Has the GOP become..the Stupid Party?

Yes.

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Has the GOP become..the Stupid Party?

Shouldn’t someone in the GOP be concerned that broadsides like this practically write themselves?

Paul Begala

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How did we devolve to the point where a leading Republican candidate for the presidency can’t count to three? Whatever happened to conservative intellectuals?

John Stuart Mill famously dismissed mid-19th-century British conservatives as the “stupid party.” But in the America of my youth, it wasn’t true. Conservatives looked up to intellectuals. William F. Buckley set the tone with his sesquipedalian erudition. George F. Will was a must-read, and my conservative classmates at the University of Texas in the Age of Reagan could all quote Milton Friedman.

No more. Today’s conservatives are more likely to mimic Rush Limbaugh than Buckley, and they probably know more of the work of Salma Hayek than Friedrich Hayek. To be sure, Will still commands respect, and intellectuals like David Frum and Bill Kristol carry the torch ably. But today’s Republican Party is more the party of Sarah Palin’s defiant know-nothingness than the brainy conservatism of Bill Bennett. The GOP is a party of ideologues, not ideas.

Turns out – some on the right do find this embarrassing, and are more and more willing to talk about it.

Kathleen Parker – The Palinization of the GOP

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Republicans aren’t really stupid, of course, and Begala acknowledges this. But, as he also pointed out, the conservative brain trust once led by William F. Buckley has been supplanted by talk radio hosts who love to quote Buckley (and boast of his friendship) but who do not share the man’s pedigree or his nimble mind. Moreover, where Buckley tried to rid the GOP of fringe elements, notably the John Birch Society, today’s conservatives have let them back in. The 2010 Conservative Political Action Conference was co-sponsored by the Birchers.

Scientific skepticism, the engine that propels intellectual inquiry, has morphed into skepticism of science fueled by religious certitude. In this strange world, it is heresy to express concern about, for example, climate change — or even to suggest that human behavior may be a contributing factor. Jon Huntsman committed blasphemy when he told ABC’s Jake Tapper that he trusts scientists on global warming.

What Huntsman next said, though refreshing and true, ensured that his poll numbers would remain in the basement: “When we take a position that isn’t willing to embrace evolution, when we take a position that basically runs counter to what 98 of 100 climate scientists have said, what the National Academy of Sciences has said about what is causing climate change and man’s contribution to it, I think we find ourselves on the wrong side of science and, therefore, in a losing position.”

..the Republican base requires that candidates tack away from science toward the theistic position — only God controls climate. More to the point, Rush Limbaugh says that climate change is a hoax and so it must be. Huntsman may as well be a Democrat.

A lot of people have seen conservative Mormon Climate Scientist Barry Bickmore’s lecture-“How I Avoided the Truth on Climate Change” – which gives a little insight into the rationalizations that go on in the sentient conservative underground.

Rustlings from Conservative Environmentalists

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The thing about people like us is that, since we sort of straddle the fence on some issues and can see some truth in alternative points of view, we are more likely to set aside ideology and vote for candidates that seem like they have some modicum of integrity and are, well… capable of abstract thought. But in the current GOP presidential race, who are our choices? We’ve got Huntsman, who seems pretty good (and was a great governor,) but who has no chance in the Primary.

We’ve got Romney, who isn’t so terrible, but badly needs to grow a spine. We’ve got Rick Perry, who comes across as a dumb jock who is real proud he can name Galileo, but we’re not sure he knows much beyond the name. (Prove me wrong, Rick! Tell us three new things about Galileo! I want you to go out there in that next debate and give 110%!!! ”And the third thing is… uh… uh… oops.”)

We’ve got Newt Gingrich, whose recent conversion from being a sleazy hypocrite is less than convincing, and who alternatesbetween sounding intelligent and like Archie Bunker. We’ve got Michelle Bachmann, who comes across as a saucer-eyed devotee of a UFO cult… and unutterably stupid. (Being a Mormon, I find this amusing. Go into any Evangelical Christian bookstore, and you will find countless books on the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints that ask whether we are “Christian or Cult”. For many Evangelicals, anyone who isn’t an Evangelical belongs to a “cult”. Ok, I completely understand that many LDS beliefs sound weird to outsiders–what religion doesn’t sound weird to outsiders? But just look at the GOP presidential candidates, and if you want to tell me that Bachmann and Perry come across as more sane than Huntsman and Romney, I’ll politely mumble something as I back away.)

We have Herman Cain, who is very likely a groper, is ridiculously uninformed, and who now answers all uncomfortable questions with “999″. No, I’m serious. Frankly, I don’t know anything about Tim Pawlenty except that “T-Paw” looks like a total pansy in debate. Makes me want to pants him and shove him in a locker. [UPDATE: I realized just after I posted that it's Rick Santorum who's still in the race, rather than Pawlenty. Nobody cares.] And Ron Paul… I’m at a loss for words.

Maybe there aren’t very many of us, but we’re beginning to hear some rustlings from Republican environmentalists. The Salt Lake Tribunereported today that Tim DeChristopher, who is in jail for obstructing the sale of resources on sensitive government lands (even though these sales were later deemed improper,) would support Jon Huntsman for president, because he had showed some integrity on environmental issues while in office as Utah governor.

GOP Birthers Still at it

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Yesterday, four Republicans in the New Hampshire State House supported a hearing requested by a group of birthers who want President Obamaz officially removed from the state’s primary ballot.

Of course, Birther attorney Orly Taitzz is in the midst of it and had filed a complaint about Obama’s candidacy that, according to WND, was joined by several state lawmakers. Ortiz had submitted “evidence” of alleged fraud regarding his birth certificate. The evidence, she charged, “indicates he does not meet the Constitution’s requirement that the president be a ‘natural born citizen.’”

It’s not clear whether all this is a smokescreen or whether these dead-enders actually believe this stuff. But they aren’t letting the facts get in their way — one group in Arizona has even demanded that the President “release the microfiche” of his birth certificate.

Here’s what one of the state representatives backing the effort had to say about yesterday’s hearing: “I’m not the sharpest knife in the drawer, (PS – that’s apparently a real quote) but even I could take [the long-form birth certificate] apart and see that it was fraudulent.”

And of course there's more: Newt is pro-child labor. Ron Paul pines for the days of the Old Testament where women were kept in their kitchens. Santorum blames homosexuals for the collapse of civilization and think the poor should just shut up and suffer like the good Christians they are (or should be). Do I even need to mention creationism or Bachmann's anti-vax hysteria?

Demonstrable idiots, the lot of 'em. But I can't tell which came first: the idiot politicians or the idiots they're forced to pander to. The world may never know.

Heretic wrote:

Yes.

Demonstrable idiots, the lot of 'em. But I can't tell which came first: the idiot politicians or the idiots they're forced to pander to. The world may never know.

I think the bar for "conservative intellectuals" disappeared the minute that McCain nominated an idiot like Palin. The right loved her even though she still to this day has never held an actual press conference or appeared on a Sunday talk show other than Fixed news. I'd even bet that she was the inspiration for someone like Herman Cain to run. Just parroting hate radio talking points and war cries gives them instant credibility with the 20 percent that would sooner vote against their own interests than support a Democrat.

Rick Santorum: “Smart People Will Never Be on Our Side”

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Probably the clearest, most direct expression of reactionary right wing anti-intellectualism we’ve seen yet: Rick Santorum Says ‘Smart People Will Never Be on Our Side’.

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“We will never have the media on our side, ever, in this country,” Santorum, a former Pennsylvania senator, told the audience at the Omni Shoreham hotel. “We will never have the elite, smart people on our side.” …

“When it comes to conservatism libertarian types can say, oh, well you know, we don’t want to talk about social issues,” Santorum said. “Without the church and the family, there is no conservative movement, there is no basic values of America.”

To Rick Santorum and his caveman buddies at the Values Voter Summit, this is a good thing.

You can always count on Republicans to provide memorable quotes and plenty of material for late night comics when they gather at these wingnut conventions like the "Voter Values Summit".

"Smart People Will Never Be on Our Side," said the creationist.

The GOP in a nutshell.

Conservative Leaders Urge Their Followers To Become Even More Stupid

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It has been proven in multiple studies that consumers of conservative media (particularly Fox News) are significantly less knowledgeable about current affairs than those who favor other media or even those who consume no news at all.

Nevertheless, it is conservatives who whine incessantly about an illusionary liberal media bias. It is astonishing how they can convince themselves that these giant, international, multi-billion dollar, conglomerates are somehow aligned to a socialist ideology that would rob them of their wealth and independence.

As if the present ignorance of the right-wing masses were not already disturbingly severe, a group of conservative organizations and authorities just issued an open letter calling on their minions to “Tune out the Liberal Media” and cease their exposure to the evil leftist press. The letter enumerates a set of perceived grievances and concludes with this desperate appeal:

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“We the undersigned – representing millions of Americans from our respective organizations – are now publicly urging our members to seek out alternative sources of political news in order to make an intelligent, well-informed decision on November 6.”

Oh great. Now the least informed segment of society is being coerced to voluntarily make themselves even more stupid by constricting their media access to a narrow and partisan assemblage of right-wing propaganda and blind conservative boosterism. That’ll help.

The aforementioned list of grievances in the letter is a tired collection of debunked conspiracy theories, misrepresentations of news events, and Republican talking points. Certainly the audience to whom the letter is directed has already been sufficiently misinformed on these matters. So what goal do the letter’s co-signers have in beseeching their readers to abstain from watching a more diverse selection of media? The only plausible purpose is to insure that they remain untainted by alternative viewpoints so that they can be more easily manipulated by their conservative masters. Obviously there is some lack of confidence in the ability of conservatives to digest broad-based information and make up their own minds.

The signers of the letter are a who’s who of right-wing disinformation, starting with the head of the uber-rightist Media Research Center, Brent Bozell. Other notables include Gary Bauer, President of Campaign for American Values; Matt Kibbe, President and CEO of FreedomWorks; Laura Ingraham, National Radio Host; Amy Kremer, Chairman of Tea Party Express; Tony Perkins, President of the Family Research Council; and, of course, Rush Limbaugh. These are the people who are complaining about bias in the media? And their appeal was posted as a news story on the front page of the Fox News web site where there has never been a hint of bias.

Fox News Bias Alert

I think it’s a great idea to sequester the lunatic fringe to an asylum inhabited by their own kind. Then they won’t bother the rest of us with their delusions of Kenyan usurpers, climate science deniers, and fables of Jesus riding on dinosaurs. They can amuse each other with their shared distortions of reality, listen to Ron Paul books on tape, and swap stories about their gold coin collections and dehydrated survivalist dinner packets.

We’ll be here taking care of things while they’re gone, and tending to the problems of the real world. Should they ever decide to rejoin us they will find history, and diversity of opinion still in tact.

Akin: Evolution is not ‘a matter of science’

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The Missouri Republican Senate candidate who asserted that women could not get pregnant through “legitimate rape” shared some more wisdom with a tea party group on Thursday, telling them that evolution was not “a matter of science” because “all of the different things that have to be lined up” to create life.

“I’ve taken a look at both sides of the thing and it seems to me that evolution takes a tremendous amount of faith,” Rep. Todd Akin said in audio of the event obtained by Think Progress. “To have all of the sudden all the different things that have to be lined up to create something as sophisticated as life, it takes a lot of faith.”

“I don’t see it as even a matter of science because I don’t know that you can prove one or the other,” he explained.

Red or Blue, can we all agree that when a science committee member says something like this in public, on record, it's grounds for immediate disqualification since he clearly has no understanding of science?

Bachmann in July Warned that Obama is Allowing ‘Influence by the Muslim Brotherhood at the Highest Levels of Power’

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Back in July, Eagle Forum Collegians hosted their 2012 Annual Leadership Summit at the Heritage Foundation where Rep. Michele Bachmann delivered a speech warning of the Muslim Brotherhood’s supposed infiltration of the U.S. government, her baseless pet cause. Bachmann told attendees that the Obama administration’s meeting with an Egyptian lawmaker, who was vetted by the Secret Service and both the State Department and Department of Homeland Security, was part of a string of “outrageous, unbelievable actions on the part of the administration to allow influence by the Muslim Brotherhood at the highest levels of power: the State Department, the White House, the Pentagon, the FBI.”

And cited discredited hack and still hero of the GOP, David Barton, to boot.

Wingnut extraordinaire Steve King taking a play right out of that idiot Sarah Palin's playbook..
Steve King's debate 'notes'

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Iowa GOP Rep. Steve King debated his Democratic opponent, Christie Vilsack, on Tuesday night — and it looks like he brought notes.

In footage of the debate (screenshot below, or at about 9:30), King opens his hand and there are handwritten notes on it. The debate rules said neither candidate was allowed to bring notes.

King campaign spokesman Jimmy Centers said he had "no idea" what the notes on King's hand actually said that night, but that the congressman has a "habit" of writing himself reminders on his hand and that Tuesday was no different.

“The congressman’s got a habit of writing things on his hand. He does it when he’s on the House floor, he does it when he’s campaigning, he does it when he’s with constituents," Centers said. "Tuesday he was at the Romney rally in Van Meter, he visited his mother in the nursing home, and then his wife reminded him to smile and he drew a smiley face on his finger.”

“If he doesn’t wash his hands good enough, he probably has notes from yesterday," Centers added.

Yeah,why use paper when you can use your hand

And sadly, it's all small beans compared to the litany of crazy that man's been spewing for the last few years.

Panic sets in on Planet Wingnuttia....
The far left turns to Nate Silver for wisdom on the polls

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While many conservatives look to former Clinton political consultant Dick Morris to understand the polls and political surveys on the elections, or even a site like UnSkewedPolls.com, those on the left look to New York Times blogger Nate Silver. Silver had a background in analyzing and writing about baseball that Wikipedia describes as, “Silver first gained public recognition for developing PECOTA, a system for forecasting the performance and career development of Major League Baseball players, which he sold to and then managed for Baseball Prospectus from 2003 to 2009."

Silver currently writes about the polls and politics at a web site called FiveThirtyEight.com that is affiliated with the New York Times. His currect projections of the presidential race look quite favorable to the incumbent, President Obama, both nationally and especially in the swing states. Routinely he assigns percentage odds of a candidate (usually his beloved Obama) winning a state far higher and disproportionate any reasonable odds of that candidate winning a state as indicated by the polls.

His blog site has an article yesterday arguing that Mitt Romney's momentum in the polls has stopped. This is wishful thinking of a liberal given that the polls continue to improve for Mitt Romney. He still has Obama winning in Virginia and Colorado even though the most recent and credible polls in those states show Romney winning them. He gives Obama a 73.4 percent chance of winning Ohio, which is downright absurd, as Rasmussen has the candidate tied in Ohio, which really means the undecided voters tip the state of Ohio to Romney if the election were held today. So much for that fantasy-land 73.4 percent chance of Obama winning Ohio.

Nate Silver is a man of very small stature, a thin and effeminate man with a soft-sounding voice that sounds almost exactly like the “Mr. New Castrati” voice used by Rush Limbaugh on his program. In fact, Silver could easily be the poster child for the New Castrati in both image and sound. Nate Silver, like most liberal and leftist celebrities and favorites, might be of average intelligence but is surely not the genius he's made out to be. His political analyses are average at best and his projections, at least this year, are extremely biased in favor of the Democrats.

Apparently, Nate Silver has his own way of “skewing” the polls. He appears to look at the polls available and decide which ones to put more “weighting” on in compiling his own average, as opposed to the Real Clear Politics average, and then uses the average he calculates to determine that percentages a candidate has of winning that state. He labels some polling firms as favoring Republicans, even if they over sample Democrats in their surveys, apparently because he doesn't agree with their results. In the end the polls are gerrymandering into averages that seem to suit his agenda to make the liberal Democrats candidates apparently strong than they are.

He claims to have been highly accurate in predicting the 2008 election results, and perhaps he was. But it's highly unlikely his current methods and projections will have the level of accuracy unless he changes then quite a lot between now and election day. The race has shifted profoundly in favor of Mitt Romney while Nate Sillver is still projecting an Obama win. Unless he changes that, the credibility he earned in 2008 will be greatly diminished after this years election.

Biased? They wish. Never mind that these kooks fail to make a mention about 2010 when Silver forecast correctly that Democrats were going to get killed with his predictions pretty much spot on across the board...

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Of the 37 Senate seats contested in the November 2, 2010 elections, 36 were resolved by November 4, including very close outcomes in several states. Of these 36, the FiveThirtyEight model had correctly predicted the winner in 34. One of the two misses was in Colorado, in which the incumbent Michael Bennet (D) outpolled the challenger Ken Buck (R) by less than 1 percentage point. The 538 model had forecast that Buck would win by 1 percentage point. The second miss was in Nevada, in which the incumbent Harry Reid beat challenger Sharron Angle by 5.5 percentage points, whereas the 538 model had forecast Angle to win by 3.0 percentage points. Silver has speculated the error was due at least in part to the fact that polling organizations underrepresented Hispanic voters by not interviewing in Spanish.[95]
The 538 model had forecast a net pickup of 7 seats by the Republicans in the Senate, but the outcome was a pickup of 6 seats.

On election eve, he reported his final forecast as follows:

Our forecasting model, which is based on a consensus of indicators including generic ballot polling, polling of local districts, expert forecasts, and fund-raising data, now predicts an average Republican net gain of 54 seats (up one from 53 seats in last night's forecast), and a median net Republican gain of 55 seats. These figures would exceed the 52 seats that Republicans won from Democrats in the 1994 midterms.[102]

In final vote tallys as of December 10, 2010, the Republicans had a net gain of 63 seats in the House, 8 more than the total predicted on election eve though still within the reported confidence interval.[103]
State governorships

The FiveThirtyEight model for state governors' races also relied basically on aggregating and projecting public polls in each race. However, Silver reported that gubernatorial elections in each state were somewhat more independent of what happened in other states than were either Senate or House of Representatives elections. That is, these races were somewhat more local and less national in focus.

Just before election day (October 31), the FiveThirtyEight projection was that there would be 30 Republican governors in office (counting states where there was no gubernatorial election in 2010), 19 Democratic governors, and 1 (actually 0. Other (Lincoln Chaffee, who was leading in the polls running as an Independent in Rhode Island).

Of the 37 gubernatorial races, FiveThirtyEight correctly predicted the winner of 36. Only in Illinois, in which the Democratic candidate Pat Quinn defeated the Republican Bill Brady 46.6% to 46.1%, was the FiveThirtyEight prediction wrong.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fivethirtyeight#2010_U.S._mid-term_elections

Silver himself got a big chuckle after reading the nonsense,tweeting:
Nate Silver ‏@fivethirtyeight

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Unskewedpolls argument: Nate Silver seems kinda gay + ??? = Romney landslide! http://www.examiner.com/article/the-far-left-turns-to-nate-silver-for-wisdom-on-the-polls?cid=db_articles …

5h Nate Silver Nate Silver ‏@fivethirtyeight

This is pretty awesome. Per http://unskwedpolls.com , I am "a thin and effeminate man" & therefore not to be trusted. http://www.examiner.com/article/the-far-left-turns-to-nate-silver-for-wisdom-on-the-polls?cid=db_articles …
Expand

Nice to see these losers are still sticking to their worn out lame game plan they always use when cornered by facts....claim the guy presenting them is gay

This kind of speaks for itself.

Fail: Anti-Obama teen wants to move to Australia because we have 'Christian, male president'

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BARACK Obama's "four more years'' victory tweet may have become the most retweeted message of all time, but last night one American teenager's misguided views on Australia were lighting up the twittersphere down under.

Clearly disappointed with the election result, 18-year-old Georgia republican Kristen Neel joined the throngs of American Twitter users claiming they were moving to Australia to escape Obama's presidency.

Unfortunately, she got a few facts wrong.

"I'm moving to Australia, because their president is a Christian and actually supports what he says,'' she tweeted.

Neel's tweet quickly went viral as bemused Aussies retweeted it more than 1400 times, many pointing out that Australia actually has an atheist, female Prime Minister.

"Our Prime Minister is a woman, an atheist who lives with a man she hasn't married. I don't think you'd like it here,'' tweeted Ian Cuthbertson, TV editor at The Australian.

Heretic wrote:

This kind of speaks for itself.
Fail: Anti-Obama teen wants to move to Australia because we have 'Christian, male president'

Just wait until he finds out that they have Universal Health Care

What I love about these idiots is that every country they threaten to move to after a Democratic win, is either more socialist,has higher tax rates,or significantly higher prices on things like gasoline than we do.

Creationist Gov. Bobby Jindal Calls for the GOP to Stop Being Stupid

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Irony meter pegged again

Some Republican politicians are trying to get out in front of their massive loss this election by making speeches calling for the party to stop being so stupid

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No, really — that’s what Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal said yesterday.

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Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal on Monday called on Republicans to “stop being the stupid party” and make a concerted effort to reach a broader swath of voters with an inclusive economic message that pre-empts efforts to caricature the GOP as the party of the rich.

In his first interview since his party’s electoral thumping last week, Jindal urged Republicans to both reject anti-intellectualism and embrace a populist-tinged reform approach that he said would mitigate what exit polls show was one of President Barack Obama’s most effective lines of attack against Mitt Romney. …

“It is no secret we had a number of Republicans damage our brand this year with offensive, bizarre comments — enough of that,” Jindal said. “It’s not going to be the last time anyone says something stupid within our party, but it can’t be tolerated within our party. We’ve also had enough of this dumbed-down conservatism. We need to stop being simplistic, we need to trust the intelligence of the American people and we need to stop insulting the intelligence of the voters.”

Politico’s article doesn’t mention it, but Gov. Jindal is rather infamous at LGF for pushing the very stupidest of stupid right wing positions; he enthusiastically promoted and signed into law a bill in Louisiana that legitimizes the teaching of creationism under the disguise of “academic freedom.” Jindal’s promotion of creationism outraged scientists across America; one scientific organization actually cancelled a major convention in protest.

More recently, Jindal has also promoted legislation that allows Louisiana state funding to go to private religious schools that teach creationism and all kinds of other anti-science mind rot.

And that’s not all, by a long shot. While a college student, Jindal took part in an exorcism, that he claimed cured a woman of cancer.

And of course, when Jindal gave the GOP response to President Obama’s congressional address in 2009, he singled out “volcano monitoring” for mockery, as a government expense he would cut — a few months before the eruption of a giant Icelandic volcano that disrupted air traffic all around the world. Jindal’s dumb comments about volcano monitoring also outraged scientists across America.

This is the guy who’s going to be the poster boy for the new super-intelligent big-brained GOP?

Good luck with that.

The very real economic ramification of Rubio's "I don't know how old the earth is" comment, and via Forbes, no less:

Why Marco Rubio Needs To Know That The Earth Is Billions Of Years Old

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Rubio told GQ that, “I’m not a scientist, man. I can tell you what recorded history says, I can tell you what the Bible says, but I think that’s a dispute amongst theologians and I think it has nothing to do with the gross domestic product or economic growth of the United States. I think the age of the universe has zero to do with how our economy is going to grow. I’m not a scientist. I don’t think I’m qualified to answer a question like that. At the end of the day, I think there are multiple theories out there on how the universe was created and I think this is a country where people should have the opportunity to teach them all. I think parents should be able to teach their kids what their faith says, what science says. Whether the Earth was created in 7 days, or 7 actual eras, I’m not sure we’ll ever be able to answer that. It’s one of the great mysteries.”

The emphasis in Rubio’s statement is mine. I say that because the age of the universe has a lot to do with how our economy is going to grow. That’s because large parts of the economy absolutely depend on scientists being right about either the age of the Universe or the laws of the Universe that allow scientists to determine its age. For example, astronomers recently discovered a galaxy that is over 13 billion light years away from Earth. That is, at its distance, it took the light from the Galaxy over 13 billion years to reach us.

Now, Marco Rubio’s Republican colleague Representative Paul Broun, who sits on the House Committee on Science and Technology, recently stated that it was his belief that the Universe is only 9,000 years old. Well, if Broun is right and physicists are wrong, then we have a real problem. Virtually all modern technology relies on optics in some way, shape or form. And in the science of optics, the fact that the speed of light is constant in a vacuum is taken for granted. But the speed of light must not be constant if the universe is only 9,000 years old. It must be capable of being much, much faster. That means that the fundamental physics underlying the Internet, DVDs, laser surgery, and many many more critical parts of the economy are based on bad science. The consequences of that could be drastic, given our dependence on optics for our economic growth.

Here’s an even more disturbing thought – scientists currently believe that the Earth is about 4.54 billion years old because radioactive substances decay at generally stable rates. Accordingly, by observing how much of a radioactive substance has decayed, scientists are able to determine how old that substance is. However, if the Earth is only 9,000 years old, then radioactive decay rates are unstable and subject to rapid acceleration under completely unknown circumstances. This poses an enormous danger to the country’s nuclear power plants, which could undergo an unanticipated meltdown at any time due to currently unpredictable circumstances. Likewise, accelerated decay could lead to the detonation of our nuclear weapons, and cause injuries and death to people undergoing radioactive treatments in hospitals. Any of these circumstances would obviously have a large economic impact.

If the Earth is really 9,000 years old, as Paul Broun believes and Rubio is willing to remain ignorant about, it becomes imperative to shut down our nuclear plants and dismantle our nuclear stockpiles now until such time as scientists are able to ascertain what circumstances exist that could cause deadly acceleration of radioactive decay and determine how to prevent it from happening.

Clear, logical, measurable, testable implications of their beliefs, assuming they actually believe them. The American public deserves to know, so these idiots, and they are idiots, need to be challenged on their beliefs, by the media and their fellow Republicans (the ones who have at least a grade school understanding of science), to determine just how far down the rabbit hole they've fallen. And if they refuse to give up such stupid, childish, and demonstrably false ideas, they need to be removed from office, as their ability for rational/critical thought has clearly been compromised, which poses a danger to the economy and ultimately the country.

Heretic wrote:

The American public deserves to know, so these idiots, and they are idiots, need to be challenged on their beliefs, by the media and their fellow Republicans (the ones who have at least a grade school understanding of science), to determine just how far down the rabbit hole they've fallen. And if they refuse to give up such stupid, childish, and demonstrably false ideas, they need to be removed from office, as their ability for rational/critical thought has clearly been compromised, which poses a danger to the economy and ultimately the country.

The problem is that if a sane Republican were to do that they would either find them self getting primaried or basically drummed out of the their party like Richard Lugar or Charlie Crist.

Take the last POTUS primary race for example...Their best candidate,IMO,John Huntsman was the first one out. Why? Because he stood up and proclaimed that he believed in science and not creationism. Meanwhile a loon like Rick Santorum goes all the way to the end. Is he now next in line for 2016?

Their party has been hijacked and completely taken over by far right zealots. The hate radio crowd,Rush Limbaugh, and people like Grover Norquist give them their marching orders. They refuse to learn from their mistakes as evidenced by Senate candidates they ran like Mourdouch and Akins. If they had run moderate candidates in the last 2 elections instead of wackos like Christine O'Donnel and Sharon Engle they would have easily won back the Senate.

Maybe if they get totally annihilated in 2016 they'll finally wake up. Until then there's tons of money still to be made by the wingnut entertainment complex by preaching hate and encouraging idiotic thinking like birtherism or secession. Buffoons like Dick Morris,whose only interest is making money,are treated like royalty,telling these idiots what they want to hear (Romney Landslide) while totally ignoring reality.

Artie60438 wrote:

The problem is that if a sane Republican were to do that they would either find them self getting primaried or basically drummed out of the their party like Richard Lugar or Charlie Crist.

Quite possible. But I wonder how influential they would be, how likely another such occurrence, were they to face a concerted effort by the conservative media and their fellow politicians/talking heads flat out telling them, loudly, that these ideas are false, completely untenable, let alone dangerous. I don't think that fringe would be quite as influential without their endless coddling, and I think if the Republican establishment started accepting reality and science, I think their electorate would too (especially given how susceptible they are to false conservative narratives).

Though it could just very well be wishful thinking on my part.

Artie60438 wrote:

If they had run moderate candidates in the last 2 elections instead of wackos like Christine O'Donnel and Sharon Engle they would have easily won back the Senate.

That's why I think they'll finally start listening.

Bill Nye "The Science Guy" smacks down that idiot Marco Rubio

Heretic wrote:

Artie60438 wrote:

The problem is that if a sane Republican were to do that they would either find them self getting primaried or basically drummed out of the their party like Richard Lugar or Charlie Crist.

Quite possible. But I wonder how influential they would be, how likely another such occurrence, were they to face a concerted effort by the conservative media and their fellow politicians/talking heads flat out telling them, loudly, that these ideas are false, completely untenable, let alone dangerous. I don't think that fringe would be quite as influential without their endless coddling, and I think if the Republican establishment started accepting reality and science, I think their electorate would too (especially given how susceptible they are to false conservative narratives).

Though it could just very well be wishful thinking on my part.

Artie60438 wrote:

If they had run moderate candidates in the last 2 elections instead of wackos like Christine O'Donnel and Sharon Engle they would have easily won back the Senate.

That's why I think they'll finally start listening.

Sure doesn't sound like it...

Debt talks could redefine Senate races

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"The fiscal cliff negotiations and debt ceiling negotiations are going to define the primaries a lot better afterwards," Club for Growth President Chris Chocola told The Hill.

The deep-pocketed, fiscally conservative group has been the biggest outside player in GOP primaries in recent years. They were a major factor in helping Sen.-elect Ted Cruz (R-Texas) win his primary, and gave Indiana Secretary of State Richard Mourdock (R) a big boost in his victory over Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.).

Chocola emphasized that he has “no idea” who the Club will target next year, and said much depends “on what happens with the fiscal cliff and debt ceiling” as well as previous votes.

“If Republicans vote for something that raises taxes, doesn't do any entitlement reform or spending cuts, does nothing to actually address our fiscal challenges every one of them is going to have a problem and we're the least of their problems, they'll have primaries everywhere,” he warned. “This is an important test for all Republicans: Whether they go along and accomplish nothing or stand up and try to solve our problems.”

He said that while the group wouldn't oppose closing tax loopholes if it was accompanied by a lowering of rates, if Republicans seek to increase revenue solely through loophole closures "that would be a problem" — and any tax increases would likely be a "non-starter" for the group.

Two Republican Senators who may end up as targets are Sens. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), both of whom have said recently they’re open to breaking with Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform pledge against raising any new taxes.

What's fascinating is that the party who always looked out for the super-rich are now virtually their slaves due to organizations like CFG and Grover Norquist.

Pretty simple way to illustrate and explain evolution to the creationists

Almost Half of GOP Voters: ACORN Stole It Again!
(Never mind they don't even exist anymore! They stole it anyway!)
By Brad Friedman on 12/4/2012, 4:59pm PT

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It was bad enough when a majority of Republicans were so disinformed after the 2008 election that they thought ACORN stole the election (almost 10 million votes, apparently) for Barack Obama.

Now that ACORN is no more (since early 2010), the massive disinformation campaign that Republicans have been suckered into believing seems to continue nonetheless. Just under a majority of self-identified GOP voters think the non-existent ACORN stole the election again this year for Obama! Those tricky non-existent bastards, apparently, somehow stuffed the ballot box 5.5 million times and never got caught even once!

From Public Policy Polling today, who note that Republicans are "not handling election results well"...
49% of GOP voters nationally say they think that ACORN stole the election for President Obama. We found that 52% of Republicans thought that ACORN stole the 2008 election for Obama, so this is a modest decline, but perhaps smaller than might have been expected given that ACORN doesn't exist anymore.

It should be noted, for any of those duped Republicans who may be reading this, that there is no evidence, none, zero, nada, that any vote has ever been stolen in any election either by ACORN or via one of the bad voter registrations submitted by one of its workers (bad registrations which were almost all discovered by ACORN themselves and turned in, along with the rogue worker who submitted them, to authorities.)

For those stooges who are still unconvinced, because they read something somewhere on the Internet about "voter fraud" in 2012, we dispatched with the most popular "massive voter fraud" myths of 2012 over the weekend right here.

Finally, as if all of that isn't pathetic enough, PPP has more sad news for a party which now seems intent on disappearing itself entirely...

Some GOP voters are so unhappy with the outcome that they no longer care to be a part of the United States. 25% of Republicans say they would like their state to secede from the union compared to 56% who want to stay and 19% who aren't sure.

One reason that such a high percentage of Republicans are holding what could be seen as extreme views is that their numbers are declining. Our final poll before the election, which hit the final outcome almost on the head, found 39% of voters identifying themselves as Democrats and 37% as Republicans. Since the election we've seen a 5 point increase in Democratic identification to 44%, and a 5 point decrease in Republican identification to 32%.

Remember that the next time you come across a Republican it's almost 50/50 that they're a stone cold idiot!

Wow. Just... wow. Apparently I'm severely underestimating the power of Fox News.

Stunning example of how completely out of touch conservatives are these days...

Latinos hate Republicans, and they disagree with them too

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The conservative Hispanic Leadership Network decided to do their own poll to find out what existing phone and exit polling, not to mention election results, could already tell them—that Latinos hate Republicans. On every issue

The only time Republicans get out of the 30s is on negative topics, like "cares about helping rich people" and "anti-immigrant." Democrats maintain dominant advantages on every question. It's not even close.

So how does the Hispanic Leadership Network Respond to the results of its own poll?

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The results of our poll confirm, once again, that the policies offered by conservative candidates are more closely aligned with the values of Hispanic voters.

Wow.

Young Republicans National Policy Chairman demonstrates just how out of touch they are by getting into a Twitter battle with a fake news anchor.
So over the weekend THIS was tweeted:

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Will McAvoy Will McAvoy ‏@WillMcAvoy_ACN
When will the media stop talking about the politically irrelevant Sarah Palin at CPAC? I'm devoting the hour to that topic tonight!

Now if you are constant visitor to this blog, or a fan of HBO, you already know what is wrong with this tweet.

Sadly there are some who are apparently neither, such as Jason B. Whitman the Young Republicans National Policy Chairman, who became incensed and tweeted this in response.

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My favorite part of this is that this guy notified Sarah Palin that he was standing up for her honor against this asshat who is going to dedicate "an entire hour" to her appearance at CPAC.

However the problem, of course, is that this is a parody twitter account using Will McAvoy's name.

But what is even a BIGGER problem is that Will McAvoy himself ONLY exists in the world of HBO where he is a character in the series Newsroom, played by the incredibly talented Jeff Daniels.

So essentially this Jason B. Whitman guy was arguing with a guy, pretending to be a fake journalist, on a fake news channel, in an HBO series, on cable television.

I understand that after he was notified that he was making a fool of himself, he deleted the tweet.

Too late.