What Obama's Done Wrong

totally unrelated to the post

Did you ever listen to someone go on about a person they have an irrational hatred for- a coworker, acquaintance, musician, celebrity- and while they can't think of one nice thing to say about the individual, they also can't come up with one specific flaw or bad act, either? You're left with the opinion that either the hatred is completely irrational, or the hater doesn't want to admit what it is they really hate about the person, i.e., race, sexual orientation, etc.

That's what it's like when wingnuts try to describe their hatred of Obama. (Note: this is what real people who vote actually think about Obama. It's frightening.)

Describe what Obama is doing wrong

I perceive a very negative opinion of Obama on this board. I'm not American and I don't know much about politics, but I was in the midst of a pro-Obama discussion between some Christians and had the nerve to speak up with an alternative viewpoint. I don't think I articulated my view very well.

I would appreciate if someone could sum up what Obama is doing wrong, as concisely as possible. Is it possible that the negatives are outweighed by the positive changes he is making, as these Christians believed?

Keep in mind, this person who doesn't know anything about American politics, or Obama, hates Obama, for admittedly no reason at all. That's some fantastic wingnuttery right there. (From Canada, no less!) "Please tell me why I should hate the man I already hate."

First off, are you living on this planet ? What has this guy done right ? Just one thing do you know ? I can't believe you are asking this question.

Well, uh, healthcare. Dialing down the rhetoric in the Middle East. Taking nuclear responses to nonnuclear provocation off the table. Those are good things.

Well I'm not American either, so I don't know the issues as intimately as others here. But some off the top of my head are:

1. Making Abortion more accessible

2. Over-ruling the Constitution to ram what he wants down the throats of the people

3. Refusing to produce a Birth Certificate and taking extreme lengths to hide it... he's a law breaker, to say the least.

4. Mocking the Bible, the Christian faith, and bullying Israel while reaching out to the Muslims.

That's just a starter list.....

None of those things. How has Obama made abortion more accessible? He has not. He has not overruled the Constitution, he has not refused to produce a birth certificate, nor has he mocked the bible or christians. He has not bullied Israel, though I wish he would. As for "reaching out to Muslims", yes, he did do that. There's 1 billion of them, and they live on the same planet we do. We need to make nice occasionally.

My apologies. I will just sum up Obama as short as I can , HE IS BAD NEWS . If I make a list of what this guy has done my blood pressure will go through the roof. I will let others explain the things this guy has done.

I, too, cannot answer the question, but my nonanswer will be in convincing RED CAPS.

He's done everything wrong. He basically just kicked this nation off a cliff, and it's currently plummeting towards the jagged rocks. We're just waiting for the gruesome death.

I can't answer the question, either, but I will use violent imagery to not answer your question.

1. He supports and upholds infanticide!

2. He hates this country, the very country he leads. Don't believe me, then, read his two, that's right, two autobiographies!

3. He just came out and said the US will never use nukes, even if we are attacked by nukes, he will never respond in that way. In other words, please attack America, you will not be retaliated against.

4. He is a Marxist. He does not believe in the free market system. He is nationalizing every piece of our economy he can get his hands on.

5. He is a racist. In his book he speaks very badly of white people. His grandparents who raised him were white, and he said he hated that part of himself, and would separate himself from that part. He actually referred to his own grandmother as a "typical white person."

6. He is a liar. He said he sat in Jeremiah Wright's church for 20 years but never heard the radical sermons that we have heard sound bites of......

7. He is anti-Israel. He supports Israel's enemies, not our ally, Israel. In fact, he bows down to Arab kings, but treats Netanyahu like a door mat.

Is this enough because there is much much more....

Infanticide, really? Um, no. Hates America? No. Taking nuclear weapons off the table is apparently a bad thing in this alternate reality in which Obama eats babies. Marxist? Obama is barely left of center. Oh, you're talking about healthcare. Yes, providing healthcare for your fellow Americans is the mark of Stalin.

Then we're back to the racist meme, which is racist in and of itself. For as much as Obama is described as being "black", he's half white. His mother was white, his grandparents were white, he himself is as much white as he is black. Accusing Obama of being racist against white people is an attempt to make him TEh Scaree (entirely) Black Man Who Will Shank You All, Possibly In Da Hood.

#1 He diminishes Jesus Christ, and is embarrassed by the claims of God about His Son.

He secured 700+ billion dollars as a slush fund to "stimulate" the things he wants to "stimulate."

He secured a new federal entitlement program while ignoring all the other entitlement programs bankruptcy.

He cuts deals with "special" interests at the expense of the rest of us, like giving unions special deals on health care. A feat usually reserved by mutual silence because it is shameful, he now makes public, even righteous in his own eyes, and flaunts in the face of the people.

He "apologized" to the world for Americas 'folly', in his own eyes anyway.

He has let double digit unemployment hang around the necks of the people. Yes, it is entirely his responsibility, I give him no one iota of slack.

However, if you're arguing with your average European or socialist, I wouldn't even waste my breath.

The diminishment of Jesus I can only assume means being polite to Muslims. Yes, there was no stimulus in the Bush Administration. None at all. What entitlement programs are bankrupt? Guess I missed that. As for the unemployment, yes, the economy was fine under Bush. It collapsed the day Obama took office. Totally Obama's fault. Yes, indeedy.

The worst thing he has done above all else...
He has played the race card. He has demonized white, hard working , law abiding, CHRISTIAN, God Fearing Americans. Everything is the white man's fault.

Yes, it's so hard to be a white, Christian male in America today.

Kidding aside, you have said it better than I could. And as good as your list is it just scratches the surface of what this radical, narcicistic, muslim, comunist, socialist, Chicago machine politician, and out of control refugee from the rubber room president could do to this country and the world if he isn't stopped; and soon.

So, barely left of center is radical and comunist [sic] AND socialist, black is muslim, something is narcicistic [sic], and black is "out of control refugee". I get tea party politics now.

With all this said, either Obama is extremely ignorant of what the people of this country want, or he is very shrewd. He is stripping us of all rights and putting us in physical danger. He has surrounded himself with liars and thieves who will stop at nothing to get what they want. And they think it's funny. They laugh at us and make fun of us and even set us up to look bad. He's controlling the media now and trying to remove our free speech. We have a dictator problem now and yet, we do nothing. Isn't there something we can do to stop this craziness?

He's ignorant of what the majority who elected him want? I doubt it. What rights has Obama stripped you of, and were you equally enraged when Bush stripped you of rights? Nobody needs to set you up to look bad, you guys do that just fine on your own. As for controlling the media- have you seen Fox and CNN? Have you had any trouble listening to Limbaugh? I didn't think so. As for what to do about "this craziness", I assume you've heard of voting?

There's just not going to be any getting through to these people, is there?

picture link

Obama's Pro Life Ad

abortion, obama, cnn, nbc, advertising, prolife, prochoice, lie
The prolife blogosphere has been abuzz since shortly before the Superbowl about a prolife ad that NBC refused to air. The ad used Barack Obama as an example of a person who might have been aborted, but wasn't. (They've done this such notables as Mozart and Beethovan. I like the example of Hitler, but I guess that's not the point.)

It's obvious why NBC refused to air the ad: respect for the POTUS, a person who is pro choice, and who has not agreed to allow his name or life story to be used in a pro life ad. Heather, however, has a unique take on this:

Our ad does not suggest that Barack Obama is pro-life. Instead, our ad presents nothing but facts. President Obama, like every human being, began as an unborn child. Because he was born, he was able to become the President of the United States.

CNN and others simply don't like the obvious conclusion of our ad - there was no ‘choice' for abortion back in 1961. Thankfully, we had laws then safeguarding unborn children -- laws that protected the life of a future president who tragically is unwilling to fight for those same protections today.

That is disingenuous at best. You are using the name and life story of a living person, the POTUS no less, to support a viewpoint he doesn't hold. We don't know how Beethoven might have felt about abortion, and he's not alive to tell us. We know exactly how Obama feels about abortion, and to suggest that this ad would do anything less than imply- strongly- that Obama is prolife, is to lie.

If you have to lie to make your point, you don't have one.

Surprise, Surprise, the Mormons Lied, Part II

lie, liar, prop 8, traditional, marriage, homophobia, homosexual, gay, mormon, money, democracy, legislation, politics,

For more on Mormongate, check out Latter Day Chino's riveting expose. (Mostly I just wanted to say "riveting expose", but really, it's very informative.)

Intellectually Bankrupt and Oxytocin

turner, keroack, abstinence, liar, lie, lying, study, science, sex, sexism, misogyny,

So, the abstinence only crowd has found a scientific (scientists, you guys like scientists, right?) reason for abstinence: Women who have multiple sexual partners lack oxytocin, which is to emotional bonding what superglue is to physical bonding.

Unfortunately, this simply isn't true.

This post quotes a study by Eric Keroack, except Keroack didn't do the study, Rebecca Turner, a psychology professor at San Francisco's Alliant International University did. And she was appalled to see what Keroack had done with her study.

From hugthemonkey:

Dana Wilkie of Copley News Service tracked down Rebecca Turner, a psychology professor at San Francisco's Alliant International University whose paper found its way into a treatise Keroack wrote for the Abstinence Clearinghouse.

According to Wilkie, Turner found that:

When women were asked to recall memories about close relationships, whether familial or romantic, those with a tendency to be anxious about such relationships had lower oxytocin increases than those who were married, living together or dating. Hardly surprising. If oxytocin is emotional superglue, it's not shocking that women who are anxious about their relationships have low levels of oxytocin. However, Turner's research did NOT delve into why those women had low levels of oxytocin. Perhaps low levels of oxytocin cause anxiety in relationships, which destroys relationships, which forces a woman into many relationships. We don't know.


Turner was shocked and dismayed to find that her research was being misrepresented, she told Wilkie.

But here's the kicker: No matter what the level of oxytocin in women who were anxious about close relationships, Turner's paper found that oxytocin activity was “completely unrelated” to the number of previous sexual partners.

Understanding that finding doesn't require a course in logic; a simple ability to read will do. Still, Keroack somehow made the leap that sex with multiple partners inhibits the brain's ability to respond to oxytocin, and therefore the ability to bond.

During a follow-up study three years later, Turner found no links between oxytocin levels and emotional conditions, but that was after Keroack's paper came out.

So, intellectually bankrupt or just Liar for Christ(tm)?

Surprise, Surprise, the Mormons Lied

morality, mormon, lie, lying, prop 8, tradition, traditional, marriage, gay, homosexual, homophobia, fppc, california

From americablog.

In a Friday filing with California's Fair Political Practices Commission, the Mormon Church listed almost $190,000 in previously unreported expenses in support of last year's successful campaign to eliminate marriage equality in California.

$190,000. That's how much they now admit to spending.

The report, filed with the secretary of state's office, listed a variety of California travel expenses for high-ranking members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and included $20,575 for use of facilities and equipment at the church's Salt Lake City headquarters and a $96,849 charge for "compensated staff time" for church employees who worked on matters pertaining to Prop. 8.

It seems as if the complaint filed with the FPPC by Californians Against Hate was not as specious as the Mormons initially charged:

Up until Friday, the Mormon church had denied any direct financial support for the campaign beyond a reported $2,078 spent for bringing church Elder L. Whitney Clayton to California.

$2,078. Hmmm . . . That seems smaller somehow than $190,000. Let's see . . . yes, it is, $187,922 smaller in fact. Quite a lie, that one.

Church officials complained that Karger's complaint was full of errors and that the church had "fully complied" with California law.In other words, the Mormon Church had no intention of modifying their expense reporting until pressed by Californians Against Hate and the subsequent -- and ongoing -- FPPC investigation.

The Mormon Church deserves the scrutiny its been getting. The leaders have not been honest. Teddy poses the important question: what else is the Mormon Church hiding? We have to find out.

So, tell me Ruby, tell me Pearlysnot, tell me DNA, how are you going to spin this one? What are you going to say to excuse the lies?

Militant Atheism and Mendacity

atheism, atheist, atheophobia, liar, pride, sin, lying, lie, christian, jewish, judeo-christian, values, morality, religion, fundamentalism

Can I just say "militant atheism"? Was I in the bathroom when they were handing out jackboots to the atheists?



And, mendacity, in case you don't know, means given to or characterized by deception or falsehood or divergence from absolute truth. (From Mirriam Webster online.)



Militant Atheism and Mendacity: How the Rise of Atheism is Destroying Truth

by Bruce Walker (if you start voting republican and talking about the superiority of trickle down economics after viewing that site, don't blame me.)



Public opinion polls show faith in a Blessed Creator um, blessed by whom? who blesses the blessor? melting it's melting! (you know what voice i'm hearing here.) in Europe, in other English speaking democracies, in Japan are the Japanese especially christian, and I missed it? nope: shinto and buddhism are the major religions in Japan. a significant portion of buddhists are atheists, and always have been – just about everywhere but America that counts. everywhere that counts? really? oh, that's right, those damn Ay-rabs don't count! (very religious, but not the right one.) and forget about those brown people in africa- who cares about them? (well, not many people apparently, but that's a different discussion.) Even in America, the most religious nation on Earth i think most muslim nations are far more religious, at least officially. and what about israel, aren't they pretty darn religious? oh, that's right, muslims and jews don't count., the percentage of the American people who believe in a Blessed Creator is declining. true, though not by much.


Atheism is not the advocacy of murder or rapine or any other particular social vice wow, that is so true . . . this isn't going to last is it?, so is the decline of faith in God a serious social problem? i'd say it's the solution to a serious social problem, but i'm usually wrong . . . It is. yup, i'm wrong. It is a problem for the same reason that science and the systematic study of knowledge arose precisely once in human history: the Christian medieval university. what? that didn't even make any sense. i can't even imagine what asshat is trying to say. It is. It is for the same reason that the Jewish people have not only survived the Diaspora but thrived and made Israel a living nation again. again, i can't see the comparison/similarity/point here.


Without God, everything is permitted. nothing is true, everything is permitted are supposedly the last words of the founder of the Order of the Assassins, Hassan-i Sabbah. probably not true, but cool nonetheless. That literary maxim of the Nineteenth Century is quite true no, but it somewhat misses the mark. or just entirely misses the mark. The wilted lettuce rusty spoons? moldy bread? sprouting potatoes? of atheism in Europe and America is not about to set up a Gulag or a system of death camps yeah, we're just too wilted for that. Atheists are not championing the cause of ghastly criminals whose horrors haunt our television news. does this guy have multiple personalities or something? Indeed, militant atheism jackboots! in modern industrial democracies masquerades as compassion, “Secular Humanism,” as Bill O’Reilly oh dear, he's quoting O'Liely. and that's not even the person who came up with the phrase. That phrase became popular after it was used in a 1961 Supreme Court decision, Torcaso v. Watkins. Bill was born in 1949, which would have made him all of 12 in 1961. likes to call it.



It is true that the denial of objective moral absolutes which is atheism no, we don't deny objective moral absolutes, we simply don't believe in god. why, oh why, is that so hard to understand? inevitably leads toward more and more members of society becoming self-absorbed monsters what?! there is absolutely no evidence that atheists commit more crimes. in fact, atheists commit less crimes., but that is not the biggest social problem of atheism rampant. Atheist Soviet Russia like atheist Nazi Germany had a degree of social order. please stop blaming us for fascim and communism. i'll have to bring up the crusades and witch trials, and then the discussion really goes downhill. Crimes like murder and rape and burglarly, when not perpetrated by the state, were punished. you mean like capital punishment and eminent domain in the US today? Life is unpredictable, death is certain, and the best grounded system of objective moral absolutes will not prevent tragedy or keep creeps from winning lotteries. Does this asshat agree with me, or not? it's really rather confusing.

oh, and just as a reminder to my atheist and pagan readers, good things are god, bad things are free will.

The hidden horror of atheism oh my! is a greater loss than just the grave which faces us all, and the loss of God i didn't lose god (how does one lose an omnipotent, noncorporeal being, anyway?), i just don't believe in god. involves a loss greater than just chastity, charity and security. that's just odd. atheists are incapable of being chaste, charitable and secure? i'm personally incapable of being chaste, but i am charitable and secure. (not financially, but i'm secure in some things.) The loss of God involves the loss of the possibility of truth. what? Why? do tell. If there are no absolute objective moral virtues, then honesty is not an absolute moral virtue.

As far as that argument goes, it's true. If there are no absolute objective moral virtues, then honesty is not an absolute moral virtue. However, asshat has not established that there are no absolute objective moral virtues, nor has he established that godbotherers have absolute objective moral virtues and atheists do not. This is called the logical fallacy of the unasked question. you assume the answer to a question, and then assert your argument based on that answer. For example: have you stopped shooting heroin yet? This assumes that you ever were shooting heroin, and it's awfully hard to continue a debate until you deal with that.

The Judeo-Christian tradition, what I have sometimes simply called “The Great Faith,” making up your own names for things, huh? godbotherer. demands the absolute moral virtue of honesty isn't that number 9 on the list?, and it shows this demand it ways that surprise unbelievers. really? okay, shock the unbelief right out of me, asshat.

The Hebrew prophets, for example, never once told their audience “The Blessed Creator says everything you are doing is great. Don’t change a thing.” ummm . . . why is this surprising? prophets never say nice things. it's always the fire and the brimstone. On the contrary, that part of the Tanach which deals with the major and minor prophets is a litany of complaints from God to the Hebrew nations. god's whiny? besides, it's not just a "litany of complaints", it's also a litany of really awful things god did to the Israelites as a result of his anger: killing, plagues, killing, snakes, killing, floods, killing and killing. Critically, when the Tanach was canonized, all of these embarrassing and serious complaints from God were kept in, while “feel good” books, like Esther, were almost kept out. it is surprisingly hard to keep one's station as a powerful religious leader when the gospel is "hey, good enough for you, good enough for god."

Likewise, the Church Fathers did not try to reconcile inconsistencies in the Gospel. wow, is this guy a secret atheist? you rarely hear the word "inconsistencies" attached to "gospel" out of a christian. usually, it's either "inconsistencies" and "evolution" or "there are no inconsistencies in the gospel- see this overly complicated explanation that involves facts i can't possibly prove?" Quite the contrary, the different versions of the ministry of Jesus are deliberately kept in. all four of them. out of twelve. for further explanation, see the Council of Nicea. Things hard to grasp and harder to explain are left in the Gospels. Did Jesus have siblings? Why does He pray to His Father on the Cross, like an abandoned child? These very difficulties, like the difficulties of the prophets or the anomalies of Genesis have been kept for thousands of years precisely because serious Jews and serious Christians believe in honesty and believe that honesty is the path to truth and to God. or because changing the gospels every time somebody notices a problem is basically admitting that the gospels are not the direct word of yhwh?

Atheism, like Allahism (or Sinisterist Radical Islam) what?! i bet this guy believes the Illuminati, or some similar group of jewy jewish conspiring conspirators are involved in a conspiracy to control the world, by contrast, has no objective moral absolute against lying. lying is wrong. lying is wrong because when you lie to people, you don't treat them with respect. lying is wrong because if everyone lies, and you can't trust anyone, society falls apart within 0.5 seconds. People of faith, like everyone, lies sometimes slightly less than atheists and Sinisterist Radical Islamists?, but they realize that lying is a sin so, it's okay to lie, as long as you realize it's a sin? does that in any way affect the fact that you have lied, or the damage lying does? no. can we say "rationalization"?. Atheists simply realize that lying is the easiest way of accomplishing your objective yes, it is. if your objective happens to be making certain no one trusts you. This does not just mean self-enrichment or self-aggrandizement, but it also means achieving goals which, to an atheist, are “noble.” you know, like equal rights for everyone, food for starving children, health care for everyone, saving the environment. we're an evil, evil people. and godbotherers never lie to achieve an objective which they might consider noble. (see: Ray Comfort)

So, when religion came under its most serious attack in the early Nineteenth Century, religion or christianity? I find it hard to believe that in all the history of the world, that atheism (and I think he's really referencing evolution, which is science, which is not atheism) is the most serious attack on religion. i mean, what about the lions? the professors who launched the attack first began to lie. They pronounced as fact things like Christians had believed the Earth was flat before Columbus actually, at one point, christians did believe the world was flat. so did most people. these people still do. or that the complaints about Galileo’s heliocentrism were theological they were. stop rewriting history, asshat., rather than scientific, even though they knew this was not true.

Because these professors did not believe in the Judeo-Christian God, they saw no ethical problem with destroying the idea of God with lies. really? all professors (i think he means scientists, too) are atheists? this just isn't true. nor are all people who recognize the irrefutable fact that the church's position on heliocentrism is a fact atheists. Serious Christians and Jews, by contrast, could not do that. why yes, christians and jews would not try to disprove the existence of yhwh with lies. that's true. Dishonesty is a sin. or it's just wrong for rather obvious reasons.

The consequence is that a marketplace of ideas filled with atheists quickly produces a lot of counterfeit intellectual currency. BWAHAHAHAHAHA that was great! that's right- atheists lie and lie and lie. it's all we do. we don't have little things called facts and evidence and logic behind our assertions. Why be even-handed in research if you know that you are right and there is no God to worry about? why be even-handed in research if you know that you are right and god is behind it all? Indeed, why worry about even being right? cause it's science, asshat? if atheists/scientists didn't worry about being right, that computer you typed this on, and the internet you display it on, wouldn't fucking work. neither would your car. or the lights in your house. If you fancy a theory, fabricate findings to “prove” it and then move on

(much like Margaret Mead did when she invented findings about Samoa, because it described a reality she preferred.

(1) Margaret Mead was never discredited. As Boas and Mead expected, this book upset many Westerners when it first appeared in 1928. Many American readers felt shocked by her observation that young Samoan women deferred marriage for many years while enjoying casual sex but eventually married, settled down, and successfully reared their own children.
In 1983, five years after Mead had died, anthropologist Derek Freeman published Margaret Mead and Samoa: The Making and Unmaking of an Anthropological Myth, in which he challenged Mead's major findings about sexuality in Samoan society, claiming evidence that her informants had misled her. After years of discussion, many anthropologists concluded that the truth would probably never be known, although most published accounts of the debate have also raised serious questions about Freeman's critique. His obituary concludes that "many anthropologists have agreed to disagree over the findings of one of the science's founding mothers, acknowledging both Mead's pioneering research and the fact that she may have been mistaken on details."

(2) look, it's one discredited scientist. all scientists are liars. you don't want to play that game- ted haggard, anyone?)

This all falls from the prime sin of pride. oh, now we're prideful and liars. and, since when is pride the prime sin? according to the Ten Commandments, the prime sin is holding another god before yhwh- which atheists do not do. Pride is one of the Seven Deadly Sins which are not listed in the bible. In fact: The Seven Deadly Sins are really attitudes that underlie sins . . . first identified by St. John Cassian (360-435) and refined by Pope St. Gregory the Great (540-604).

Atheists like Margaret Mead margaret mead was an anglican. in fact, she was a A committed Anglican who took a considerable part in the drafting of the 1979 American Episcopal Book of Common Prayer wanted to be a god (or goddess) and create a reality to her liking. This theory is just so silly. I don't believe in god. I don't believe gods are even possible. How freakin' delusional would I have to be to want to become a god, and more, to believe that by lying I could become one? (About as delusional as the author of this article, probably.)

Atheists like Rachel Carson included, in her “masterpiece,” Silent Spring, a dedication to Albert Schweitzer (who strongly support the use of DDT which she sought to ban oh, for nothing at all's sake, Schweitzer supported the use of DDT before he knew the damage it did. so did a lot of people. changing your mind because new facts have become available is not flip-flopping, it's good thinking.), and at least another twenty-seven outright lies from her source materials. give me a link, asshat. She, however, made herself a goddess she had the power to create universes? really? and the fact that banning DDT caused unimaginable suffering and millions of deaths in the tropical parts of the Third World did not bother her at all. that is entirely irrelevant. DDT is extremely hazardous to all kinds of birds and fish. it is unacceptable to destroy entire species in an effort to prevent malaria. you would only find this acceptable if you believe that humans are more important than say, everything else on earth. and, honestly, mesquito netting. doesn't kill birds, prevents malaria.

The dialogue which can produce truth in sociology or environmentalism can only nudge us toward that truth if based upon a holy belief in honesty. how on earth could you possibly provide scientific truth if you base science on a book written thousands of years ago by bronze age desert nomads? Atheists, believing nothing holy but the playthings of their minds and whims what?, will always allow pride to trump integrity no, but apparently you will, given the complete disregard for facts and evidence represented in this article, self-interest to stand above honor repeat after me: Jesus does not make you better than anyone else. Atheists will always be tugged toward counterfeiting reality prove it. really. just one link, one study, one shred of evidence, asshat. and then taking that counterfeit currency enough with the "marketplace of ideas" analogy and using it to buy fame, wealth, power, adulation yup, that's me, swimming in fame, wealth, power and adulation- not unlike your average TV preacher, for example (especially the adulation of popularity – because they believe everyone is as hollow as they are ad hom attacks are not logic or reasoning. try again.)

The answer to rampant lying in our culture can you prove that more people lie than before, or in other cultures? can you prove that religious people lie less and atheists more? if so, why haven't you done so?, the need for a user id and password for everything, what? because not all people should have access to all information? because without a username, how would we prevent every person from getting everyone's email? it would be a little tedious sorting through billions of emails a day to find yours. the doubt in our children’s eyes about everything that must be you, because the children in my family are fine is not because God is not dead i think you mean "god is dead", but because atheists have done their best to try to murder consciousness of God how does one murder the consciousness of an omnipotent being? and how powerful must the average atheist be to achieve this?. The first social victim of this attempted homicide is truth itself, "homicide" refers to killing a human, hence "hom". the truth is not a human being, nor can it be killed but after truth dies TRUTH CANNOT DIE then those who murdered truth STOP IT or rejoiced in its convenient death NO MORE descend into an infinite maelstrom really? uh-huh,, an eternal descent you pretty much covered that with "infinite maelstrom", to a place devoid of purpose or of hope. i have both purpose and hope, as do all atheists i am acquainted with, so, your point is . . . totally invalid?

Disingenuous (adjective):

lacking in frankness, candor, or sincerity.

I like the word "disingenuous." I like it because it is a good description of so much of what goes on in the news, in punditry and in politics. If you notice, being disingenuous does not mean you are not telling the truth, it means you aren't telling all of the truth, or you are telling the truth in a context that makes the truth complicit in a less than truthful statement. Sort of like holding a gun to the truth and forcing it to read a prepared statement.

Below is an example of disingenuous reporting.

This is an article from Campbell Brown, of "No Bias, No Bull" (disingenuous), posted on CNN today.

I want you to hear something President-elect Barack Obama said just about a year ago:"I am running to tell the lobbyists in Washington that their days of setting the agenda are over. They have not funded my campaign. They won't work in my White House." Just this weekend The New York times published a list of names -- a rather long list of names of people -- who are working on Obama's transition team or who have accepted jobs in his White House who are either former lobbyists or who have close ties to lobbyists. The Times reports that some of those people were lobbying as recently as this year.

Ummm . . . are they lobbyists now? Because if they aren't lobbyists now, then no lobbyists will be working in the White House with Obama, and his statement is entirely true. Two years ago, I worked as a data entry clerk. Now I am a legal secretary. I don't call myself a data entry clerk, and it would be inaccurate for anyone else to do so. The above is disingenuous. Everything she says is true, these people know, are related to, or used to be lobbyists. BUT, since they aren't currently lobbyists, Obama did not go back on his words. The above doesn't seem to say that, does it? And yet, Ms. Brown didn't lie. She just made the truth dance on the head of a pin.

Moreover, virtually everyone in Washington has worked as, or is related to, a lobbyist. There are thousands of jobs in the field, it's well paying, there are lots of entry level positions, and there is power and prestige to be had. Obama would have to start recruiting people with no useful experience from other states entirely to avoid all ties with former lobbyists and their families. Do you want your government run by people with no experience at all? Well, if you're a Republican, you do. The rest of us would like to be able to sleep at night.

Now, the Obama team is quick to point out that their rules and restrictions on lobbying ties are far stricter than any previous administration.

And now we have the truth twisted into a knot. She makes it sound like the Obama team is being, well . . . disingenuous. What they are saying is simple truth. I have to admire Ms. Brown's ability to make the truth look like a lie.

And the Obama folks concede that eliminating anyone in Washington who had ever lobbied Congress or who has a family member who lobbied Congress would be foolish. They concede? That's what you do when you have been lying and are forced to tell the truth. Perhaps they were pointing out the reality of Washington. Seems a little more truthful put that way, doesn't it?

And it's true, you could argue the reality of Washington and our government is that lobbyists are often the most informed people on a given issue. Yeah, it's true, but unless the truth is dressed up in a dominatrix outfit and whipping Democrats, we don't care about that here.

But we certainly never heard Obama articulate it quite that way when he was candidate Obama. What he said then was:
"That's what happens when lobbyists set the agenda and that's why they won't drown out your voices anymore when I am president of the United States of America." Still don't see how that is no longer true. Hey, is that the truth? Why is it wearing a William Shatner mask? And what's up with the machete?

And that is a promise that he may already be struggling to keep.

"May be"? Why are we debating what may or may not be going on? Lots of things may be happening right now. How 'bout we try reporting on and commenting on what actually did happen? Oh, that's right, silly me . . . that would require research and . . . stuff.