Two-Minute Townhall
In a perfect world where everyone is equal, I’d still own the film rights and be working on the sequel.
Shorter Michael Medved: Does Israel have the right to exist? Based on my reading of Judeo-Christian and Western texts, the answer is yes.
Shorter Ben Shapiro: Being Jewish is no defense against charges of anti-Semitism.
Shorter Walter Williams: There is absolutely no constitutional authority for this disgusting abuse of federal power. But most Americans, who – Do what now? Signing statements? Warrantless wiretaps? FISA who? Calm down, my good man, I was talking about Internet gambling.
Shorter Jay Sekulow: Now is no time to let the UN ambassador position go unfilled. That is why the Senate must immediately confirm John Bolton.
Shorter Paul Weyrich: Will New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg run for president? You never know!
Shorter Donald Lambro: I urge Democrats to pander to their pro-war minority or risk alienating some voters with a political debate.
Shorter Jacob Sullum: As a libertarian, I wonder if Chinese and Iranian dissidents worry that Americans have given away too easily our right to smoke pot and gamble online.
Shorter Michelle Malkin: Based on some available evidence, the anti-war left wishes to assassinate the president, put teenagers into comas and beat up Jews in the park. (Would that they’d do the same to our Muslim foes.)
Shorter John Stossel: What’s a sample size?
Shorter Bill Bennett: The United States will allow fledgling Middle Eastern democracies to rule themselves once they start turning in results we like.
Shorter Linda Chavez: It’ll be pretty hard to run the public school system if all the teachers get fired for being incompetent.
Shorter Terence Jeffrey: Congress should set about stripping the Supreme Court of its jurisdiction, issue by issue.
Shorter Tony Blankley: The war on terror has been insufficiently advertised; it is, after all, a war against Islam.
Shorter Roger Schlesinger: I used to think earnings determined pricing for a mortgage loan. Boy has things changed!
Shorter Paul Greenberg: The former lieutenant governor of Arkansas, Win Rockefeller, has died. Heckuva guy, heckuva guy.
Shorter William F. Buckley: I just might abandon my independent status, register as a Democrat and vote for Joe Lieberman – who certainly is no friend to the Republican Party. After all, he asked Bill Clinton to campaign for him. And Clinton did it!
Shorter Maggie Gallagher: The world’s a mess, and Democrats are running around discussing plans to fix it. As if!
Shorter John McCaslin: Perhaps you might find these news items of some interest.
Shorter Mike S. Adams: For most of history, the Bible was the most advanced scientific text in existence. Take that, scientists!
What’s a sample size?
John Stossel’s entire career in four little words. Well done!
Jacob Sullum is a liberarian? What liberary does he work at?
Uh, check out this comment under Tony Blankley’s column…
“Russia lurks and smirks the commie smile
and seems to love the evil terror puppets works.
China wines and dines as the evil puppets dance
and with the ever so soft asian voice whispers
“America look over there” its the loon who flys
down North Korea way, its not we who puts the
rockets in the terror pockets.
Iran lives only for August 22 and awaits the evil dozen’s return and does claim “all” evil
puppets of terror as their own.
Now why might you ask do the leaders of America act as if they too can dance the puppet dance,
well could be they too have heads of wood,
We real Americans on the “other hand” are real
boys and girls and just not able to do the puppet dance.
There are two choices for the ones of terror
prison or the cemetery, any thing else is a waste of innocent life and just plain wrong.
thus spoke the real ones”
The title, by the way, seems to be “Fingers who work Puppets.”
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/TonyBlankley/2006/07/26/just_another_coincidence&Comments=true#comments
“But I suspect the biggest reason is that the editors just don’t like capitalism and free markets.”
Stossel should just use that line for every story because, basically, that is all he ever concludes. It is just some vast conspiracy against capitalism and free markets which are behind the “problems” with education/climate/marriage/Katrina/etc. .
Er….Mike, in the Buybull burning bushes talk, so do donkeys and snakes, people ride flaming chariots to heaven, bones of the dead rise to form an army, rabbits chew the cud, whales are a kind of fish while bats are a kind of bird, pi is 3.0…I could go on. Clearly we are dealing with a stunning scientific work.
For Jews who oppose Israel’s right to defend herself, their Judaism is a convenient tactic utilized to silence critics.
…
It is a foul and rank political convenience for those who care nothing about Judaism to flout their Jewish birth as some kind of defense for their cowardly and foolish surrender-first ideals.
Take that, Satmar Hasidim, Neturei Karta and True Torah Jews! Now there’s a bunch of self-hating Jews who care nothing about Judaism…
As happy as I am to see VBen back, he was better when he was writing about all the sex he is not having.
Shorter Ben Shapiro: Being Jewish is no defense against charges of anti-Semitism.
Krusty: “I thought I was a self-hating Jew, but it turns out I’m just a plain old anti-Semite!”.
Wolfcastle:”We have so much to discuss.”.
Oh. My. God.
On a whim I decided to actually read some of the original articles. Why? I have no idea. The SN version is pretty acurate and doesn’t make me pound my head on the desk.
It is kind of like someone saying “this tastes like crap…taste it” and actually tasting it only to realize that yes, it is crap.
We real Americans on the “other hand� are real
boys and girls and just not able to do the puppet dance.
Why the scare quotes on “other hand”? I just don’t get modern poetry.
I was wondering about the scare quotes myself. It looks inappropriate, like when you see a billboard in East Texas that advertises “‘genuine’ apple pie” or “‘friendly’ service,” thus implying that the pie is made of wax or that the waitress is going to slit your throat, respectively.
Lucy said: Jacob Sullum is a liberarian? What liberary does he work at?
Fixed it, smarty-pants. On the other hand, the grammar in the Roger Schlesinger one is a direct quote. I thought “sic” would ruin the effect.
Oh, and BarrettBrown, that poem is creepy as hell. It reminds me of something the cops find at the scene of a multiple homicide. Yikes.
Leviticus 17:11 says, “For the life of the body is in its blood. I have given you the blood on the altar to purify you, making you right with the Lord. It is the blood, given in exchange for a life that makes purification possible.� For centuries after these words were written by Moses the scientists were bleeding the sick with leeches. How much better would humanity have fared, had these scientists listened to the Word of God?
Shorter Mike Adams: What’s a metaphor?
Travis G.,
How in the hell can you read all that bs? I looked at a couple and am really curious as to whether you puke or have bleeding ulcers. What is it?
what??? no shorter Hugh Hewitt?
oh, never mind, he’s short enough. I mean,
for a man of his height, he’s so awfully
small.
Oh, and BarrettBrown, that poem is creepy as hell. It reminds me of something the cops find at the scene of a multiple homicide. Yikes.
Either that, or Swank’s taken up poetry:
its the loon who flys
down North Korea way, its not we who puts the
rockets in the terror pockets.
Scientists once thought the earth was flat. Had they read the great prophet Isaiah, they would have learned much earlier about the “circle of the earth.�
Umm, circles aren’t flat?
Someday soon the mathematicians will admit that pi is eaxctly equal to 3 like the Bible says.
Be honest – did one of you guys write Mike S. Adams’ entire column for him as a Townhall parody?
It is kind of like someone saying “this tastes like crap…taste it� and actually tasting it only to realize that yes, it is crap.
Just like in the new Get Yer War On…
I’d be worried about it if I didn’t think President Bush’s skillful leadership would help resolve the situation peacefully and fairly. Wait… is that bullshit I taste in my mouth?
Travis-
I forgot to add that the guy’s SN is “taxfreekiller.” Maybe they’ll find Code Red at the crime scene.
Mike Adam is right. Scientist have only recently found out that bats are birds like the Bible says.
Hammurabi’s Code also mentions “life-blood,” so I think we can say that one predates Moses. In fact I’d be surprised if all of the examples he gives weren’t more widespread than he intends us to think, and furthermore that he is full of beans. 1100 stars? Beans.
I know it’s cliche’ by now but keep an eye on that Day By Day comic. The masterful art and wordplay in this one is instantly obvious to anyone but a liberal: http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2006/07/07/
For Jews who oppose Israel’s right to defend herself, their Judaism is a convenient tactic utilized to silence critics.
I like the “convenient tactic”. These opponents of Israel’s responses used to be gentile, you know. They actually converted to Judaism in a tactical move to deflect criticism. Like women who arranged to have their husbands die in the WTC, simply to elevate themselves to the moral high ground when they later became opponents of war. People are tricky like that.
Shapiro sez: Being born Jewish says nothing about whether you care for Israel, because being a Jew is about more than emerging from a Jewish uterus
Um . . . no, that . . . that’s exactly the definition of being Jewish, more or less.
Adams sez: The assertion that the Bible was “written and edited by still unknown authors� is not terribly important . . . For centuries after these words were written by Moses . . .
Um . . . but Moses didn’t . . . that is, the authorship of . . . oh, never mind.
As for “astrophysicist Hugh Ross,” he’s an evolution-denying loon.
ohmigod, Mike A deserves his own column for this friggin doozy. I believe his examples require ancient ‘scientists’ (who?) to not know about:
1)dust devils or waterspouts (cyclonic winds)
2)shadows (what happens when light is interrupted in its “travels”)
3)that there are more than 1100 stars. I’d love to see Mikey cite that someplace, Im pretty sure I can see more than that from out in the country at night, and our ancentors weren’t *completely fucking retarded*. They may have named only 1100, but I can only imagine that that gets boring after the first thousand or so.
In other news, no one has explained to Mike that circles are flat (ie circle does not equal sphere). And he teaches? At a university?
I just read the Mike S. Adams article – what a twit that guy is. I mean, the ancient Greeks knew that the world was round (and were aware of most of the other bits of biblical science the article mentions), and I’m going to go out on a limb here and suggest that they probably didn’t get the info from the Bible.
Ouch! Mike Adams’s column really is as stupid as the shorter version! I couldn’t believe that it really was and so I went and read it and….. it really is. Really. It makes my head hurt.
For millenia, learned people knew the earth was not flat. Whenver some fundie (or anyone else) says “scientists used to think the earth was flat” in order to prove the fallibility of scientists just make them prove it. Because they didn’t.
I have to go lie down in a quiet dark room for a while.
It reminds me of something the cops find at the scene of a multiple homicide. Yikes.
So one time, maybe fifteen or so years ago, I wrote this parody of the Raindrops on Roses “My Favorite Things” Disney song, where essentially my favorite things were weapons, explosives, drugs and porn (reality-based, dontcha know). Well, for reasons unknown this song parody, written on a scrap of paper, ends up in the trunk of my car. So one night, I’m kinda strung out and this japanese kid said something and I dusted him. So the cops come. I mouth off and bam! I’m cuffed and searched. What a surprise, they find some things in my possesion I kinda wish they hadn’t. So on our way to the can, they stop off and search my car. Whatever, right? To my surprise, at my trial, they introduce this song parody as evidence that I’m a violent psychotic. They kind of presented it that same way, like I’d left it at a heinous crime scene.
Backfired on ’em. The judge thought it was hilarious and it actually worked to my advantage. But in my FOIA package is a redacted version of that same parody. I’m sure it will come back again to haunt me…
mikey
You’d think that the other Clownhall “writers” would have lynched and hanged Jacob Sullum for mentioning “The Evil Weed” in his article.
Sadly, the Robert Schelsinger article isn’t totally loopy. Just a bland advertisement for his mortgage company website.
The Mike S. Adams article is a true winner when he refers to “astrophysicist Hugh Ross”. Nothing like wingers using other wingers as references.
Well I’ll be damned! (I guess I already am. My wife and in-laws think I’m goingto hell), Hugh Ross really IS an astrophysicist. BS in Physics from U of British Columbia and PhD in Astronomy from U of Toronto.
He’s published actual, real scientific articles on galactic radio frequencies back in the seventies.
He’s a winger all right. But the nutty creationist folks at Answers in Genesis disavow him. Creationist catfight!
Well, I don’t know about the rest of you, but I can’t stop writing “Mrs. Prof. Dr. Mike S. Dr. Adams Ph.D.” over and over again in cursive on my Trapper Keeper.
I can’t help it. He’s just so dreamy!
In other news, no one has explained to Mike that circles are flat (ie circle does not equal sphere). And he teaches? At a university?
He teaches criminology at UNC-Wilmington.
This, using wingnot logic, makes him qualified to speak at length on the Bible and on science. Using real logic, he’s a tool who works at the lesser end of the UNC gene pool.
“I was wondering about the scare quotes myself. It looks inappropriate, like when you see a billboard in East Texas that advertises “‘genuine’ apple pieâ€? or “‘friendly’ service,â€? thus implying that the pie is made of wax or that the waitress is going to slit your throat, respectively. “
Actually, quotation marks can be used to denote slang or any other kind of non-literal speech.
It’s used to indicate that there isn’t literally something on an actual alternative hand somewhere.
It’s a fairly archaic usage, and it tends to make your speech seem overly formal, but it’s still alegitimate use.
Adams’ colum is astonishingly moronic, even for him. Why on earth would you assume that “Circle” means “sphere”?
I can’t believe this guy teaches. I mean, I know you can compartmentalise your stupidity, but a person who doesn’t think there’s such a thing as a flat circle kind of scares me a little.
I love that he thinks we atheists haven’t heard this stuff before and will be shocked into silence, though.
The Adams column isn’t only totally moronic (I can’t even be bothered to list the ways), it doesn’t actually appear to be original.
Hint: Google the phrase “1100 stars” in quotes, and see what shows up. The basis for his column appears to have been floating around in fundie circles for quite some time…
PS – there is actually some basis for the claim that it was at one time thought that there were only about 1100 stars. That estimate is due to Ptolemy. However, how Adams manages this conclusion is beyond me:
ahem. From where does one get “closer to a billion” from the quoted passage? All it’s doing is reporting the vastness of the number of stars, something that would be very apparent to anybody in that era without the incumbrance of street lights. People of that time would probably think 1100 to be quite a lot…
ALERT: We have Marie Jon’. Repeat, we have Rie Jon’.
I wrote this parody of the Raindrops on Roses “My Favorite Things� Disney song, where essentially my favorite things were weapons, explosives, drugs and porn (reality-based, dontcha know).
So what are you waiting for, Mikey? Upload a copy already!
Glad to see Dr Adams puffing the work of Hugh Ross, author of Lights in the Sky & Little Green Men, an expose on why aliens are really demons. I have more here.
All I can say after reading the Mike Adams column is … wow.
“Dr” “Mike” “S.” “Adams” once tried to count all the stars and got to a bazillion and twenty eleven before his mom threatened to turn the hose on him if he didn’t come in and finish his homeswork.
Ptolemy catalogued the magnitude stars he could see from his home, which was 1022. That doesn’t mean he thought that was all the stars there were, and in fact he knew there were stars to the South he couldn’t see, as did other northern hemisphere star charters. Plus there are several texts before or contemporaneous with Jeremiah’s using “countless” in referring to the stars, so I still say Dr Professor Mike is full of beans, and not the good kind.
The magnitude of the number of stars… sheesh. Me good speking Engrish.
God damn! That Mike Adams piece is a laugh riot.
For example, the fact that scholars can’t agree on who wrote the Book of Hebrews—they generally agree on the authorship of all other Books of the New Testament—is hardly a sticking point for non-believers.
“scholars” here means “theologians”. Historians, anthropologists and archaeologists do not even claim to know who wrote the Torah (easy answer: Moses. Hard answer: At least four different sources).
Astrophysicist Hugh Ross
Let’s clarify here, Astrophysicist and pastor Hugh Ross.
How much better would humanity have fared, had these scientists listened to the Word of God?
Huh? It is only in hindsight that you can make such a deduction from such a nebulous statement. One could just as easily argue that it states living sacrifices must be made in order to promote health.
Long after these words were written, scientists maintained the primitive view that air is weightless. Eventually they caught up to the Bible and realized that air has weight.
Uh, the line was about “wind”. The weight of wind is the pressure you feel when it blows against you. Did people not experience this phenomenon back then or is this just stupid?
When God asked these questions of Job, he was letting him in on the secret that light actually travels. It would take the scientists many years to figure that one out without the guidance of the Holy Scriptures.
Yea, if we just listened to scripture we’d know the speed of dark!
Long after Solomon shared the truth that the wind blows in cyclones, the backward scientists were still claiming that it blew straight. They should have listened to Solomon. He was a very wise man.
Number one, most scholars – even theologians – recognize Ecclesiastes as a pseudepigraphical work written well after Solomon died. Number two, who are these ancient straw-men of whom he speaks who never saw a dust devil?
Scientists once thought the earth was flat. Had they read the great prophet Isaiah, they would have learned much earlier about the “circle of the earth.�
Is this dolt really basing his argument on a total lack of understanding of the dimensionality of a circle? Hey Mike, here’s a clue: circles are flat. Spheres are round.
Oh, and additionally… Pythagoras claimed the Earth was spherical long before Isaiah was written. And Eratosthenes made a damn fine measurement of the circumfrance about the same time as Isaiah was composed.
The scientists believed there were only 1100 stars long after Jeremiah knew there were a closer to a billion.
Too bad the number is closer to 10^21 not 10^9. God was only a few orders of magnitude off…
I suspect that many of those who see me as a backwards (or back woods) fundamentalist will be shocked to read the passages in this short column.
No, not a bit.
That’s because, until now, most of them have been too narrow-minded to take the time to read the Bible.
As oppossed to too stupid to do a quick google of the number of stars in the universe?
As I close in on my eighth reading of the Bible I am now well aware that it is hardly an impediment to rational thought and human progress.
Yes. Yes it is.
tigrismus,
certainly agree that Professor Mike is full of, well, “beans” if you like… I wouldn’t be quite so polite myself. But whatever 😉
My understanding is that the 1100 number includes a correction from Ptolemy’s actual catalog of 1022 taking into account the part of the sky he wasn’t able to see.
However, where I part company from Mike is in saying that that number is somehow at odds with the “countless” description that appears in the baaable and elsewhere. It’s a pretty trivial and obvious observation to make – the number of stars visible in a dark sky such as would have been visible to the ancients is indeed more than anybody could possibly count in a reasonable period. 1022 or 1100 is in fact a very large number of stars to count and catalog, and would certainly be beyond anybody but the most determined, and could only be made over a very long period of observing.
Mike is just pulling stuff out of his ass in asserting that the “countless” description necessarily implies “closer to a billion”. Asserting that describing the number of stars in the sky as “countless” is somehow stupefyingly insightful – to the point of implying divine inspiration – is bullshit.
Aha! But, you see, this only reveals the true genius of the Bible in its prophecy. See, for instance, Genesis 44:12:
See? If those stupid scientists would have read the Bible, Google would have been invented 2000 years ago!
I know we’re both arguing the same thing (I think Adams is wrong! No, I think Adams is wrong!) and you are right about Ptolemy, but even the corrected-to-the-equator number doesn’t show what Adams is claiming it shows, namely that Ptolemy et alia believed that was the total number of stars, that they were sure there were no more below the threshhold of their vision. To be perfectly blunt, I think Adams is wrong!
Hey! Where’s my Shorter Kathleen Parker? Huh? Huh? TraVIS!!!! You know I can’t go over there. You’re just being mean. Is she ill? Or did she just not get male permission to write her drivel this time? Or perhaps she’s being punished. She did almost actually say something concrete the other day.
medved says that israel is ok because it isn’t doing anything to the arabs that the english colonists and the u.s. didn’t do to the american indians?????
but, but…. he can’t be serious. he does think that what we did to the american indians was *bad* doesn’t he?
“medved says that israel is ok because it isn’t doing anything to the arabs that the english colonists and the u.s. didn’t do to the american indians?????”
So… Isreal is breaking it’s treaties with Lebanon? Or selling them small-pox infested blankets?
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