Truth Honesty And The American Way

“The United States is committed to the world-wide elimination of torture and we are leading this fight by example. I call on all governments to join with the United States and the community of law-abiding nations in prohibiting, investigating, and prosecuting all acts of torture and in undertaking to prevent other cruel and unusual punishment. I call on all nations to speak out against torture in all its forms and to make ending torture an essential part of their diplomacy.” -– George W. Bush, 2003

George Bush is a right wing evangelical fundamentalist dupe.

Happy 4th of July and thank goodness we can rotate our leaders.

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Evil Christians and Abortion

From: Stories about Women’s Rights campaigns on Change.org 
Written by Alex DeBranco

“Today (March 02-2011), I’m especially proud to be a proud New Yorker. This afternoon, the New York City Council took a step forward for women by passing a bill telling crisis pregnancy centers (CPCs): no more tricking women.

CPCs across the country are infamous for their manipulative, shaming, and downright deceitful tactics in trying to keep women from exercising their right to choose an abortion. NYC’s “fake clinics,” are no exception, caught by a NARAL Pro-Choice NY investigation frightening women with made-up risks of breast cancer and mental illness, and lying about the status of their pregnancy and the laws surrounding abortion (pdf). And they snare women seeking comprehensive information and medical care by presenting themselves as unbiased clinics. But it’s not Halloween, and the NYC Council now says: masks off.”  My bold emphasis
Full story can be found here

They are being very gentle and polite in calling what these CPC’s do “shaming” and “tricking”…I pretty much would call it lying through their teeth.

Just one more example of how Christians (Protestant and Catholic) have been lying their asses off to achieve their goals of complete domination of women’s bodies and souls.  They choose a time where women are at their lowest point and lie about everything relating to her condition…it’s about time that some politicians are standing up to the vile and evil religious fundamentalist crazies this country seem to spawn.

And, No, life doesn’t start at the moment of (or soon after) coitus…this is another example of how sadly lacking they are in any understanding of science.
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Lies, Lies, Lies…

Once again major league baseball players (right now it’s Miguel Tejada) are paraded through Congressional committees and being charged with lying to said committees.  It seems many players in America’s pastime are now, or have been, using steroids to enhance their on-field performance.  That Congress is charging them with lying is totally specious.

Some of these players are going to spend jail time for the same thing that politicians do to the American public aaallll the time and never get charged with.  From the president on down to the lowly freshman congressman the politicians lie, lie, and lie, in a never ending stream of bull-crap and misdirection.

* We don’t torture prisoners.
* They have weapons of mass destruction.
* They are training terrorists.
* My opponent is a child predator.
* I am defending the constitution, not destroying it.
* We don’t wiretap ordinary Americans.
* I did not take bribes.
* I did not try to sell that Senate seat.
* Even though we are giving no-bid contracts to my former employer there’s nothing going on.
* Even though we deregulated the oil industry it’s not our fault that our oil buddies and former employers are enjoying record profits and gas prices are higher than they’ve ever been.
* Just because we deregulated the financial industry doesn’t mean it’s our fault they screwed you out of your retirement funds and lost trillions of dollars…which you and your descendants will have to replace to the industry with your taxes for the next 200 years.

The paragraph below from The Huffington Post, in a story by Geoffrey Stone, about political lies says volumes about our leaders and their scheming to mislead the people. HERE

“An essential element of this strategy is that the perpetrators of the lie will insist, no matter what, that the lie is true. Confronted with the facts, the perpetrators will reiterate the falsehood. The key to this strategy is the willingness to lie, and to lie repeatedly.”

I think it should be against the law for a government official to accuse or charge any American citizen of lying.

taxes-suck

Intelligent Design…I Can’t get no Respect.

Nothing ever gets built on schedule or within budget. – Cheop’s Law. I just knew contractors were always like that :}

People who subscribe to the Intelligent design “theory” are constantly complaining that nobody accepts their “theory.” What they mean is, no real scientists or serious science journal accepts what they say; so consequently, they get no respect.

What they invariably forget to mention is that their “theory” depends on the acceptance of magic as a part of the real world. I can see why they don’t mention this, as there has never been an instance of verifiable, repeatable, testable magic in the whole history of our world.

Have you, or anyone you know, ever been witness to magic? If you think this happened, have there been witnesses, and has it been widely acknowledged as a true event? Don’t say the Bible either, as this book is widely known to be copies of copies and parts are known to be allegory and other parts could be made up theology. Also, the man who went around raising dead people, curing leprosy, and had thousands of followers is not supported in non-biblical writing. I know two billion people believe in it, but one billion people are Hindu’s, with a whole nother’ belief in world history, and apparent validity of their own Gods.

There is, of course, no recognizable physical support for any of the ‘God as a spirit’ believing religions, and there never has been. Of course ID people try to turn this around by saying that there is no evidence for evolution, conveniently forgetting that Darwin has been gathering steam for 150 years, long before ID was even a gleam in anybodies eyes, and it keeps getting stronger in proofs. The ID people need to accept that and stop trying make our whole world fit into their rather small and smothering mold.

All the “facts of science” that ID people advance, generally sound plausible to the layman, or even to the well educated sometimes. But, this same “fact”, when given to someone who is schooled in the science in question, the ID argument invariably falls apart. And the problem for the ID’ers is all of the sciences are advancing so rapidly now that even they can’t stay ahead of the curve.

The biggest problem facing the Intelligent Design fans is that they have so far been unable to come up with any convincing science or proofs to back up their claims. All of their claims (except the paranormal ones, that are inherently un-provable) have been disproved in the real world of physical sciences.

In the February issue of the conservative magazine ‘Townhall‘ (they can be found on the internet at townhall.com) a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute, David Klinghoffer, bemoans the fact that people that believe in ID get no respect at mainstream universities. In fact they usually hide their belief from fear of being fired. He writes of Guillermo Gonzalez, assistant professor of physics and astronomy at Iowa State University who was denied tenure, reputedly because of his being outspoken on ID. He goes on to describe others who have suffered in the science community because of their beliefs in intelligent design religion.

I wonder if the universities are doing this so they don’t get into the same situation as Lehigh University in Pennsylvania, where Michael Behe, author of various ID friendly books is a professor of biochemistry. The Department of Biological Sciences department, of which he is of course a member, had to come up with a disclaimer, telling the world that they do not subscribe to professor Behe’s theories. Following is that disclaimer:

Department Position on Evolution and “Intelligent Design”
“The faculty in the Department of Biological Sciences is committed to the highest standards of scientific integrity and academic function. This commitment carries with it unwavering support for academic freedom and the free exchange of ideas. It also demands the utmost respect for the scientific method, integrity in the conduct of research, and recognition that the validity of any scientific model comes only as a result of rational hypothesis testing, sound experimentation, and findings that can be replicated by others.

The department faculty, then, are unequivocal in their support of evolutionary theory, which has its roots in the seminal work of Charles Darwin and has been supported by findings accumulated over 140 years. The sole dissenter from this position, Prof. Michael Behe, is a well-known proponent of “intelligent design.” While we respect Prof. Behe’s right to express his views, they are his alone and are in no way endorsed by the department. It is our collective position that intelligent design has no basis in science, has not been tested experimentally, and should not be regarded as scientific.” My emphasis.

I think this is a fair position for the university to take, as they have to compete for serious students and faculty in the real world. Let the ID proponents form their own institutions of higher learning, get accreditation, and compete for credibility. I might add that professor Behe’s testimony in the Kitzmiller vs. Dover School District was singled out by the judge as specious, and that: “intelligent design is not science but essentially religious in nature.”

It helps if you remember that a number of right wing religious organizations are trying to make the whole United States a theocracy…that is; religiously ruled and dominated by evangelical leaders…and real science…no longer taught in our schools.

Now, we as a country have some real problems admittedly, but compared to countries that are ruled by religionists, we are a profound “Paradise.” Can you even imagine how deeply disturbed our society would be if we gave up scientific inquiry in this country or indeed, the whole world?

Can you conceive of a world where trying to understand the physical universe would be considered blasphemy?

Perhaps punishable by brainwashing in government facilities.

Where you would be punished for trying to consider reality.

Intelligent Design Pushers LIE

“I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.” — Stephen Roberts

Immediately below is excerpted from Discovery institute website, retrieved on 01.05.08. Their address is:
http://www.discovery.org/

” Peer-Reviewed & Peer-Edited Scientific Publications Supporting the Theory of Intelligent Design (Annotated)
By: Staff
Discovery Institute
July 1, 2007

Editor’s Note: Critics of intelligent design often claim that design advocates don’t publish their work in appropriate scientific literature. For example, Barbara Forrest, a philosophy professor at Southeastern Louisiana University, was quoted in USA Today (March 25, 2005) that design theorists “aren’t published because they don’t have scientific data.”
Other critics have made the more specific claim that design advocates do not publish their works in peer-reviewed scientific journals-as if such journals represented the only avenue of legitimate scientific publication.” end excerpt

Then they go on to list some ‘religious science’ that got peer review in the scientific arena. Among them is this jewel:

Begin excerpt again. “Stephen Meyer, “The Origin of Biological Information and the Higher Taxonomic Categories” Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington 117 (2004): 213-239.

Meyer argues that competing materialistic models (Neo-Darwinism, Self -Organization Models, Punctuated Equilibrium and Structuralism) are not sufficient to account for origin of the information necessary to build novel animal forms present in the Cambrian Explosion. He proposes intelligent design as an alternative explanation for the origin of biological information and the higher taxa.” End of excerpt

Well this is great for the ID movement that the Discovery Institute not only backs, but actively pushes on schools and people. They finally got an article published in a scientific journal….but….
….Not long after the article was published, an embarrassed Council of the ‘Biological Society of Washington’ comes out with this statement

excerpt follows from Biological Society of Washingtom
“The paper by Stephen C. Meyer, “The origin of biological information and the higher taxonomic categories,” in vol. 117, no. 2, pp. 213-239 of the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington, was published at the discretion of the former editor, Richard v. Sternberg. Contrary to typical editorial practices, the paper was published without review by any associate editor; Sternberg handled the entire review process. The Council, which includes officers, elected councilors, and past presidents, and the associate editors would have deemed the paper inappropriate for the pages of the Proceedings because the subject matter represents such a significant departure from the nearly purely systematic content for which this journal has been known throughout its 122-year history. For the same reason, the journal will not publish a rebuttal to the thesis of the paper, the superiority of intelligent design (ID) over evolution as an explanation of the emergence of Cambrian body-plan diversity. The Council endorses a resolution on ID published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (http://www.aaas.org/news/releases/2002/1106id2.shtml),** see below, which observes that there is no credible scientific evidence supporting ID as a testable hypothesis to explain the origin of organic diversity. Accordingly, the Meyer paper does not meet the scientific standards of the Proceedings.” End of excerpt Their address is: http://www.biolsocwash.org/

excerpt from American Association for the Advancement of Science
** “Over the past several years proponents of so-called “intelligent design theory,” also known as ID, have challenged the accepted scientific theory of biological evolution. As part of this effort they have sought to introduce the teaching of “intelligent design theory” into the science curricula of the public schools. The movement presents “intelligent design theory” to the public as a theoretical innovation, supported by scientific evidence, that offers a more adequate explanation for the origin of the diversity of living organisms than the current scientifically accepted theory of evolution. In response to this effort, individual scientists and philosophers of science have provided substantive critiques of “intelligent design,” demonstrating significant conceptual flaws in its formulation, a lack of credible scientific evidence, and misrepresentations of scientific facts. Approved by the AAAS Board of Directors on 10/18/02″

Recognizing that the “intelligent design theory” represents a challenge to the quality of science education, the Board of Directors of the AAAS unanimously adopts the following resolution: ” excerpt ends. It goes on to basically say that ID is not science, never will be, keep it out of our public schools.
The full statement can be read here: http://www.aaas.org/news/releases/2002/1106id2.shtml

What this little exercise in ‘investigative blogging’ is showing me, is that the Discovery Institute, as of 01.05.08, is knowingly passing off what they know to be rebutted, as mainstream science. In other words-they lie.

Gives me an all warm and fuzzy feeling when the pastor lies to me.

Peace to all

Fair use doctrine material included and credited.

Genocide in Iraq

“If tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.” – “It is a universal truth that the loss of liberty at home is to be charged to the provisions against danger, real or pretended, from abroad.” – “No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.” – James Madison

The American war strike and occupation in Iraq has resulted in the deaths of anywhere from 100,000 to over 1 million Iraqi people and the probable displacement of perhaps 4 million from their homes….depending on who you believe. But, they’re only Iraqi’s, who cares….the oil is there.
http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/iraq/iraqdeaths.html

Of course a lot of these deaths were Iraqi to Iraqi violence (maybe 25%) that was brought about by our killing the people in charge of the infrastructure, and the consequent rush to fill this power vacuum. We, of course, knew this would happen and had good plans to counter it…But, the oil is there.

Iraq is now pumping more oil than they did pre-war…We have dibs on it…We have augmented our national strategic reserve…Who directly profits from this fact?

There are some rumors floating around the Internet that the Bush White House is playing loose with the numbers of our soldiers killed in the war. But, we have taken out a threat to our country, who had Weapons of Mass Destruction…Right?

Hey, if your son or daughter comes back in a coffin how do you keep track of the others that came back the same. There is no transparency about this matter, we have to trust our government to tell the truth. But, we have taken out a threat to our country, who had Weapons of Mass Destruction…Right?

We have made the area more stable and now have many friends there….Right?
We have made the world safer for our children, haven’t we?

Now we will be staying there for the foreseeable future, spending untold Billions of dollars on top of the near Trillion dollars we have already spent….But, the oil is there. Who directly profits from this fact?

Could it be the 2 oilmen in charge of our country….Naw…..we know they are honorable men.
They would never mislead us, lie to us, or sell us out to Big Oil. It’s not their fault that gas is over $3.00 a gallon.
They are honest men and will look out for us….Right?
Those rumors about Daddy Bush, the Saudi’s, and The Carlyle Group weren’t true….Right?
Those rumors about Halliburton weren’t true….Right?

We can trust our leaders….Right??

Breaking the law again

 

An article from the New York Times.
Article
Once again ol’ GW and the GOP are breaking the law and trying to justify it.Paying journalist to make up propaganda for US citizens
Seems like the taxpayer is paying for lies to be spread to our own citizens.