that they would show on projectors to unsuspecting classes of wide-eyed youngsters, who were about to hear how to best duck and cover in the event of a nuke being dropped, or how to know if they have gonorrhea. Oddly appropriate.
Oh no. Now they dramatically get scientists saying that Intelligent Design and positing a deity are not scientifically acceptable ideas. Ben is hunched against a wall, waiting to be called to a podium out as triumphant music plays. Our poor, skulking hero.
"Freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom from fear freedom of religion, freedom is the way to equality, America is about freedom" blah, blah, blah. "What happens when we don't have freedom?" (Brief clips from Nazi Germany. Subtle). "We are losing freedom in science. I always thought that scientists were able to explore any realm of inquiry without fear of reprisal." [Pfft. You are. But when you don't have anything to back it up, your work will be rightly dismissed. You are still free to try to delve into such research, but if you cannot pass in something that is up to muster, it will not be offered up to the public, because it is most likely utter crock].
Ben: "You ruined Richard Sternberg's life!!!!" Sternberg is a biologist who "questioned the powers that be" (I am going to be thinking "Bueller? Bueller?" this entire movie). Lost his job because he published a paper "that mentioned that an Intelligent Designer might be a possibility". Sternberg: "people were so upset about it". Whining about how people mentioned the author of the paper's religious and political beliefs, while showing clips of people shoving each other around. "I was viewed as an intellectual terrorist because of giving the topic of intelligent design some modicum of credibility". [Really? Intellectual terrorist? I would have settled for 'moron enabler'].
Michael Shermer talks about how there is an equal lack of evidence for each god. Says that Intelligent Design is unproven, so it is not nonsense but not science either (3/4ths towards the nonsense side). Ben whines about Sternberg publishing a "PEER REVIEWED" research paper in favor of intelligent design and losing his job. [He was fired because it wasn't supposed to pass the peer review process, so he is being disingenuous...I think...].
A corny ad video for "George Mason University". Caroline Crocker "mentioned intelligent design" and her "career came to an abrupt end". Image of a guillotine in process (no head unfortunately). "Blacklisted, unable to find a job anywhere". [Note: same thing has happened to teachers of evolution in some states.]
"Michael Engor" 'attacked' for writing an essay that said that doctors don't need knowledge of evolution to practice medicine. [Whaaa...bloggers were mean to him! Seriously. He is bitching because his essay was criticized on the internet. Where is that violin music!?].
Professor Robert Marks was forced to shut down his website and lose grant money when it was found that there was "a link between his work and Intelligent Design". [Clip from Planet of the Apes, "It's a madhouse"] Talkie talkie. [Clip of a man getting shot in a Western, with the shooter scornfully saying "creationist." If only...]. Guillermo Gonzales was denied tenure, despite "finding several planets" after publishing Privileged Planet. "If you value your career, you better keep quiet about your intelligent design views."
[ Interviews with people who are afraid to lose their jobs so remain anonymous and with shadowed faces. ] "When I write Intelligent Design, they hear creationism, they hear religious right, they hear theocracy."
Ben admits that they wouldn't want to teach I.D. if it were wrong, because you don't want to teach the "Earth is flat and that the Holocaust never happened". [Random clips of criticism. Old clip of dumb creationist talking with his teacher]. He immediately thereafter asks "what's so bad about I.D.", returning to his line about being unfairly tossed aside despite the former.
"Intelligent Design today, school prayers tommorrow" [music: Hallelujah, hallelujah. Me: shudder]. Music: "Love is in the air", scenes from protest against what I assume to be the opening of the Creation Museum (can't tell, but there are a lot of people there, and they have signs protesting I.D.).
PZ Myers says ID is propaganda designed to suck in money. Eugenie Scott making a challenge for ID to present evidence. Boxing match bell rings. Ben Stein walking, looking around Seattle for the Discovery Institute. Asks a half-dozen peole where it is. Finally finds that it is a single floor of a large administrative-type building.
Guy he interviews says that religion is not part of I.D., that it's a red herring, that they have agnostics and people from a variety of backgrounds. [Crock]. He then says: "They claim the debate has been settled". Ben then goes to Biola ("Bible University of Los Angeles"). [Music: "Personal Jesus" as he passes a really creepy, super tall Jesus mural with a very prominent shadow adjacent to Jesus, making him look a little grim reaperish]. Scene of Ben scratching himself with some metal rod during a presentation.
Talks to the head of Biola, asks him if he's accepted money from Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, or if he is a minister (no, no, no, also not a "youth minister"). Mentions that evolutionists will admit flaws in the theory (wow, what a revelation). Pulls the standard separation of evolution into micro and macro (without using those terms). Says I.D. isn't creationism because it doesn't involve the Bible, and that it doesn't necessarily say that God is the creator. "Intelligent Design is the study of patterns in nature that are best understood as a product of intellgence". Ben still suspects that I.D. is related to creationism. Hunts down Dembski. Country music song about creationism plays. Dumbski says that scientists are sometimes overzealous and apply principles to areas they do not belong. Uses Einsteinian physics addition to Newtonian physics as the example. "Darwin had valid insights but it is not the whole picture".
Ben driving. Talks about how Newton and Darwin are buried right next to each other in the "geniuses corner" of Westminister Abbey. "For every evidence based argument for Darwinism, there is an evidence based argument against it" [Pfft. Except the evidence against it is weak, the arguments even weaker ]. Johnathan Wells: Called a "creationist". I cry for him. "Evidence is being distorted to prop a theory that I think doesn't fit it". [You "think"? Your opinion is irrelevant.] Transition into Paris, French music (accordion sound prominent) playing. Talks to a guy who spouts out his resume. "Is [Darwinian theory] clear enough so that it could be correct?" "Nothing is clearly defined and delineated." [Says it isn't mathematical, like is physics. Why don't you just toss out the whole of biology while you are at it?].
Richard Dawkins with intense music, accompanied by previous television appearance clips of him. "Most people who don't believe in evolution are ignorant". Ben's rebuttal: "But the people I interviewed are highly credentialed scientists" [and yet are probably still ignorant on the subject, at least in some respects]. Back to Johnathan Wells, who says that Origin of Species isn't just about changing in species over time, but how new species can come about and how every species probably came about [acting as if there is no evidence obtained after Darwin's book was written to support that].
Video: [Abiogenesis alert]. Chemical elements are present on Earth, and, oh noez, they said they don't know what the original energetic impetus was for abiogenesis! Stein sad. Then the Miller-Urey experiment is brought up. Frankenstein clip: "It's alive!". Ben says "it didn't work". Ben is vastly oversimplifying, especially since they formed many of the proteins that he will go on to mention in the next segment.
Michael Ruse mentions theory that life "began on the backs of crystals" (Clip of a strange turbaned guy ordering people to look into his "Crystal ball"). Ben: "I don't know how we got from mud to a living cell". Roulette wheel. "What were the chances of life arising on its own?" Guy says 240 proteins needed to form simplest life, so it is improbable for it to occur in a step by step process [Again, pfft.] Enter cartoon world: 'Casino of life!' 'Play the slot machine'. Magoo like guy does so. 'Oh, you have to do that 250 times in the right order!' Me: Hahahaha, way to fail probability forever. Two scientists saying that there is a "1 in a trillion trillion trillion" chance for life to form agree with the cartoon.
Francis Crick mentions "directed panspermia". Ben: "aliens did it" ( footage of old school aliens). "Crystals? Aliens? I thought this was science, not science fiction". [Har, har Ben. You asked for speculation, and you got it. Strawmanning it isn't going to make I.D. more tenable]. "Everybody agrees that it started with a single cell". I.D. guys say that cells are incredibly complicated (comparing it to a factory, cars, and the universe). Awesome images of DNA, and then babbling about the "information in DNA". "Information in a one dimensional form that provides information for a three dimensional form"
Awesome video of signal transduction up to RNA synthesis that they got sued for taking without permission. "Information in the cell that cannot be accounted for by undirected processes. There has to be information source." "Darwin assumed that increased information came from natural selection. But natural selection reduces genetic information." [Stop saying "information", people!]. "Why should we eliminate the possibility that there is an intelligent creator from discussion?" [No proof, and it is a logical and practical dead end.] Berlin wall when talking about limits on "permissible hypotheses". "What about academic freedom?". Guy mentions that science isn't a democratic process "and that there is a consensus view" and Ben talks about how Darwin challenged that consensus, blah blah. [You can only challenge the consensus when you have good evidence against it and for the alternative. Geez]. Goes back to Germany footage when joking about "Idea inspection".
Talk about dissenters, footage of bullying. Whines "if you want awards, you can't challenge the paradigm". [Bullshit]. Ben says that "Darwinists" fear that there will be an unraveling [show Wizard of Oz being revealed behind the curtain...ironic that that scene serves as a such a good metaphor for determining the rule force behind religious entities, like God. i.e. manipulative, deceitful, ordinary people who want to seem more powerful than they actually are].
Eugenie Scott "defending Darwinian gospel" [ughh...hate you Ben...]. Talks about opposition to equal time for creationism. Guy talking about conflict between liberal and conservative Christians. Dawkins talks about needing to tell that there is no incompatibility between Christianity and evolution. I.D. guys talk about "The Establishment", whining about being covered like "outsiders" in the media rather than part of an "even debate" [facepalm. Reality has an evolutionary bias]. Pamela Winnick: claims she wasn't religious, was writing about Intelligent Design, that she didn't take a side, and that she got hate mail and extra scrutiny afterwards. [Scrutiny? Oh, wow. What a tragedy.] "Courts say what you can or cannot teach". Ben summarizes a Polish creationist by saying that "Poland is freer academically than America". Dembski then pops up, saying that "evolutionists" didn't win the Scopes trial, and that Inherit the Wind is "fake history" (it's a frickin' play that even uses different names for the people that it is roughly modeled ater; I don't think anyone would purport it to be anything but creative non-fiction).
"Debate runs deeper than courts and science". More black and white T.V. programming. "Has become a religious war". "Have switched from defending Darwinism to attacking religion". Cites Richard Dawkins' God Delusion as an example. "Are Science and Religion really at war?"[War footage] Alister McGrath: "Dawkins has a charming and interesting view of science and religion and one has to win....a very naive view...ignorant of history" Says that a scientific explanation for formerly presumably divine activity doesn't undermine the religion. [So basically, he says that science isn't at war with religion because the religious people in the past, who weren't dealing with things that potentially contradicted their beliefs, did science, and because fundamentalists just plain old don't exist.] Some random person says stuff about how drawing metaphysical implications from science is not scientific. "people are so deeply entrenched in their own worldviews that they will not countenance alternatives". Early scientists thought that it was easier to do science due to their religious beliefs [ehh?].
Guy on stage. "No gods, no life after death, no alternate foundation for ethics, no alternate menaing in life, no human free will, are all connected to evolutionary worldview." Ben gets dramatic. Guy talks about how his teacher and book didn't give signs of design in biology and how that caused him to give up on the potential for a deity, on hope for emanent morality, and on hope for free will. Guy he is interviewing was diagnosed with a brain tumor and it returned after the interview. Said during the interview that he wanted to be euthanized if he went into remission because his brother was forced to suffer through Lou Gehrig's disease and wanted to be euthanized, but wasn't.
PZ Myers of Pharyngula interview footage again. "Find religion quite comfortable...what led me was learning more about the natural world"
Richard Dawkins: "when I discovered evolution, Darwinism...elegant explanation, that finally killed off my remaining religious faith."
Basically says that there are a lot of atheistic evolutionary biologists therefore evolution leads to atheism. Peter Atkins: "religion is devoid of explanatory content. And is evil as well"
[Clip of Bill Maher talking about how religion is dangerous.] PZ compares religion to knitting in how it brings comfort and is fun. Wants it to affect life less. Bring more science in (image of a Church bell being brought down and shattered).
Goes back to an I.D. guy, then he says that there is a "connection from Hitler to Darwin". So, we finally get to what they reeeaaallly wanted to say.
"Darwinism isn't a sufficient condition for something like Nazism but it is a necessary one".
Ben in a car. Talk about 15,000 handicapped individuals who were killed with a tour guide lady. They were 'after a utopia without illlness and handicaps'. [Shows German propaganda that talks about how the ill and "individuals lower than any beasts" or "inferior life-forms" should not be supported by the rest of society]. "Nazis, they relied on Darwin and German scientists". He continues to be led around empty gas chambers by tour guide-like lady. Says that 70 were killed a day, from Monday to Thursday. Cracks bitter joke about them wanting to take weekends off. Pretending to be solemn.
"Hitler...fanatical Darwinists and wanted to apply Darwinism to society" [which would be...social Darwinism! Which is not supported by actual understandings of evolutionary theory! Which is fail!]. "There were plenty of Americans who were doing similar things". Enter Eugenics (nice looking drawing of Eugenics tree]. Says that were trying to accelerate evolution by sterilizing the feeble minded and prohibiting their marriages [if only they were successful! But, then again, stupid seems to be environmental, not genetic.]. They forcibly sterilized some who were deemed unfit to breed. Ben brings up Planned Parenthood, which is suggested to be based on the same idea as eugenics, and is being directed at lower class [anti-abortionists like making that argument alot]. "Nazis applied eugenics on a massive scale". Sitting on railroad tracks. Guy he is talking to says that Nazis repressed racial and political enemies, which usually overlapped (used justification of biological inferiority for the former group). Guy mentions Jews and Ben covers eyes in distress. Man doesn't say that Hilter was insane, but just took radical solutions. Says Hitler is evil and evil can be rationalized as science. "Hitler thought he was benefiting humanity by driving evolution forward". [He thought he was doing God's work...] Ben visits Dachau memorial to Jews killed. "I know that Darwinism doesn't automatically equate to Nazism" (good). But what if it was used to justify similar stuff to die. "Seems to be an excellent argument for getting rid of useless people". Claim that evolution leads to euthanasia and thinking of people in economic terms, "deprivileging of humans".
"An elite that controls essentially all the research money saying there is no such thing as moral truth and that science will not be related to religion" bitches a living bobble head.
Low key piano music in the background, while the camera is looking at evolution texts, gambling chips, bottles, and religious texts. Quotes Darwin talking about feeble people taken off to asylums, and breeding and saying that doing something comparable when breeding animals wouldn't be prudent. Staring contest between Ben and a statue of Darwin. Ben walks away sadly. "America progressed by allowing freedom of speech and freedom of inquiry". Blah, blah, people died to protect our freedomz. "By what authority...do they presume to decide what is and is not science". And then he is kicked out of the Smithsonian by security.
He talked with the guy who didn't renew Caroline Crocker's contract, and he is stiff and semi-responsive. Ben goes back to people crying persecution. A guy who has says he has respect for Guillermo Gonzales, also said that "religious nut jobs must be opposed at every opportunity" [obviously, this was supposed to make their intended audience piss their pants with fear, rage, and the sexual arousal that they have equated with both of the other emotions]. Awesome Graffiti wall is pictured nearby while Ben talks with two others about "tearing down the wall" (clips of Berlin Wall) in academia. [Now a messiah complex. Nice]. Dawkins powdered up while Ben travels. Dramatic instrumental playing all the while. The showdown begins....
Dawkins reads from the beginning of second chapter of the God Delusion about how evil God is. Ben asks him why he spoils it for people who believe in a loving and generous God [pffft...because they associate with a religion that has doctrine that utterly contradict that belief, and, as harmless as their snuggly god is, they still support the evil god that it happens to share a Biblical basis with]. Dawkins, when coaxed to answer, says there is a 99% chance against God, Ben says "why not 97%", and Dawkins says that he doesn't really want to put a number on it. It is unlikely. "Who did create the heavens and the earth". Dawkins points out that this is begging the question. Says that we "know the sort of event involved" but not the details. Says that I.D. has a chance if we were intelligently designed by alien beings, find the signature of some form of designer, but they also need to have come about through an explicable process. Ben starts asking Dawkins about what gods he doesn't believe in. "Any god anywhere would be incompatible with anything I've said". Dawkins asked what he would say if he came face to face with God, and paraphrases Bertrand Russell, asking "why did you take such pains to hide yourself?".
Ben: "God isn't hidden. We may be able to encounter God through science, if we have the freedom to go there" (I.D. doesn't work that way!). Ben is back on the podium he was at the beginning, more Berlin Wall clips.
"There are people out there who want to keep science in a little box, which cannot possibly touch a higher power". Bobble head cries persecution. More Reagan talking about Berlin Wall. "No lie can live forever" [hahahaha, irony]. "We will overcome" [Berlin Wall falls, "All these things that I have done" plays. Ben leaves classroom, talking about needing people left to carry on the struggle. Credits roll.
WASTE. OF. TIME.
Film starts out playing old footage of East Berlin to the sound of a violin while running the credits. Appropriately enough, the last portion of the black and white footage is the film name itself. Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed, written on the screen like the title of one of those old, classic, smultzy and factually sloppy films that they would show on projectors to unsuspecting classes of wide-eyed youngsters, who were about to hear how to best duck and cover in the event of a nuke being dropped, or how to know if they have gonorrhea. Oddly appropriate.
Oh no. Now they dramatically get scientists saying that Intelligent Design and positing a deity are not scientifically acceptable ideas. Ben is hunched against a wall, waiting to be called to a podium out as triumphant music plays. Our poor, skulking hero.
"Freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, freedom from fear freedom of religion, freedom is the way to equality, America is about freedom" blah, blah, blah. "What happens when we don't have freedom?" (Brief clips from Nazi Germany. Subtle). "We are losing freedom in science. I always thought that scientists were able to explore any realm of inquiry without fear of reprisal." [Pfft. You are. But when you don't have anything to back it up, your work will be rightly dismissed. You are still free to try to delve into such research, but if you cannot pass in something that is up to muster, it will not be offered up to the public, because it is most likely utter crock].
Ben: "You ruined Richard Sternberg's life!!!!" Sternberg is a biologist who "questioned the powers that be" (I am going to be thinking "Bueller? Bueller?" this entire movie). Lost his job because he published a paper "that mentioned that an Intelligent Designer might be a possibility". Sternberg: "people were so upset about it". Whining about how people mentioned the author of the paper's religious and political beliefs, while showing clips of people shoving each other around. "I was viewed as an intellectual terrorist because of giving the topic of intelligent design some modicum of credibility". [Really? Intellectual terrorist? I would have settled for 'moron enabler'].
Michael Shermer talks about how there is an equal lack of evidence for each god. Says that Intelligent Design is unproven, so it is not nonsense but not science either (3/4ths towards the nonsense side). Ben whines about Sternberg publishing a "PEER REVIEWED" research paper in favor of intelligent design and losing his job. [He was fired because it wasn't supposed to pass the peer review process, so he is being disingenuous...I think...].
A corny ad video for "George Mason University". Caroline Crocker "mentioned intelligent design" and her "career came to an abrupt end". Image of a guillotine in process (no head unfortunately). "Blacklisted, unable to find a job anywhere". [Note: same thing has happened to teachers of evolution in some states.]
"Michael Engor" 'attacked' for writing an essay that said that doctors don't need knowledge of evolution to practice medicine. [Whaaa...bloggers were mean to him! Seriously. He is bitching because his essay was criticized on the internet. Where is that violin music!?].
Professor Robert Marks was forced to shut down his website and lose grant money when it was found that there was "a link between his work and Intelligent Design". [Clip from Planet of the Apes, "It's a madhouse"] Talkie talkie. [Clip of a man getting shot in a Western, with the shooter scornfully saying "creationist." If only...]. Guillermo Gonzales was denied tenure, despite "finding several planets" after publishing Privileged Planet. "If you value your career, you better keep quiet about your intelligent design views."
[ Interviews with people who are afraid to lose their jobs so remain anonymous and with shadowed faces. ] "When I write Intelligent Design, they hear creationism, they hear religious right, they hear theocracy."
Ben admits that they wouldn't want to teach I.D. if it were wrong, because you don't want to teach the "Earth is flat and that the Holocaust never happened". [Random clips of criticism. Old clip of dumb creationist talking with his teacher]. He immediately thereafter asks "what's so bad about I.D.", returning to his line about being unfairly tossed aside despite the former.
"Intelligent Design today, school prayers tommorrow" [music: Hallelujah, hallelujah. Me: shudder]. Music: "Love is in the air", scenes from protest against what I assume to be the opening of the Creation Museum (can't tell, but there are a lot of people there, and they have signs protesting I.D.).
PZ Myers says ID is propaganda designed to suck in money. Eugenie Scott making a challenge for ID to present evidence. Boxing match bell rings. Ben Stein walking, looking around Seattle for the Discovery Institute. Asks a half-dozen peole where it is. Finally finds that it is a single floor of a large administrative-type building.
Guy he interviews says that religion is not part of I.D., that it's a red herring, that they have agnostics and people from a variety of backgrounds. [Crock]. He then says: "They claim the debate has been settled". Ben then goes to Biola ("Bible University of Los Angeles"). [Music: "Personal Jesus" as he passes a really creepy, super tall Jesus mural with a very prominent shadow adjacent to Jesus, making him look a little grim reaperish]. Scene of Ben scratching himself with some metal rod during a presentation.
Talks to the head of Biola, asks him if he's accepted money from Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, or if he is a minister (no, no, no, also not a "youth minister"). Mentions that evolutionists will admit flaws in the theory (wow, what a revelation). Pulls the standard separation of evolution into micro and macro (without using those terms). Says I.D. isn't creationism because it doesn't involve the Bible, and that it doesn't necessarily say that God is the creator. "Intelligent Design is the study of patterns in nature that are best understood as a product of intellgence". Ben still suspects that I.D. is related to creationism. Hunts down Dembski. Country music song about creationism plays. Dumbski says that scientists are sometimes overzealous and apply principles to areas they do not belong. Uses Einsteinian physics addition to Newtonian physics as the example. "Darwin had valid insights but it is not the whole picture".
Ben driving. Talks about how Newton and Darwin are buried right next to each other in the "geniuses corner" of Westminister Abbey. "For every evidence based argument for Darwinism, there is an evidence based argument against it" [Pfft. Except the evidence against it is weak, the arguments even weaker ]. Johnathan Wells: Called a "creationist". I cry for him. "Evidence is being distorted to prop a theory that I think doesn't fit it". [You "think"? Your opinion is irrelevant.] Transition into Paris, French music (accordion sound prominent) playing. Talks to a guy who spouts out his resume. "Is [Darwinian theory] clear enough so that it could be correct?" "Nothing is clearly defined and delineated." [Says it isn't mathematical, like is physics. Why don't you just toss out the whole of biology while you are at it?].
Richard Dawkins with intense music, accompanied by previous television appearance clips of him. "Most people who don't believe in evolution are ignorant". Ben's rebuttal: "But the people I interviewed are highly credentialed scientists" [and yet are probably still ignorant on the subject, at least in some respects]. Back to Johnathan Wells, who says that Origin of Species isn't just about changing in species over time, but how new species can come about and how every species probably came about [acting as if there is no evidence obtained after Darwin's book was written to support that].
Video: [Abiogenesis alert]. Chemical elements are present on Earth, and, oh noez, they said they don't know what the original energetic impetus was for abiogenesis! Stein sad. Then the Miller-Urey experiment is brought up. Frankenstein clip: "It's alive!". Ben says "it didn't work". Ben is vastly oversimplifying, especially since they formed many of the proteins that he will go on to mention in the next segment.
Michael Ruse mentions theory that life "began on the backs of crystals" (Clip of a strange turbaned guy ordering people to look into his "Crystal ball"). Ben: "I don't know how we got from mud to a living cell". Roulette wheel. "What were the chances of life arising on its own?" Guy says 240 proteins needed to form simplest life, so it is improbable for it to occur in a step by step process [Again, pfft.] Enter cartoon world: 'Casino of life!' 'Play the slot machine'. Magoo like guy does so. 'Oh, you have to do that 250 times in the right order!' Me: Hahahaha, way to fail probability forever. Two scientists saying that there is a "1 in a trillion trillion trillion" chance for life to form agree with the cartoon.
Francis Crick mentions "directed panspermia". Ben: "aliens did it" ( footage of old school aliens). "Crystals? Aliens? I thought this was science, not science fiction". [Har, har Ben. You asked for speculation, and you got it. Strawmanning it isn't going to make I.D. more tenable]. "Everybody agrees that it started with a single cell". I.D. guys say that cells are incredibly complicated (comparing it to a factory, cars, and the universe). Awesome images of DNA, and then babbling about the "information in DNA". "Information in a one dimensional form that provides information for a three dimensional form"
Awesome video of signal transduction up to RNA synthesis that they got sued for taking without permission. "Information in the cell that cannot be accounted for by undirected processes. There has to be information source." "Darwin assumed that increased information came from natural selection. But natural selection reduces genetic information." [Stop saying "information", people!]. "Why should we eliminate the possibility that there is an intelligent creator from discussion?" [No proof, and it is a logical and practical dead end.] Berlin wall when talking about limits on "permissible hypotheses". "What about academic freedom?". Guy mentions that science isn't a democratic process "and that there is a consensus view" and Ben talks about how Darwin challenged that consensus, blah blah. [You can only challenge the consensus when you have good evidence against it and for the alternative. Geez]. Goes back to Germany footage when joking about "Idea inspection".
Talk about dissenters, footage of bullying. Whines "if you want awards, you can't challenge the paradigm". [Bullshit]. Ben says that "Darwinists" fear that there will be an unraveling [show Wizard of Oz being revealed behind the curtain...ironic that that scene serves as a such a good metaphor for determining the rule force behind religious entities, like God. i.e. manipulative, deceitful, ordinary people who want to seem more powerful than they actually are].
Eugenie Scott "defending Darwinian gospel" [ughh...hate you Ben...]. Talks about opposition to equal time for creationism. Guy talking about conflict between liberal and conservative Christians. Dawkins talks about needing to tell that there is no incompatibility between Christianity and evolution. I.D. guys talk about "The Establishment", whining about being covered like "outsiders" in the media rather than part of an "even debate" [facepalm. Reality has an evolutionary bias]. Pamela Winnick: claims she wasn't religious, was writing about Intelligent Design, that she didn't take a side, and that she got hate mail and extra scrutiny afterwards. [Scrutiny? Oh, wow. What a tragedy.] "Courts say what you can or cannot teach". Ben summarizes a Polish creationist by saying that "Poland is freer academically than America". Dembski then pops up, saying that "evolutionists" didn't win the Scopes trial, and that Inherit the Wind is "fake history" (it's a frickin' play that even uses different names for the people that it is roughly modeled ater; I don't think anyone would purport it to be anything but creative non-fiction).
"Debate runs deeper than courts and science". More black and white T.V. programming. "Has become a religious war". "Have switched from defending Darwinism to attacking religion". Cites Richard Dawkins' God Delusion as an example. "Are Science and Religion really at war?"[War footage] Alister McGrath: "Dawkins has a charming and interesting view of science and religion and one has to win....a very naive view...ignorant of history" Says that a scientific explanation for formerly presumably divine activity doesn't undermine the religion. [So basically, he says that science isn't at war with religion because the religious people in the past, who weren't dealing with things that potentially contradicted their beliefs, did science, and because fundamentalists just plain old don't exist.] Some random person says stuff about how drawing metaphysical implications from science is not scientific. "people are so deeply entrenched in their own worldviews that they will not countenance alternatives". Early scientists thought that it was easier to do science due to their religious beliefs [ehh?].
Guy on stage. "No gods, no life after death, no alternate foundation for ethics, no alternate menaing in life, no human free will, are all connected to evolutionary worldview." Ben gets dramatic. Guy talks about how his teacher and book didn't give signs of design in biology and how that caused him to give up on the potential for a deity, on hope for emanent morality, and on hope for free will. Guy he is interviewing was diagnosed with a brain tumor and it returned after the interview. Said during the interview that he wanted to be euthanized if he went into remission because his brother was forced to suffer through Lou Gehrig's disease and wanted to be euthanized, but wasn't.
PZ Myers of Pharyngula interview footage again. "Find religion quite comfortable...what led me was learning more about the natural world"
Richard Dawkins: "when I discovered evolution, Darwinism...elegant explanation, that finally killed off my remaining religious faith."
Basically says that there are a lot of atheistic evolutionary biologists therefore evolution leads to atheism. Peter Atkins: "religion is devoid of explanatory content. And is evil as well"
[Clip of Bill Maher talking about how religion is dangerous.] PZ compares religion to knitting in how it brings comfort and is fun. Wants it to affect life less. Bring more science in (image of a Church bell being brought down and shattered).
Goes back to an I.D. guy, then he says that there is a "connection from Hitler to Darwin". So, we finally get to what they reeeaaallly wanted to say.
"Darwinism isn't a sufficient condition for something like Nazism but it is a necessary one".
Ben in a car. Talk about 15,000 handicapped individuals who were killed with a tour guide lady. They were 'after a utopia without illlness and handicaps'. [Shows German propaganda that talks about how the ill and "individuals lower than any beasts" or "inferior life-forms" should not be supported by the rest of society]. "Nazis, they relied on Darwin and German scientists". He continues to be led around empty gas chambers by tour guide-like lady. Says that 70 were killed a day, from Monday to Thursday. Cracks bitter joke about them wanting to take weekends off. Pretending to be solemn.
"Hitler...fanatical Darwinists and wanted to apply Darwinism to society" [which would be...social Darwinism! Which is not supported by actual understandings of evolutionary theory! Which is fail!]. "There were plenty of Americans who were doing similar things". Enter Eugenics (nice looking drawing of Eugenics tree]. Says that were trying to accelerate evolution by sterilizing the feeble minded and prohibiting their marriages [if only they were successful! But, then again, stupid seems to be environmental, not genetic.]. They forcibly sterilized some who were deemed unfit to breed. Ben brings up Planned Parenthood, which is suggested to be based on the same idea as eugenics, and is being directed at lower class [anti-abortionists like making that argument alot]. "Nazis applied eugenics on a massive scale". Sitting on railroad tracks. Guy he is talking to says that Nazis repressed racial and political enemies, which usually overlapped (used justification of biological inferiority for the former group). Guy mentions Jews and Ben covers eyes in distress. Man doesn't say that Hilter was insane, but just took radical solutions. Says Hitler is evil and evil can be rationalized as science. "Hitler thought he was benefiting humanity by driving evolution forward". [He thought he was doing God's work...] Ben visits Dachau memorial to Jews killed. "I know that Darwinism doesn't automatically equate to Nazism" (good). But what if it was used to justify similar stuff to die. "Seems to be an excellent argument for getting rid of useless people". Claim that evolution leads to euthanasia and thinking of people in economic terms, "deprivileging of humans".
"An elite that controls essentially all the research money saying there is no such thing as moral truth and that science will not be related to religion" bitches a living bobble head.
Low key piano music in the background, while the camera is looking at evolution texts, gambling chips, bottles, and religious texts. Quotes Darwin talking about feeble people taken off to asylums, and breeding and saying that doing something comparable when breeding animals wouldn't be prudent. Staring contest between Ben and a statue of Darwin. Ben walks away sadly. "America progressed by allowing freedom of speech and freedom of inquiry". Blah, blah, people died to protect our freedomz. "By what authority...do they presume to decide what is and is not science". And then he is kicked out of the Smithsonian by security.
He talked with the guy who didn't renew Caroline Crocker's contract, and he is stiff and semi-responsive. Ben goes back to people crying persecution. A guy who has says he has respect for Guillermo Gonzales, also said that "religious nut jobs must be opposed at every opportunity" [obviously, this was supposed to make their intended audience piss their pants with fear, rage, and the sexual arousal that they have equated with both of the other emotions]. Awesome Graffiti wall is pictured nearby while Ben talks with two others about "tearing down the wall" (clips of Berlin Wall) in academia. [Now a messiah complex. Nice]. Dawkins powdered up while Ben travels. Dramatic instrumental playing all the while. The showdown begins....
Dawkins reads from the beginning of second chapter of the God Delusion about how evil God is. Ben asks him why he spoils it for people who believe in a loving and generous God [pffft...because they associate with a religion that has doctrine that utterly contradict that belief, and, as harmless as their snuggly god is, they still support the evil god that it happens to share a Biblical basis with]. Dawkins, when coaxed to answer, says there is a 99% chance against God, Ben says "why not 97%", and Dawkins says that he doesn't really want to put a number on it. It is unlikely. "Who did create the heavens and the earth". Dawkins points out that this is begging the question. Says that we "know the sort of event involved" but not the details. Says that I.D. has a chance if we were intelligently designed by alien beings, find the signature of some form of designer, but they also need to have come about through an explicable process. Ben starts asking Dawkins about what gods he doesn't believe in. "Any god anywhere would be incompatible with anything I've said". Dawkins asked what he would say if he came face to face with God, and paraphrases Bertrand Russell, asking "why did you take such pains to hide yourself?".
Ben: "God isn't hidden. We may be able to encounter God through science, if we have the freedom to go there" (I.D. doesn't work that way!). Ben is back on the podium he was at the beginning, more Berlin Wall clips.
"There are people out there who want to keep science in a little box, which cannot possibly touch a higher power". Bobble head cries persecution. More Reagan talking about Berlin Wall. "No lie can live forever" [hahahaha, irony]. "We will overcome" [Berlin Wall falls, "All these things that I have done" plays. Ben leaves classroom, talking about needing people left to carry on the struggle. Credits roll.
WASTE. OF. TIME.
How to Lose Elections.
I've really got to stop doing this...but the Daily Show and Colbert Report are too alluring to not blog about.
Ludacris is always right. It's a rule I live by. Another rule I live by, and perhaps more important one, though: keep your hands off little girls. I think it has worked well for me thus far...
Ludacris is always right. It's a rule I live by. Another rule I live by, and perhaps more important one, though: keep your hands off little girls. I think it has worked well for me thus far...
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Terrorists in India? Better stay the course in Iraq!
I should really stop going to Townhall.com. Because sometimes...I accidentally read something. And I am afraid the Oedipus method of coping with extreme duress has only gotten me so far in removing the horrible memories from my mind. So, I will instead have to settle for blindly prodding at the keyboard in order to express my impotent rage.
We increased public safety just fine by increasing airport security measures to ridiculous levels and by going after al-Qaida. If our safety has been obtained by wiretapping, taking suspected terrorists as POW's, and then using whatever means necessary to make them talk, then I think we deserve to be attacked again. People like you are willing to sell our collective soul in order to protect your own hide. People like you are the ones who make us look selfish, arrogant; who makes the world hate us. It disgusts me. It's why I could never be patriotic. Because I could never blindly accept the actions of a nation that is so clearly guided by those who are willing to assure our nation's success at the expense of everyone else in the world. It is unbecoming.
2. Torture is rarely a good source for reliable information.
3. See above, you sick fuck.
Yes, "heading them off" would be ideal. Care to tell us how to do so without consulting horoscopes and crystal balls? I'm sure the militaries of the world would be very appreciative of this info.
9/11 happened because of nearly a dozen hijackers. The Mumbai attack was performed by 25 or so performing a rough military-type strike. We just need to be on guard, not overthrow governments and strip us of rights to see the attacks more clearly. You are using flamethrowers to fight mice.
For two or three years running, it seems, all we've heard from the political left in the United States, concerning the war on terror, is: Aren't we awful?Oh no! Not doubt! Not having standards to hold ourselves up to in order to assure that we do not become overzealous and turn into something worse than that which we self-righteously oppose! That way lies communism!
Blog and editorial commentary around presidential election time tilted heavily to the view that it was high time we restored constitutional liberties after their trashing by the George W. Bush administration. We needed to close the Guantanamo holding pen for terrorists, tighten the rules against spying on Americans, renounce disgusting forms of interrogational persuasion (usually labeled torture), and broaden the judicial rights of suspected or accused terroristsPffft. Having fair trials for randomly captured "enemies", protecting Americans' privacy, and abstaining from torture? That's stupid...
If the Mumbai bloodbath fails to refocus some American eyes on the complexity and immense risk involved in combating homicidal maniacs, what, frankly, will?Considering that the Mumbai bloodbath is an illustration that they are willing to attack anywhere, and that many of them are coming from Pakistan...it refocuses completely away from where we are already. But saying that is inconvenient, isn't it? You want us to stay in Iraq, and your evidence for why we should do this is that terror cells enterred India from Pakistan and killed 100 people? It's complex alright. More complex than you people who think that we are fighting coherent military groups that we can "win" against are willing to admit.
I have grown fond of using the phrase "homicidal maniacs" when discussing terrorists. It's what they areAnd you and I would agree on that issue. Thanks for that.
How you endeavor to stop mad dogs is the point: not shooting on sight, of course, unless they come foaming around the corner, but, rather, to begin with taking them as seriously as they take their potential victims.Mad dogs are a good analogy to terrorists, even if you completely gave up on it with your conclusion. How the hell does "taking them seriously" work out, when, save under circumstances where they are "foaming around the corner", they are indistinguishable from regular dogs? And does it really matter if we "take them seriously" if there is not a damn thing we can do about them when the 17th dog on the left decides to start gnawing on the neighbor kid while you stare down the 23rd dog from the right without any actual plan about how to deal with it if it does the same?
Its legions would rather shred Bush. Not to mention Vice President Cheney, whom various left-wing types hope they can indict for God knows what after he leaves office, as punishment for helping keep us safe.Which reminds me of a quote I just made up: "It doesn't matter who you beat, rape, torture, or kill, as long as you can call it self-defense and have a police force too cowardly to call bullshit on you".
It seems to have escaped general notice in recent years that the United States hasn't been subjected to a single terrorist attack since 9/11.And what about all those terrorist attacks that we didn't experience up to 9/11? Huh? Now beg! Beg Bill Clinton for forgiveness! He worked so hard to protect us, enough so that you never experienced a terrorist attack at all during his terms, and yet you have not showered thanks upon him.
lack of a substantial radicalized domestic community into which terrorists can blend. We're not Baghdad. We're not even Mumbai or Jakarta. We're Dallas and Chicago and Casper, Wyo. You can't pull the stuff in places like this that you pull abroad.You could have just simplified it by saying: "We're not the Middle East, we've got police and military forces up the ass, and if terrorists abroad are afraid, those who come here will inevitably shit their pants".
But surely much of the credit for our thus-far-clean record of public safety is owing to stringent federal measures to catch or head off terrorists: domestic surveillance included; Guantanamo included; the Patriot Act included; conceivably even water boarding"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." Bitch.
We increased public safety just fine by increasing airport security measures to ridiculous levels and by going after al-Qaida. If our safety has been obtained by wiretapping, taking suspected terrorists as POW's, and then using whatever means necessary to make them talk, then I think we deserve to be attacked again. People like you are willing to sell our collective soul in order to protect your own hide. People like you are the ones who make us look selfish, arrogant; who makes the world hate us. It disgusts me. It's why I could never be patriotic. Because I could never blindly accept the actions of a nation that is so clearly guided by those who are willing to assure our nation's success at the expense of everyone else in the world. It is unbecoming.
(As if the momentary terrorizing of a terrorist, for the sake of prospectively vital information could offset the prospect of preserving American lives and property!)1. They might not be terrorists. Hence the problems with holding them without fair trials.
2. Torture is rarely a good source for reliable information.
3. See above, you sick fuck.
Mumbai reminds us that terrorists aren't idealists, they're barely identifiable as human; it reminds us, further, that heading them off is a proposition more urgent than cleaning up after them."Barely identifiable as human"? Not going to Godwin...not going to Godwin...
Yes, "heading them off" would be ideal. Care to tell us how to do so without consulting horoscopes and crystal balls? I'm sure the militaries of the world would be very appreciative of this info.
That nation has a right anyway to snoop effectively in order to protect even ACLU members against threats of mayhem and massacre.They already have previsions for "snooping" when they have sufficient evidence to be suspicious through means of obtaining warrants. It is the ability to begin this snooping legally without any of the above that raises peoples ire, because it is moving from the necessary level of surveillance needed to protect us into a foot-in-the-door provision to begin arbitrarily suspending the fourth amendment whenever they have a "feeling" that they might find something important and have no evidential reason to back this up.
The Western left gives lip service to the idea of self-defense without acknowledging the danger of defending too little or too lethargically -- the very danger that the Mumbai massacres exemplify.9/11 also is evidence that defending too little or too lethargically can lead to tragedy. But, guess what? The kind of self-defense involved here is being vigilant and prepared for such attacks occuring within the confines of our own borders, and does not involve trudging around abroad, randomly capturing and killing people that might be terrorists, while simultaneously encouraging those who despise what you are doing in such a cavalier fashion to become a terrorist just to get a shot at you.
9/11 happened because of nearly a dozen hijackers. The Mumbai attack was performed by 25 or so performing a rough military-type strike. We just need to be on guard, not overthrow governments and strip us of rights to see the attacks more clearly. You are using flamethrowers to fight mice.
One thing's sure: No such neighborhoods can remain safe unless constantly and efficiently patrolled by the forces of law and order so as to exclude the entrepreneurial mass murderer.And when those forces of law and order are corrupt, or shouldn't have any authority there?
We're the good guys, comparatively speakingNot for very long, if you and your ilk have your way. (Which is hopefully not going to be the case).
Why do so many Western liberals have so hard a time with that simple, undeniable proposition?You meant "simplistic, untenable presumption" right?
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