@Grimm, I think the right legislation to focus on is the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, which appears to be the genesis of federal funding for education.

Now, I confess I have no direct knowledge of the Department of Education beyond what I can google, but according to their website, their mandate is:

• Establishing policies on federal financial aid for education, and distributing as well as monitoring those funds.
  
• Collecting data on America's schools and disseminating research.
  
• Focusing national attention on key educational issues.
  
• Prohibiting discrimination and ensuring equal access to education.
  

Now I'm not sure how many of those things Ron Paul is really against, but for the sake of argument, let's just pretend he's only opposed to that first bullet.

But why is he opposed to that? I'm guessing the whole idea here is the money comes with strings attached. Well, that's fine, if states want to forgo that funding and ignore those strings, they can. What's his objection?

If he doesn't want the money to have strings attached, I'm open to that idea, but I would like him to put a little effort into explaining what "strings" are currently being attached, and why he thinks they're so onerous.

If he's just opposed to some specific policy the Department of Education has put in place, then he should just say that. But then it's not the Department of Education that's the problem, it's that policy that's the problem -- the Department of Education as an institution is fine, he just wants it to be run differently.

But just outright discarding the Department of Education means getting rid of popular, reasonable things like federal funding for education, collecting statistics about educational outcomes, enforcement of federal anti-discrimination law, or even basic curriculum standards (like you can't teach religious doctrine as science).

And this in a nutshell is why I never really have anything nice to say about Ron Paul anymore. Either he's a fucking clueless idiot who doesn't know anything about what the Department he supposedly wants to eliminate is responsible for, or he does know all the things the Department he wants to eliminate is responsible for, and he's just hoping normal people don't realize that eliminating it would mean cutting education funding and decriminalizing racial segregation of schools until it's too late.

One can certainly complain about the policies the Department of Education is setting -- and I see liberals doing so all the time, BTW -- but this call for the abolition of the Department in its entire is mindless, heartless insanity, and it's gotta fucking stop.

I think you might be falsely thinking the the word tragic autimaticaly means Tragic for everyone Ie a human tragedy and that is not the case.

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/tragic

If someone dies against there will regardless of how stupid and risky ( playing russen rulet for example) it would still be fair to use the word "tragic" to describe the person dying.

From your position if you believe its simply a culling of the stupid and Darwinism , obviously its not tragic from your perspective but its tragic from the person that died perspective ( assuming they didn't want to die)







>> ^packo:

>> ^luxury_pie:
Well given he would be stupid enough to not pack a parachute, I guess concerning this particular situation I agree with packo.
But he did pack on, and it failed him. I wonder if packo was aware of that.

yes i was aware he jumped with a pack, and that he opened it too late or that it malfunctioned... that was never specified
and at no point did I say my way of feeling about the situation EVERYONE must feel
in regards to things that adrenaline junkies do, this included... the fact that there was a choice made to do it in the first place takes TRAGEDY out of the situation for me... why? because I'm assuming he knew the risks and was taking them on... let alone how that affects any family/friends this person may have impacted with this resulting jump... and keep in mind, his decision to do a potentially life threatening thing does impact those groups of people, even if it is his own choice...
myself as a bystander who has no direct connection to this person, feel more sorry for his family and friends than I do for him... they were put in a situation (whether he asked their permission/blessing/etc) where really they had no control of the situation, and had to watch a person they care about get severely injured... that's why i consider it more likely than not, that the person jumping is probably of a self-centered mindset
there's a reason they call it adrenaline JUNKIE... and not adrenaline ENTHUSIAST
that's why my sympathy is low for this person, he made his choice, he gets to live with the consequence (and so do the people this choice impacted)... i wouldn't send money to a collection in his benefit or even a get well card... i shake my head and move along
it all comes down to choice, and imho it was a foolish (no matter the precautions taken) and self-centered choice...
and him getting back up on the horse to do something like this again wouldn't be a display of human courage and perseverance, but something more akin to a drug addict scoring their next hit
10,000s of people starve to death every day, 150,000 or so die everyday; alot from TREATABLE disease/infection, lots of children are abused, or forced to grow up too soon, or aren't given a chance at a productive future... sorry if I don't lump this guy who chose to wingsuit jump off a bridge, in with those truly tragic situation

>> ^luxury_pie:

Well given he would be stupid enough to not pack a parachute, I guess concerning this particular situation I agree with packo.
But he did pack on, and it failed him. I wonder if packo was aware of that.


yes i was aware he jumped with a pack, and that he opened it too late or that it malfunctioned... that was never specified

and at no point did I say my way of feeling about the situation EVERYONE must feel

in regards to things that adrenaline junkies do, this included... the fact that there was a choice made to do it in the first place takes TRAGEDY out of the situation for me... why? because I'm assuming he knew the risks and was taking them on... let alone how that affects any family/friends this person may have impacted with this resulting jump... and keep in mind, his decision to do a potentially life threatening thing does impact those groups of people, even if it is his own choice...

myself as a bystander who has no direct connection to this person, feel more sorry for his family and friends than I do for him... they were put in a situation (whether he asked their permission/blessing/etc) where really they had no control of the situation, and had to watch a person they care about get severely injured... that's why i consider it more likely than not, that the person jumping is probably of a self-centered mindset

there's a reason they call it adrenaline JUNKIE... and not adrenaline ENTHUSIAST

that's why my sympathy is low for this person, he made his choice, he gets to live with the consequence (and so do the people this choice impacted)... i wouldn't send money to a collection in his benefit or even a get well card... i shake my head and move along

it all comes down to choice, and imho it was a foolish (no matter the precautions taken) and self-centered choice...

and him getting back up on the horse to do something like this again wouldn't be a display of human courage and perseverance, but something more akin to a drug addict scoring their next hit

10,000s of people starve to death every day, 150,000 or so die everyday; alot from TREATABLE disease/infection, lots of children are abused, or forced to grow up too soon, or aren't given a chance at a productive future... sorry if I don't lump this guy who chose to wingsuit jump off a bridge, in with those truly tragic situation

Boston: FBI Thwarts Own R/C Bomb
Another case of FBI entrapment, proving the only terrorism Americans must fear, comes from within the bowels of their own government.
By Tony Cartalucci

The United States' Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) claims to have thwarted their own "drone" bomb, in yet another farcical case of entrapment and fear mongering aimed not at ending the "War on Terror" but perpetuating the mythological, unending conflict. FBI agents apparently strung along another subpar malcontent by providing him with materials, including a model airplane, real C4 explosives, and small arms. Rezwan Ferdaus, 26, was approached by undercover FBI agents and tasked first with building remote detonation devices he was told would be used in Iraq against US troops. FBI agents went as far as falsely telling Ferdaus that one of his devices had killed 3 US troops. The grand finale was assisting Ferdaus in a spectacular, Hollywood-style attack we are told by FBI agents, would have involve simultaneous assaults on both the US Capitol and the Pentagon involving drone bombs and multiple gunmen.

Photo: Your FBI at work - sneaking around the United States, constructing drones made of toy planes like the one above, building bombs, handing out weapons and live explosives to prospective "terrorists" then stopping them "just in time" for sensational headlines to get Americans wringing their hands in fear from what Media Monarchy calls, "terronoia."

According to an AFP report, FBI special agent Richard DesLauriers claimed the sting operation proved ''a committed individual, even one with no direct connections to, or formal training from, an international terrorist organisation, can pose a serious danger to the community.'' DesLauriers fails to explain where, if not from the FBI or other federal agencies, Ferdaus could have acquired C4 explosives for his alleged plot. Additionally, DesLauriers fails to explain how Ferdaus can be considered acting as an "individual" with no "direct connections" to an international terrorist organization, when FBI agents were posing as just that, supplying him with motivation, supplies, explosives, logistics, and weapons.

If convicted, Ferdaus faces 15 years in prison for supporting a foreign terrorist organization and an additional 40 years on other terror related charges. In order to support a foreign terrorist organization, Ferdaus would have to have believed, by necessity, to be in contact with one, again undermining FBI special agent DesLauriers' statement. Ironically, Ferdaus is being arrested, held, and awaiting trial that could see him locked up for most of his life, while the US State Department, Department of Defense, and the White House itself are verifiably supporting foreign terrorist organizations, including the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), listed as #26 on the State Department's own list, as well as Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK) in Iran, listed as #28 by the US State Department.

Far too long....

>> ^quantumushroom:
QM:I'm happy to see that you accept the label 'right wing nutjob', that saves us time.
If it makes you happy to believe that, go right ahead. And there is no time being saved here at the sift.


Make me happy? Sometimes yes, sometimes no.
It saved me time to waste on other stupidness.


I wonder where you get your 90% figure (or your implication that 100% of teachers unions are democrat)...if true, why don't right wingers believe in education and journalism? No one is stopping them from being teachers or journalists.
"MSNBC.com identified 143 journalists who made political contributions from 2004 through the start of the 2008 campaign, according to the public records of the Federal Election Commission. Most of the newsroom checkbooks leaned to the left: 125 journalists gave to Democrats and liberal causes. Only 16 gave to Republicans. Two gave to both parties.
The pattern of donations, with nearly nine out of 10 giving to Democratic candidates and causes, appears to confirm a leftward tilt in newsrooms."


So, in your small sampling, it's 87%. I somehow think the sampling may have been intentionally skewed, but OK. Note I didn't disagree with your stat, just questioned it's origin, if it was Faux, I would discount it offhand.


You're part right about McCain, I did respect him for the most part (but didn't always agree with him) until he sold his soul and lost his mind in/after 2000 when the 'straight talk express' took a 90 deg right turn into a sewage filled ditch of lies, direction changes, blatant pandering, and BS. It makes me shudder to think what might have been if he had been president during his 'right wing wind sock' days, turning whichever way the right wing wind blew that day.
Yeah, because things are going SO great with the clueless community organizer at the helm. Did you see the Dow drop 500 points today? No confidence in the Obamateur, from Americans or the world.


You seem to assume that because I think McCain is worthless now that Obama must be my preferance, and that I support his policies and actions and think he's leading us strongly. That is an incorrect, and all to often made assumption. Why must you continue to make an ass out of umption, do what you like to yourself.


You have no idea when or how I was raised, so you should refrain from commenting on that subject. Let's just say your statement is wrong, as I'm sure are most of your assumptions about me.
Well, you're not overtly libertarian or conservative. So what's LEFT?


I'm what used to be republican. I'm a social liberal, and fiscal conservative. There is no sane party I can call home today.


The idea that the left is 'running roughshod' over the right is more complete insanity, the left is incapable of being cohesive enough to do much of anything intentionally. The right is cohesive, but their ideas are insane and proven repeatedly to be wrong for the most part. I do give them credit for knowing how to get their agenda furthered, I just disagree with their agenda as enacted.

Obama is on track to spend more than bush, but he has not yet. The reasons for the respective spending sprees and amount of each is another discussion in itself.
Sorry, this is untrue. Obama so far has spent 3 trillion in 3 years, whereas Bush spent close to 5 trillion in eight years, much of it opposed by the Right.


This is why people call you nuts...you are insisting that 3 trillion is more than 5 trillion, and that spending sprees and tax (revenue) cuts under total republican control were against republican (the right's) wishes.


All taxpayers tired of being 'over' taxed are not right wing nutjobs, or even right wingers. That's an utter falicy and insulting BS. It's seemingly easy for you to point at the failings of one underfunded, over administrated program (public schools) and make the leap to the theory that all governmental programs are failures, but that is a gross simplification of a multifaceted problem.
Goverment schools are "underfunded"? On what planet? BTW, there is no direct correlation between school performance and how much money is spent per student. I believe DC spends the most per student and you can see how well that turned out.


Underfunded because of insane administration costs, better? More money doesn't automatically make better schools, but it helps, but not if it's all spent on non-school related administration expenses.


Even so, that theory doesn't hold water. The 'free market' for higher education shows that many, if not all completely 'private' schools provide sub par education (if any at all) while many schools using 'public' funds are among the highest ranked in the nation.
And yet how many liberal politicians send THEIR kids to private schools, even as they need teacher union votes? Competition weeds out crappy private schools while failing government schools keep churning out dummies. Government schooling is a racket, as well as unconstitutional at the federal level.


I'm not sure your arguement here...I'm not a liberal politician, or a true supporter of them, so how does what they do relate to me? I've been to good and bad private and public schools, the ones with money always had a leg up. I really believe if you have children, you should be taxed the cost of a decent education and allowed to spend it at the school you prefer (excluding religious school, that's another issue). Since this doesn't happen, I prefer decent public education be purchased with my tax dollar rather than prison cells and barbed wire. I do see it as an either or situation.


I'm sure you did call the feds attempt at stoping the failed CEO's from looting the failing companies we had just bailed out "obamatrons trying to loot corporations in the name of "social justice" ", so why isn't it 'the far right trying to loot the pensions and paychecks of the teachers' in the name of social justice? What's good for the goose...right? A legal contract is a legal contract, right?
I was never a fan of any bailout. Bush was barely conservative as it was. The left was too busy hating Bush to notice him rubber-stamping most of their spending requests. Stupid Hillary is on record claiming she'd like to seize all of the oil companies' profits. To the best of my knowledge, some states are making some teachers pay a tiny fraction more for their own health insurance and/or pension. Hardly the a$$rape by unnamed "far right" specters you're insinuating.


I'll never understand the arguement that, when confronted with their own abhorrent behavior people answer with 'look, that other guy I always call an a$$hole is doing bad stuff too'.
As I understand it, many states are cutting back on pension payments, or not paying them at all. At the same time they are regulating teachers, denying them union status, and forcing renegotiation of in place pay and work hours/load contracts. Not total a$$ rape, but close, and certainly not fair or acceptable treatment.

I'm not sure if you are ignoring my last statement there or if that's some kind of 1/2 assed, racist response. Either way, TOTAL FAIL.
Knowing me, I probably just didn't give a sh1t. Nothing personal. Youse guys have such thin skins when it comes to these faux-racial matters. What part of 'Kenyanesque Hawaiian' is racist? Odumbo's fadda was Kenyan and he (the son) was purportedly born in Hawaii. Where's the racism? Only in your mind.

I said:Letting right wing nutjobs re-write contracts and negate our obligations was one of our biggest mistakes.

You replied: Fail. The Kenyanesque Hawaiian never met a spending cut he liked. He's overclocked this economy because he wants to cripple it. Here comes the broom to sweep the moonbats out of the belfry.

The ridiculous infactuation with his ancestory (race) is where the racism is. Kenyanesque only applies if he acts Kenyan, and he does not. It is intended to be racially insulting, you know it, we know it. Either give it up or own it.
It's sad that you just don't give a sh!t about your people being so unstable that you can't trust any agreement made with them. That's my issue, not so much their political party, but their actions and trustworthyness. I'm hardpressed to find a politician of either party I wouldn't call fectless and feculant. I call out the right more often because they went bat sh!t crazy and deserted me, leaving me partyless.

QM:I'm happy to see that you accept the label 'right wing nutjob', that saves us time.

If it makes you happy to believe that, go right ahead. And there is no time being saved here at the sift.

I wonder where you get your 90% figure (or your implication that 100% of teachers unions are democrat)...if true, why don't right wingers believe in education and journalism? No one is stopping them from being teachers or journalists.

"MSNBC.com identified 143 journalists who made political contributions from 2004 through the start of the 2008 campaign, according to the public records of the Federal Election Commission. Most of the newsroom checkbooks leaned to the left: 125 journalists gave to Democrats and liberal causes. Only 16 gave to Republicans. Two gave to both parties.
The pattern of donations, with nearly nine out of 10 giving to Democratic candidates and causes, appears to confirm a leftward tilt in newsrooms."

FOX news appears to 'tilt' right. You may have heard of them.

As for conservative educators, they're out there but are a minority on kollij kampii.

You're part right about McCain, I did respect him for the most part (but didn't always agree with him) until he sold his soul and lost his mind in/after 2000 when the 'straight talk express' took a 90 deg right turn into a sewage filled ditch of lies, direction changes, blatant pandering, and BS. It makes me shudder to think what might have been if he had been president during his 'right wing wind sock' days, turning whichever way the right wing wind blew that day.

Yeah, because things are going SO great with the clueless community organizer at the helm. Did you see the Dow drop 500 points today? No confidence in the Obamateur, from Americans or the world.

You have no idea when or how I was raised, so you should refrain from commenting on that subject. Let's just say your statement is wrong, as I'm sure are most of your assumptions about me.

Well, you're not overtly libertarian or conservative. So what's LEFT?

The idea that the left is 'running roughshod' over the right is more complete insanity, the left is incapable of being cohesive enough to do much of anything intentionally. The right is cohesive, but their ideas are insane and proven repeatedly to be wrong for the most part. I do give them credit for knowing how to get their agenda furthered, I just disagree with their agenda as enacted.



Obama is on track to spend more than bush, but he has not yet. The reasons for the respective spending sprees and amount of each is another discussion in itself.

Sorry, this is untrue. Obama so far has spent 3 trillion in 3 years, whereas Bush spent close to 5 trillion in eight years, much of it opposed by the Right.

All taxpayers tired of being 'over' taxed are not right wing nutjobs, or even right wingers. That's an utter falicy and insulting BS. It's seemingly easy for you to point at the failings of one underfunded, over administrated program (public schools) and make the leap to the theory that all governmental programs are failures, but that is a gross simplification of a multifaceted problem.

Goverment schools are "underfunded"? On what planet? BTW, there is no direct correlation between school performance and how much money is spent per student. I believe DC spends the most per student and you can see how well that turned out.

Even so, that theory doesn't hold water. The 'free market' for higher education shows that many, if not all completely 'private' schools provide sub par education (if any at all) while many schools using 'public' funds are among the highest ranked in the nation.

And yet how many liberal politicians send THEIR kids to private schools, even as they need teacher union votes? Competition weeds out crappy private schools while failing government schools keep churning out dummies. Government schooling is a racket, as well as unconstitutional at the federal level.

I'm sure you did call the feds attempt at stoping the failed CEO's from looting the failing companies we had just bailed out "obamatrons trying to loot corporations in the name of "social justice" ", so why isn't it 'the far right trying to loot the pensions and paychecks of the teachers' in the name of social justice? What's good for the goose...right? A legal contract is a legal contract, right?

I was never a fan of any bailout. Bush was barely conservative as it was. The left was too busy hating Bush to notice him rubber-stamping most of their spending requests. Stupid Hillary is on record claiming she'd like to seize all of the oil companies' profits. To the best of my knowledge, some states are making some teachers pay a tiny fraction more for their own health insurance and/or pension. Hardly the a$$rape by unnamed "far right" specters you're insinuating.

I'm not sure if you are ignoring my last statement there or if that's some kind of 1/2 assed, racist response. Either way, TOTAL FAIL.

Knowing me, I probably just didn't give a sh1t. Nothing personal. Youse guys have such thin skins when it comes to these faux-racial matters. What part of 'Kenyanesque Hawaiian' is racist? Odumbo's fadda was Kenyan and he (the son) was purportedly born in Hawaii. Where's the racism? Only in your mind.

>> ^shinyblurry:

This video is complete fantasy. Take the evolutionary animation for instance..none of that is supported in the fossil record. All of those transitions are completely inference, especially ape to man. If you believe that, you are thick..do your own investigation. There isn't any conclusive evidence for ape to man evolution what so ever.
And you don't think they're looking for true transitionals? Why do you think evolutionists trotted out piltdown man and nebraska man as proof of evolution for over 50 years, and why today the desperate search is still on to find the missing link. They thought it was neanderthal man but it turned out to be a guy with arthritus and rickets. The fossil record isn't just incomplete, it is ludicrously so..with hundreds of millions of them uncovered yet no true transitionals. I'll let real palentologists explain it to you:
Our museums now contain hundreds of millions of fossil specimens (40 million alone are contained in the Smithsonian Natural History Museum). If Darwin's theory were true, we should see at least tens of millions of unquestionable transitional forms. We see none. Even the late Stephen Jay Gould, Professor of Geology and Paleontology at Harvard University and the leading spokesman for evolutionary theory prior to his recent death, confessed "the extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology."
He continues:
The history of most fossil species includes two features inconsistent with gradualism: 1. Statis. Most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they disappear… 2. Sudden Appearance. In any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the steady transformation of its ancestors; it appears all at once and 'fully formed'. 6 The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches; the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of fossils. 7
The British Museum of Natural History boasts the largest collection of fossils in the world. Among the five respected museum officials, Sunderland interviewed Dr. Colin Patterson, Senior Paleontologist at the British Museum and editor of a prestigious scientific journal. Patterson is a well known expert having an intimate knowledge of the fossil record. He was unable to give a single example of Macro-Evolutionary transition. In fact, Patterson wrote a book for the British Museum of Natural History entitled, "Evolution". When asked why he had not included a single photograph of a transitional fossil in his book, Patterson responded:
...I fully agree with your comments on the lack of direct illustration of evolutionary transitions in my book. If I knew of any, fossil or living, I would certainly have included them. You suggest that an artist should be used to visualize such transformations, but where would he get the information from? I could not, honestly, provide it, and if I were to leave it to artistic license, would that not mislead the reader? I wrote the text of my book four years ago. If I were to write it now, I think the book would be rather different. Gradualism is a concept I believe in, not just because of Darwin's authority, but because my understanding of genetics seems to demand it. Yet Gould and the American Museum people are hard to contradict when they say there are no transitional fossils. As a paleontologist myself, I am much occupied with the philosophical problems of identifying ancestral forms in the fossil record. You say that I should at least "show a photo of the fossil from which each type of organism was derived." I will lay it on the line - there is not one such fossil for which one could make a watertight argument. 2
David B. Kitts. PhD (Zoology) is Head Curator of the Department of Geology at the Stoval Museum. In an evolutionary trade journal, he wrote:
Despite the bright promise that paleontology provides a means of "seeing" evolution, it has presented some nasty difficulties for evolutionists, the most notorious of which is the presence of "gaps" in the fossil record. Evolution requires intermediate forms between species and paleontology does not provide them… 3
N. Heribert Nilsson, a famous botanist, evolutionist and professor at Lund University in Sweden, continues:
My attempts to demonstrate evolution by an experiment carried on for more than 40 years have completely failed… The fossil material is now so complete that it has been possible to construct new classes, and the lack of transitional series cannot be explained as being due to scarcity of material. The deficiencies are real, they will never be filled. 4
Even the popular press is catching on. This is from an article in Newsweek magazine:
The missing link between man and apes, whose absence has comforted religious fundamentalists since the days of Darwin, is merely the most glamorous of a whole hierarchy of phantom creatures … The more scientists have searched for the transitional forms that lie between species, the more they have been frustrated. 5
Wake up people..your belief in evolution is purely metaphysical and requires faith. I suppose if you don't think about it too hard it makes sense. It's the same thing with abiogenesis..pure metaphysics.
Now, after over 120 years of the most extensive and painstaking geological exploration of every continent and ocean bottom, the picture is infinitely more vivid and complete than it was in 1859. Formations have been discovered containing hundreds of billions of fossils and our museums are filled with over 100 million fossils of 250,000 different species.
The availability of this profusion of hard scientific data should permit objective investigators to determine if Darwin was on the right track. What is the picture which the fossils have given us?… The gaps between major groups of organisms have been growing even wider and more undeniable. They can no longer be ignored or rationalized away with appeals to imperfection of the fossil record. 2
You've been had..be intellectually honest enough to admit it and seek out the truth. Science does not support evolution.


Case in point.

You think those quotes are made up? All you have to do is plug those names into google to find out who they are and what their reputation is. They're not made up and have nothing to do with the site itself other than being a collection of evidence which shows even evolutionists know their theory is completely flawed.

>> ^Maze:
I'd have trouble taking anything you've copied from a religious website seriously. It's hardly unbiased, is it?
http://www.allaboutthejourney.org/problems-with-the-fossil-record.htm
>> ^shinyblurry:
This video is complete fantasy. Take the evolutionary animation for instance..none of that is supported in the fossil record. All of those transitions are completely inference, especially ape to man. If you believe that, you are thick..do your own investigation. There isn't any conclusive evidence for ape to man evolution what so ever.
And you don't think they're looking for true transitionals? Why do you think evolutionists trotted out piltdown man and nebraska man as proof of evolution for over 50 years, and why today the desperate search is still on to find the missing link. They thought it was neanderthal man but it turned out to be a guy with arthritus and rickets. The fossil record isn't just incomplete, it is ludicrously so..with hundreds of millions of them uncovered yet no true transitionals. I'll let real palentologists explain it to you:
Our museums now contain hundreds of millions of fossil specimens (40 million alone are contained in the Smithsonian Natural History Museum). If Darwin's theory were true, we should see at least tens of millions of unquestionable transitional forms. We see none. Even the late Stephen Jay Gould, Professor of Geology and Paleontology at Harvard University and the leading spokesman for evolutionary theory prior to his recent death, confessed "the extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology."
He continues:
The history of most fossil species includes two features inconsistent with gradualism: 1. Statis. Most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they disappear… 2. Sudden Appearance. In any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the steady transformation of its ancestors; it appears all at once and 'fully formed'. 6 The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches; the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of fossils. 7... etc, etc..

I'd have trouble taking anything you've copied from a religious website seriously. It's hardly unbiased, is it?

http://www.allaboutthejourney.org/problems-with-the-fossil-record.htm
>> ^shinyblurry:

This video is complete fantasy. Take the evolutionary animation for instance..none of that is supported in the fossil record. All of those transitions are completely inference, especially ape to man. If you believe that, you are thick..do your own investigation. There isn't any conclusive evidence for ape to man evolution what so ever.
And you don't think they're looking for true transitionals? Why do you think evolutionists trotted out piltdown man and nebraska man as proof of evolution for over 50 years, and why today the desperate search is still on to find the missing link. They thought it was neanderthal man but it turned out to be a guy with arthritus and rickets. The fossil record isn't just incomplete, it is ludicrously so..with hundreds of millions of them uncovered yet no true transitionals. I'll let real palentologists explain it to you:
Our museums now contain hundreds of millions of fossil specimens (40 million alone are contained in the Smithsonian Natural History Museum). If Darwin's theory were true, we should see at least tens of millions of unquestionable transitional forms. We see none. Even the late Stephen Jay Gould, Professor of Geology and Paleontology at Harvard University and the leading spokesman for evolutionary theory prior to his recent death, confessed "the extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology."
He continues:
The history of most fossil species includes two features inconsistent with gradualism: 1. Statis. Most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they disappear… 2. Sudden Appearance. In any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the steady transformation of its ancestors; it appears all at once and 'fully formed'. 6 The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches; the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of fossils. 7... etc, etc..

This video is complete fantasy. Take the evolutionary animation for instance..none of that is supported in the fossil record. All of those transitions are completely inference, especially ape to man. If you believe that, you are thick..do your own investigation. There isn't any conclusive evidence for ape to man evolution what so ever.

And you don't think they're looking for true transitionals? Why do you think evolutionists trotted out piltdown man and nebraska man as proof of evolution for over 50 years, and why today the desperate search is still on to find the missing link. They thought it was neanderthal man but it turned out to be a guy with arthritus and rickets. The fossil record isn't just incomplete, it is ludicrously so..with hundreds of millions of them uncovered yet no true transitionals. I'll let real palentologists explain it to you:

Our museums now contain hundreds of millions of fossil specimens (40 million alone are contained in the Smithsonian Natural History Museum). If Darwin's theory were true, we should see at least tens of millions of unquestionable transitional forms. We see none. Even the late Stephen Jay Gould, Professor of Geology and Paleontology at Harvard University and the leading spokesman for evolutionary theory prior to his recent death, confessed "the extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology."

He continues:

The history of most fossil species includes two features inconsistent with gradualism: 1. Statis. Most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they disappear… 2. Sudden Appearance. In any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the steady transformation of its ancestors; it appears all at once and 'fully formed'. 6 The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches; the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of fossils. 7

The British Museum of Natural History boasts the largest collection of fossils in the world. Among the five respected museum officials, Sunderland interviewed Dr. Colin Patterson, Senior Paleontologist at the British Museum and editor of a prestigious scientific journal. Patterson is a well known expert having an intimate knowledge of the fossil record. He was unable to give a single example of Macro-Evolutionary transition. In fact, Patterson wrote a book for the British Museum of Natural History entitled, "Evolution". When asked why he had not included a single photograph of a transitional fossil in his book, Patterson responded:

...I fully agree with your comments on the lack of direct illustration of evolutionary transitions in my book. If I knew of any, fossil or living, I would certainly have included them. You suggest that an artist should be used to visualize such transformations, but where would he get the information from? I could not, honestly, provide it, and if I were to leave it to artistic license, would that not mislead the reader? I wrote the text of my book four years ago. If I were to write it now, I think the book would be rather different. Gradualism is a concept I believe in, not just because of Darwin's authority, but because my understanding of genetics seems to demand it. Yet Gould and the American Museum people are hard to contradict when they say there are no transitional fossils. As a paleontologist myself, I am much occupied with the philosophical problems of identifying ancestral forms in the fossil record. You say that I should at least "show a photo of the fossil from which each type of organism was derived." I will lay it on the line - there is not one such fossil for which one could make a watertight argument. 2

David B. Kitts. PhD (Zoology) is Head Curator of the Department of Geology at the Stoval Museum. In an evolutionary trade journal, he wrote:

Despite the bright promise that paleontology provides a means of "seeing" evolution, it has presented some nasty difficulties for evolutionists, the most notorious of which is the presence of "gaps" in the fossil record. Evolution requires intermediate forms between species and paleontology does not provide them… 3

N. Heribert Nilsson, a famous botanist, evolutionist and professor at Lund University in Sweden, continues:

My attempts to demonstrate evolution by an experiment carried on for more than 40 years have completely failed… The fossil material is now so complete that it has been possible to construct new classes, and the lack of transitional series cannot be explained as being due to scarcity of material. The deficiencies are real, they will never be filled. 4

Even the popular press is catching on. This is from an article in Newsweek magazine:

The missing link between man and apes, whose absence has comforted religious fundamentalists since the days of Darwin, is merely the most glamorous of a whole hierarchy of phantom creatures … The more scientists have searched for the transitional forms that lie between species, the more they have been frustrated. 5

Wake up people..your belief in evolution is purely metaphysical and requires faith. I suppose if you don't think about it too hard it makes sense. It's the same thing with abiogenesis..pure metaphysics.

Now, after over 120 years of the most extensive and painstaking geological exploration of every continent and ocean bottom, the picture is infinitely more vivid and complete than it was in 1859. Formations have been discovered containing hundreds of billions of fossils and our museums are filled with over 100 million fossils of 250,000 different species.

The availability of this profusion of hard scientific data should permit objective investigators to determine if Darwin was on the right track. What is the picture which the fossils have given us?… The gaps between major groups of organisms have been growing even wider and more undeniable. They can no longer be ignored or rationalized away with appeals to imperfection of the fossil record. 2

You've been had..be intellectually honest enough to admit it and seek out the truth. Science does not support evolution.

There are a lot of insults lobbed in this collection of video clips, but no direct evidence of who the insults are aimed at. It is as if the Media Research Center thought that all tea-party folk would recognize themselves by way of the insults. That is harsh MRC. Not all tea-party members are extremist reactionary homophobic racists. And if this video really only pertains to those that are extremist reactionary homophobic racists, then the media really does have them figured out. This video makes no sense.

Bonus:
Voter turnout for the U.S. 2010 election was at its highest level since 1970 (for a mid-term election). And I gotta say, I don't think forcing babies and convicts to vote is not going to improve things
- Population of California (2010): approx. 37 million
- Eligible voters in California (2010): approx. 22.8 million
- Voter turnout in California (2010): approx. 10.3 million

*backup=[...snipped...]

>> ^blankfist:

Weird. Looks like he's trying to reinvent himself. He was probably headed for director jail and knows his Mall Rats and Clerks fans are fewer these days. It looked like he tried Action/Comedy with Cop Out. I guess that didn't go very well, so this looks like another attempt to reinvent himself as a director. I hope it's good. The teaser looks good.


Actually, In either October or November, can't remember which, he came to my hometown and did an "Evening with Kevin Smith" here. One of the questions asked basically had him go completely off topic but he did talk about Red State being his final movie for a long, long time because he was tired of re-inventing himself.

He also talked about how much of a treat it is to work with John Goodman, who does all his own stand-ins for dialogue scenes where all you see is the back of his head (A job generally reserved for 'look alikes' so the stars can go sit in the corner and text.) As opposed to Bruce Willis, who generally took absolutely no direction from Kevin because he was too "Amateur" and instead actually reemed him out one day on set.

So, the fact alone that everybody in the film seems to actually enjoy what they do and like kevin enough to give their best performances hopefully means this is indeed better then cop out.

[edit] Guess RS beat me to it.

^In this circumstance it did discriminate, though. There is certainly no direct blame, as this guy acted of his own free will, but it is valid to question the merit of violent political speech and imagery in a country as violent as the United States, especially when it comes from a movement built upon fear and delusion. Whether or not this metaphorical violence played a role in this assassination plot is irrelevant to the larger issue.

The pertinent bits of each example given by Qmush (hi, Qmush!):

slap him
I'd spit on her
I am only hoping that when Glen Beck does put a gun to his head
It's about time that we have an intifada in this country that changes fundamentally the political dynamics in here
The Iraqis ... are the REVOLUTION, the Minutemen, and their numbers will grow -- and they will win
there has never been an army as violent and murderous as our army has been in Iraq.
I hope his wife feeds him lots of eggs and butter
This administration is waging war on poor children

Compared to (paraphrased from memory):
Don't retreat, reload
First to the ballot box, if that doesn't work, then to the bullet box
The recent news story of the gun manufacturer who was offering a limited edition run of a automatic weapon gun part inscribed with "you lie"
Water the tree of liberty with blood


The Dems hoped someone would make an omelet. That's their big threat. Feed them. Ratchet it up a bit to ... Slap someone. Spit on them. Plus a couple of ugly and maybe not ugly observations about what other people might do of their own accord.

No direct threats that incite violent action that would lead to loss of life. None.

That intifada thing is the closest thing about inciting to violence. It wasn't a politician who said it, it was clearly not a planned speech, it was something said in the heat of the moment. But I'll halfway grant you that one. Reluctantly.

I think you have to give it up, Q. That, or find some better examples. These don't make it.