The difference between being crazy and being devout:
Last week I was baking a cake. OK, not really. But it’s a metaphor, so I was. I was baking a cake. I had my recipe laid out in front of me, I had all my ingredients on the table ready to be mixed, and I had gotten permission to use the oven for the next few hours, as my wife doesn’t like me to commandeer the oven for so long without notifying her first. And this is a big important cake, so it takes quite a while to bake.
So I punch a few buttons on the oven to get it preheated to the right temperature. Then I proceed to mix everything together in a huge pan, like the recipe says, and I throw it in the oven. To keep track of how things are going, I watch it closely. But not too closely, because I know that the baking process can be long and arduous, and sometimes ugly. All the heat and the melting of ingredients, fusing together and rising from mere cake batter… it’s bound to get ugly. But I know that it will be nice and pretty when everything is said and done.
Oh, I’m so excited! It’s a blend of chocolate and vanilla, with a few nuts and an ice cream center. I know what you’re thinking, ‘you can’t put ice cream in an oven, it will never work’. But just you watch. It’ll be great.
My significant other, though, doesn’t seem to understand the process. While we’re watching the cake, she keeps pointing out that I must have done something wrong, because the cake batter is sporadically exploding and leaving remnants all over the oven. Sometimes the exploding batter hits the oven window, and obscures our view.
“Do you know what a mess this is going to be to clean up? I’m already having to wipe the batter off the window just so I can see,” she exclaims.
I try to calm her fears, “It’s a long and difficult process for this cake. But there is progress, look how the batter is still rising. This cake will be beautiful when it’s done.”
She keeps bringing it up, every time there is an explosion, no matter how big or small. It begins to get annoying, and I wish she would just leave me alone. Then, she tried to ask me when it was going to be done, but I don’t have time for such trivial matters.
“It’ll be done when it’s done,” I said.
And just as I had predicted, progress continued. The batter continued to rise and eventually plumped up nicely over the edge of the pan. Just enough to where you could tell it was going to be great! The batter had risen, and the doughy center was beginning to form a soft, spongy base. Sure the explosions were becoming more frequent, but I took it as a sign that the cake was succeeding. I mean, the two things were so perfectly correlated, how could anyone deny the connection?
I had the icing out, and I was ready to spread it across the monstrous cake in a celebration of monumental accomplishment.
Then disaster struck… in a manner that no one could have predicted. The center of the cake collapsed, and brought everything else down with it. The chocolate and vanilla separated and you could see the ice cream (now melted 
) spreading across the bottom of the pan. I looked over at my significant other, and I could tell she was doing everything she could to refrain from saying ‘I told you so.’
I thought, for a moment, that maybe this was supposed to happen. Maybe it’s just part of the process. I looked at the recipe again. And lo and behold, the recipe didn’t say anything about it not happening, so we must keep going until the cake is finished. I’m an optimist, by nature. And I’m strong, and resolute. I don’t quit! My job is done when it’s done.
My significant other chimes in
“Uh, maybe we should think about other options or perhaps–”
“Stay the course!” I said.
I didn’t have time for her defeatist nonsense. Stupid quitter! Weak and pessimistic are not the qualities we need in our cooks right now. I have the qualities that are needed to see this cake through to the end and she was really starting to get on my nerves.
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This is absolutely unbelievable to me, but Paula Zahn has managed to do it again - allowing a gratuitously unchecked forum where Christians bash Atheists on CNN. The absolute unabashed bigotry is appalling. The hypocrisy seems to escape these folks.
Note: This video is from the January 31, 2007 edition of Paula Zahn Now, but I felt compelled, however belated, to comment on it anyway.
Notice how the video starts off? Paula Zahn says:
We’re talking about whether there is widespread discrimination against Atheists, folks who don’t believe in God.
She then proceeds to introduce her panel for this “discussion” which includes (wait for it…) three theists! Only one of whom, manages to mildly defend freedom of speech and civil liberties, but makes sure to profess his loyalty to his all-powerful authority figure before doing so.
Karen Hunter begins the discussion by questioning what more atheists could want:
Are we gonna take “In God We Trust” off of our dollars? Are we not gonna say “One nation under God”? When does it end? You know, We took prayer out of schools, what more do they want?
Now, normally, you would expect and unbiased journalist like Paula Zahn ( 
) to correct her panel with the facts. She doesn’t have to present the Atheist point of view, only the facts. You know, like the fact that prayer has not been removed from schools, but forced state-sanctioned prayer has been declared unconstitutional. Karen seems to want to pose the question as if the apparent ridiculousness in her tone is enough to dismiss the entire subject. Not only that, but she acts like Christians did someone a favor by taking “prayer out of schools”. Nevermind the Constitution, the Atheists should be happy that we went along on that one.
Then Debbie Schlussel chimes in with her turn at the misinformation machine:
I think that, um, the real discrimination is Atheists against Americans who are religious. Listen, we are a Christian Nation.
Apparently this “attorney” is not familiar with Article 11 of the unanimously approved Treaty of Tripoli. Instead, she notes that she’s Jewish, as if to attempt to point out her objectivity on the subject, and goes on to posit that we are a Christian nation because there are a lot of Christians here.
She also manages to point out that:
Freedom of religion doesn’t mean freedom from religion
Well, I’ll be. Perhaps if she weren’t adhering to a inadequate and incomplete conventional wisdom interpretation of the establishment clause in the Constitution she might understand why her comment is flat out wrong.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion
Notice that it doesn’t say “a religion”, it says “establishment of religion”. For it is inherent in the idea of freedom of religion that freedom from it must also be required. Otherwise you must choose which religion it’s going to be that gets to inhibit that freedom. Schlussel, obviously, thinks Christianity should be the religion that gets to restrict that freedom.
Moreover, forcing people to accept some particular idea or adhere to behavioral standards from someone else’s religion means that their religious freedom is being infringed upon. In other words, to put it so bluntly so someone as dim as Schlussel can understand it, freedom of religion, by definition, means freedom from Christianity. And the same goes for every single other religion present in the world. See? I’m not just picking on (or discriminating against) the Christians.
Stephen A. Smith, a sports analyst for ESPN (why is he there?), manages to interject a thin slice of rationality into the discussion, immediately after professing his love for his lord, by pointing out that you’re entitled to believe what you want as long as you’re not imposing those beliefs on other people.
But not to be outdone, Karen points out that the Atheists’ problem is marketing, and perhaps Atheists should adopt the Christian strategy of feeding off American consumerism to get their “message” out:
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…with an open hand. 
Wow… just, wow!
via Think Progress
Two weeks ago, the University of Florida voted to deny Jeb Bush an honorary degree. By a 38-28 vote, the faculty Senate rejected the former governor’s nomination, citing concerns about some of Bush’s education initiatives, including his dismantling of affirmative action programs in the state:
In higher education circles, Bush’s greatest criticism came over his “One Florida” plan, which ended race-based admissions in state universities. Black enrollment dropped at UF and statewide after the change took effect, as critics predicted.
Bush’s policies of “rewarding and punishing schools according to students’ standardized test results and using vouchers to send certain students to private schools at public expense” also contributed to the rejection of his nomination.
Upset by this lack of Jeb Bush adoration, the conservative-controlled House Schools & Learning Council voted yesterday to force the university to rename its education school the “Jeb Bush College of Education.”
Over the faculty’s opposition, the school will now have “to erect ‘suitable markers‘ noting the college’s new name and include the revised name in all university documents, including catalogues and brochures.” The lawmakers acknowledge they “came up with the idea as an answer” to the faculty’s denial of Bush’s honorary degree.
Nevermind the irony of Jeb being W’s brother and getting a school of education named after him… when I first saw this, I thought, ‘what a narcissistic asshole’. But it turns out that the Florida Legislature did this without Jeb’s knowledge, because they felt he deserved that honorary degree, damnit! So the lawmakers reacted in true Nappy Roots fashion: “Awnaw! Hell naw! Y’all done up and done it!” And they added the amendment to name the school after Jeb to an existing bill.
What’s even funnier is the rationalizations given by some members of the State House.
While I didn’t agree with Gov. Bush on anything, I do believe he was sincere in what he wanted to do for education.
- Rep. Shelley Vanna, D-Lantana
In other words, the path to hell is paved with good intentions, but let’s name a school after him anyway. But wait there’s more from the guy who introduced the measure.
Whether you agree with him or disagree with him on the issue of education, he certainly pushed the debate and pushed the envelope on the issue.
- Rep. David Rivera, R-Miami
So all you need to do is propose some controversial educational measures to warrant a namesake at a major state university, regardless of what those actions actually did. Luckily we have state senator to trumpet the positive record of Jeb’s proposals.
Gov. Bush did a lot of amazing things in the area of education. Schools are performing better, children are reading better, performance scores are up.
- Senate Majority Leader Daniel Webster, R-Winter Garden
Daniel basically references one thing (performance) in three different ways. This would be a more reliable reference it it weren’t for the educational gerrymandering provided by the school vouchers there, or the standardized tests that are used to measure this performance.
Now, I’m not from Florida. And I, admittedly, don’t know a whole lot about their local politics. But the fact that the legislature would react to the university’s denial of an honorary degree by naming a school at the university after Jeb is absolutely dumbfounding. It’s a slap in the face to the University of Florida faculty, who voted the way they did. And for government to show this blatant disregard for its people in an effort to prop up a former governor is unequivocally and undeniably shameful.
The extent to which today’s governments, especially republican led governments of late, will go for posturing and status symbols is certifiably idiotic, completely transparent, and altogether useless in anything that should really matter to governments (i.e. not re-election). Granted, it’s not unusual for governments to sanction the naming of state schools after someone. But to do it as a specific response to a school’s denial of an honorary degree in an effort to rebuke their vote is unbelievable.
…apparently.
I happened across a post by one Frank Walton on his blog, Atheism Sucks. I found the link to his blog on the Passionate Atheist. The post, entitled “TXAtheist won’t share the burden of proof”, by Frank is an email exchange between himself and an atheist, in which Frank tries to argue that a god exists based on “the impossibility of the contrary”. And tries to get the atheist to make the same kind of argument for his opposing position.
As any of you intelligent beings might recognize, such an argument is a fallacy of ignorance. I was interested in how Frank would reconcile this problem within his argument against the atheist, so I read on.
I ended up responding to his post by leaving a comment, under the username ccannizz11. I don’t want to link to his blog, but feel free to get there through the Passionate Atheist link on his sidebar. The exchange is currently posted in the comments section, however, all my comments must be approved by the owner, so I’ll be tracking the exchange in a separate post and will make it known if Frank doesn’t follow through.
Also, I would encourage you to respond, if you have the time.
UPDATE:
Awww, maaan, Frank quitted.
I’m going to post his final comments here, so everyone may witness the idiocy without going to his blog. My responses to his previous arguments are in bold, while his responses are blockquoted, and I have added a few comments in italics. The rest of the exchange is available on his blog. Not riveting stuff, but enjoy…
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I’ve seen plenty of posts about the relatively new Conservapedia , and felt little reason to comment on it myself. However, with my discovery of the new GodTube, I am convinced that the Christian fundamentalists behind these sites are quickly becoming their own worst enemy.
I present exhibit A…
Nevermind that the banana he is using in his divine demonstration is a direct result of human engineering and 7000 years of cultivation for smaller seeds and a tastier banana, in much the same way we have cultivated seedless grapes and watermelons. The comments on the video’s page tell much of the story.
Like I said, their own worst enemy.
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