Palinanity

This is a terrifying video. It’s Sarah Palin going on and on in front of her Assembly of God church, talking about the war in Iraq as “a task that is from God”, promising the congregants the gift of prophecy, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus…it ought to make any rational human being ill.

But that’s not the scary part. The truly frightening prospect, and the thing that we must not forget lest we underestimate Palin, is that huge numbers of people in this country will find that blithering speech uplifting and wonderful. We atheists view it with alarmed horror, that an idiot like that could be considered vice-presidential material, but there are people in your neighborhood right now who will watch that and say that she is obviously a good person, they will identify with her, and they will vote for her.

While most of her positions are outside the mainstream, this flavor of Jesus-talk is not. While her hypocrisy of talking small government and detesting federalism while expanding government and raking in pork may grate on people who look at her record, all most are going to see is that she is pretty and upbeat.

I know. She sounds like a moron. But get ready, she’s also a walking advertisement for the corrupting power of religion to mask substance and elevate superficialities and lies to the status of perceived truth.

McCain/Palin could still win this election, unbelievable as that may sound.

On the high velocity rotation of interred organic remains

Let us all doff our hats in astonished disbelief at the brazen arrogance of the people who have created the Carl Sagan Institute in Brazil.

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That is, the Carl Sagan Institute…of UFOlogy. That’s right, a cranky gang of saucernuts have appropriated the name and likeness of Carl Sagan without authorization to flog their belief that Jesus is a flying saucer pilot. They claim that Sagan was secretly a believer in visitations by Little Green Men, who simply publicly lied, and now they want to use his dead body to beg for donations.

Anyone know a good Brazilian lawyer who’d like to fight this?

We prefer our Jebus impotent, please

Somebody took offense again. An art museum in England is exhibiting some controversial statues, and of course some kook can’t just stay away, they have to make sure no one else gets to see them.

A Christian group is taking an art centre to court, claiming it displayed an indecent statue of Jesus Christ.

The artwork was part of an exhibition at Gateshead’s Baltic Centre featuring several plaster figures with erections, including ET, Mickey Mouse and Jesus.

Lawyers for Christian Emily Mapfuwa, 40, of Essex, are bringing a civil case for outraging public decency.

It seems a little unkind to demand that the poor guy be eternally flaccid, as well as tortured. And look! Fatwah envy!

Mrs Mapfuwa, of Brentwood, said Baltic would not have dared depict Mohammed in such a way.

Simple science teaching recommendations

Adam Savage of the Mythbusters (the second most easily recognized scientists in the US, right after Bill Nye) has a short article up on Popular Mechanics on how to fix US science education. He only has 3 suggestions, but they’re really just two.

The first is to let students get their hands dirty. Instead of just telling them what science is about, make them do it and work at it and see it being done. Working through an actual experiment is a very different experience from being told what the cleaned-up, simplified results are.

The second is to actually spend more money on science education. Weird, huh? It works, though. Science isn’t cheap, and especially if you’re going to put students to work breaking stuff and using up reagents, it’s going to have an ongoing cost.

The third is a bit obvious and a natural consequence of his first: students will make mistakes, and that’s OK. If they’re actually doing experiments, science class is not like home ec class, where you’re supposed to follow a recipe and get a perfect outcome every time.

Of course, all of these suggestions are already being implemented by good public school science teachers (except maybe the second, since you can’t spend money if you don’t have it), but you’d be surprised at how many creationists think science is a matter of rote memorization.

My dance card is officially full

I’ve squeezed one more talk into my fall schedule, but that’s it — if you want me to come talk to your university or organization, it’ll have to be in January or later — I’m not accepting any more invitations. Here’s my complete and final long distance travel schedule for the next few months.

Friday, 12-14 Sep: Denver, CO
Friday, 19-21 Sep: Madison, WI
Thursday, 25-28 Sep: Long Beach, CA
Friday, 10-12 October: Springfield, MO
Friday, 31 Oct-2 Nov: Toronto, ON
Thursday, 13-15 Nov: Kearney, NE
Wednesday, 19-22 Nov: Philadelphia, PA
early December: Central Florida (pending)

I do have a few engagements set up for the spring already, and it’s filling up fast, too.

Looking forward to 28 September

Why? Because that is the day of the Pulpit Initiative, when brave and idiotic right wing preachers will defy the IRS and lose their tax exemptions.

The Pulpit Initiative
Reclaiming pastors’ constitutional right to speak Truth from the pulpit

On Sunday, September 28, 2008, we are seeking pastors who will preach from the pulpit a sermon that addresses the candidates for government office in light of the truth of Scripture. The sermon is intended to challenge the Internal Revenue Code’s restrictions by specifically opposing candidates for office that do not align themselves and their positions with the Scriptural truth. By standing together and speaking with one voice, it is our hope to recapture the rightful place of pastors and churches in American life.

This really isn’t that hard to understand. If you are an organization that has a tax exemption, you pay for that privilege with some limitations: you don’t get to use your economic advantage to campaign for politicians. It’s not just churches, but also organizations like Americans United for Separation of Church and State and the NCSE — talk to them and you’ll discover that they are scrupulous about avoiding any entanglement with elections. Why, if Ken Ham were running for president against Ken Miller, the NCSE would not try to even hint at who you should vote for … to do otherwise would be to jeopardize their legal status.

I think it is fine that wingnut churches should be able to speak freely and endorse candidates, as long as they think it’s so important that it is worth setting aside their tax-free status. These kooks, though, want to be able to both act as power brokers in politics and not pay for it.

By the way, if anyone out there detests the political content on this blog, one solution would be to arrange a major tax exemption for me for shutting up. I’m paying tuition bills for two kids in college this week, so I’d take it readily.