Fox News Hates Math... and facts

During the tail end of the election, Nate Silver ran a meta-analysis of the running polls which predicted an overall likelihood of Obama winning of 79%.  The actual analysis was a pretty exhaustive and thoroughly explained collective statistical analysis that looked at the populations that were sampled and how that affected the electoral result.  Note that the statement was that he had a 79% chance of coming out the winner (that too, specifically in terms of electoral votes) -- not that he'd win with 79% of the popular vote.  Either way, the point is that it wasn't his opinion.  It was the cold hard math.  Which is precisely why conservatives railed on him for being a political ideologue because the idea of math pointing to Obama's victory.

Because, well...  math has a liberal bias after all.  Since it's true.

So then Fox News' show, The Five, where they pit four magnificently idiotic conservative bullshit factories against a phony liberal who feigns ignorance of everything, just came out with their latest enemy -- algebra.

Arkansas Proves Itself Worthy of Notice

...  by showing that they, too, can set new and previously unimaginable benchmarks in human stupidity and downright evil.  So we all expect this sort of thing out of states in the deep South like Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, etc.  Arkansas technically falls under the same wing when you think about it, but because the stupid burns so deep in those other areas, and also quite recently, that Arkansas kind of just never really gets noticed.  After seeing the Texas Republican Party proclaim proudly that they are against thinking, I made it clear that they deserve a mighty eradication from existence.  But now, I feel it is only fair to include Arkansas Republicans in the picture, too.

Congratulations, Jon Hubbard, Charlie Fuqua, and Loy Mauch.  You, too, much like the entire Texas Republican Party, Michele Bachmann, Todd Akin, Rick Santorum, Paul Broun, et al. all deserve to be launched directly into the sun where every last molecule of your physical substance will be vaporized and all of existence will be better off.

What is it with Republicans and Women??!?

I have to admit that I am still facepalming from Michele Bachmann's insane claim during the GOP debates in which she made up some baloney tale about some girl receiving the HPV vaccine and it apparently caused mental retardation (as if that's actually possible).  But at the very least, nobody backed her on that one.  Then Todd Akin comes out with his claim that "legitimate" cases of raped women can't result in pregnancy, and therefore, there's no need to offer abortions for rape victims.  I especially love his use of the word "legitimate", something which I doubt many people actually mistook to mean he felt there was some sort of contextual justification for rape.  No, he was pretty clearly trying to imply that women lie about being raped and use that to get abortions.

Of course there are people who lie about being victims of crimes.  Any crime, and rape is no exception.  But to assume that it's the rule rather than the exception is something that takes an inordinate degree of stupidity and forceful rejection of reality that I can't even begin to enumerate.  The reality is that most rapes don't even go reported, and the rate of pregnancy is ~5%.  This is about 1/4 the rate of pregnancy for couples when they're actually trying to get pregnant.  The reason for the lower proportion is quite simple -- couples actually trying to get pregnant are also paying attention to things like ovulation cycles and so on, which simply does not fall under the attention of a rapist.  It's the sort of religion-guided universal disdain for women that leads to the sort of assumption that given the opportunity, any woman will deliberately play the victim in order to shirk responsibility.  This is funny, considering that 100% of religious fundamentalists play the victim whenever they feel the need to rob others of their equality of rights.

But it gets even crazier than that.  There were plenty of GOP figureheads who saw the backlash and distanced themselves from him -- yes, for the first time, the opposition actually argued back with *facts* rather than just talk of cruelty or play other games.  However, because Akin addressed a point that is pretty much on the core of the right-wing platform (unlike Michele Bachmann with her anti-vaccine garbage), it was inevitable that there would be support for his idiotic claims.  And boy, what support.

S.E. Cupp and The Cycle of Unbearable Idiocy

I had heard wind of the possibility that the inimitably stupid Sarah Elizabeth "S. E." Cupp might get a show on MSNBC for reasons as yet incomprehensible to me.  Sure enough, she now has a show on MSNBC, and I just watched some clips from the first episode of her new show, The Cycle.  It was an agonizingly painful experience.  I have a feeling that the only reason MSNBC, a largely left-leaning network would even put her on is because they want to feign some level of neutrality.  I can't imagine why.  Technically, CNN already plays this angle, but only by way of argumentum ad temporantiam, and trying to feign neutrality is not meaningful.

There are only four reasons why she ever had a job at Fox...  1 ) Boobs...  2 ) The Naughty Librarian look...  3 ) Boobs...  and 4 ) she poses as a Right-Wing ultra-conservative atheist who espouses the false virtues of religion.  And in spite of my mentioning her appearance more than once, the 4th one is the big one.  Sure, they made it obvious the first 3 were significant considering her presence on Fox involved a deliberate use of a wide camera shot that displayed her bared legs stretched out...  Could they make it more obvious that this woman's mindless prattling is without a shred of substance?  Nonetheless, I still have to say it's the 4th factor that It's just the sort of tool the right-wingers would love to have because it is the sort of sock-puppetry that makes it possible for religious nutbags and conservatives to say "See?? We even have an atheist agreeing with us!"

Of course, I don't buy for a second that there's anything remotely genuine about S. E. Cupp.  While I'm not entirely ready to say that she's waiting for that chance to suddenly convert, I only say that because I think her very existence as a character is created out of the right wing impression of atheism as a "trend."  It's certainly arguable that it would be if your only sample space is young impressionable teenagers who don't really have the weapon of thorough analysis of the subject material.  But she's basically got the platform of being the person who supposedly sits on the other side of the fence, but blindly agrees with what theocrats say.  And that's something politicians love, and that's exactly why she'd do better to stick with it.

Still, there's an obvious show of insincerity.  She can't even support her own supposed position.

Dear Mexico, Please Take Texas Back.

We don't want it any more.

It should really be eradicated from Earth, so maybe we should give it to North Korea or something with the condition that they're required to use it for nuclear weapons testing.

You know, we've all had our laughs at Rick Perry...  the man who thought measures like government-sponsored collective praying for rain makes him a great leader of state.  But, really, he's cut from a cloth of the veritable black hole of ignorance where stupidity is so dense that it exerts a gravitational pull from which no bright idea can escape.  That cloth is the Texas Republican Party.  I mean, when I lived in Texas, I ran across geocentrists who tried to argue that teaching gravity is a socialist concept and that the "Satanic science" of astronomy caused 9/11.  It has gotten to the point where you just can't get any stupider than Texas stupid.

The best part, though, is that they are willing to say out loud not only that Texas Stupid^tm is a real thing, but that it's their ideal.

The Texas Republican Party Official Platform (Final revision)
I read it...  and it surely made me weep

Why You Should Be an Elitist Prick

There is an old Tamil film released back when I was only about a year old, titled Varumaiyin Niram Sivappu.  Literally, that translates to "Red is the Color of Poverty."  At the very end of the movie (after the story formally really resolves, so to speak), the main character -- played by fellow Desi atheist, Kamal Hassan -- is working in a barber shop and he receives a customer.  Well, that scene is also the film's cameo for legendary Tamil comedy actor, "Thengai" (yes, as in coconut) Srinivasan, so viewers know ahead of time that the film would be closed off with a comedy scene.  During the shave, there is idle chatter between the barber and the client, and our hero barber character reveals that he actually went to graduate school and earned a Master's Degree in philosophy.  The comedy that ensues is that the client runs in fear presuming that the fact that his barber is an educated man means he's out to murder him.  Because...  that's what educated people do?

Well, Bruce Lee also had a Master's Degree in philosophy, so maybe he was making some assumption about Kamal Hassan being a fearsome martial arts master.  Sure.  That makes perfect sense.

It's an odd sentiment, though...  that educated people...  the intelligentsia of the world... are somehow the problem individuals.  What exactly do they think will happen?  Last I recall, it's those who are uneducated who tend to be dangerous.  I've never heard of a scientist who killed church officials for spreading lies about science.  Sure, there was that one mathematician who engaged in a 17-year long bombing campaign, but you can't trust those darn mathematicians, anyway ;-).  But nonetheless, there's a common cultural sentiment here.  There's a common response I get from fundies whenever I write about knowledge, education, being scientifically literate, etc.  It is the admonishment that I'm some evil elitist.  By subscribing to this sort of meritocratic philosophy centered around knowledge and the advancement thereof, I and other literati like myself therefore profess a sort of cold-blooded elitism, and that makes them a threat to the "average" person.

Call me crazy...  but I would rather have the average of tomorrow be roughly equal to the borderline genius of today, and if that makes me a threat to the "average" person today, then that's a good thing.

Atheists in America

In the comments of an earlier post, a little point came up about nonbelievers who are not so direct and "out there" about their atheism.  Indeed, there is some value in choosing the right time and place to "come out", and there are those who wear their anti-religion stance on their sleeves like myself.  In addition to those who are merely being cautious, there are those who simply want to avoid telling anyone or just say the word "agnostic" in lieu of "atheist" order to save face and/or avoid confrontation entirely.

It kind of begs the question as to why there is such a conflict in the first place?  Here in the United States, especially, you have people who view atheists as being among the most loathsome of all creatures.  In the episode of Family Guy where the dog (Brian) reveals his lack of belief, a news report brands him as "Worse than Hitler?"  The sad part of this is that such a reaction is hardly an exaggeration.  Why should it be that way?  This is supposed to be the country that has more Nobel Laureates than any other.  This is the country where people come to to get the best healthcare on the planet (assuming you have the enormous wealth required to get it).  This is the country which has put men on the moon and created the friggin' Internet.

And yet, this is also the country where state legislatures propose that women who have been raped should be raped one more time by an ultrasound machine so that she can be guilt-tripped out of an abortion.  This is also the country where people paid to provide us with an education believe that the universe has only existed for 6,000 years and man and dinosaurs lived at the same time.  This is also the country where the state which is generally considered to be the most socially liberal in the entire nation still passed a law to outlaw gay marriage.  This is the country where the Constitution demands that no religious test be required for any office in government, and yet there is not a single elected official in government who can avoid a religious test at the hands of its populace.

So what the friggin' hell is America's problem?

Idiocy worn on the sleeve.

For a long time, many people in the atheist community, myself included, have been denouncing many members of the Republican party, and especially of the extremist Tea Party nutjobs as being anti-intellectual.  It isn't exactly rare to hear them lie about science and particularly evolution.  It isn't rare to have them support the teaching of creationism in a science class.  It isn't rare for them to rewrite history to claim that Reagan brought income taxes to their lowest level ever or that the "Hoot-Smalley" tariff was created by liberals.  So often, they get on the backs of some of us for being too "elitist"...  as if that's a bad thing.  Is it necessarily wrong for people to want the best of the best that the country has to offer...  the most eminently competent individuals to be the ones in the seats of power?  If I'm to elect a person who is to represent the needs of the greater good, wouldn't it be a decent idea to actually have someone there who is better equipped than Joe Six-pack to do the job?  I don't particularly care if the guy is such an asshole that I'd not dare make small talk with him over beers.  Elitism isn't just not bad; it's in every way the correct attitude to have when it comes to picking your leader.  Oh wait... that's an elitist thing to say, isn't it?  Big fat hairy deal.  Roll over and die if you think the laws of the land need to be decided upon by someone with no greater brain-power than the average person.

So, there have been a number of  Republican debates already, all of which showcased various brands of insane stupidity...  and a few pro-stupidity.  Then Rick Perry dropped this gem.

Link : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZYQ9IYeOlU

If Only I had a Nuclear Arsenal...

...  I'd nuke every last ultra-conservative district.

After seeing the sorts of things that people had to say in the recent Republican debate, it is pretty well clear that if this is what conservatives really want out of the leader of the nation, then there is no place for them on this Earth.

Mitt Romney was leading the party for quite some time, and while I have my problems with him and his magic underpants, he is, in an odd way, more centrist than the liberal-by-affiliation-only Barack Obama.  Romney is willing to be anything and take on any sort of role in order to gain and hold onto the presidency.  If the populace swings conservative, he'll play conservative...  if he needs to be liberal, he'll be liberal.  If he's in a crowd which wants gay marriage, he's in support of it.  Another day, he'll be in a crowd which is anti-abortion, and he'll talk endlessly about the sacredness of any "potential life"...  while also remembering for another day that he's technically murdering thousands of "potential lives" every time he scratches his nose.  Well, simply put, he's the epitome of the phony politician.

The Creation School of Economics

It's often easy to point out the vile and twisted evils of fundamentalism and theocracy in the Middle East.  After all, these are places where the law is decided in accordance with the ~1400-year old dictates of an illiterate pedophile warrior charlatan who fooled an entire culture into believing he had some sort of connection to the divine.  Yet for all that I can say to condemn every Islamic nation ever to be conceived, it's hard to ignore theocratic nutbars a little closer to home.

Prior to living in the generally liberal environment that is Silicon Valley, I'd worked and lived in Texas for a little over 2.5 years, about half of which was in Houston and about 1 year in Dallas.  While my brief experiences of San Antonio and Austin both showed some promise for the state as far as having the semblance of brain power within the populace, I did find that my longer time in Houston and Dallas both demonstrated that the state of Texas can be quite the hotbed of religious lunacy and uneducated idiocy.  This is the place where I had an employer who believed that octagons have five sides, and threatened to fire anybody who disagreed... too bad he couldn't fire every dictionary ever made.  This is the place where I came across an activist group who petitioned the schools to remove heliocentrism from school science education and replace it with the "Biblically correct" geocentric model.  Thankfully, it kind of fell apart when they started to try and blame 9/11 on Stephen Hawking (slight exaggeration, but not far off).

Well, the state's current serving governor, Rick Perry, does not disappoint.  He brings forth further examples of how reprehensible right-wing reactionaries would love to conceive a nation on the proposition that a separation of church and state is illegal and causes gay angel rape and baby-eating.

The Idiocy of Supply-side

It is rarely surprising when you see some right-wing nutbar say something incalculably stupid.  The general M.O. of conservatives is to basically blindly repeat certain rules as some sort of absolute.  In general, the difference between people who lean liberal vs. conservative is not the set of values they have, but in how they prioritize them.  Liberals tend to value fairness and minimization of harm over other values.  Conservatives tend to value authority and purity above other values.  This is why the sort of blind adherence to rigidly defined principles trumps everything when it comes to Republican discourse.  That's why being deeply religious to the point of rejecting science is practically a requirement of conservative politics.  You have to reject something like science because it indicates progress and change, while religion is indicative of order and authority (as well as unflappable loyalty to that authority) -- things that conservatives value more.

When it comes to economic policy, it's hard to hide the fact that all politicians are basically self-serving greedy douchebags looking to profit through under-the-table activities which aren't entirely kosher.  The real factor, though, is in how they rationalize it before their constituency.  Doing that basically rests on pandering to those specific values which your voters prioritize.

The thing I hear most from conservatives and libertarians alike on economics (as the latter is technically fiscally conservative) is that there is an immutable relationship between taxation on the rich and a dearth of jobs.  When you simplify to that extent, you're doomed to be wrong.  The problem isn't so much with the idea that taxation on the wealthy and/or corporations affects jobs, but that the relationship is immutable and absolute.  This is where Republicans and, to a large extent, fans of the Austrian school of economics, basically have no hope of of being anything other than intolerable idiots unworthy of ever drawing breath.