Read It and Weep

A new poll from Pew on where people believe the CoVID-19 virus originated:

While a plurality of Americans (43%) say the new coronavirus most likely came about naturally, nearly three-in-ten (29%) say it most likely was created in a lab, according to a Pew Research Center survey conducted from March 10 to 16, 2020, as part of the Center’s nearly yearlong Election News Pathways project.

Around a quarter of adults (23%) say it is most likely that the current strain of coronavirus was developed intentionally in a lab; another 6% say it was most likely made accidentally in a lab. A quarter say they aren’t sure where the virus originated.

Note that it's already been determined that CoVID-19 is a mutation of the SARS virus. But, thanks to Fox News and Glorious Leader, that bit of information got buried.

Here's the breakdown:

 

What's appalling about this is that less than half the people in this country believe the virus is a natural mutation. (And let's face it, viruses mutate like crazy -- that's why there are so many varieties of flu.) And even worse, look at the age breakdown: the 19-29 year-olds are the group with the largest number of -- what shall I call them? How about "paranoid fantasists"?

I fear for the future.

Via Joe.My.God.

Climate Change? Well, Maybe

I was going to make this a "Saturday Science" post, but it's more about the politics than the actual science. Now that the UN has issued a rather earth-shaking report on the effects of climate change and the speed with which they are happening, the Trump regime is . . . well, the consensus there seems be be "Report? What report?":

On Oct. 6, United Nations policy makers approved a report presenting a “dire” picture of the coming changes to the planet, including the extinction of coral reefs, spikes in extreme weather events like hurricanes or drought, and widespread food and water shortages that would multiply the risks of mass migration, political instability, and global war.

The report warned that the effects of global climate change could become irreversible by 2040, and that preventing them would require an immediate global effort, “unprecedented in terms of scale.”

But in the nearly two weeks since the report’s release, the federal government has avoided the subject or declined to discuss it at length.

A spokesperson from the New York headquarters of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) told The Daily Beast that she was unaware of the recent report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. “What report?” she asked. “I haven’t heard of it.”

At least the Ignoramus in Chief is willing to admit that it might be happening:

When Trump visited Florida just days before it would face Michael, a storm even climate skeptic Rick Scott called “the worst hurricane the Florida panhandle has ever seen,” the president said only that he was aware of the IPCC’s publication.

“It was given to me,” he said, before noting that he wanted to look at “who drew it.” Later, Trump told journalist Lesley Stahl on 60 Minutes that, although he would no longer deny climate change, he was not sure whether it was caused by human activity, and that it could “go back” on its own. When Stahl disagreed, Trump added: “You’d have to show me the scientists. Because they have a very big political agenda. Scientists also have a political agenda.”

While leaving himself an out -- I wonder when he's going to start calling climate scientists "enemies of the people".

Read the whole thing for a really grim picture of how Trump and his minions have gotten rid of anyone in the administration who might know what they're talking about.

Via Towleroad.

A Reminder

For all the RWNJs who are about to start screaming about Roseanne Barr's First Amendment right to freedom of speech being violated because just about every network and streaming service that is/was showing her new series or reruns of her old one has dumped her:

 

As might be expected, they're fine with the NFL trying to muzzle the players protesting police violence against minorities.

Today's Must-Read: High School Civics Edition

OK -- this should scare you, even if nothing else does:

Unfortunately, many Americans lack fundamental civics knowledge, according to the recent Constitution Day Civics Survey by the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania, and therefore cannot understand current events.

“In light of the information in the news about First Amendment issues, the ignorance of the public about the First Amendment is startling,” Kathleen Hall Jamieson, director of APPC, tells Newsweek. “So there are times in which one needs knowledge about the Constitution to make sense of what's happening in the news environment,” she adds. “In particular when rights are at issue it's important that people understand what their rights are as they read the news.”

The results, published on September 12, reveal that more than half of Americans (53 percent) believe people in this country illegally have no protections under the Constitution. If that weren’t startling enough, only about a quarter (26 percent) of Americans can successfully name all three branches of government, with one-third of respondents unable to name a single branch, 27 percent who knew one branch and 13 percent who knew two.

It gets worse.

There's a reason Betsy DeVos was named Secretary of Education -- and it wasn't to improve the general public's knowledge of how this country works.

Actually, I'd like to blame Trump, but we've been a while getting here. Don't look for it to get better, if for no other reason than those who don't know don't care and don't want to learn, and, since the right has taken over the majority of state houses, no one's going to make them.

Today's Must-Read: Understanding Fly-Over Country

This, from RawStory, points out, I think, a basic flaw in all the analyses of Trump's base -- and the Republican base in general:

As the aftermath of the election of Donald Trump is still being sorted out, a common theme keeps cropping up from all sides: “Democrats failed to understand white, working-class, fly-over America.”

Trump supporters are saying this. Progressive pundits are saying this. Talking heads across all forms of the media are saying this. Even some Democratic leaders are saying this. It doesn’t matter how many people say it, it is complete bullshit. It is an intellectual/linguistic sleight of hand meant to throw attention away from the real problem. The real problem isn’t east coast elites who don’t understand or care about rural America. The real problem is rural America doesn’t understand the causes of their own situations and fears and they have shown no interest in finding out.

One aspect of this that the author points out is that, unless you are one of them, they're not going to listen to anything you say that disputes what they already believe. There is a deep distrust of "outsiders" at play here -- I've run into samples of it while visiting family in the North Carolina hills: if you're not in some way connected, you're suspect.

It's longish, but it's worth reading in full.

Today's Must-Read: How to Run an Administration

Advice from Obama to Trump, as reported by Brian Beutler:

“[H]ow you put a team together to make sure that they’re getting you the best information and they are teeing up the options from which you will ultimately make decisions, that’s probably the most useful advice, the most constructive advice that I’ve been able to give him,” he said. “That if you find yourself isolated because the process breaks down, or if you’re only hearing from people who agree with you on everything, or if you haven’t created a process that is fact-checking and probing and asking hard questions about policies or promises that you’ve made, that’s when you start making mistakes. And as I indicated in some of my previous remarks, reality has a way of biting back if you’re not paying attention to it.”

Trump ignored it. Given what we know of Trump's personality, Obama might as well have been talking to the wall. What he put together is just the opposite:

Heeding Obama’s advice might have helped Trump avoid making an obvious and monumental error, but Trump either lacks the capacity to run the government in an orderly fashion or intentionally discarded Obama’s recommendations, or both. When reality quickly asserted itself, as Obama promised it would, Trump claimed (out of ignorance or malicious dishonesty) that he was merely reprising “ what President Obama did in 2011 when he banned visas for refugees from Iraq for six months”—a “ban” that quite literally never happened.

Of course, the author assumes that Trump wants to run an administration that actually functions to the benefit of the country. I've seen no evidence of that. He thinks it's a reality show, and is acting accordingly.

Read the whole thing, needless to say.

Via Balloon Juice, which has some interesting additional information.

This Would Be Funny

If it weren't my country. Sort of like the Keystone Kops taking over the government:

One day before U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s first meeting with a foreign leader, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Japanese officials said they had not finalized when or where in New York it would take place, who would be invited, or in some cases whom to call for answers. . . .

Japanese and U.S. officials said on Wednesday the State Department had not been involved in planning the meeting, leaving the logistical and protocol details that normally would be settled far in advance still to be determined.

“There has been a lot of confusion,” said one Japanese official.

The Japanese are masters of understatement.

In spite of Trump's denials, the picture that's coming out of his "transition" is one of a bunch of amateurs under the direction of a five-year-old trying to stage Der Ring des Nibelungen.

Today's Must-Read, Part Two: Congratulations

Via Digby again, this is pretty much how I feel right now:

It goes on:

This is by the cartoonist David Horsey:

I’m sure thousands of bottles of Budweiser will be raised tonight in those white, working-class neighborhoods of the upper Midwest that put Donald Trump over the top in the electoral college. You folks should enjoy your moment and don’t trouble yourselves with the thought that plenty of celebratory champagne is being poured in corporate board rooms, country clubs and in the spacious mansions of hedge fund managers.

Thanks to your votes, Mr. and Mrs. White Working Class, all those rich people will soon get a massive tax cut and relief from the environmental regulations that have kept them from polluting your air and water and from the financial oversight that has restrained them from milking every last penny from their employees and the victims of their big-money schemes.

Yes, congratulations. At the same moment you elected a billionaire who claimed he would drain the special interest “swamp” in Washington, you kept in power insiders such as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, one of the biggest snakes in the swamp, plus all the other Republicans in Congress who have fought to keep the mighty flow of corporate dollars streaming in.

You think you have struck a blow against the “elites” on the coasts who look down on “real Americans” in the heartland. You say you have been forgotten or misunderstood by the powers that be. That may be true. But I must say that those of you who act as if you are the only ones in the country who work hard, care for your families and love your country are pretty damn elitist, as well.

I look around at my friends and neighbors here on the West Coast and I see lots of patriotic people who put in long hours of labor to put food on the table and put their kids through school.

There is Keith, a guy with whom I recently got acquainted when we discovered our common affinity for good drinks, good ribs and good jazz. Keith is a muscular black man who would likely be subject to unfair and unfriendly scrutiny from the local sheriff if he showed up in a small Midwestern town, but forget the stereotype. Keith had a career in the Marines before taking a job managing security for Hollywood celebrities. In his free time, he works to help the homeless in downtown Los Angeles.

There is the Korean family that runs the laundry down the street from my apartment who never seem to take a vacation or even a day off. There are the Latino men I see laboring every day in the Southern California heat cutting lawns and repairing houses. There are the men of every race I pass by on my way to work who are hauling steel, handling jackhammers, driving trucks and raising girders as they build new subway lines and raise up towering skyscrapers.

And there are my colleagues in the newsroom, both the seasoned veterans of the news business and the charged-up millennials. There’s nothing elite about them, unless being able to spell and use proper grammar are now elite attributes. The men and women around me are working harder than ever for wages that are not rising in an industry threatened by rapid change. Sound familiar?

Most of us here do not live in Beverly Hills. We live in more modest places such as Pasadena, East Los Angeles, Inglewood and Long Beach. Of course, the working class here is a lot more brown than where you might live. They sweat just as hard, though, and put in long hours just like you — maybe longer, and maybe for less money. But you have not done them a favor by electing a guy who threatens to start a trade war based on an illusion. The illusion is that if America cuts itself off from the global market, all those manufacturing jobs your fathers once had will come flooding back. It won’t happen. The robots have taken over the assembly lines. But what a disruption in trade would do is shut down the West Coast ports and, according to expert estimates, kill more than 600,000 working-class jobs in California.

I know you didn’t think about that sort of effect when you cast your protest vote to Make America Great Again, but what exactly were you thinking? Whenever one of you was interviewed by a TV reporter all I heard was you parroting the vague generalities being spouted by your candidate: America doesn’t win anymore; we need a wall to keep out immigrants; political correctness sucks.

Trump’s careless ignorance could make him the world’s most dangerous man[.]

I didn’t hear any of you say you were happy with the longer droughts, bigger storms and more vicious wildfires that are devastating farms, ranches and rural communities. But your new president has promised to rip up the international treaty that might mitigate some of the extreme weather caused by climate change.

I didn’t hear any of you say you were tired of the peace and order created by the NATO alliance and would rather have a cozier relationship with the Russians. But you just elected a man who has denigrated NATO and has warm and fuzzy feelings about Vladimir Putin.

I did hear plenty of you say you hated big government, but is that because you are someone who got fined by the EPA because your industrial plant was poisoning a river? Or because you are a rancher who doesn’t want to pay grazing fees when you exploit publicly owned land? Or because you are a farmer who doesn’t want to admit that government price supports are what keep your business viable?

Does your hatred of government mean you voted for more pollution? With your vote, were you demanding that big banks be set free to run the economy into the ground? Were you eager for less consumer protection? Did you insist that more of the tax burden be put on average Americans and less of it on the super-rich? I hope those are the things you wanted because that is what you will get from a Republican Congress and a Republican president.

Do I sound angry? That is because I am. I’m mad because your misguided hissy fit is messing with the country I love. I am as much a patriot as you are. I choke up when I visit the Lincoln Memorial or the graves of the Kennedys. I love the flag and do not cringe from the Pledge of Allegiance. When I ride a horse across open country, I feel a link with all my ancestors — the first of whom arrived on the Maryland shore in the 1640s. Those family members who came before me slowly made their way West, generation after generation, until they finally found a home within sight of the Pacific. I am about as “real” an American as you can get.

But I am fed up with those of you who think there is only one way to be American. Some of the truest Americans I have met are among those whose ancestors came here in slave ships. Some of the Americans who give me the most hope are the children of parents who slipped across the border in search of a better life; young dreamers working hard for an education and a chance to contribute to our society. Some of the Americans I admire the most are like my friend Jack who left the narrow-mindedness of his home state and came West to Los Angeles, where he met and married the man he loved. America is great because it has room for all these people and more.

If, ultimately, the real reason you voted for Trump was because he promised to start shutting doors that have been opened for people who do not fit a narrow definition of American, you should understand you are in for a fight. It’s now my turn to say it: I want my country back.

I wish I could think that those who voted for a neo-fascist adolescent for president were in for a rude awakening and might see the light, but at this stage, he'll just blame someone else for shafting them and they'll buy it, lock, stock and barrel.

Today in Trump's America

In Georgia. The only surprise is that it's not in Alabama. From Raw Story:

A meeting about whether to lift a moratorium on the construction of a mosque in an Atlanta suburb was canceled on Tuesday after a video made by right-wing militia members led to fears of armed violence.

According to NBC News, officials in Covington, GA canceled a city planning meeting dedicated to voting on whether to proceed with the construction of a new mosque and Muslim cemetery in the town.

Chris Hill — leader of local militia group the Three Percent Security Force — told reporters that he made the video during a weekend protest against the mosque.

“I was just shooting from the hip is what I was doing, and saying, ‘Right over there, this is going to be a future ISIS training group. This is where you’re going to see terrorism taking hold in Newton County.’ It’s tied to terrorism, everything from 9/11 to Boston bombings to the Fort Hood shooting, to the coup in Turkey. It’s all connected,” said Hill, who goes by the name “Blood Agent” in his videos.

This is one of those "real Americans" who can't find his ass with both hands and a map. He must get dizzy from all the buzzwords flying around in his head.

And this is choice:

On Tuesday, armed militiamen protested outside the site of the proposed meeting, some carry assault weapons, others with sidearms. One man walked in circles shouting through a megaphone.

Hill, a Marine veteran, said that at no point has his group made violent threats against city officials, but Newton County administrators took the video seriously enough to postpone the planning meeting.

Umm -- you don't think armed idiots parading around with assault rifles constitutes a threat?

Brace yourselves -- it's going to get worse before it gets better.

Today's Must-Watch

Rachel Maddow on the history of "nativism"* and anti-immigrant sentiment in the US (fair warning: there's a section running several minutes of The Hairpiece spewing hate):

Adam L. Silverman has this post at Balloon Juice on the same subject.

It's a recurring nightmare, and it's not just America, or even any country established by immigrants. Look at what's going on in Europe right now, and the countries of Europe are largely homogeneous in ethnic make-up. Or were. Or think about the inter-tribal conflicts in Africa resulting from the creation of nation states with boundaries imposed by the colonial powers. It's all "Us vs. Them."

In part, I think it's due to our existence as social animals: by definition, membership in a group leads to distrust of those not in the group. Think of howler monkeys or gibbons vocalizing to establish their territories -- certainly one of the less harmful means of doing that. Chimps can get violent.

But we're so much more advanced than that. Aren't we?

Speechless

We've all heard what a total loss Fox News is as far as actual information is concerned, but the degree of ignorance displayed by their hosts and anchors is genuinely astonishing. We have another Ten Commandments battle, this time in Oklahoma, where the state supreme court ordered the government to remove a monument on the capital grounds.

State Rep. Mike Ritze (R), whose family funded the monument, told Doocy that he was shocked because the judges had never ruled against a Ten Commandments display before.

“Well, you know, it’s curious because in many instances like this, Mike, things in state capitals and on public ground are regarded as historical because that’s where our laws and our heritage comes from, came from in the beginning when this nation was first founded,” [host Steve] Doocy opined.

Hmm -- Enlightenment philosophy, English common law, Roman law, even some Iroquois law, but the Ten Commandments? Sorry, no.

The real problem here is that the Fox audience doesn't seem to value critical thinking skills very much, and they're likely to take this kind of blatant ignorance as gospel. Can I suggest that this has more than a little to do with the state of public discourse in this country these days?

Idiot du Jour

Bryan Fischer is, among his other accomplishments, an expert epidemiologist, who knows all about transmission vectors and incubation periods.

Of course, in real life Fischer is a raving rabble-rouser who will say anything that will get him some attention, as well as being an everything denialist. (Denial seems to be as much a part of the Christianist toolbox as projection.)

It's people like him that make me sometimes regret that we have free speech in this country -- but then, unlike Fischer and his ilk, I have no intention of setting myself up as the arbiter of who gets to say what.

I wonder if he realizes how ridiculous he is to sane people.

Via Joe.My.God., where you will also find this article on the origins of HIV. Like, real science.

Another Snake Oil Salesman

all dressed up for a party. Yep, none other than Archbishop Salavatore "DUI" Cordileone, via Good As You.

Instead of protecting persons, [the Employment Non Discrimination Act] uses the force of the law to coerce everyone to accept a deeply problematic understanding of human sexuality and sexual behavior and to condone such behavior. The current proposed ENDA legislation is not about protecting persons, but behavior. Churches, businesses and individuals should not be punished in any way for living by their religious and moral convictions concerning sexual activity.

Eliminating truly unjust discrimination – based on personal characteristics, not sexual behavior – and protecting religious freedom are goals that we all should share. The current political climate makes it very difficult to maintain a reasonable dialogue on these contentious issues, but we must keep trying.

This is just the quote that Jeremy Hooper published. The full letter is here. It's all of the same cloth, and a prime example of the ability of some people to turn reality on its head. Go ahead and read it, if you can stand it. I could go through and rebut every statement in it, but I'm sure you can do the same, so I won't bother.

This is the comment I left at Good As You:

I hardly know where to start -- Cordileone is as good as Tony Perkins at distorting and misrepresenting facts. (But at least we don't have to deal with middle-school word-play.)

1) "Deeply problematic understanding of human sexuality" -- in what way? Anyone who knows what they're talking about understands that homosexuality is part of the range of normal human behavior. It seems the Church's "understanding" of human sexuality, as in most areas of human behavior, is problematic.

2) "to condone such behavior" -- no one's insisting you condone anything, only that you keep your nose out of people's private lives.

3) "Churches, businesses and individuals should not be punished in any way for living by their religious and moral convictions concerning sexual activity." --No one's suggesting that. The law just says you can't force your religious convictions on anyone else. See # 2, minding your own business.

4) "Eliminating truly unjust discrimination – based on personal characteristics" -- you mean, like the decision to join the Catholic Church, or follow any religious tradition? Which I don't think anyone can characterize as a "personal characteristic" -- that's really a behavior. Or maybe you mean something more fundamental, such as being female? The Church has a real good record there. The consensus among those who actually know something about human psychology is that same-sex orientation is, in fact, an innate characteristic.

5) "and protecting religious freedom" -- trans.: I have the right to force my religious dogma on everyone else. Just ask me.

6) "The current political climate makes it very difficult to maintain a reasonable dialogue on these contentious issues," -- "dialogue" means you listen as well as speak, something for which the Catholic hierarchy is not noted. In fact, there's been a quite spirited dialogue, in the media, the courts, and the Internet. Sorry you missed it.

And all this, coming from a highly placed member of an institution that has repeatedly proven itself not only hypocritical, but morally bankrupt.

Oh, and I forgot one thing: it's also an institution that has, at best, a tenuous relationship with reality.

Addendum: I had to include this, the final paragraph of the Archbishop's statement. It's a prime example of the cynicism that seems to be a common characteristic of the so-called "religious" right. Keep in mind that this is coming from someone who believes that the authority of the Church cannot be challenged in any way and that he, as a member of the ruling hierarchy in that Church, has the right to determine the parameters of everyone's private behavior.

Lobbying for coercive laws that violate freedom will not promote justice in the workplace. Nor will it advance the common good to seek to silence debate about sexual morality. We, like all Americans, wish there was an easy way forward. There is not. But there is an honest one. And it starts with the unflinching commitment to the inherent dignity of every human person, and to the “healthy pluralism” we all wish to share.

Another One I Can't Resist

Rick Santorum, the gift that keeps on giving:

"Since when in America do we have classes? Since when in America are people stuck in areas or defined places...that's called a class. That's Marxism talk. When Republicans talk about middle class, we're buying into their rhetoric."

Since the oligarchs bought everything, including the government.

All snark aside, "middle class" is a term, or at least a concept, that's been around since the Middle Ages -- which is just a little bit before Marx. Well, the late Middle Ages, which is probably after Santorum's time. (Actually, it occurs to me that the Republicans want to return to the time when there were just two classes -- the aristocrats and the peasants. Think about their economic policies.)

Right Wing Watch has video, if you can stand it. It gets worse -- or better, depending on your point of view.

Tofay's Must Read

This post by John Aravosis at AmericaBlog on one of the front-runners for pope -- Cardinal Peter Turkson of Ghana, who is not only a homophobe but a racist as well.

Cardinal Turkson was asked about the Catholic church’s ongoing pedophile scandal, and whether there was a chance the scandal might spread to Africa – most of the cases have been in western Europe and America.

Turkson’s response included two basic parts:

1. The pedophile scandal is really a gay scandal.

2. It’s a white thing, so black Africa shouldn’t have a problem.

The ignorance revealed by these statements is staggering. I often wonder that contemporary Africans are so brain-washed that they strenuously try to maintain the worst aspects of colonial rule, claiming them as "African traditions."

Read the whole thing -- it's pretty appalling. The only hopeful note is that if they elect someone like this joker as pope, the Church is finished in the West. Of course, that doesn't bode well for Africa. Latin America, which Aravosis points to as the other big Catholic region, has a distanced relationship with the Church, largely a reflection of its history: the Church was firmly on the side of the oppressors and seems to have as much influence politically as the Church in the U.S. and Europe, which is to say next to none.

Remedial Civics (Updated)

Piers Morgan, the British journalist who presently is working as a commentator on CNN, has been vocal in his calls for tighter regulation of guns and ammunition. The expected response is, of course, just as expected: a petition to deport him has gotten 62,000 signatures in two days. I'm sure those 62,000 are all "real 'Murricans" who have the Second Amendment memorized.

British Citizen and CNN television host Piers Morgan is engaged in a hostile attack against the U.S. Constitution by targeting the Second Amendment. We demand that Mr. Morgan be deported immediately for his effort to undermine the Bill of Rights and for exploiting his position as a national network television host to stage attacks against the rights of American citizens.

Wayne LaPierre could have written that, don't you think?

Unfortunately for the signers, they should have spent some time memorizing some of the other ten amendments that make up the Bill of Rights -- like the First. You know, the one that guarantees freedom of speech.

Oh, and a little dose of reality wouldn't hurt: Morgan, has vocal as he has been, has absolutely no power to do anything to the Second Amendment, or any other.

More's the pity.

Update: Just caught this story:

The day after Labor Day, just as campaign season was entering its final frenzy, FreedomWorks, the Washington-based tea party organization, went into free fall.

Richard K. Armey, the group’s chairman and a former House majority leader, walked into the group’s Capitol Hill offices with his wife, Susan, and an aide holstering a handgun at his waist. The aim was to seize control of the group and expel Armey’s enemies: The gun-wielding assistant escorted FreedomWorks’ top two employees off the premises, while Armey suspended several others who broke down in sobs at the news.

Josh Marshall has an interesting quote at TPM:

“This was two weeks after there had been a shooting at the Family Research Council,” said one junior staff member who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media. “So when a man with a gun who didn’t identify himself to me or other people on staff, and a woman I’d never seen before said there was an announcement, my first gut was, ‘Is FreedomWorks in danger?’ It was bizarre.”

Maybe that's the whole point.

I love This One

Quite a few good stories this week -- Iowans losing interest in repealing same-sex marriage, Alan Chambers of Exodus admitting that "reparative therapy" doesn't actually "cure" homosexuality -- and actually being noticed (finally -- and I think it's instructive of the mindset that he's being accused of "heresy" by his one-time fellow travelers), and the Obama administration moving directly into the DOMA fight.

But this is the one that won my heart:

A member of the Louisiana House of Representatives who eagerly supported Gov. Bobby Jindal’s plan to fund private schools has had an epiphany: Muslim schools might start getting taxpayer money!

Rep. Valarie Hodges, a Republican who represents East Baton Rouge and Livingston, now says she wishes she hadn’t voted for the Jindal voucher bill.

“I actually support funding for teaching the fundamentals of America’s Founding Fathers’ religion, which is Christianity, in public schools or private schools,” Hodges told the Livingston Parish News.

“I liked the idea of giving parents the option of sending their children to a public school or a Christian school,” Hodges added.

The newspaper reported that she “mistakenly assumed that ‘religious’ meant ‘Christian.’”

Now, I don't find it so remarkable that there is someone who is not only ignorant, but demonstrably stupid in public office -- I mean, on the national scene we have such luminaries as Louie Gomert of Texas and Virginia Foxx of North Carolina, not to mention two generations of Pauls. (And how can we forget the distinguished Senate career of Rick Santorum?) But the revelation of the mindset is delicious -- I mean, "religious" means "Christian"? The religion of the Founding Fathers was Christianity? Has the woman ever read a history book, aside from the Old Testament? Not to mention the idea that the government can fund Christian schools and not Muslim or Jewish schools -- or Buddhist schools, or Hindu schools, or whatever -- I mean, has the woman ever heard of the First Amendment? Does she understand the Establishment Clause at all?

The frightening part is not that someone as fundamentally ignorant and as blatantly prejudiced as Valarie Hodges is a state representative, but that people actually voted for her.

Keep Your Government Hands Off My Medicare!

The Tea Party lives: Reactions to the Supreme Court's decision on Obamacare.

How much you want to bet they all watch Fox News?

Ignorance Is Bliss

Their ignorance, our bliss. Flushed with the success of their boycott of Disney, the American Family Associations has now called a boycott against Pepsi for its support of gay organizations. (And this is a surprise exactly how?) Some of the results are too funny for words:

Last month, Bell Shoals Baptist, a mega-church in Brandon, Florida, removed its Pepsi vending machines and replaced them with Coke machines.

"We fight this battle one skirmish at a time," said Terry Kemple, the Bell Shoals member who organized the vending machine change, in an interview with the Brandon News & Tribune. "Our forefathers came here for religious liberty, not sexual liberty."

But the church's switch from Pepsi to Coke -- which other Florida churches joined -- may have been a strategic mistake. As Bridgette LaVictoire reported on the LezGetReal blog, "Coca Cola has consistently scored higher on the Human Rights Campaign’s list of LGBT friendly businesses" than Pepsi.

"The AFA [is] furious with PepsiCo over their diversity training, which is actually not quite as good as Coca Cola’s, and their work place support of LGBT individuals, which is not quite the same level of support as seen in Coca Cola Corp.," she wrote.

You have to love it.

The Next Question

A wonderful piece by Batocchio at Hullaballoo on unasked questions, framing, unquestioned assumptions -- all my favorite things. (Regular readers will know how irritated I get with those who don't question their assumptions and who take everything at face value.) It's impossible to do it justice through an excerpt. Read the whole thing.