And the GZM Stupidity Keeps Coming...

Via Hot Air, we have a clip of Russell Simmons trying to say we shouldn’t blame Muslims for 9-11.  Agreed.  There is no such thing as group guilt, you are responsible for yourself only.  But then it gets stupid when he asks “Did we blame Christians at the first World Trade attack?”

Really, there are no words.  But let me say, no, this is not the stupidest thing said during his entire controversy.  Kathleen Parker gets the prize for that.

Islamic Research Academy: There Should not be a Mosque at Ground Zero... and, um, the Decision to Create One is a Zionist Conspiracy?

You know I didn’t think anyone’s paranoia could top Pelosi’s, but silly me I forgot all about the insanity coming on a daily basis out of the Middle East.  Yeah, I said it, there are idiots all over the place over there that make Oliver Stone go “gee, don’t you think you’re being a bit too suspicious?”  Mind you, I ascribe the majority of that crap to just living in dictatorships, but for whatever reason its really endemic over there.  Death Cult Mickey Mouses, lovable furry rabbits that eat Jews, Jews stealing organs, and other nuttiness spew on a daily basis over there.  I mean I have heard people over there claim that Tom and Jerry cartoons were a Jewish conspiracy, because in their minds Jews (or “Joooooos!”) are mice and thus the T&J cartoons were designed to make kids like mice.  Yes, really.

So really I should have known better than to be surprised when I read this in Pajamas Media:

A number of Al Azhar ulema expressed their opposition to building a mosque near [where] the events of September 11 [occurred], convinced that it is “a conspiracy to confirm a clear connection between the strikes of September [11] and Islam.” Dr. ‘Abd al-Mu‘ti Bayumi, a member of the Islamic Research Academy [of Al Azhar] told Al Masry Al Youm that he rejects the building of any mosque in this area [Ground Zero], because the “devious mentality” desires to connect these events [of 9/11] with Islam, though he maintains that Islam is innocent of this accusation. Instead, it is a “Zionist conspiracy,” which many are making use of to harm the religion. Likewise, Dr. Amna Nazir, professor of doctrine and philosophy at Al Azhar, expressed her rejection that a mosque be built near the World Trade Center, saying: “Building a mosque on this rubble indicates bad intention — even if we wished to shut our eyes, close our minds, and insist on good will. I hope it is a sincere step, and not a new conspiracy against Islam and Muslims.”

I mean it is par for the course over there.  Everything is the Jews’ fault.  Apparently even these Muslims are in on it.  The Jooos are that insidious.  And really it fits an old pattern of kleptocratic dictatorships blaming an easy scapegoat, and let’s face it, the jews have been the punching bag of choice for something like 2000 years.

It all reminds me of that case a few years ago in Nigeria involving that woman who got pregnant something like three months after husband died and was tried, convicted and sentenced to be stoned to death for adultery (in the sense that she had sex outside of the context of marriage), all according to their interpretation of Islamic Law.  Now she had claimed that in fact she was raped, but no one cared, and for that reason her case attracted international attention for that reason.  It turned out that she was lying when she said that, but given that they were going to stone her to death for a reason that is stupid even if she is “guilty” makes me very willing to forgive that lie.

So finally the Nigerian Supreme Court stepped in and set her free.  Which sounds great and all until you read the reasoning.  You see, according to Islam, or at least their interpretation of it, a man’s sperm can survive up to 7 months inside a woman.  Mind you, science calls that complete bullshit, but Islam says it is true.  So the court said that since she got pregnant within 7 months of her husband’s death, that there was an irrebuttable presumption that it was actually his child and therefore she did not commit adultery.

So you read that and go, “okay, I like the bottom line—the woman ain’t going to be stoned—but man, that reasoning is FUBAR" (Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition).  So that is about how I feel reading that quote.

That all being said if Nancy Pelosi wants to investigate these opponents of the GZM, I am with her.

Is Ann Althouse Equating Pelosi’s Conspiracy Theories with Conspiracy Theories About Radical Islam?

Althouse correctly excoriates Pelosi for her silliness writing: “It just can't be that people — and it's the vast majority of Americans! — actually read/hear news reports and commentary and arrive at opinions.”  Good point and it does highlight to me again the creepy disdain the left has been showing recently for the opinions of the American people.

But then she write this: “Meanwhile, the right is headed over to the conspiracy place too.”

Sorry, but is she trying to demonstrate a certain equivalency?

Well, Ann, if you are, there is a slight difference between imagining a Vast Right Wing Conspiracy in relation to opposition to the mosque v. imagining a conspiracy to spread islamofascism.  You know what that difference is?  There is undeniably a conspiracy to spread islamofascism.

Seriously, what do you call it when 19 hijackers got together, with support from al Qaeda to murder about 3,000 Americans?  You call it a conspiracy.  There indeed is not one but many conspiracies to spread islamofascism.  There is no question at all the conspiracies exist, and it is perfectly rational to wonder if there are connections to the Ground Zero Mosque and these undeniably real conspiracies.

In related silliness, Kathleen Parker writes “[t]he Muslims who want to build this mosque didn't fly airplanes into skyscrapers.”  Yes, Kathy, that is right.  Because the ones who did, are dead.

You win the prize for officially saying the stupidest thing possible in this entire debate.

Nancy Pelosi on the Ground Zero Mosque: Hey, We Should take a Really Close Look at the Funding... of the Opposition to the Ground Zero Mosque. (Updated x3)

Yes, she really said that.

Well, I have a special message for her:

In other news, apparently the PR people for the GZM are issuing anti-Semitic tweets.  Nice.

Update: God bless Google, via Cnn, we learn that this means Pelosi would have to investigate 68% of all Americans, including 70% of Independents and 54% of Democrats.  That is right even a majority within her own party is apparently in on it.  That is how insidious we are in the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy 2.0.

And indeed 53% of New Yorkers oppose the mosque.  So I guess they are in on it, too.

Update (II): Nancy Pelosi doubles down on the stupidity.  From a new press release:

I support the statement made by the Interfaith Alliance that 'We agree with the ADL that there is a need for transparency about who is funding the effort to build this Islamic center. At the same time, we should also ask who is funding the attacks against the construction of the center.'

Well, at least she is finally interested in looking into the funding behind it.  And all it took was for her to say something stupid and paranoid.

Updated (III): The Ground Zero Mosque builders won’t rule out getting funding from...  Iran.  Well, isn’t that special?  (Source)

Not Sure Whether to Laugh or Cry

We have heard Congress tell us it is too much trouble to read what a law says before passing it, and that we should pass laws in order to learn what is in them.

Now we learned that Congress apparently can’t be bothered to read the title page.

You see the other day, they passed a law that is entered into the books as “The _________ Act of ____.”

Yes, really.  Yes, literally that.  Seriously, follow the link and you will be amazed.  They passed a law and literally failed to give it a title, failed to even notice they didn’t give it a title, failed to even notice they forgot to enter in the date.

Jesus wept.

Calling Bullshit on Ted Olson

In defending the recent ruling that apparently gay marriage is in the Fourteenth Amendment, and no one apparently discovered that for the first 142 years of its existance, former Solicitor General Ted Olson made the idiot comparison between freedom of speech and gay marriage:

Well, would you like your right to free speech, would you like Fox’s right to free press put up to a vote and say well, if five states approved it, let’s wait till the other 45 states do?  These are fundament constitutional rights.  The Bill of Rights guarantees Fox News and you, Chris Wallace, the right to speak.  It’s in the constitution. And the Supreme Court has repeatedly held that the denial of our citizens of the equal rights to equal access to justice under the law, is a violation of our fundamental rights. Yes, it’s encouraging that many states are moving towards equality on the basis of sexual orientation, and I’m very, very pleased about that. … We can’t wait for the voters to decide that that immeasurable harm, that is unconstitutional, must be eliminated.

First, every time someone says that it’s a throw-something-at-the-screen moment.  I am sick and tired of morons like Olson equating what is not reasonably in the constitution with what is obviously in the constitution.  Olson has made a great argument for amending the constitution, not making crap up in it.  The reason why the first amendment is not up for a simple majority vote is because someone has put it in the constitution. The claim that excluding gay people from marriage is unconstitutional doesn’t pass the laugh test.

Second, its funny you should stay that, Teddy boy, because do you remember a little case called McConnell v. the FEC?  In that case they made a facial challenge to McCain-Feingold on the theory that it suppresses freedom of expression.  A few years later the Supreme Court said the same law was unconstitutional precisely because it had that effect.  And guess who was on the side of the FEC and greater restrictions of expression in McConnel?  Then Solicitor General Theodore Olson.  As in you, dickhead.  You personally argued that congress could vote away our freedom of expression.  Indeed, if your arguments were accepted, Fox News, and indeed every news corporation would have been subject to direct federal regulation if congress only decided to do it.

So basically he tried to justify a ruling not supported by the constitution by citing a principle actually written in the constitution that he personally worked to subvert.

What a complete pile of bullshit.

(Source for quote, with slight correction.)

Why Kennedy Probably Won’t Invalidate Proposition 8—A Response to James Taranto

James Taranto today said that he felt that Kennedy was principled enough that he would invalidate Proposition 8.  I have to disagree.

First, Kennedy is not nearly as principled as Taranto imagines.  Yes, he seems reasonably principled in defense of freedom of speech, but in terms of his interpretive methods, not so much.  He joined Scalia’s opinion in Heller v. District of Columbia, which was an intensely originalist decision, determining how the Second Amendment would have been understood at the time it was ratified.  And this was no mere joinder for convenience; in oral argument, he talked about how the founders would have considered life without guns unthinkable.  He put on at least an act of caring what the founders believed.

Then along came Kennedy v. Louisiana.  In that case they were called on to determine whether the term “cruel and unusual punishment” included executing a person for forcibly raping a child.  And with apologies for being this explicit, but the Defendant in that case, also coincidentally named Kennedy, had raped his eight year old daughter so violently that it ruptured the wall between her vagina and her anus and she will never have children.  Read the case and, to Justice Kennedy’s credit, he does nothing to excuse or diminish the cruelty of the act.  So if Justice Kennedy was a principled follower of original intent this would be a no brainer.  At the time of the founding, we executed horse-thieves.  Killing a defendant like this scumbag is nothing compared to that.

But in fact (Justice) Kennedy declared it would be cruel and unusual to kill (Defendant) Kennedy for his crimes.  That decision came only a day before the decision in Heller, leading some of my more sarcastic friends to argue that Heller made Kennedy v. Louisiana moot.

Snooki Galt? And John Kerry Goes Ayn Rand, too.

Its been a running joke for a while that Obama’s new tax on artificial tanning sessions is racially discriminatory.  Instapundit has talked about that for ages as sort of a tongue in cheek way to attack the way anything that has an incidental effect on race, as racial discrimination under a disparate effect theory.  Which although I recognize the value of this approach in some cases, in some cases it can get ridiculous, such as claiming that criticism of Islam is racist because the people who adhere to it are arguably generally not white.

So now Snooki has chimed in and of course Instapundit couldn’t resist the link (and conspiring darkly in a tongue-in-cheek fashion).  I saw the clip on The Soup, and yeah, it was funny, but I wondered if Renolds was picking it up.

I don’t go tanning anymore because Obama put a 10% tax on tanning. McCain would never put a 10% tax on tanning. Because he’s pale and would probably want to be tan," she said. Snooki was referring to a provision in the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act that mandates tanning salons impose a 10 percent tax on UV-ray sessions.

She goes on to say that that Obama doesn’t care because he doesn’t need to tan.  Yike.  Yeah, not touching that with a twenty foot pole.

But what is funny about that is that Snooki intuitively gets the most basic problem with much, if not all, liberal regulation and taxation: that the more you burden businesses, the more you drive people out of that business.

I Like This Picture

It’s a publicity still from “I Dream of Jeannie.”

Barbara Eden looks like she is really fascinated by something.  Meanwhile, Larry Hagman looks like he is thinking, “Oh yeah, you know I am hitting that.”

Of course that’s attached to a story that ain’t half as fun, given that they seem to be mistaking epilepsy for possession by an evil Jinn, but still, the pic leapt out at me.

Another Liberal Accuses Others of Racism, Proves to be Racist in the Attempt

Let me introduce my reader to a new character.  This will take some verbiage, but I promise you it is fun.  And funny!  And maybe insightful.  Anyway, I know his real name, I even know his nickname, but out of some level of kindness, I will call him Stalker-boy.  You see I first ran into him around 2002-2003 tangling with him on the message boards of Findlaw.com.  Then later I went to a site called Freespeech and blogged there for a while.  And suddenly who shows up?  Stalker-boy.  I quit Freespeech for a while, quit blogging entirely, got busy and then eventually started this blog.  And guess who shows up in my email inbox?  Yep, Stalker-boy.  Indeed, it is apparently his endless desire to find me wherever I am on the internet that earns his nom de plume.

So Stalker-boy and I were arguing about Shirley Sherrod and he made an off-hand comment about Mark Williams being “disgraced.”  Williams, you might know, wrote a piece satirizing the NAACP imagining a letter by their President Ben Jealous saying that “colored people” like them wanted slavery reestablished.  It was satire of the variety Jonathan Swift would engage in, his point being to 1) mock the fact that the NAACP has the word “colored” in its name, and 2) to suggest that by following Obama they were establishing a form of slavery, albeit a race neutral one.  The first joke is feeble, yes, and the second argument is extreme.  But citing it for the proposition that the man is racist, is like citing A Modest Proposal for the proposition that Swift thought human flesh was delicious.

Or gee, its like taking Franken imagining a sexual encounter between Newt Gengrich and an Asian woman, employing many stereotypes of Asian woman, as racist.  I mean if Williams is racist, then Franken is, too, right?

Now, I don’t know jack about Mark Williams, this supposed leader of the Tea Party movement.  I never heard of the guy until the controversy over the letter blew up.  So for all I know, there might be pages and pages of racist shit the guy said.  But this is not the proof of it.

So I said to Stalker-boy that it was just a satire and he replied by saying that there was more evidence of William’s racism, than just the satire.  Like what?  Well, he explained: “Calling Allah, the deity of millions of peace-loving people, a ‘monkey-god’ (i.e., Allah's followers are monkeys) was particularly racist.  Or was that ‘satire’ too?”

Now, for the really hilarious part.  This claim that it was racist to say this, is itself racist.  That is in claiming Williams is a racist, Stalker-boy outted himself as a racist.