You are currently browsing the monthly archive for September 2010.
Media lens is currently calling another Independent reporter on their uncritical treatment of Tony Blair and his sentiments toward the Palestinians. Go to the Media Lens website for the entire deconstruction.
A snippet from John Pilger caught my attention, I will repost it here:
In similar vein, Macintyre made a cryptic reference in his article to the “tragically abortive peace talks at Camp David in 2000”. This “tragic” episode is “Israel’s most important contemporary myth”, John Pilger writes. The myth states that Ehud Barak offered the Palestinians the return of “90 per cent” of the Occupied Territories and that Yasser Arafat turned him down. Arafat’s alleged rejection of this “unprecedented act of generosity”, to quote the myth once again, became the launch pad for renewed abuse of the Palestinians, including the building of an apartheid wall.
Pilger writes of the peace talks in 2000:
“There was no ’90 per cent’ offer. At Camp David, Barak promised a token military withdrawal from no more than 12 per cent of the Occupied Territories. He also made it clear that Israel had no intention of giving back any part of Greater Jerusalem, which covers some of the best Palestinian land and is the administrative and cultural heart of Palestine. Most of the illegal settlements, which controlled 42 per cent of the West Bank and Gaza, would stay, leaving the Palestinians with fragments of their original homeland, or 15 per cent of pre-Israel Palestine.” (John Pilger, Freedom Next Time, Bantam Press, London, 2006, pp. 107-108)
“In practice,” wrote Barak’s chief negotiator at Camp David, Shlomo Ben-Ami, before taking up his negotiator’s role, “the Oslo agreements were founded on a neo-colonialist basis, on a life of dependence of one on the other forever.” (Quoted, Pilger, ibid.)
It is nice to see we are giving the Palestinians a fair shake with our obvious generosity.
I am going to use the discussion points found on RichardDawkins.net as the basis of this feature.
Calilasseia is the author of the post and deserves many rich accolades for assembling so much useful information in one spot. This constitutes an open thread of sorts, please leave your opinions and observations in the comment section.
[16] The “evolution is a belief” nonsense.
At this point, it should be sufficient for me to point to [2], [4] and [6] above, and tell those entertaining this fatuous idea to go and learn something. However, I suspect that the attention span of the typical creationist is such that a reminder is needed at this point. And that reminder is now forthcoming.
When scientists provide hard evidence supporting their postulates, in the form of direct empirical tests of the validity of those postulates, “belief” is superfluous to requirements and irrelevant. This has happened time and time and time again in evolutionary biology, and once more, if you can’t be bothered to read the actual scientific papers in question in order to learn this, then you are in no position to critique a theory that has been subject to more thorough critical scrutiny than you can even imagine is possible. Oh, and as an indication of the size of the task ahead of you, if you think you’re hard enough to dismiss the scientific evidence on a case by case basis, you have over a million scientific papers to peruse that have been published in the past 150 years. Be advised that tossing one paper into the bin isn’t enough, you have to toss ALL of them into the bin. Good luck on that one.
Just in case this hasn’t registered here, the critical thinkers regard belief itself as intellectually invalid. If you have to ask why, then again, you are in need of an education, and badly.
As a corollary of the above, I now turn my attention to:
[17] “You only believe in evolution because you hate god”.
Anyone posting this particular piece of drivel, and make no mistake, it IS drivel, is quite frankly beneath deserving of a point of view. Erectors of this sub-amoeboid, cretinous, verminous, pestilential and thoroughly decerebrate cortical faeces are not considered to be worth the small amount of effort required to treat them with utter disdain, let alone the greater effort required to subject them to actual contempt.
Aside from the fact that I have dealt with the “belief” bullshit in [16] above, and aside from the fact that I’ve dealt with the complete failure of supernaturalists to provide any evidence for their pet magic man back in [1] above (yes, you need a proper attention span if you’re going to engage in debate here), and as a corollary of this latter point, we’d like to know how one can “hate” an entity whose very existence has only ever been supported by vacuous apologetics instead of genuine evidence, this particular favourite meme of creationists is singularly retarded because it misses the whole point by several thousand light years. Allow me to remind you all once again, first that the critical thinkers do not regard “belief” as intellectually valid full stop, and that the critical thinkers accept the validity of evolution because REALITY supports it. THAT is what counts here, because it is what counts in professional scientific circles. You can whinge, moan, bitch and bleat all you like with respect to this moronic canard, but be advised that people who paid attention in classes at school regard this canard as one of the most utterly spastic pieces of apologetics in existence, and given the fulminating level of stupidity that has emanated from apologetics over the years, this makes the above canard rather special.
While we’re at it, let’s deal with one polemical argument that was presented to me recently, and one which is again entirely specious. Namely, the argument that evolutionary theory was erected “to kill off the idea of a creator”. Er, no it wasn’t. Anyone who follows the actual history of the development of evolutionary theory will know that it was erected to provide an explanation for observed biodiversity, and to provide an explanation for observed dynamic change in populations of living organisms. I know that creationists love to erect specious doctrine-centred arguments such as this (which dovetails with the doctrine-centred thinking and specious apologetics covered in [15] above), but such specious doctrine-centred arguments are, not to put too fine a point on it, blatant lies. Just because creationists can’t accept that someone might alight upon a view of the world that doesn’t rely upon doctrinal presuppositions doesn’t mean that such a view cannot exist. But then, the entire creationist argument consists of asserting that the world conforms to their ignorant wishful thinking, so it’s no surprise that they adopt the same view with respect to the development of scientific theories. So, if you erect any of the “you hate god” or other specious polemical pseudo-arguments here, be prepared to endure much mockery for doing so, especially if you do so after being directed here and told to learn from this.
The infidels are swarming in the middle east. Measures must be taken to combat this outbreak of critical thought and rationality. Fortunately brothers (any sisters present get out now, double shame if you’re not barefoot and burqa’d) action is being taken.
“CAIRO – Egypt’s most prominent democracy advocate accused President Hosni Mubarak’s government Saturday of posting Facebook photos of his daughter in swimsuits and at events where alcohol was served in an attempt to discredit him.
Keep your eyes on this 'atheist'!
Mohammed ElBaradei, the Nobel Peace Prize winner and former U.N. nuclear chief, was quoted in the independent Al-Dustour newspaper as saying the government is “waging a campaign of sheer lies” by using the photos to portray him and his family as nonbelievers — a politically damaging accusation in an increasingly conservative Muslim country.
We have the infidels, women in public with bathing suits and even a greater sin, dare I say it? Alcohol. Warm up your stoning arms people.
“The more than 30 photos were posted under the title: “Secrets of 
the ElBaradei family.” Some show his daughter in swimsuits at the beach and sitting at events in front of what appeared to be bottles of alcohol. Drinking is forbidden in Islam and conservative Muslims would generally consider a woman appearing publicly in a bathing suit to be immodest.”
The scandal. It is shocking. Truly shocking.
“ElBaradei has drawn the government’s anger with a campaign he started early this year boldly calling for electoral reform and constitutional amendments that would allow a credible candidate to challenge the ruling party in next year’s presidential election.
Respected internationally and untouched by the corruption tainting much of Egypt’s regime, ElBaradei brought together a coalition of young activists and opposition groups to push for change.”
Yes! We shall smear this activist for opposing our regime. There may be a few rotten apples in the barrel of the Egyptian government, overall we are a transparent, open democracy.
“The Facebook site also says his daughter is married to a Christian and shows an image of what it purports is her real profile from the social networking site listing her religious status as agnostic.
The Facebook site also accuses ElBaradei himself of being an atheist and of seeking to deceive Egyptians by touring mosques and being photographed praying.”
The forces of freedom in action.
We saved the best for last a double hit! ElBaradei’s daughter is married to a Christian and ElBaradei himself is an atheist!
Checkmate brothers! We have ferreted out this unbeliever in our midst, he claims he wants responsible government by the people, but we have exposed him. He wants to take our gods away and we all know the sinful immorality that will follow once that happens.
Never fear though brothers we shall keep reason safely at arms length! Allah Ackbar!
Hollywood is stupid. The hype, the banal trysts, the obscene amount of media attention garnered. If it all evaporated mysteriously overnight, it would be no great loss to humanity.
What is good though is some of the off-beat weird films that get produced around the fringes of the Hollywood fail machine.
Would anyone lives be the same after seeing such awesomeness as Jesus Christ:Vampire Slayer? Or Sukiyaki Western Django or The Good The Bad and the Weird? Probably not. Let me be clear, I’m not recommending any of these titles to anyone, they are all cheezy schmaltz, but if you want something that is not H-wood approved, these titles would not be a bad place to start.
Any other oddball picks you can recommend? Leave them in the comments. :)
The links between the Tea Party and scripture were hazy and undefined. Mr.Current does a wonderful job of illuminating the connections and bringing enlightenment to all.
Fighting the Russians in the Arctic WTG Steve!
Newsflash(?): Many of Steven Harper’s Policies are based on ideology and not fact.
Wow, way to go Libs. You finally caught a whiff of the conservative miasma that has engulfed our country. Where do you stake your claim? Draw your line in the sand? Where do you make your stand and bellicosely shout “You shall not pass!” The systemic underfunding of women’s groups? The overspending glut and fake lake of the G8 summit spending? Not funding abortions in the third world? Nope.
How about the Long form Census and the Long Firearms Registry. It is on these two ‘important’ issues our principled opposition has brought the noise.
“The Harper government has adopted a deliberate strategy of hiding information from Canadians in order to advance a right-wing social and justice agenda, Liberals charge.
Liberal MP John McCallum pointed Thursday to two recent examples to prove the point: The government’s decision to scrap the mandatory long-form census and its refusal to release a favourable report on the effectiveness of the long-gun registry.
He called the approach “a triumph of ignorance over knowledge, a triumph of ideology over science.”
Those of us who follow our enlightened government have be aware of this small fact for quite awhile. During the election(s) Harper has often been accused of having a ‘hidden-agenda’. I would argue that in has never been hidden from the public, as one can ascertain his policy motives and goals quite easily.
Keeping Canada safe from Unicorns, Dragons and Fairy-Folk too!
The “Tough on Crime” agenda is classical social conservative hogwash and prime example of what Harper and his conservatives are about. Consider, we need more prisons for unreported crimes because our crime rate is falling. it seems that little mistakes like this are not really worth the Oppositions time.
Now what McCallum says is true, but why the onslaught on these particular issues?
“McCallum said the decision to turn the compulsory long-form census into a voluntary survey is “one of the most visible examples of one of the most fundamental shortcomings” of the Harper government.
He said it’s aimed at robbing federal, provincial and municipal governments of the reliable data they need to deliver progressive social programs. It would skew “the picture of what Canada really looks like” because low-income and minority Canadians will be less likely to fill out a voluntary form.”
Makes sense to me. We need to know about our population to best meet its needs.
“McCallum also cited the government’s refusal to release the annual RCMP evaluation of the gun registry’s effectiveness as another example of Harper’s penchant for stifling facts.
Opposition parties maintain the government has been sitting on the report for six months and wants to keep it hidden until after a crucial September vote on Tory backbencher Candice Hoeppner’s private member’s bill to scrap the controversial registry.
According to the CBC, the report concludes the registry is cost-effective, efficient and “an important tool for law enforcement.”
“Clearly the Conservatives want to prevent parliamentarians and Canadians from seeing important information about the cost and effectiveness of the long-gun registry before an important vote,” McCallum said.”
Now again, sitting on bad news is not strictly a conservative phenomena, but the long gun registry has been a contentious issue during election time and that is about it. We are getting much drama for issues that seem to be a low priority for many Canadians.
There is plenty of fodder to roast Harper and his conservatives with, why is the opposition focused on these relatively low key issues? I’m hoping it is part of a bigger strategy that builds on a few small examples and then works it way up the ladder of importance. I’d like to be right about this, but I have my doubts.
bleatmop
Mystro
The Arbourist
Dead Wild Roses 
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