Some idiocy from Sarah Palin
June 20th, 2010
|
| Share |
I can’t believe that this woman is being supported by a large number of Americans as the next big thing politically, even a potential presidential candidate. It’s just breathtaking how stupid she is.
Gulf disaster needs divine intervention as man’s efforts have been futile. Gulf lawmakers designate today Day of Prayer for solution/miracle
So what? Pray and god is going to make all the oil just suddenly vanish and the well close up?
The fact that something has not been done or that previous attempts to do so have not succeeded does not mean that it can’t be done. If a problem is not solved on the first attempt or the second or even the tenth, that does not, in and of itself, mean that it should be considered unsolvable.
If we used lack of prior success to decide something was not possible, nothing, absolutely nothing new would ever be accomplished. No records would ever be broken. No innovations would ever be developed. Nothing would be ever improved.
Oh, and also, man’s efforts have not been entirely futile. While the leak has not been stopped 100%, the cap and collection method has proven to be at least effective in reducing the release. It’s not a complete solution, but it’s not a complete failure either.
Moron.
This entry was posted on Sunday, June 20th, 2010 at 3:21 pm and is filed under Bad Science, Culture, Politics, religion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
View blog reactions
June 20th, 2010 at 3:57 pm
Moron yourself.
Some people are relegious. Some aren’t . You apparently arent. for a relegious person to ask for divine intervention can’t hurt and if YOU are wrong it might help.
Kinda like prayers before a football game….may the best team win and all that.
Sorry to have to cut you off buddy. But I can’t bigots.
Quote Comment
June 20th, 2010 at 4:09 pm
“So what? Pray and god is going to make all the oil just suddenly vanish and the well close up?’
That is indeed consistent with what these people believe.
The world is staggering towards a major conflict, not with one religion, but with all religion. The Muslims are just the leading edge of a larger problem that will erupt when the pressures build to the breaking point, and that time is coming soon.
What we are witnessing is not the resurgence of religion, but its death throes.
Two considerations support this claim. One is that there are close and instructive historical precedents for what is happening now. The second comes from an analysis of the nature of contemporary religious politics.
If a given interest group turns up the volume, it is usually reacting to provocation. Today’s “religious upsurge” is a reaction to the prevalence of its opposite. In fact, it is a reaction to defeat, in a war that it cannot win even if it succeeds in a few battles on the way down.
Here is what is happening. Over the last half-century, sections of the Muslim world have become increasingly affronted by the globalisation of Western and especially American culture and values, which appears arrogantly to disdain their traditions.
When a climate of heightened tension such as this prompts activists in one religious group to become more assertive, to push their way forward in the public domain to demand more attention, more respect, more public funds (faith-based schools are one example), other religious groups, not wishing to be left behind, follow suit. In the West Muslim activism has been quickly mimicked by others—by Sikhs demonstrating about a play, Christian evangelicals demonstrating about an opera, and all of them leaping on the funding bandwagon for faith and interfaith initiatives. To placate them, politicians lend an ear; the media report it; immediately these minorities of interest have an amplifier for their presence. The effect is that suddenly it seems as if there are religious devotees everywhere, and the spurious magnification of their importance further promotes their confidence. As a result they make some gains, as the faith schools example shows.
Yes, over half the population claim vaguely to believe in Something, which includes feng shui and crystals, and they may be “C of E” in the sense of “Christmas and Easter,” but they are functionally secularist and would be horrified if asked to live according to the letter of (say) Christian morality: giving all one’s possessions to the poor, taking no thought for the morrow and so impracticably forth. Not even Christian clerics follow these injunctions.
The historical precedent of the counter-Reformation is instructive. For over a century after Luther nailed his theses to Wittenberg’s church door, Europe was engulfed in ferocious religious strife, because the church was losing its hitherto hegemonic grip and had no intention of doing so without a fight. Millions died, and Catholicism won some battles even as it lost the war. We are witnessing a repeat today, this time with Islamism resisting the encroachment of a way of life that threatens it, and as other religious groups join them in a (strictly temporary, given the exclusivity of faith) alliance for the cause of religion in general.
Quote Comment
June 20th, 2010 at 4:32 pm
Palin’s short request for a “Day of Prayer” for a solution/miracle to the oil spill is silly. But people praying for a miracle is better than blowing themselves up in a bus or airliner, and even better than selling crack on the street. Smart people learn to distinguish between religious people who are about to get you killed, and religious people who are just finding things to keep themselves occupied and calm.
Quote Comment
June 20th, 2010 at 6:12 pm
Everitt Mickey said:
Of course it can hurt. It can distract people from what really needs to be done to mitigate the damage. Some bays can be closed if you act in time, others can be boomed; this requires that locals pay attention and put pressure on local officials when necessary to get their butt into gear and authorize a workable plan that can be put into action before they are hit. There are several areas that have unnescessarily been contaminated with oil because they wanted to keep their bay navigable or local politicians couldn’t get permission from the federal government to do what was necessary in time.
On the other hand, praying cannot possibly help. Even if there is a deity, and were already now in fantasy land, then there exists an infinite number of imaginable gods who could fulfill that discription. Only a very small subset of those gods would know of the existance of humans. Of that subset there is an even smaller subset of gods who would care about humans. Of that subset there is an even smaller subset of gods who would continously monitor your thoughts. Of that subset there is an even smaller subset who would consider intervening. Of that subset there are some potential deities that would make things worse out of spite because you prayed to the wrong god, some who would make things better and some who think the whole thing is so amusing they’ll cause more disasters just for enjoyment.
There is as much reason to presume that praying is detrimental as there is to presume that it is useful even if I grant you that a god exists.
Besides; the woman has rocks in her head. She can barely complete a coherent sentence when she is speaking naturally; this is not an occassional gaffe, this is every other non-scripted sentence.
She singled out fruit fly research as a particularly egregious waste of tax dollars. It’s bad enough if she doesn’t realize what a useful tool fruit flies are for studying genetics; but given that she doesn’t believe in evolution it would not be too much of a surprise if she doesn’t believe in genetics either.
She didn’t even know which countries were in NAFTA.
Everitt Mickey said:
Bigotry is an irrational intolerance of someone’s beliefs; in this case it’s quite rational.
Quote Comment
June 20th, 2010 at 6:55 pm
Everitt Mickey said:
But that’s not what she is saying. She is implying that the situation is hopeless and that human intervention is useless making it the only hope that there is divine intervention. It’s defeatist. She’s saying all efforts have been futile as if to say throw your arms up in the air and give up on trying unless god does something.
It’s a dangerous mindset. It’s a clear move away from science, engineering and logic. Basically, magical thinking.
I don’t want our leaders thinking about a solution that involves prayer, voodoo dolls, blood sacrifice or ritual dances. I want them to be thinking about things like ROV’s, oil skimmers and relief wells.
It’s clear where her intention and mind are. The thought of someone like that in a position of power is scary.
Al Fin said:
I think it’s a safe assumption that most suicide bombers pray before blowing themselves up. Once you cede your life and mind to a deity, it’s where this all starts. People pray and ask for guidance or spiritual strength and then try to ask what god is telling them to do. All too often they feel he is asking them to do something terrible.
Sure, not all people who pray do that, but it’s all an issue of religious devotion. When you become devoted without question to a dogma and spend your time asking what you can do to please god, you may very well feel that god has inspired you to kill people. even if you don’t reach that point, it’s common for those who turn to religion to feel the need to take away the rights of others or impose extreme punishment and injustice onto others. (IE: making homosexuality a crime punishable by death, treating someone like garbage because they have a disease that is seen as god’s punishment, disowning their child when they find out she has had sex before marriage, outlawing the teaching of evolutionary biology, imprisoning those who read Harry Potter for witchcraft)
Quote Comment
June 20th, 2010 at 8:48 pm
And yet, I think that I’m still more likely to vote for her than many of her peers.
How is faith in “divine intervention as man’s efforts have been futile” any different from Kerry-Lieberman’s faith in the legislative intervention of cap-and-trade to prevent “climate change” since so far “man’s efforts have been futile”? Both cases are equally dependent on faith.
She’s a politician. She’s no dumber than the rest. She’s perhaps more honest than most.
This is how far the bar as been lowered.
Quote Comment
June 20th, 2010 at 9:44 pm
It took her three days and, to calm down, six trips to the shoe store, to compose that twitter.
BMS says:
“How is faith in “divine intervention as man’s efforts have been futile” any different from Kerry-Lieberman’s faith in the legislative intervention of cap-and-trade to prevent “climate change” since so far “man’s efforts have been futile”?”
To prevent climate change from excessive and long lived atmospheric Carbon Dioxide, emitted by man’s combustion of fossil fuels, the first step is emitting less, and providing for a plan to reduce that to zero over some long term time frame. Kerry-Lieberman is the first in what will likely be a long series of legislative step to do that. If you can’t see the difference between an arguably flawed legislative plan, and a simplistic appeal to divine intervention, you have the same problem as Sawah.
Quote Comment
June 20th, 2010 at 10:38 pm
She’s right, at least 80% of the population is doomed to death.
Quote Comment
June 20th, 2010 at 10:57 pm
Jeremy said:
It’s worse than that. It’s actually 100%.
I don’t know about you, but I’d guess you probably have 80 or so years tops, maybe a bit more if you’re lucky, but probably not much more than 90 – at least that’s how things stand now.
Hell, no matter what technology is developed to keep you alive, the fact is you’re still doomed by the thermal death of the universe, although you’ll likely end up being burned up by the sun in its deaththrows or sucked into the massive blackhole in the middle of the galaxy long before that.
Yep, it’s hopeless. 100% are doomed to death.
Quote Comment
June 20th, 2010 at 11:01 pm
BMS said:
I’m not sure I’d consider believing in cap and trade as an effective climate change mitigation to belief in a supernatural power. I mean, I strongly disagree with it, because of all the consequences. It could work in theory, but it would necessarily cause extreme economic suffering to do so.
I’d say cap and trade is more like communism than religion. It’s an idea that is not supernatural, it’s just a political philosophy that tends to cause a lot more harm than good.
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 1:41 am
I’m accustomed to people using prayer (beyond its literal appeal to God) as a means of refocusing themselves. People’s religious beliefs serve as the framework for their value system, and praying about a problem helps to frame it within those values, not as a replacement for action, but to help decide on the best course of action. How I see it playing out, or at least how I prefer to see it play out, is to create resolve for hard work, accountability, and charity. In that case, the question of whether God exists is secondary to the usefulness of prayer as a tool for focusing on one’s values.
Unfortunately, I occasionally see an instance of someone trying to substitute prayer for action. For instance, trying to pray away an infection rather than going to the doctor. It’s especially disheartening to read of a politician suggesting that praying away a problem should be a matter of public policy.
But I don’t think that a “Day of Prayer” is a suggestion that human efforts have been a waste or that all efforts should be focused on encouraging divine intervention. Rather, I think it’s a way of encouraging people to keep the problem in mind, and frame it within their value systems. I am certain that “Gulf lawmakers” would never support an effort to abandon BP and government efforts in favor of the hope for miracles. Sarah Palin’s position, however… I just don’t know.
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 2:15 am
DV82XL said:
Fixed. Please don’t make that mistake again, the vast majority of Muslims are just like the vast majority of Christians – incredibly decent people who have their little rituals and preferences but are otherwise very open-minded, forward thinking and warm-hearted.
drbuzz0 said:
The irony of this is, at their heart, most religions are fundamentally socialist. Call it Communist if you will.
Did Christ feed the 5,000 by selling them food? Nope, he convinced a few people to pool what they had and it was shared out (and magically fed many more people but that’s irrelevant). The Bible is quite open about the virtue of lack of material wealth – encouraging people to give away their possessions and the classic quote (which is the only bit of scripture I can convincingly recite) that “it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to pas through the gates of heaven”.
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 5:29 am
I understand getting annoyed by the ‘we must appease God to save us’ crowd, but to single out Sarah Palin because she is an easy and visible target without calling out the Gulf lawmakers who designate the Day of Prayer for solution/miracle, or all the religous leaders in the regoin who are doing the same thing.
I don’t like her politics either but she is one of many, a lot of whom have much more power than she does, who are espousing the same thing. They should all be held accountable for their unscientific stand.
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 8:28 am
Pity you had to go and turn this all political.
I’ll miss you, guy, though I accept that the feeling isn’t mutual.
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 9:20 am
I’mnotreallyhere said:
The use of the terms ‘Muslims’ and ‘Christians’ to refer to those that are in essence apostates that only pay lip-service to the faith, is really a polite way of indicating ethnicity. True believers are a very different group of people and are not necessarily extremist, that is they may hold very bigoted views of other faiths, but wouldn’t become suicide bombers. The real battle is for the minds of the former, because without them the latter cannot survive, or prosecute their outrages.
When a politician calls for an appeal to a deity, they are empowering religious faith by legitimizing it, and perforce advancing one world-view over another.
But more importantly they are in essence abrogating their own duty to work to a practical solution. Religion employs a group of parasites known a clergy, let them call upon their flock of the deluded to look for magical divine intervention. Secular leaders, and those that aspire to secular leadership, should concentrate on secular solutions.
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 12:46 pm
apotheosis said:
What? Because I’m frustrated that a major political figure (and there are others) seems to have given up hope in science and engineering as a means of stopping something like a oil leak?
You really can’t separate the issues of “bad science” and science policy from politics. Politicians are the ones who often dictate science policies. They decide what programs get funding and what don’t and impose political will on scientific research by doing things like making embryonic stem cell research illegal in institutions that receive government funding.
All too often, science issues like global warming, pharmaceutical sciences, energy generation and many others become very strongly influenced by political concerns. Of course, politicians are the ones who ultimately have a say in things like education.
I don’t see how you can possibly expect that I’d stay away from politics like it’s some kind of sacred cow or taboo. IMHO, sacred cows are for the barbecue.
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 2:39 pm
I think that you are all looking at this from the wrong viewpoint. The first thing to consider is that this woman is a politician. Her first concern is how to turn this event into something to her own advantage. She could blame BP but everyone else is blaming BP and there are no points for saying, ‘Me too’. Anyway, having said, ‘Drill baby drill’, there are no points for criticising those that do. She could blame the President but her supporters blame the President for everything so, again, no points for saying, ‘Me too’.
Really, she is being very cunning. A ‘Day of Prayer’ is free publicity for her and if BP fix the problem soon, she can make another announcement giving herself the credit. If BP are slow in fixing it, nothing is lost, people are used to not having their prayers answered and will soon get over it.
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 5:11 pm
People like her do scare me. She’s the obvious and well known one and gets all the attention, but what scares me is that she is just like many others and many of them are politicians and elected leaders. Her mindset, ridiculous as it is, is not uncommon.
If she said something like “Pray that our efforts at repairing this are successful” or something, I might find it a bit less frighting, but the way she speaks really is a clear indication of this coming down to a faith versus science kind of way of thinking. She is saying science hasn’t worked and thus the way to go is with religion, almost implying this is somehow to the exclusion of science or that there’s no hope in human intervention. It’s a mentality and a distrust of science and technology, which I think comes from the same roots as the disdain for evolution or cosmology because it conflicts with their idea of the world.
It reminds me of some of those who reject modern medicine because it “doesn’t offer a solution” or “can’t help everyone” since it does not cure all conditions all of the time. It’s the same kind of thing as saying “doctors still don’t have a cure for cancer so I’m going with homeopathy because mainstream medicine is futile.”
I think Steve makes a very good point that because something has not been solved does not mean it won’t. Difficult pursuits often fail on the first attempt.
“We need divine intervention” says to me “We can’t do this with science and technology.” That’s what I find so scary. We can’t give up on using our minds to tackle these things even if they are a tough nut to crack.
If she were the only one who had such a view of things, it wouldn’t really bother me, but the fact that so many agree with her is very concerning.
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 6:03 pm
What is wrong with a day of prayer? It’s not as though the people behind it would actually try to stop any continued real effort towards dealing with the problem. If prayer cuts down on panic which would exacerbate the trouble, then I certainly have no problem with it. If, however, the lawmakers she mentioned in the Tweet (presumably the legislative assemblies of some state or other) really have stopped searching for a way to solve or mitigate the problem, then they ought to resign in a great big declaration of “we can’t do our jobs”. I still don’t see what this has to do with Palin, though (as she is not among those who declared the “day of prayer”).
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 6:30 pm
Steve (and to a lesser extent DV82XL):
If we atheists want to evangelize, I think we ought to take some lessons from existing evangelists. The successful ones don’t call the people they’re trying to convert idiots, and they don’t stubbornly oppose other points of their audience’s beliefs. They don’t, for example, decide what their position is on nuclear power and then tie it to their religion, pronouncing everyone who disagrees an idiot. Instead, they LISTEN, not talk, to their audience, and, upon finding out what the various strains of opinion are, they explain to each faction how the overall goal is consistent with all of their opinions, allowing the different people to work together toward that overall goal.
Communication is the art of bridge-building. It is not sufficient to know how to talk; there has to be an attitude of listening on the part of the communicator, in order to characterize the “other side” of the “span” to be “bridged.” It is not sufficient to start building the bridge in a random direction from where you happen to be standing, simply because the guys on the other side legitimately should be over here. Building the bridge to nowhere, to use a Sarah Palin phrase, and then asking people to jump off it, simply does not work if the ultimate goal is a bridge; your responsibility is to construct the passageway, not the debarkation point. You know enough about how people can unintentionally mislead themselves to know that psychology is what happens when people aren’t thinking. Why, then, would you give the audience hints about what you want to hear, so that they can cold read you and give you what you want in order to get you to go away (the “little white lie”), if you want to understand where they’re coming from? Speaking before you understand what is to be spoken to causes your audience to conclude that you’re on a different wavelength – and, really, you are. Without letting the audience speak first, you have no idea what motivates them to be in the situation or what they want to get out of it. Fundamentally, you really have no idea what will convince them to do things your way.
The facts will not convince people, and on some level, I think we all know that. After all, if being right would win a debate, we would have won the nuclear power debate 30 or 40 years ago. Effective communication does not change reality, of course, but it does change people’s ability to understand reality. People can only act on the information they have, and when they act, it can only be in accordance with what they perceive to be their interests (“interests” being not necessarily what is good for them, but rather what their emotions propel them to seek).
The key here is to recognize that, since people can only place information in the context that they have acquired through experience, and everyone’s experience is different, understanding is relative. That understanding of reality has real consequences on people over whom that person has power (in the sociological sense – the ability to have a statistically significant effect on another person’s strategic mobility – not necessarily any line-authority relationship). Being right about the facts, when you take that phenomenon into consideration, doesn’t have any relationship to the degree of success you have in getting people to do something. This points to a whole different set of phenomena, with no relation to the facts as such (i.e., the information inputs to the social system), but which can be modeled and understood – in other words, social psychology (i.e., the control theory of the social system itself). Surprising as it may be, people who do not care about the facts are not stupid, or any more stupid than the general population. They simply are analyzing the social system’s control and decision dynamics, as such, instead of the system’s inputs. In order to do this, they seek a different set of information: how the people in a given social situation are behaving. Observing behavior instead of critically analyzing ideas is the natural state of a pack animal, which humans are. Of course, so is dying of typhus, so that doesn’t make it a good idea, but both situations happen, and must be understood. Next time you’re in a social situation where people are acting irrationally, try to think about how the people who are acting irrationally would act if they were observing behavior and emoting in response to how that behavior makes them feel rather than thinking critically. I bet it will make more sense – at least you’ll be able to model the situation, regardless of whether the people in it are acting properly. Heck, why not try it now?
Strategically speaking, I know what I think the best move is for atheists. But – in an attempt to illustrate how to use this theory of communication, I’m not saying. Try to pull it out of me. Try to construct it. State what your conclusions are. Or, if you’re not interested, boo and hiss and throw things at me, for being an impertinent punk. If you are, to get the ball rolling, I’ll pose the following item for consideration:
Given that ideas don’t necessarily matter, and that people think about ideas but act on emotions, how do we get people to respond emotionally in a desired manner?
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 8:11 pm
Jeremy said:
Actuall we all are. Life is a fatal condtion 100% of the time (that one guy 2000 years ago was faking it).
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 8:12 pm
At least we are not talking about boobgate – oh crap now we are.
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 9:11 pm
It’s amazing how much commotion 20 words — just 140 little characters — can cause.
The lack of substance here is rather pathetic. It’s just bigoted nonsense from people who apparently have so much free time on their hands that they’re psychoanalyzing tweets. sigh
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 9:38 pm
Stewart Peterson said:
I’m not calling all religious people idiots. Much as that might simplify things for me, it’s clearly not true. One of the smartest people I know and probably one of the best living nuclear energy visionaries is a devout Mormon and there have been many religious people of extreme intelligence who have made contributions to science. Johannes Kepler, Gregor Mandel, Philo Farnsworth. Louise Pasteur was a Catholic and Jonas Salk was a jew.
Palin is not simply religious, she represents an anti-science, anti-intelectualism kind of religious mindset that holds science in very low regard. Some in years past have seen science as a means of understanding our world and viewed this in a religious context, seeing it as a kind of gift.
Palin’s comments show something much different. It’s defeatist and relegates humanity to being incapable of anything but begging for intervention. Combined with her previous comments it shows a belief that religion is somehow in opposition to science and the scientific process is the enemy.
Not all religious people are idiots, no. However, she is. And I’m not trying to convince her of anything or convert her to my mindset. She’s beyond hope. Besides, even if she were an atheist, she’d be a stupid one, and that isn’t necessarily that much better anyway.
Stewart Peterson said:
Actually, nuclear energy is, in a way, akin to religion to me. Not directly or anything, but if you’ve ever heard Carl Sagan talk about the concept of a secular feeling like spirituality that is based on the sense of wonder at what we know of the cosmos or the idea of a kind of worshiping knowledge and the quest for knowledge. It is a bit like that.
To me, the very idea that I live in a time where we as a species are mastering the ability to bring energy from reordering the nature of matter is awe-inspiring. The limitless potential of nuclear energy is hard to even fathom. We have replicated the kind of reactions that power the universe and have learned how to use fission, fusion, decay and other nuclear effects for our own purposes, for the first time, no longer being a slave to the sun for energy.
Even nuclear weapons, for all their destruction when used against fellow man make me feel an admiration and awe for the sheer energy released. Imagine if that energy were used not as a weapon but for space propulsion or to alter the orbit of an asteroid! The Tsar bomb was small enough to fit in a single car garage and yet when it detonated, it released five yodawatts! It produced more than 1% of the power of the sun for about 50 nanoseconds – by far the most energetic device ever created by man. Consider that a few dozen of those at the full yield would produce as much energy as a star for a short time…
Yes, it was conceived for destructive purposes, but for the first time in history, humans can create energy of **cosmic** significance. That’s just staggering and the implications are profound.
I like to think that the era I live in is a bit like when man first learned how to tame fire.
Stewart Peterson said:
No, but Sarah Palin is. Have you seen some of the thins she has said? I don’t think she meets the diagnostic criteria for being mentally deficient or retarded, but I would not be surprised if she were close to the borderline on it.
Quote Comment
June 21st, 2010 at 9:43 pm
Stewart Peterson said:
First I don’t know what sort of evangelists you are exposed to, the one’s I have run into have been adamant that there is no room for a plurality of opinion when it comes to dogma. Indeed they do not pronounce everyone who disagrees an idiot: they pronounce them damned, and assure them they will be made to spend eternity suffering in torment because of it. I do not find them reasonable or accommodating to other’s positions beyond whatever manipulative agenda they are operating under at that moment
The problem is that society bends over backward to be accommodating to religious sensibilities but not to other kinds of sensibilities. If we say something offensive to religious people, we are universally censured, including by many atheists. But if we say something insulting about the Green Party,or any one of a number of identifiable groups we flame here, we’re allowed to get away with that.
Hiding behind the smoke screen of untouchability is something religions have been allowed to get away with for too long. Any thing else Sarah Palin says, it seems, is a legitimate target, even I suspect when she has accedently said something right, but the instant the faith card is played, it’s hands off.
Frankly I don’t give a damn about the woman: she is your problem in the U.S. not mine, we have more than our fair share of idiots up here in public life. But it just isn’t right that any of those people, anywhere in the world should get a free ride to say what they want as long as they bracket it with religion.
Quote Comment
June 22nd, 2010 at 7:05 am
Why do so many beat up on Sarah Palin for being religious? All politicians claim to be believers. If “faith” is dangerous, then it is dangerous to spread it, whether or not the spreader actually believes.
I have a suggestion for you liberal Democrats (many of whom are atheists like me): Instead of praying for divine intervention, as Palin has urged, just gather ’round the beach wherever you are and sing “We Shall Overcome”.
That oughtta work.
Quote Comment
June 22nd, 2010 at 11:39 am
From Twitter
GodAlmighthimself @SarahPalinUSA Not my job.
Quote Comment
June 22nd, 2010 at 11:47 am
Peter K. said:
Not because she’s religious, because she’s an imbecilic.
I don’t know how else I can put it. There is one word that comes to mind. It combines a four-letter obscenity with a politically incorrect term for a mentally retarded person, but I don’t want filtering software to block this site.
Quote Comment
June 22nd, 2010 at 12:53 pm
DR. Buzz, you be repeating yourself homey. Dat be a sign of idiocy don’ it?
You be fool, you, got nothin better ‘n to destroy a blog that once was good?
Quote Comment
June 22nd, 2010 at 2:37 pm
Dr. Cuzz said:
It’s not when you apparently are not heard the first time (or second or third or fourth or eleventh)
Notice that in comment 26 I was asked “Why do so any beat up on Sarah Palin for being religious?”
Apparently the commenter didn’t notice (or chose to ignore) that I had made the statement earlier. It’s not uncommon for it to take more than a single statement for something to sink in.
Quote Comment
June 22nd, 2010 at 3:27 pm
drbuzz0 said:
What, you thought she ever *had* hope in science and engineering? Like many politicians, Sarah Palin is not all that interested in technical details or solutions to difficult problems. What she’s interested in is *power*. Doesn’t matter what kind, really; she just wants to be big and important and powerful. And she will say or do whatever is required to get there. Solving difficult problems is interesting to this sort of politician only when it is required to maintain hold on power. Whenever possible, the actual work will be delegated. And if she can delegate it to God, that’s even better. If it works, she can say God answered her prayers and feel even more powerful; if it doesn’t, she has perfect deniability because “God works in mysterious ways” or maybe other people weren’t praying hard enough or maybe this is punishment for something. She is not the first politician to use public prayer for grandstanding, nor will she be the last.
Quote Comment
June 22nd, 2010 at 4:43 pm
Calli Arcale said:
I’d like to think that, all things being equal, at least a few people in leadership positions would just as well have things go well then go poorlby even if it does not have a direct impact on their political career. I mean, I do think most politicians are dishonest scumbags, but if you asked every member of the house of representatives “If you had the choice to push one of two buttons, button A will result in another 9/11 scale attack on the US and an ensuing economic collapse and button B will result in a period of prosperity and peace and either way your poll numbers will be identical…” I really hope at least a couple dozen of them would pick B… I don’t know, maybe I’m being naive
Okay, now politicians who were pro-science and pro-technology:
President Herbert Hoover – graduated stamford with a degree in engineering and became a mining engineer
Senator John Glenn – Astronaut, test pilot,
Benjaman Franklyn – If not a politician he’d be remembered as one of the great minds of science of his time. Like all test pilots of his time, he was trained in flight sciences and aeronautical engineering.
Thomas Jefferson – had several patents and designed his own structures at his estate
George Washington – civil surveyor and
George H. W. Bush – Naval aviator in World War II who later made his fortune by developing new oil drilling methods.
Winston Churchill – Famously said “Scientists should not be on tap but on top.” That alone puts him on the good side in my book
Albert Spear – Architect, city planner noted for his inovations in design and consturction. Also, a high ranking Nazi (I didn’t say I agreed with his politics)
Edward Teller – Pyhsist, father of the H-bomb, extremely politically active.
Senator Bill Frist -an MD, but not just an MD, he worked in the cutting edge of heart-lung transplantation.
Senator Ted Kaufman – Masters in Mechanical Engineering and master of business administration
Congressman Todd Akin – Former plant manager and electronic systems developer for IBM
Quote Comment
June 22nd, 2010 at 4:44 pm
Somehow part of my thing on john Glenn ended up on Franklyn. Hope this does not con fuse anyone. The later didn’t fly airplanes.
Quote Comment
June 23rd, 2010 at 1:27 pm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMEr4FctWAM
Quote Comment
June 26th, 2010 at 8:22 pm
Anyone who would name her son after a high-school math course is not to be trusted with this country’s future.
Quote Comment
June 30th, 2010 at 5:30 am
Engineering Edgar said:
Also, interestingly, Angela Merkel, the current chancellor of Germany. She is a physicist. Her political achievements so far have been less then stellar, but there might still be hope.
Satan_Klaus
Quote Comment