Bull. And also, shit.

The latest experiment in "Why the Hell Not?" is underway in a Michigan federal court.

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"The undisputed sociological and psychological evidence demonstrates that unmarried persons, straight, gay or lesbian, are no less loving, caring and effective parents than those parents who are married to each other. In addition, there are very significant legal benefits for children having two legal parents rather than one," the couple's lawyers, Dana Nessel and Carole Stanyar, wrote.

There are some things so stupid only a lawyer could mouth them. There is, after all, the rather gruesome track record of reality:

While there are no national statistics available from the federal government, a survey by the Child Welfare League of America bore out the state data, finding that anywhere from one-tenth to one-third of all child fatalities were caused by unrelated adults in the home.

"If you're looking at abuse overall, the natural parents are far more likely to be the perpetrators than anyone else," said Kevin Kirkpatrick, a spokesman for the Chicago-based Prevent Child Abuse America.

But, according to Walter Smith, director of Family Resources Inc., a local child-abuse prevention agency, ."it's very common, either because of a breakdown in attachment, or failure to create one" for live-in lovers to become involved.

"They don't love the kid," said Martin Daly, author of a number of Canadian studies on the issue. "A lot of stepmothers and boyfriends regard the kid as undesired baggage who they wish had never been born. The child remains a resented nuisance at best."

Daly is the co-author of a 1999 Canadian study that found that an American child living with one genetic parent and one step-parent or a live-in companion was 100 times as likely to suffer fatal abuse as a child living with two genetic parents.

And a number of other studies, in fact, strongly suggest that children being cared for by an unrelated adult are at far greater risk of injury or death than may have been previously believed.

A 1993 British study found the incidence of abuse was 33 times higher in a household where the mother was living with an unrelated boyfriend. And a study presented at the American Academy of Pediatrics of 175 Missouri children under the age of 5, who were murdered between 1992 and 1994, found that the risk of a child's dying at the hands of an adult living in the child's own household was eight times higher if the adult was unrelated.

You're going to say that, hey, these are adoptive parents, it's different. Maybe. Or maybe [bracketing the gay marriage issue for the nonce] people who can't commit to each other legally aren't in the best place to be committing to the care of children via adoption.

But what the hell--throw the dice. It's not like lives are at stake or anything.

Right in the wheelwell.

A couple of months ago, you may recall this bit of eco-proselytizing involving exploding children. Even the writer for the above environmentalist website acknowledged the obvious hateful implications.



Charming--and the scoundrel's "just a joke" defense was happily ineffective.

But some Greens seem enamored with the "whack 'em!" solution.

Chris Johnson found a new approach leading to the same result: using a Mayan goddess as a mascot for a U.N. climate change convention.

Great idea: nothing says "reason and creativity" quite like a goddess worshipped by a culture which was big on human sacrifice. Including children.

Sign me up.

Not so by the way, Hernan Cortes died 463 years ago yesterday. As Ms. Figueres' mascot diety makes clear, Cortes deserves to be regarded as a great, if largely unwitting, humanitarian.

The perils of undergoing a classectomy.

The side-effects are lifelong and difficult to treat, as a distinctly churlish commentator at the Reporter demonstrates.

In the past, Winters was a sometimes-challenging read, but his increasingly-venomous streak has made it not worth the bother.

May God have mercy on her soul.

AIDS truther Christine Maggiore is dead at 52.

Proceeded by rivers of blood. An emblem of the decay of the Western mind.

Following the "If You Can't Say Something Nice..." adage, here are my thoughts about her:












.

Some free advice for journalists covering the pregnant "man" story.

SHE'S NOT A MAN!

SHE'S A CONFUSED WOMAN WHO COULD AFFORD EXPENSIVE SURGERY.

MEN. CANNOT. HAVE. BABIES.

CALLING HERSELF A MAN NO MORE CHANGES HER CHROMOSOMES THAN ME STICKING MY HAND INTO MY SHIRT CHANGES ME INTO NAPOLEON.

Back to you.

Next up--shaved heads, black sneakers and vats of kool-aid.

I have a proposal. Every time you run into a piece of Obamolatry, start responding with an irreverent "Barack H. Obama."

Because this is getting seriously out of hand.

Barack Obama isn't really one of us. Not in the normal way, anyway.

This is what I find myself offering up more and more in response to the whiners and the frowners and to those with broken or sadly dysfunctional karmic antennae - or no antennae at all - to all those who just don't understand and maybe even actively recoil against all this chatter about Obama's aura and feel and MLK/JFK-like vibe.

To them I say, all right, you want to know what it is? The appeal, the pull, the ethereal and magical thing that seems to enthrall millions of people from all over the world, that keeps opening up and firing into new channels of the culture normally completely unaffected by politics?

No, it's not merely his youthful vigor, or handsomeness, or even inspiring rhetoric. It is not fresh ideas or cool charisma or the fact that a black president will be historic and revolutionary in about a thousand different ways. It is something more. Even Bill Clinton, with all his effortless, winking charm, didn't have what Obama has, which is a sort of powerful luminosity, a unique high-vibration integrity.

Dismiss it all you like, but I've heard from far too many enormously smart, wise, spiritually attuned people who've been intuitively blown away by Obama's presence - not speeches, not policies, but sheer presence - to say it's just a clever marketing ploy, a slick gambit carefully orchestrated by hotshot campaign organizers who, once Obama gets into office, will suddenly turn from perky optimists to vile soul-sucking lobbyist whores, with Obama as their suddenly evil, cackling overlord.

Here's where it gets gooey. Many spiritually advanced people I know (not coweringly religious, mind you, but deeply spiritual) identify Obama as a Lightworker, that rare kind of attuned being who has the ability to lead us not merely to new foreign policies or health care plans or whatnot, but who can actually help usher in a new way of being on the planet, of relating and connecting and engaging with this bizarre earthly experiment. These kinds of people actually help us evolve. They are philosophers and peacemakers of a very high order, and they speak not just to reason or emotion, but to the soul.

Barack H. Obama. Yessirree, and I'm the irrational theocrat. At this point, the Illinois Senator could be running against Verne Troyer and I'd still put a VERNE! sign in my yard (Proposed slogan: "Let's Toss This Dwarf Straight Into The White House!")

Reaganolatry could be pretty bad, and I could be wrong, but I don't recall anyone ever positing that the Gipper was a demigod.

Christianity: Still The Only Safe Way to Worship a Living Human Being.™

["Thanks" to LGF.]

It's Rifle-Burying Time!

Der Tommissar takes a certain political blogger out to the woodshed.

The company you keep...

Amy Pawlak incurs the wrath of the American Protective Association.

Reason? She calls Michelle Malkin's overheated commenters on their Catholic bashing.

Start here, then go here.

I'll disagree with the charitable Amy on one point--Malkin has some explaining to do with this canard:

"His [Pope Benedict XVI] primary concerns are not the sovereignty and security of our country. Open borders benefit Catholic churches looking to fill their pews and collection baskets. The Vatican and American bishops, led by radical L.A. Cardinal Roger Mahony, have long promoted immigration anarchy and lawlesness."

Let's unpack that opening statement a bit. Besides the yessirre, dirt-poor Latinos just ante up to the rafters every Sunday nonsense, that is.

American sovereignty is being threatened by the actions of the Pope, who wants to fill the pews with papists from way down south.


That's the old dual-loyalty charge, disinterred and waved at the papists. If you're with the Pope, you're against American sovereignty. I'm sorry, but the rabid commenters gone wild are taking their cues from the first paragraph.

I have my problems with the American bishops stance on immigration, which is high in muzzy-headedness and low in addressing the legitimate concerns of American citizens. I don't think a blanket amnesty is mandated by the Gospel, nor is building a border fence an affront to almighty God.

But flamethrowing like that seen in the Malkin comboxes is familiar. Catholics have heard this tune before and won't dance to it. Italians, anyone?

Benedict XVI and Roger Cardinal Mahony, leading the flock across the Rio Grande.

I don't believe for a minute that Michelle Malkin is an anti-Catholic. But she would do well to disassociate herself from rhetoric that is.

Al Qaeda objects to 9/11 "Truther" Book.

Absolute perfection. [Via Hot Air.]


9/11 Conspiracy Theories 'Ridiculous,' Al Qaeda Says

Looks like a trip to A2 is in order.

Up for a trip to Quickie Burger, Zach?

The hostile reaction in the comments is heartening.

I have no title for this story.

Except maybe Apocalypse of St. John 22:20.

CourageMan reports on the Brave New World's latest innovation, an 8 (that's "eight." "as in just 8". The period stops here) year old boy claiming "transgendered" status.

I got nothin'.

Just so we're completely clear.

People who believe in the Semtex Fairy are not welcome here.

Someone once said 9/11 trutherism should be added to the DSM-IV. I think he has a point.

Here's a wake-up call, Fairy fans: you have somehow managed the difficult feat of sounding even dumber than all those shortwave radio morons who said Clinton bombed the Murrah Building.

Ahem.

I don't like to bra-

Oh, who am I kidding? Just let me draw your attention to this (scroll to the bottom and go to the next page).

Thanks to Victor for the heads up.

The untruther has been escorted from the premises.

Because, you see, it's my board. And yes, I am Dale Price, and I am painfully easy to find if you have a Michigan phone directory. Bonus info: I, like the rest of my family, adhere to an individual rights interpretation of the Second Amendment of the Bill of Rights, too. I find it ironic that an untruther gets all snarky about questions, but your mileage may vary.

But s/he left with a panicked squirt of pixels. OK, I had the nightstick in hand, but still. Note the pontificating blather with which s/he attempts to baptise his/her otherwise inexplicable passivity in the face of a hellish regime, and the long indictment of American society's (real) moral failures. Which are, of course, a shared concern for the Catholic untruther's hard-left associates.

You know--the ones driving untrutherism. You can lie down with whatever dogs you like. Just don't expect a big hug from the rest of us afterwards.

Here's the crux of the jib:

I find the ignoring of facts when they are presented to you in an open manner to be contemptible. Others are willing the talk over the points. What's the problem?

Ah, the truth. The "facts." Well, of course--who better to trust than anonymous folks who aren't expert in the relevant fields? Trouble is, what was offered weren't really "the facts." They aren't even tested theories. They are hypotheses fueled by unreason, conjecture and a corrosive irrational distrust coupled with a deficiency of real critical thinking skills. It ain't pretty. Want to see real critical thinking in action? Zach Frey manages it in one sentence:

An administration so competently evil as to pull off 9/11 as a Reichstag fire would surely have "found" a few more WMDs in Iraq as well.

I'll toss in a few more examples: the discovery of the wiretapping and CIA prisons by the New York Times. The massive conspiracy that a staged 9/11 requires would have far more people involved, and yet not a one has talked? Okay.

There's nothing to discuss. The illogic behind untrutherism is worthy of a Chick tract. No, wait--that's not fair to Mr. Chick. Some things are so absurd as to deserve no serious discussion. And I could really care less if--allegedly--the Ground Zero workers thought there was a government conspiracy involved. The truth is not subject to overturning by a majority vote. Likewise if veterans of the 4th Armored Division suddenly started saying "maybe there wasn't a Holocaust after all." The Holocaust happened regardless of what the ballot returns at Hutton Gibson's poker night are. Sadly, there's no point in having a discussion with untruthers, as they have demonstrated that their faith is not subject to disproof.

The facts are readily available to all, shiny-eyed and infidel. Leave it to my beloved late grandfather's favorite magazine to respond with this magisterial piece. For a broader treatment of the 9/11 claims in general, go here. The way critical thought is going, you probably ought to get the book-length version. For an examination of the functional insanity of conspiracy thinking, I strongly recommend this essay. [Big h/t to Mike Inman.] In short, there is a point where continuing to "ask questions" constitutes bad faith and culpable ignorance, and is corrosive of the very concept of objective truth.

Especially so when the questions have been definitively answered by witnesses and people in the know. Irrefutably so when the questioner's position depends upon a farrago of conjecture, fantasy and, yes, flat out lies ("melting steel," for God's sake). And metaphysically so when the questioner doesn't have the courage of his shoddy convictions to actually do anything about it except to anonymously to emit carbon dioxide. When the questioner is a follower of Christ...words fail.

Respond? Or Not Respond?

You tell me.

A Republic, if you can keep it.

Whoa--someone needs to tell Thomas Sowell to get a grip.

When I see the worsening degeneracy in our politicians, our media, our educators, and our intelligentsia, I can't help wondering if the day may yet come when the only thing that can save this country is a military coup.

Yiiiikes. The only good thing I can say about this is that at least he said it while a Republican was in office.

Stop wondering. By its very nature, a coup means that the nation's end has arrived. Leaving aside the insuperable moral problem, there is also a pragmatic one: in a continent with a widely dispersed population, a coup attempt buys you a civil war. Which, given the fact we are the most technologically-advanced nation in human history, means destruction on a hellish scale. Think Espana 1936, with the full goodie-bag of American military hardware at the opponents' disposal.

Oh, wait--that gets you back to the "insuperable moral problem" again.

Deep breaths, Dr. Sowell.

Yes, the country is filled with a dismaying number of non-thinkers with grievances inversely proportional to their capacity for logic. Yes, the nation is culturally fissiparous, with pockets of selfish, stupid, navel-gazing hedonism that makes Cabaret look like a celebration of Calvin's Geneva.

But that's no reason to look for a shining man on horseback, come to save us all. Look what all that "solution" has done for Latin America, Southern Europe, Africa, Eastern Europe, etc. throughout the ages.

Consider: (1) the non-thinkers really don't mean it. Take, for example, the 9/11 un-Truthers.

Please, dear Lord, and soon.

In the case of the un-Truthers, it boils down to a lazy mental pacifier used to medicate the pain of defeat at the polls. They don't mean a word of it, deep down. People who really believed this crap would do something more concrete than, say, posting hit and run anonymous comments on blogs. I mean, if you really believed the Chimpy McBushitlerburton Regime blew up the WTC, you wouldn't shrug and go home every night to watch Futurama reruns on Adult Swim. Not very Founding-Fatherish, when it comes down to it.

Ditto climate change alarmism. If Sheryl Crow were as terrified of global warming as she claims, she wouldn't travel with a retinue that would make an Ottoman Sultan pull up short.

"Hey, Sherry, that's a little over the top, don't you think? Four buses? Less is more, hon. Less is more. Except when you're talking 'harem.' Hi-yo! Speaking of which: How would you like to join? Lately, I've had a hankerin' for 'clueless' and 'bony.' Whaddaya say?

(2) Selfish hedonism solves itself in the medium term. People who are too busy surfing for the latest Thai animal p**n are not going to be movers and shakers on the political scene.

None of this is to deny that there are serious problems in the culture and the body politic. Nor is this to say that one shouldn't take steps to protect himself and his family from the cancers in both. I'd argue it's a duty, and the steps involved may be extensive.

But a counsel of despair is self-defeating, and just as destructive in the long term. After a decade and a half of hippies, the country elected Reagan. The electorate that swept the Dems to power in 2006 did so only after the Democrats promised to govern like adults and even tossed some counter-cultural pro-life candidates into the mix. Their actual record in power isn't particularly encouraging, but there are still grounds for hope.

Hoping for a coup? Come on. That's a declaration of surrender.

Just put a bullet in the American Experiment right now.


Why?


Keep this in mind: ratings have been up since this certified ignoramus started braying on Teh Voo.


Because if there was any hope left for this nation, ABC's offices would have been surrounded by mobs demanding the immediate firing of the simpleton months ago.


Oh, and nice job there, Ricki Lake: "Because of a ineducation." If she's right, then she should be thanking her lucky stars there's no draft.

Then again, anyone looking to Lake for political insight has probably also received a diagnosis that uses the terms "vegetative" or "irreparable."


That goes double for O'Donnell fans.


Remember: Fire can't melt steel.

The true story behind the sinking of the Titanic.

Real culprit? Probably the Jews.

Makes a pretty compelling case, especially about that whole metal vs. ice thing. And he uses science and stuff.

Wake up, America!

[H/t, Ace of Spades.]

From the Jesus Never Said Anything About Dwarf-Tossing or Seal-Clubbing School of Christian 'Thought'.

Mark brings us the stylings of one Paula Gott, self-proclaimed "biblical investigator," proclaiming a Deus lo volt! in favor of embryonic stem cell research.

Initial impressions: (1) Her research has a telling, Didache-shaped hole at its center that leaves the remainder suspect (note Chapter 2).

(2) I doubt she's an evangelical, though she tries to appeal to that audience in the way she structures her arguments. (a) They generally avoid the New Revised Standard Version like it was herpes and (b), they don't argue that Plutarch wrote the Gospel According to Luke and Acts of the Apostles. [H/t to one of Mark's commenters for this great find.] I suspect the terms she uses are a direct appeal to the predominantly-evangelical audience of outstate Missouri.

And while I agree that her thesis about Plutarchian authorship of this large swath of the NT is...sui generis...I strongly object to Mark's commenters calling the Rev. Ms. Gott a "loony." In fact, those are fighting words.

She is not a loony! Why must she be attired with the epithet 'loony' merely because she has established that Luke is Plutarch? I've heard tell that John Shelby Spong has posited that Mark is Stephen King, and you wouldn't call him a 'loony'! Furthermore, Brett Favre, the gentleman quarterback, argued that Matthew was Dean Koontz; Dennis Kucinich hypothesized that Voltaire wrote both Philemon and Hebrews, and Jackie Collins conclusively proved that Douglas Coupland wrote Revelation! So, if you're calling the author of Hollywood Wives: The Next Generation a 'loony," I shall have to ask you to step outside!

Do try to keep a more civil tone next time.

Thanks for letting me borrow the Sponger for a while.

Oh, the questions:

Can a life of preening self-regard, gossipy self-aggrandizement, and laughable pseudoscholarship be made into a drama that isn't "Boy Meets Tractor" agitprop?

Can a spiteful fundamentalist who has traded in one intellectually void worldview for another be a sympathetic dramatic protagonist?

Why not a musical: SpongRock!

More importantly: Can a play close during the first intermission?

We will soon find out. Perhaps the strangest thing is that it's not a one-man play:

At 74, Spong, the retired bishop of Newark, N.J., continues to rile many Christians with his denial of the virgin birth, the bodily resurrection of Jesus and a God who works miracles and exacts punishment. His critics call him a heretic.

Others, however, say that Spong's defense of ethnic minorities, women and gays as well as his skeptical take on Scripture as the literal word of God bring relevance, rationality and hope.

Now Spong's lifelong quest to wrest himself from what he has called his fundamentalist evangelical North Carolina upbringing to understanding God in a radically different way is the subject of a sympathetic new drama, "A Pebble In My Shoe."The bishop plans to be at Sunday's 5:15 p.m. premiere at the Los Angeles Theater Center, 514 S. Spring St. After the 90-minute performance, Spong will be honored at a reception. He also will sign his latest book, "The Sins of Scripture." Other performances are scheduled for Oct. 15,16, 22 and 23.

Written and directed by Cox, the play is based on Spong's 1999 autobiography, "Here I Stand: My Struggle for a Christianity of Integrity, Love and Equality." It features actor Stephan Wolfert as the bishop.

Maybe Mr. Wolfert will be able to parlay this stepping stone into a role of true artistic integrity.

Like, say, portraying a satisfied client of Dewey, Cheatham and Howe in a commercial that runs during the middle of Montel.

[Update: My beloved child-bride, who has seen the movie more times than theoretical mathematics can count, gently corrected me, resulting in the change of the post title. She also has a great story about the time she nearly made Molly Ringwald cry in Paris (and still feels awful about it, if you're reading this, Ms. Ringwald), but I'll let her tell it.]