Category Archives: Random Blogging

Take the Sin Survey

Mississippi has passed one of those “religious freedom” bills, protecting the right of merchants who are “people of faith” to refuse service to members of the public whose identities/behaviors offend their tender religious sensibilities. (Translation: gay people.)

In response, a guy named Mitchell Moore, who owns Campbell’s Bakery, started an anti-discrimination campaign, and from the looks of it, he and many other business owners are having some fun with it.

Initially, the campaign created a large window decal proclaiming “We don’t discriminate: If you’re buying, we’re selling.” The decal proved popular with Mississippi businesspeople who remembered that they were in business. Now, Moore has produced a tongue-in-cheek “potential Campbell’s customer survey,” an online list of yes-or-no questions, complete with Biblical references:

Unbelievable as it may seem, some people took the survey literally–prompting Mr. Moore to post the following message to the Bakery’s Facebook page:

The “Potential Customer Questionnaire” is just a spoof folks. There are some people saying that my bakery shouldn’t serve certain people. I think that is RIDICULOUS. We are a business open to the public. The Public includes a TON of people I disagree with. If I only limited selling to people who aren’t sinners I couldn’t even eat my own food. We will sell our product to the public, to sinners, to people we disagree with, to anyone who loves Made From Scratch goods and wants to buy them. That is what we are in business to do.

Wow. Someone who knows the difference between a business and and a church, and actually wants to encourage people to buy his goods! Who’d have thought?

If they aren’t careful, Mr. Moore and his fellow campaigners will give Mississippi a good name.

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Because If We Ignore It, It Won’t Happen

It’s magic.

Hear no science, see no science, acknowledge no science…

“The North Carolina Coastal Resources Commission has found a solution to the political impasse posed by the conflict between science, which predicts the acceleration of sea level rise as the glaciers of western Antarctica collapse into the Southern Ocean, and Republican, money-driven politics tied to coastal development. The Coastal Commission voted to ignore long-term sea level rise.

The Commission voted, with one lone dissent, to limit the period of consideration of sea level rise to 30 years. Keeping the period to 30 years allowed the Commission to avoid considering the consequences of the collapse of west Antarctic glaciers, the speed up of the melting of Greenland’s ice cap and the slowing of the Gulf Stream. This vote will end the conflict between the Republican dominated state legislature and the Commission that happened in 2010 when the Commission’s panel of experts predicted as much as 5 feet of sea level rise by 2100. The legislature rejected that report and prohibited state and local government offices from considering the possibility that sea level rise would accelerate.”

See–wasn’t that easy?

I know Pat Sajak would approve.

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We Don’t Need No Stinkin’ Ethics

CNN recently ran an illuminating article about Indiana Congressman Todd Young. 

In 2012, Young, a member of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, claimed a house in Bloomington was his primary residence and deducted more than $200,000 from his property taxes – saving himself almost $5,000. Turns out, Young was renting the property, not living in it, according to documents obtained by CNN.

Young apologized for what he insisted was a “mistake”–although knowing whether you rent a property ought not be too complicated for a Congressman who sits on a committee writing tax laws. The County Treasurer disputes the “mistake” excuse:

Monroe County Treasurer Catherine Smith said that when Young was in her office in 2012 (paying $4,000 for 2011’s back taxes), she gave him the opportunity to update his records and remove the homestead deduction from the property, but he didn’t.

“It’s homestead fraud. He knew the state law,” the Democratic treasurer said. “A man that makes (a salary) from tax money should be held accountable for his own taxes.”

Smith was already frustrated that the check Young used to pay the $4,000 in back taxes bounced.

Well, yes, I can see how that might be frustrating…

Can we please start electing people who aren’t a complete and total embarrassment?

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Teaching Creationism

Creationism is a religious belief. It can be taught in classes on comparative religion, or in courses on the history of science, but it can’t be taught as science. 

Recently, I stumbled on a blog post that says it better than I ever could. The blogger quoted a Congressman who is running for the Senate in Montana–and who clearly has no freaking idea what a scientific theory is— saying “teach students that there are evolutionary theories, there’s intelligent-design theories, and allow the students to make up their minds.”

And presumably they can also decide for themselves whether the earth goes around the sun…or

We can believe that the earth is balanced on the back of a giant space turtle. After we go to space and take pictures that show no turtle there, however, we can no longer “believe” that with any credibility. We don’t (most of us) suggest that the turtle is simply invisible. We don’t (most of us) say that the turtle only exists when nobody is looking at it. We don’t (most of us) suggest that scientists have spirited the turtle away because they don’t want us to know the truth about the giant space turtle, or that they are involved in the lucrative cash business of pretending there are no turtles in places that there are turtles. We don’t (most of us) do that.

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So we’ve got yet another actual maker of our laws and decider of the rules of our civilization saying that the space turtle theory must be taught, because while there is no actual evidence of the space turtle so far, students whose parents believe in the space turtle must not just be accommodated or treated politely, but given public validation, under rule of law.

We are so screwed.

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Dr. Faustus, I Presume?

The term, “Faustian bargain” refers to the deal struck between Goethe’s Dr. Faust and the devil: the devil will do everything that Faust wants while he is alive, and in exchange Faust will serve the devil in Hell. (See also: selling one’s soul.)

Since the GOP’s capture by its extreme fringe, moderate Republicans have had to decide whether to leave office (Olympia Snowe), leave the party (Charlie Crist et al), stay and argue for moderate policies and risk losing to a True Believer (Dick Lugar et al) or accept the Faustian bargain by falling in line with the Tea Party agenda.

Indiana Representative Susan Brooks has fallen in line.

I knew Susan for over 25 years as an intelligent and reasonable individual. Then she ran for Congress, portraying herself as a far-Right conservative. Those of us who knew the more moderate incarnation chalked that up to a primary in which the candidates were trying to out-conservative each other, and assumed that once elected, she would be the moderately conservative person we’d known, but the new, partisan Susan Brooks has proved more durable–and disappointing.

In Congress, her party-line voting record has been so extreme, it’s earned her a 92% approval from Concerned Women for America–and you can’t get much crazier than CWA.

Now, she’s joined the “Select Committee” that will be investigating Benghazi for the 14th time.

The Washington Post’s Richard Cohen–a frequent critic of the Obama Administration–noted his bemusement over the GOP’s obsession with Benghazi.

I recognize it as a transparent Republican attempt to provide the party’s base with grist for its fantasy mill. Is it possible the Obama administration fudged the nature of the attack, refusing to apply the term “terrorist”? Yes, of course. Did the White House spinmeisters put their hands all over it? Could be. But is any of this so momentous that it has required 13 public hearings and now a select House committee that will delve and delve feverishly — for what?

Sometimes you have to choose: sell your soul to appease a rabid base, or refuse to play that game.

Congresswoman Brooks has clearly made her choice.

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