Brains So Closed The Silence Roars...

[elfs]

City Council bans access to websites of pagans and atheists

In what has to be one of the most discriminatory moves yet, the city of Birmingham, UK, has chosen to allow city workers to access "mainstream" religious sites, but banned access to websites promoting paganism, occult practices, or "atheistic views." (via Pharyngula )

John McCain does not speak for John McCain

In what has to be one of the most mind-boggling quotes of the year, John McCain's current economic advisor, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, said to Slate Magazine: He has certainly I'm sure said things in town halls that don't jibe perfectly with his written plan. But that doesn't mean it's official.

So let me get this straight. When John McCain speaks in a town hall meeting, we aren't to take him at his word?

Veteran's group cancels meeting with Cheney over unreasonable demands.

Among the requirements were that injured and disabled vets had to assemble before 6:30am and would not be allowed to leave the meeting hall for any reason for the entire two-hour period. Cheney's security detail is apparently more stringent than Bush's. I wonder why.

Evangelicals thumbs-down to Romney

Evangelicals, still convinced the country is listening to them, have warned McCain that a Romney vice-presidency choice would cause most of them to stay home on election day.

Expanded availability of birth control reduces unwanted pregnancies.

Apparently, this all comes as a very big surprise to the usually middle-conservative Brookings Institute.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

I would hope someone would legally challenge the city council in Birmingham. Unless they completely screw up their case I would imagine the council would be sent packing... that's what usually happens when government, local or national, pulls a stupid here about things like that.

[doodlesthegreat.livejournal.com]

Expanded availability of birth control reduces unwanted pregnancies.

Oh, c'mon

[ideaphile.livejournal.com]

Just because the Brookings Institute and the Urban Institute are officially non-partisan doesn't mean they're unbiased. Both are left-of-center at best, which is pretty much the opposite of your "middle-conservative" claim.

Cripes, even Wikipedia agrees: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brookings_Institution

It's asinine to say that a candidate is misrepresenting himself when he summarizes his policies rather than explaining every detail in exactly the same words as a written statement. That quote in the article from the McCain campaign guy is completely true:

"You don’t say, I’d like to reduce it to 28 percent, then 26 percent, then 25 percent, then—no one talks like that on the stump. [You say,] I’d like to get it down to 25 percent."

And it's something worse than asinine to put words in the guy's mouth. He didn't say what you say he said:

"He has certainly I'm sure said things in town halls that don't jibe perfectly with his written plan."

Only the first half of that sentence is even presented in quotes in the article; the second half is the writer summarizing what the guy said. But that's inherently bogus. Only an exact quote is acceptable here. Taking a phrase like "He has certainly I’m sure said things in town halls" out of context is only necessary in order to misrepresent what followed.

I really wish you'd apply your high standards to your own writing. Sometimes you say things you really ought to be ashamed of.

. png

Re: Oh, c'mon

[elfs.livejournal.com]

Perhaps, but then I'm writing about a campaign that is obviously not ashamed of its own pandering.

One of the reasons I've been so consistently disappointed with the candidates presented to me is that they aren't as competent as they'd like us to believe. Wonks like Clinton, Gore, Huckabee (yes, the man is obviously a wonk) and Obama do have these figure available to them. When people ask them questions at town hall meetings, they have clear and concise answers. It's not just that they were at their height of their intellectual acuity: it's that they actually knew, and cared. (Note I don't put Kerry into that category).

I mean, c'mon yourself, McCain has been "caught," if you will, rolling his eyes and panicking when asked questions about women's health issues, net neutrality, and the conflict on the Pakistan-Iraq border.

He clearly doesn't speak even with his own authority. I don't know that I should be ashamed to point that out.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm in the UK, I have seen the "pulling a stupid" thing many times. Besides, there is a reason we don't ahve seperation between church and state... because the bulk of the populace doesn't give a flying fuck about the church. We have far fewer practicing Christians, and even fewer hard line Christians than the US. The state here intentionally doesn't get involved in religion, period.