From Arkansas Online:

“‘I didn’t get into politics because I thought government had a better answer. I got into politics because I knew government didn’t have the real answers, that the real answers lie in accepting Jesus Christ into our lives.‘

He compared his entry into politics to ‘getting inside the dragon’s belly,’ adding, ‘There’s not one thing we can do in those marbled halls and domed capitols that can equal what’s done when Jesus touches the lives of a sinner.‘”

Wherein the creepily affable Huckster admits to a certain Manchurian flavor to his candidacy. Please, Huck, tell us more.

“I don’t think the issue’s about being against gay marriage. It’s about being for traditional marriage and articulating the reason that’s important. You have to have a basic family structure. There’s never been a civilization that has rewritten what marriage and family means and survived*. So there is a sense in which, you know, it’s one thing to say if people want to live a different way, that’s their business. But when you want to redefine what family means or what marriage means, then that’s an issue that should require some serious and significant debate in the public square. And if you look at states that have had it on the ballot—I know in our state it was a 70-percent-against issue. Most states are similar to that.”

*- Isn’t that a bit like saying there’s never been a civilization that lived under water, breathing through reeds that survived? And how ’bout those civilizations before the institution of marriage as we know it? Oh, wait, those aren’t still around? Damn, he’s right.

Some of the Old Rugged splinters up Huck’s ass?

• support for ousted Alabama Chief Judge Roy Moore’s court-stripping bill to keep federal courts from meddling with public officials who use their office to promote religion;
• vetoes of hate crimes legislation, ENDA (anti-discrimination law), and the fairness doctrine;
• stripping schools of federal funding for exposing children to “homosexual propaganda”; repealing IRS restrictions on churches endorsing candidates;
• bringing back Bush’s social security privatization plan;
• imposing a ban on federal funding for any U.S. group that performs or advocates for abortion;
• boosting federal abstinence spending to match contraceptive funding.

Huckabee was the runaway winner of the straw poll taken among the organizers’ hand-picked attendees. More than that, he was declared an answer to prayer by organizer Janet Folger (author of “The Criminalization of Christianity”), who said Huckabee had been revealed by God to be the “David among Jesse’s son’s.” Folger has only ramped up her rhetoric since then, insisting that God’s hand is on Huckabee and that he will be the next president of the United States. Folger was recently named to co-chair Huckabee’s Faith and Family Values Coalition.”

If only he were riding in a police interceptor with John Belushi, half a tank of gas, a full pack of cigarettes, in the dark, and wearing sunglasses on this particular mission from Gob…

(Cross posted at The Uncredible Hallq)

An article just came out in Harper’s, by David Lewis and Philip Kitcher, suggesting orthodox Christians are evil for admiring an evil God. It’s an excerpt from the book Philosophers Without Gods. I’d recommend buying the book over running to the newstand to pick up Harper’s, as:

1) The excerpt is rather insubstantial
2) You can get a decent jist from the Leiter Report summary, to which I can only really add that Lewis and Kitcher briefly endorse the logical problem of evil, which will make John happy
3) I know the book contains at least one other good essay by Richard Feldman.

Anyway, when I consider this article against the backdrop of the current intellectual climate, it feels like the most unimaginable breath of fresh air. Lewis and Kitcher have yet to be hit with the “professional atheist” tag, they’re just another pair of intellectuals writing a popular article. And yet what they say is at once obvious and unthinkable.

Take, as a random first example, this quote from William Lane Craig:

I think that a good start at this problem is to enunciate our ethical theory that underlies our moral judgements. According to the version of divine command ethics which I’ve defended, our moral duties are constituted by the commands of a holy and loving God. Since God doesn’t issue commands to Himself, He has no moral duties to fulfill. He is certainly not subject to the same moral obligations and prohibitions that we are.

This comes from a discussion of divine orders to kill children. And Craig is not only saying that God has the right to kill children. He must also say that God has a right to starve parents to the point that they will eat their own children, as he is described as doing in a couple of Biblical passages, such as Jeremiah 19:9. What kind of sick monster even thinks of such a thing? If asked to suggest something horrible to do to somebody, I might squirm and suggest electric shocks, but I would never even think to make them eat their own children. If anybody out there reading this been feeling depressed lately, cheer up: no matter how badly you’ve been doing in life,odds are you can at least take comfort in that you are a better person than the God of orthodox Christianity.

Craig’s absurdly arbitrary ethic is indispensable for the orthodox Christian, both because of the difficulty of finding any other justification for the actions attributed to the Christian God, and because of how Abraham is praised for being willing to kill his son simply because God said so. The ring of sophisticated theology has not yet gone sour, though. After all, I was taught the Abraham story in Sunday school at my relatively liberal church.

Or, consider this post by seminary professor Claude Mariottini, which declares that “The reason people believe that the God of the Bible is a savage God is because God exercises divine justice when people fail to meet divine standards.” Roll that one around in your head. “The reason people believe that Hitler was a monster is because Hitler was just.” “The reason people belive that Pol Pot was a barbarian is because Pol Pot was just.” Crazy, isn’t it? Yet too many people allow such pronouncements to take on an air of dignity simply because they’re made in the name of religion.

We need to be fearless in identifying this pernicious nonsense for what it is. Most of the people reading this will be, in a sense, beyond that problem. But we also need to ditch the idea that we are doing anything extraordinary in doing so.

From Pharyngula, we have the famous Stupid Xians in Action:

The typographer who designed the popular font Gill Sans was a devout Catholic…who had sex with his sisters, his daughters, and his dog. Who could have seen that coming?

More Christmas displays are in the news: in this case, the Christians are vandalizing a Wiccan symbol. Or who knows…maybe it’s some vicious atheist who is running over the pentacle and leaving the nativity scene alone.

Running over Wiccan symbols is much milder than what they are doing in Nigeria: evangelical Christians there are organizing witch hunts. Literally. And the ‘witches’ are often children, who may be murdered for their imaginary crime.

Look! Australian fundies blame their drought on sinners! I hate those sweeping generalizations. [...]

In other news, I guess our “group” is getting some recognition, because we actually made The Economist. After the usual stats, the writer offers the following advice:

But another failing of the irreligious movement ["movement?"] has been its tendency, frequently, to pick the wrong fights. Keeping the Ten Commandments out of an Alabama courthouse is one thing. But attacking a Christmas nativity scene on public property does more harm than good. Such secular crusades allow Christians—after all, the overwhelming majority of the country—to feel under attack, and even to declare that they are on the defensive in a “War on Christmas”. When a liberal federal court in California struck the words “under God” from the pledge of allegiance, religious conservatives rallied. Atheists might be tactically wise to accept the overwhelming majority’s comfort with such “ceremonial deism”. [...] If these growing ranks concentrate on areas where American religiosity can do harm—over-aggressive proselytising in the armed forces, undermining science or AIDS programmes, alienating minorities at home and Muslims abroad—they could wield the sort of influence that any other minority representing 10% of the country might do.

What to do? Eh, who knows. I’m not saying worrying about those things is irrelevant — but it seems to be very difficult to tease apart such goals from the daily-grind-mundane-crap that we see everyday (especially during this time of the year). So, I’ll leave discussion of this particular point to the comments section (if people care enough about it to do so).

For any of you who liked the Beyond Belief series last year.

Here is the link to this years Beyond Belief 07

There is some download problem, but if you’re a wizard then you may be able to figure it out. Apparently The Science Network is working on the problem. Enjoy!

Also while you’re at it check out what is going on over at Richard Dawkins website. There are plenty of downloads and news programs as well as radio programs that you can listen to. Not to mention just plain good writing by some of the best Atheist writers in the known universe.

It’s too bad that the religious don’t get over the rectal cranium inversions that they suffer from. They would be so much happier. Maybe they would quit killing so many people.

More tragic shootings, and more stupid-ass interviews with fundies thanking Gawd for protecting them or helping them through the crisis. Security guard Jeanne Assam, a church member of the New Life Church in Colorado Springs (who shot gunman, Matthew Murray) said she “believes God gave her the strength to confront Murray, keeping her calm and focused.”

Well, where the fuck was her god to PREVENT all this from happening in the first place? Why do we never hear a news reporter ask that question?

Link: Gunman kills 2 in missionary center
and at least four people were shot at church in 2nd Colorado attack

Brady White, who attends Faith Bible Chapel, where the center is located said of victims from the missionary center, “They’re just wonderful people,” White said of the center’s students. “Their mission is to know God and to make him known.”

*snip”

Cheril Morrison, wife of chapel pastor George Morrison, said the man who was killed had just hung up Christmas lights at her home and described the young woman who was killed as “an amazingly beautiful person.”

Why didn’t this god come to the rescue of these “wonderful people” who were working for him? This should get all those missionaries and others who are working for their god to start wondering if their god is either powerless or indifferent, or if this god has no control over anything, or if this god simply does not exist.

“There’s no blueprint for this, we’re just going to be honest and pray for one another, cry with one another,” center director Peter Warren told KUSA-TV. “Who knows what was going on in this young man’s life.”

Pray, cry? (Be honest?:roll:) Lot of good that is going to do. Should be obvious since this even happened that praying is going to do absolutely nothing. And “who knows what was going on in this young man’s life?” Maybe Xians treating him like an outcast? What were the reasons he was kicked out of the center a few years ago? What made him so insanely angry?

“Why would anybody want to hurt those kids?” Martin said. “I just pray for their families.”

Again, if this god didn’t protect these praying godly kids, why do they think he is going to help their grieving families? And if they say that god allowed it because it was “their time,” then it answers their question according to their gawd beliefs about “why would anybody want to hurt those kids?” Uh…because gawd wanted them to die! If they think too much, they can’t help to see the bullshit in their attempts to rationalize their god beliefs.

“We never doubted that we would have a service,” said Cheril Morrison. “We felt like our church faithful all needed to be together.”

PEOPLE TURNING TO OTHER PEOPLE…THIS GOD WASN’T THERE WHEN THE TRAGEDY HAPPENED, AND STILL ISN’T THERE NOW.

“Liberal, shmiberal. That should be a new word. Shmiberal: one who is assumed liberal, just because he’s a professional whiner in the newspaper. If you’ll read the subtext for many of those old strips, you’ll find the heart of an old-fashioned Libertarian. And I’d be a Libertarian, if they weren’t all a bunch of tax-dodging professional whiners.” Berkeley Breathed, American cartoonist (emphasis mine)

According to Wikipedia, Mr. Breathed is a vegetarian and an atheist. (When I mentioned to my husband that Berkeley was probably an atheist, he said he’d never noticed it. I, on the other hand, have noticed it many times. especially when Opus has center stage!)

Benny Hinn is dragging his feet on the recent Congressional investigation into the lavish lifestyles led by certain charlatans…erm…pastors. Question: why pick on the five that they chose? Why not Pat Robertson? James Dobson? Is this a diversion, the shiny object that draws attention away from the real point? Hmmm…Dobson’s little racket takes in $158 million each year…

Driving through Minnesota two days ago, listening to a public radio station (NPR), a local PSA addressed a misconception: that Congress was debating two HRs relating to religion; rumor has it that the “libruls” want to get all the xians off the radio! Seems that the well-oiled “rapid response teams for jeebus” have been burning up the ‘mails and ‘nets — to the tune of 5 million messages to their representatives in Congress. (For my money, I’d like to see them muzzled. Or just have them limited to low-signal strength and local broadcast areas. Dobson’s huge network is a propagandist’s delight.)
However, neither of the two “initiatives” exist. Verily, the bills are only “strawmen”. What a bunch of nervous-nellies, spinsters searching under the bed for rapists! How gullible can you get?

A mega-church in Montana is offering free seminars, offering financial security. The last people I’d want “managing” my money is “the church”.

A mega-church in Florida (First Baptist, of Fort Lauderdale) is coming under criticism for producing a holiday extravaganza, costing $1,300,000! The gaudy, gawdly show, including live camels, pyrotechnics and sixty dancers choreographed by a Broadway professional, could be replaced by true xian giving, according to critics. Or not.

“Complex problems have simple, easy to understand wrong answers.” – Grossman’s Law

Today’s episode of Scapegoat Theater (yet another holdover anachronism from that most loathsome of tomes, the wholly bibble) features that most casuistic of mental processes – the easy answer to complex social problems.

Our first contestant is Denyse O’Leary – who claims that Social Darwinism motivated the Jokela school shootings.

The best counterpunch is this post from the Panda’s Thumb.

Thbbbt! Wrong answer.

Our next contestant is our old, dear friend, Ken Ham, who blames the Virginia Tech shootings (along with the Columbine killings) on the stripping of God from the science classes.

Since any of these romantic, ‘metaphysical’ quibblings are untestable, unfalsifiable, and lacking in solid evidence, they have no place in a lab, let alone in a classroom. Stick to philosophy courses.

Thbbbt! Wrong answer.

The third contestant is Dinesh D’Souza, who claims that evolution is responsible for the aforementioned shootings:

“For scientific atheists like Dawkins, Cho’s shooting of all those people can be understood in this way–molecules acting upon molecules.”

Not even going to go into length (or link) on how retarded that statement is.

Thbbbt! Wrong answer.

Fourth up, we actually have the notorious serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer (actually, his father) claiming that ‘atheistic beliefs’ cut Jeffrey free from any restraints.

What, pray tell, kept Gilles de Rais from going apeshit crazy? Richard Ramirez was of another variety, but still, religious. “I’ll see you in Disneyland,” was his retort to getting a death sentence.

Thbbbt! Wrong answer.

Next up, Lee Strobel tells of the debunking of the Miller-Urey experiment that ‘led him into atheism’.

Clearly, Strobel hasn’t a clue as to the differences between evolution and abiogenesis. Also, Talkorigins addresses the Miller-Urey experiment adequately. One might note, that unless Herr Strobel was using a bit of hyperbole, one scientific venture does not an epistemology make.

Thbbbt! Wrong answer.

The list goes on, but I’ll top it off with a real charmer –  contestant number six is good old Chuck Colson, who in a tirade of tolerance, made this statement:

“This is a virulent strain of atheism which seeks to destroy our belief system,” Colson said.

Atheism as a disease? How on earth would he eradicate it (if hypothetically this were so)? What happens next, if Chuckles gets his way? Contextually speaking, a disease infers a cure, does it not? Would he enforce some sort of atheist vaccine? Repeal the First Amendment? Of course, Chuckles isn’t a big fan of the SOCAS (it’s uni-directional, dontcha know?).

It’s getting ridiculous. No, wait, it already IS ridiculous. Blaming all of societies ills and woes on one particular source without taking in the complex equations that factor into that laundry list falls under Grossman’s law (cited above). This sounds suspiciously along these lines:

“The white men were roused by a mere instinct of self-preservation… until at last there had sprung into existence a great Ku Klux Klan, a veritable empire of the South, to protect the Southern Country.” – Woodrow Wilson

But I digress…Thbbbt! Wrong answer.

I’d hand out consolation prizes (booby prizes in this case), but rewarding stupidity is enabling it.

If I were a coward, I’d shut up about it, and become one of those ‘casual secularists’ the religious are always prattling about.

But I’m not, so I won’t. I’ll say it loud and proud: I don’t believe. And I have good reasons not to. Multiple good reasons, in fact.

If that makes me a militant atheist, so be it. (And folks wonder why we’re so loud and pissed off. Yeesh, get a clue, willya?)

This is the Apostate, signing off.

The extraordinary focus on the candidates’ “faith” and supernatural beliefs is something that I can hardly bear to listen to anymore. Did you all happen to hear Romney’s speech and Huckabee’s response? It sounds more and more like the candidates are vying for a pulpit position rather than President of a secular nation. Have any of the candidates even read the Constitution?

The following is from Americans United for the Separation of Church and State:

Today’s speech by Mitt Romney on the role of religion in American politics reflects an inaccurate understanding of the constitutional relationship between church and state, according to Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

“I was disappointed in Romney’s statement,” said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, Americans United executive director. “The founders of our Constitution meant for religion and government to be completely separate. Romney is wrong when he says we are in danger of taking separation too far or at risk of establishing a religion of secularism.

“I was particularly outraged that Romney thinks that the Constitution is somehow based on faith and that judges should rule accordingly, “ Lynn said. “That’s a gross misunderstanding of the framework of our constitutional system.

“I think it is telling that Romney quoted John Adams instead of Thomas Jefferson or James Madison,” Lynn continued. “Jefferson and Madison are the towering figures who gave us religious liberty and church-state separation.

“I was also disappointed that Romney doesn’t seem to recognize that many Americans are non-believers,” Lynn continued. “Polls repeatedly show that millions of people have chosen to follow no spiritual path at all. They’re good Americans too, and Romney ought to have recognized that fact.

“I am an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ, and I believe in my faith,” Lynn added. “But I believe just as strongly that non-believers are good Americans too. I wish Romney had said that.”

Americans United is a nonpartisan organization that takes no position on candidates for any elective office. Lynn said he is responding solely to constitutional inaccuracies in Romney’s remarks, not taking a stand on his candidacy.

Romney’s Speech on Religion (excerpt)