Gee, someone better tell Alan Keyes about that bit regarding believing the world to be basically good- see, Cath-o-lics like me and Alan believe that people are inherantly immoral and, left to their own devices, will do terrible things to each other and themselves. That’s the entire premise for having a government and a Church… unless, of course, Alan is being heterodoxical and is actually actively allowing such heretical filth to be published on his website…
(tee hee- can’t have your cake and eat it too when claiming to be Captain Orthodoxy).

? roads blocking game trails, windmills killing birds along migration routes, or tourists in our national parks aggressively looking at the fauna???!!! WTF!!??? And how does one look aggressively at something?

GG —

I agree, isn’t it the religous right who continuously tell us that because of Adam and Eve, all of humanity is bad, and now we have the Darrmeister telling us they are all wrong! Someone got their wingnut talking points crossed.

Why don’t we let them fight it out and see who wins??

Why is it I feel like the wingnuts are in a deathrace to see who can be the most illogical, most ignorant and all-around brain-damaged on wingnut island?

I think what Justin is trying to say, in his inimitable way, is that environmentalists view the health of endangered and marginal species as an indicator parameter for the health of ecosystems in general. Looking at it this way it makes the impact of taxonomic inflation almost moot.

Conservatives always try to make the argument that progress (i.e., commerce) is being impeded by the suckerfish or some equally homely or friendless little creature. Whereas the true worry is that it is a whole ecosystem that is unhealthy or in danger and the demise of the suckerfish is just the first sign of that condition.

The consequences of the damage to or even loss of ecosystems may not be known for many generations. But like with so many things the wingnuts are willing to gamble our future out of shortsightedness and greed.

I’m sure that many have mocked the Justin Darr bio in the SadNo archives but every time I read this I get a laugh and a strangely deep sense of morbid curiosity about the dude’s life:Justin Darr is a veteran retail manager from the Philadelphia area where he lives with this wife, Erin, twin children Brandon and Brittany, three mice, two cats, and a spoiled dog named Xena. I mean what the hell? Wife? Children? How is that possible? Retail Manager? Are we talking Radio Shack here because that’s what I’m thinking. Xena? Yeah if I’m Justin I’m going to name my pup after Xena the warrior Princess.

Anyway, so I’m still trying to figure out Justin’s twisted logic of opening with hurricanes and closing with saving 30 endangered species.

God, where is that fracking bottle of Jack Daniels when you need it……

Sheesh, I already drank it up dealing with Kaye “rubber cement” Grogan over at Wo’C.

Anyway, let me see if I understand Justin Darr’s (is there any cioncidence in that JD’s initials are the same as my mind numbing drink of choice, JD???) argument:
JD claims that:
1. hurricanes are caused by endangered species — according to environmentalists.
2. Because we all know is is not true we can kill all the species we want to with impunity.
3. Anyone on the liberal side who claims that weather is affected by global warming, and humanity’s affect on it is just stupid and wrong.
4. Any liberal who claims that the Earth is old and resulted from evolution is just stupid.
5. We all know that they are stupid because we can still fill our Hummer H2’s with sub $3.00 a gallon gasoline.
6. If there is still gas available then there must still be species left on this planet, and if they are still left, then there can be no global warming, and if there is no global warming then there is no connection to hurricanes.
7. Therefore, we can still kill any animal at will because there will always be an infinite supply of gas, thus disproving global warming, thus there is no link to hurricanes.
8. Bill Dembski is still full of shit because he still considers Math to be logical, even though he tries to pump our (JD’s) side up by calling all of science bullshit.
(9.) (According to JD, nothing is useful knowledge, and anyone who suggests a fact is true is wrong.)
10. All facts are just plain wrong, and I (JD) am the king of all the universe.

— jeffperado

(for the record, I think Dembski is utterly full of shit. But I can imagine JD liking him until when he becomes an obstacle to his — JDs — own twisted logic.)

Sorry for rambling. But I, as a scientist, cannot stand the complete stupidity of JD. When is some good-natured country doctor going to tape up the head of Darr to stop the hemorraging from where he was kicked in the head by a mule?

Folks, we’re forgetting one big smelly elephant-turd-sized problem here:

What environmentalists do not want you to know about endangered species

In this whole column, he still hasn’t TOLD US!

This column is pure 100% Darr mental masturbation upon that aformentioned elephant turd — which make non-wingnut minds go into a dry heave and want to commit various acts of cartoon violence upon Darr’s “brain.”

That’s perfectly sane, right? YEEEEESSSSS!

To be clear for the feds (BTW, where’s Osama?): “non-wingnut minds” == “non-wingnut brains.”

That is all.

A word of warning from London’s Daily Telegraph : “Sadly, you cannot prove consequences until it is too late.”
link— bit of an overgeneralisation I’d have thought.

You know, the success of the Endangered Species Act is not measured by how many species are taken off it. (Or put on, for that matter, regardless of anything that idiot Rush Limbaugh would have you believe.)
The success is measured by how many species are NOT YET EXTINCT because of their protected status.

He’s a wounded war veteran, you know. Or so he claimed when I called him a fucking chickenhawk. I suspect if that’s true he was fragged.

He’s a wounded war veteran, you know. Or so he claimed when I called him a fucking chickenhawk.

Is that so? It’s funny how he makes no mention of his military service in his biography…

But, but, but Justin’s a veteran retail manager! Isn’t that the same as being a war veteran?

I’m sorry, but I couldn’t get past the second sentence because of his improper use of the word “affect.” Don’t these people even have proofreaders?

Yes they do, Cricket, but their proof readers don’t know the difference between “effect” and “affect.” I’d be a little surprised if they could use the contraction “they’re” correctly.

alas, their editors are as uneducated and downright stupid as the writers!

Let me say, for the record (no pun intended) that not all conservatives are anti-environment. I, for one, am of the opinion that Saddam’s list of crimes should include crimes against the environment associated with his “scorched earth policy,” he implemented during Operation Dessert Storm. What an environmental nightmare that was. At the risk of sounding like I’m shamelessly self-promoting (which is certainly false since I do feel a modicum of shame), I was among the first to publically celebrate the capture of this environmental criminal by releasing
“That Saddam is Gone Christmas Song.” I plan to re-release it this year as a reminder to Cindy Sheehan fans as one of the major benefits of this war. I also plan to release a cover of John Lennon’s Christmas song, Give Peace a Chance, with one particular lyrical alteration, “All we are saying is give war a chance.” Not!

I know, I spelled “desert” wrong in Operation Desert Storm. I told you folks I wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed (but, rather, the second sharpest). Actually, that was intended as bait for the Spelling Gestapo. It looks like, heretofore, it’s not working, so I’ll correct it. It should read “Operation Desert Storm.”

tourists in our national parks aggressively looking at the fauna???!!!
Sickduck, I think Justin was actually attempting a little joke there.

That article is just sad – Justin Darr is too light-weight to even beat up his own strawman.

This article tears it. I’m giving up the internets forever.

Well, maybe just blogs. Or maybe just posts about Justin.

“Broad brush scientific concept?” Does he really mean “biological species concept?” That would be the idea that species should be defined by whether they can interbreed.

And his description of the phylogenetic species concept is not an oversimplification. It is completely wrong. Phylogenetic species are those that share common ancestry. This does not allow scientists to just pick and choose what a species is. Genetic differences are a big part defining a species this way.

DL, he can’t be talking about the biological species concept, because that whole concept was formalized by Ernst Mayr.

Now, I know Dr. Mayr was a very old man when he died earlier this year, but he is not nearly old enough to have coined BSC “centuries” ago, like Darr says.

As far as I know, the only thing approximating a formalized approach to defining species before that was the morphological approach that is still – despite what the Darrmeister thinks – in common use today. Dinosaur remains, for example, neither breed nor leave behind useful genetic material, so species determinations among dinos are always done morphologically.

I have no idea what the hell he means by “Phylogenetic Species Concept”, either, because the way he’s using it is incoherent. What the concept actually means is that populations with unique evolutionary heritages should be viewed as unique species. Justin Darr wouldn’t know a cladogram if it walked up and bit him on the foramen magnum – which I would pay good money to see.

The general fuzziness of the concept of species is, if you think about it, inherent to the concept of evolution. If new species arise from populations of extant species, it’s easy to see why it can be hard to make a clear distinction between closely related species – the differences between them will be much smaller than the differences between less closely related taxa.

And anyway, aren’t the yahoos over at Renew America all creationists? What are they doing spouing heresy like phylogenesis? Only godless, atheistic materialists believe in that stuff.

I could kind of go for a Dessert Storm. Would that be some kind of ice-cream treat with lots of sprinkles? Like a Blizzard?

The Dessert Storm: Vanilla ice cream with chocolate shrapnel and caramel IEDs. Get one free with your draft notice.

We live in a world we believe to be basically good, and where doing what is right an end unto itself. If we stick to our values, look out for ourselves, and try to help those around us along the way, the world will be a better place.
This is conservative code for “We’ll do whatever the fuck we want, for as long as we want, and you’re going to eat it up and call it ice cream, because you don’t have a choice.
Because we believe in God and that we will be held accountable for whatever havoc we might cause.
Yeah that whole afterlife judgement thing has been a great deterrent lately. Maybe god will float down and save the pandas too.

Actually, that was intended as bait for the Spelling Gestapo. It looks like, heretofore, it’s not working, so I’ll correct it. It should read “Operation Desert Storm.”

Dr. BLT, while it is likely that someone — possibly even me — spotted and mentioned a spelling or grammar error early in your career as The Singing Troll Of Sadly No, you are pretty much the only person who notices your errors. And then you point them out and claim you’re staying one step ahead of the Spelling Gestapo. You are the only one who even bothers to notice, and your continual references to the nonexistent Spelling or Grammar Nazis are a strawman designed to allow you to claim persecution in the absence of any actual persecution. Plus, those of us who actually lost family members to the Holocaust might could find “Spelling Gestapo” an offensive trivialization of a truly horrific era in human history.

Dan Someone, you are the second person today that has claimed to know my motives. I may have mentioned that I teach Psychology of Motivation and, though I have much more to learn about the subject, I can tell you unequivocally that humans cannot read the motives of other humans. They only have the ability to form hypotheses and then to test such hypotheses. If it is your hypothesis that I am trying to appear to be the victim of some sort of persecution, then it would be best if you stated it as a hypothesis and not a fact. Also, you stated that some of you may be offended by my Spelling Gestapo reference, but you didn’t actually admit that you were offended. I would be more inclined to believe neo-Nazis would be the ones to be offended, but if you are offended as someone who has lost relatives at the hands of Nazis, then I will offer you a sincere apology. However, your statement is a little ambivalent, so I cannot tell if you are offended or not.

How come Seinfeld can get away with having a special guest character on the show called The Soup Nazi and I have to now be worried about offending the Jewish folks with references to the Spelling Gestapo?

Like a moth to the flame.

Damn right, Dr. BLT.

The Jews get to make Jewish AND Nazi jokes with impunity and we have to be sensitive.

When will we Anglo-Saxon dogs have our day? Will we never come out on top?

Anyone have an answer to that one? Lamb?..Lynx?…Dresden?…Anyone? Anyone?

Whut the hell is that smell?!? Aw, man, Justin Darr just let rip a hurricane! Somebody open a window, stat!

He misheard.

They’re caused by the extinction of pirates, not parrots.

and also by his noodly appendage.

“We live in a world we believe to be basically good,” and that is why you’re going to hell if you don’t believe that Jesus died for our sins.

Dr. BLT is a fantastic troll!

I’m sorry, let me restate that. I hypothesize that Dr. BLT is a fantastic troll.

So, wait, Justin says conservatives think the world is basically good?

So why then do we need all these protection or marriage laws and anti-porn laws and such to fend off the unwashed barbarians at our gate?

It’s rather a mixed compliment, Jefe, but hey, when all you get are insults, cursing and the occasional sharing of somebody’s homicidal fantasy about you, mixed compliments start sounding pretty good. I hyopothesize that I feel pretty good about Jefe’s comment.

Good question, Dorothy. To answer you, Dorothy (by the way, that’s my mom’s name), conservatives like me think the world is basically good, but that (believe it or not), it can actually get better.

Doc Sammich, I stand by my point, that your continual references to the Spelling Gestapo or the Grammar Nazis or whatever every time you find a typo in one of your posts is a strawman. Yes, my attribution of a motivation to that strawman — so you could complain about being persecuted — was a hypothesis, but given the evidence — notably that each such reference is accompanied by a statement to the effect that you are correcting yourself before the Spelling Gestapo et al. jump on your case — my hypothesis remains the most likely explanation for why you keep making those references.

Dan, you are moving in the direction of being more objective. However, I would like to introduce an alternative hypothesis. My hypothesis is as follows: I now correct all grammar, spelling and typos that I notice in my entries as a deterent against annoyingly repetitive, seemingly obsessive reminders from the person who is seemingly sensitive about being referred to as the Spelling Gestapo. The reason I have persisted in correcting my own entries is because it has worked as a deterent. If I can be assured that I will no longer be obsessively scrutinized on my entries in terms of grammar, spelling and typos, then I will gladly abandon my intervention. My other hypothesis is that I may have been obsessively scrutinized on such minute details as both a method of discrediting me, and as a deterent intended to discourage me from expressing my political views.

Most people are perfectly capable of correcting their own self-discovered errors without reference to some sort of persecuting agency “obsessively scrutinizing” their messages. I’ve seen it happen in these very comment threads.

Who do you think is “seemingly sensitive about being referred to as the Spelling Gestapo,” anyway? Since I’m the only one discussing the phrase with you, I assume you mean me; but I can’t recall the last time I corrected a typo of yours (or anybody’s) in these threads, so I wonder why you think I’m the Spelling Gestapo.

I mean, seriously. As a psychologist, what would you think of a patient who comes to you claiming that his public comments are being “obsessively scrutinized” –apparently with Nazi-like efficiency and fervor — for typos and grammatical slips, but can only show postings in which he himself corrects such errors?

Dan, it is not that I can’t show postings beyond those of my own that represent obsessive corrections. It was awhile back and it would be very time-consuming to do a search. The person who offered these obsessive corrections, knows who they are and knows that I am not exaggerating or otherwise delusional in my perceptions. I am frankly have better things to do with my time. If you want to conclude that my claim is baseless, I am fine with that. If you want me to apologize for the Spelling Gestapo reference, I will do so.

I don’t want you to apologize. I can’t make you do anything, but I would prefer you either just corrected your errors or ignored them, but didn’t keep harping on how someone is (or was at some point) persecuting you for them. The “poor poor pitiful me” routine is mostly just annoying, and frankly, I think it detracts from whatever point it is you might be trying to make in any given post.

You’ve left yourself wide open, Dan, what can I say? Actually, there is a great deal I could say in response to your response, but it would mean taking my job with me to “Sadly, no!” when I really should leave it at the door. And it would involve applying my training as a psychologist to a person who is not my patient—clearly an action that would raise legitimate ethical issues. So I will let your characterization of me as someone seeking pity to go unanswered. Let the chips fall where they may. As far as your advice on the spelling errors, I think I will take it. I’m already regarded by at least a vocal minority at this site as a bad singer, a shameless self-promoter, an arrogant narcissist, and a seeker of pity, so I suppose adding bad speller to the list won’t hurt.

I think Dan’s complaint about the use of the phrase “spelling gestapo” is horseshit.

According to Bob Woodward of The Washington Post, then Secretary of State Powell called Feith’s operation the “Gestapo office.” Perhaps you should go after him for anti-semitism too, Dan.

Rowan, where did I use the term “anti-semitism”? All I said was that the phrase “Spelling Gestapo” could be viewed as a trivialization of the Holocaust. I might say the same thing about Colin Powell’s comment. It’s not about anti-semitism, it’s about the modern propensity to thoughtless flippancy about real tragedies.

No, it’s about the fetishisation by you of what is merely one human catastrophe among many. It is not at all difficult to find examples of military actions in the last century which have killed more people than your precious ‘holocaust’.

“Fetishisation”? “Precious”? Oh, right, I forgot; the Holocaust was no big deal. I mean, really, there’s nothing special about a world power’s policy decision to exterminate an entire ethnic population worldwide, and its subsequent mechanization and banalization of the effort. And since it’s just “one human catastrophe among many,” it’s not worth all the remembering and the revulsion and the “Never again.” Heck, the only reason we still remember it at all is because the Jews keep shoving it in our faces, right?

“The only reason we still remember it at all is because the Jews keep shoving it in our faces, right?”
Umm, Hell yeah that’s why.

How many times do I have to hear the story about numerous people who first died at Auschwitz, (Oah, it was terrible, jowst awful) then magically rose from the dead to move to New York and Televiv.

I think this Darr fellow is a son of a “survivor”. Shouldn’t you be gathering round him and waiting to his every need?

Individualism is a cult.

You’re not helping your cause any by trivializing the genocide at Auschwitz, Cuban. In fact, I think i could go as far as to say that’s a repulsive argument.

Mass killings should never be taken lightly.

How many times do I have to hear the story about numerous people who first died at Auschwitz, (Oah, it was terrible, jowst awful) then magically rose from the dead to move to New York and Televiv.

Well, I don’t know. Maybe as many times as that lie can be told.