A Stitch in Haste

Short version:

Microbiologist: I have published a paper documenting evidence of evolution in E. coli bacteria.

Creationist: I demand to see your data!

Microbiologist: Have you read the paper?

Creationist: Since you refuse to disclose your data, I am going to denounce you as an unethical fraud on Conservapedia!

The data were, of course, in the paper (and the evolved bacteria are, of course, still in the microbiologist's lab).

"Teach the controversy" indeed...

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Long version here, or here, or here.

... Infra-Red State!

U.S. Rep. Chris Cannon, one of the nation's most conservative congressmen, lost his bid for a seventh term Tuesday in a Republican primary that focused on whether he was conservative enough for Utah's 3rd District.
...
The lobbying group American Conservative Union said Cannon was nearly perfect on its issues in 2007, scoring 96 percent. But [Jason] Chaffetz repeatedly pounded the incumbent, especially on immigration, and pledged to be even more conservative.

His opponent ran -- and won -- on a platform of promising to violate the Constitution:

Chaffetz said he wants the U.S. to deport all illegal immigrants and stop granting automatic citizenship to children born here if their parents aren't legal residents.

As I noted here and here, the notion that Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment has somehow been "misread" for over one hundred years, and that the children of illegal immigrants born on United States soil are in fact not automatically citizens, is so facially absurd that one is entitled to simply presume disingenuousness by its proponents.

But when scapegoating some subset of The Others Who Are Destroying America™, disingenuousness is good. Disingenuousness works.

And it seems to work best of all in Utah (cf., here).

More thoughts at Crossed Pond.

(Why aren't you reading this at the new website?)

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Professional bigot Maggie Gallagher continues to weave her web of anti-gay lies and illogic:

She said the government regulates such religious authorities' ability to perform marriages because the state didn't create marriage and doesn't create marriages. Rather, legal authorities merely recognize and regulate an institution that already exists and is rooted deeply in the society's history and traditions.

Of course, the ancient Romans and other heathens got married and understood marriage to be a legal status long before there was even such as thing as "Christian" marriage (or Christians, for that matter). In fact, it was the ancient Romans who invented the metallic wedding ring.

Government is in the marriage business because encouraging the best environment for raising and protecting children is a benefit to society at large, Gallagher noted. That's why the institution has special legal privileges and responsibilities attached to it that aren't given to other intimate adult relationships.

"There's a reason the government has always been involved in marriage but not in baptism or my priest's vow of celibacy," Gallagher, who describes herself as an "orthodox Catholic," said. "Marriage is not a sacrament that has only religious implications, like baptism."

Put aside Gallagher's unethical and anti-intellectual regurgitation of the malicious "kid's do best" lie. Note instead the precedent lie, the deliberate (and laughable) suggestion that it was the church that invented "marriage" in the first place. That marriage was originally and always conceived strictly as a religious sacrament. And that it was only after the "social" benefits (including, apparently, coverture and spousal rape) of church-crafted "traditional" marriage were realized that the government then decided — "for the children" — to get in on the act.

A facially absurd thesis contradicted by both ancient and modern history. A purported model that is the exact opposite of current practice. All neatly packaged and peddled to redneck illiterates for the sake of rationalizing their backward beliefs.

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Oh, sorry, I still owe you a "comment left elsewhere," don't I?

Well, I found Gallagher's screeches via Box Turtle Bulletin:

Oddly, I could be persuaded to support this idea. If the government were to allow churches to define marriage and then recognized and enforced those religiously distinctive marriage contracts, gay people could marry in every state of the union and in any nearly every city that had a Unitarian Universalist fellowship, a Quaker meeting, or a United Church of Christ congregation.

To which I commented:

Of course, one could just as easily turn around and say that the government will issue marriage licenses to all, but let the religious groups craft a new, additional and exclusive status just for themselves.

Call it "holy matrimony," "covenant wedding," "sacramental union" or "zoop-de-do." Whatever you like. And they can have it all to themselves. But marriage stays a government institution subject to constitutional standards of equal protection and due process.

Think Gallagher would go for that?

Me neither.

Because when they say it's "all about marriage," they lie. When they say it's "all about the children," they lie. Whenever they insist it's about anything other than un-Christian hatred of others, they lie.

Why else would He tease some of His biggest fans by putting a huge heap of anti-creationist evidence right in their backyard?

A newly discovered batch of well-preserved dinosaur bones, petrified trees and even freshwater clams in southeastern Utah could provide new clues about life in the region some 150 million years ago.

The Bureau of Land Management announced the find Monday, calling the quarry near Hanksville "a major dinosaur fossil discovery."
...
The area has long been known to locals and BLM officials as a dinosaur haven. But no one knew of the site's magnitude until excavation began.

Actually, Mormons as a group have been remarkably reluctant to drink the Kreationist Kool-Aid. It might have to do with the fact that in 1909 one of the religion's elders was a geologist who smacked down the church's leader when he tried to issue an anti-evolution edict.

Or maybe it's just hard to deny evolution when you live in a state where every time you dig a hole in the ground a 150 million year old fossil turns up.

Too bad there's no dinosaur quarry underneath the Southern Baptist Convention.

Why else would He tease some of His biggest fans by putting a huge heap of anti-creationist evidence right in their backyard?

A newly discovered batch of well-preserved dinosaur bones, petrified trees and even freshwater clams in southeastern Utah could provide new clues about life in the region some 150 million years ago.

The Bureau of Land Management announced the find Monday, calling the quarry near Hanksville "a major dinosaur fossil discovery."
...
The area has long been known to locals and BLM officials as a dinosaur haven. But no one knew of the site's magnitude until excavation began.

Actually, Mormons as a group have been remarkably reluctant to drink the Kreationist Kool-Aid. It might have to do with the fact that in 1909 one of the religion's elders was a geologist who smacked down the church's leader when he tried to issue an anti-evolution edict.

Or maybe it's just hard to deny evolution when you live in a state where every time you dig a hole in the ground a 150 million year old fossil turns up.

Too bad there's no dinosaur quarry underneath the Southern Baptist Convention.

Quick dispatches from here and there —

ITEM: The federal government continues its futile, warm-fuzzy-feeling efforts to censor the Internet in the name of "protecting children." The Child Online Protection Act, enjoined by the Supreme Court in Ashcroft v. ACLU, 542 U.S. 656 (2004) (a/k/a "Reno II" — and yes that's "Reno" as in "Janet" from way back in 1998) is again before the Third Circuit, where the Justice Department must convince the court that:

• the availability to parents of built-in content filters


• the fact that U.S. law cannot reach online porn posted overseas anyway


• the fact that COPA "does not cover chat rooms, You Tube and other interactive sites that emerged in the last decade"

are all somehow irrelevant and that age verification ("a belt and suspenders approach" according to the DOJ lawyer arguing the case) is the "least intrusive way" to achieve the law's stated goals. Expect the court to yet again find the law unconstitutional. Flagship post here.

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ITEM: Here's an incident where the censors claim not to be protecting the children but rather the parents —

In the short walk across stage, Joseph Bryan Shore, 18, elicited more than boos when he allegedly cursed out his family and flipped the bird to the crowd, according to authorities. Immediately after the [high school graduation] ceremony, two police officers took him into custody and charged him with disorderly conduct.
...
The principal of Arab City High School, Patrick Crowder, said he regretted the incident but that he had no choice other than to have Shore arrested.

MY TAKE: The principal "had no choice"? Over a few moments of some profanities and the finger — both of which are unambiguously protected free speech, even in "dignified" (the principal's term) settings such as, e.g., a courthouse? Without more, this sounds not only like a improper arrest but also a civil rights violation that would survive a qualified immunity challenge. (Related late entry here — it is graduation season, after all.)

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ITEM: Let's switch from "commencement and freedom of speech" to "commencement and freedom of religion" —

Newark Public Schools has settled a lawsuit filed by a former student who claimed he couldn't attend his graduation from West Side High School because it was held in the sanctuary of a local Baptist Church.

Bilal Shareef, a Muslim student, said his religious faith prohibited him from entering a building with religious icons, such as pictures of God or images of the cross. He skipped the ceremony held at New Hope Baptist Church in June 2006.
...
The district also agreed not to sponsor or promote religious events, not to hold student events in places of worship and not to hold student events in other religious buildings unless religious images are covered.

MY TAKE: It is beyond absurd to suggest that a public school district as large as Newark's cannot find suitable secular locations to hold high school graduations and therefore simply "must" have them in churches. If all else fails, then have them at the schools themselves — that's where mine was held. I don't buy the "no other suitable site" excuse for using churches as polling places, and I don't buy it here. (Via Religion Clause.)

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ITEM: And will students be reading about such stories in the school newspaper?

A high school newspaper in Northern California has been disbanded after it published a front-page photo of a student burning an American flag, triggering criticism that the administration was stifling free expression.
...
The Redding controversy is the latest example in recent years of high school and college administrators in California attempting to censure [sic] student-run newspapers or punish those who oversee them.

MY TAKE: I always tread lightly on this topic, since I am not convinced that there is a "right to a (taxpayer-funded) school newspaper." And no student was disciplined or penalized for exercising her free speech rights (cf., the Doninger case I recently updated here). But the fact that the topic that resulted in the newspaper's termination — flag burning — is itself protected expression and generates so much faux indignation by activist legislators and other anti-rights malcontents certainly gets my libertarian dander up.

Quick dispatches from here and there —

ITEM: The federal government continues its futile, warm-fuzzy-feeling efforts to censor the Internet in the name of "protecting children." The Child Online Protection Act, enjoined by the Supreme Court in Ashcroft v. ACLU, 542 U.S. 656 (2004) (a/k/a "Reno II" — and yes that's "Reno" as in "Janet" from way back in 1998) is again before the Third Circuit, where the Justice Department must convince the court that:

• the availability to parents of built-in content filters


• the fact that U.S. law cannot reach online porn posted overseas anyway


• the fact that COPA "does not cover chat rooms, You Tube and other interactive sites that emerged in the last decade"

are all somehow irrelevant and that age verification ("a belt and suspenders approach" according to the DOJ lawyer arguing the case) is the "least intrusive way" to achieve the law's stated goals. Expect the court to yet again find the law unconstitutional. Flagship post here.

---

ITEM: Here's an incident where the censors claim not to be protecting the children but rather the parents —

In the short walk across stage, Joseph Bryan Shore, 18, elicited more than boos when he allegedly cursed out his family and flipped the bird to the crowd, according to authorities. Immediately after the [high school graduation] ceremony, two police officers took him into custody and charged him with disorderly conduct.
...
The principal of Arab City High School, Patrick Crowder, said he regretted the incident but that he had no choice other than to have Shore arrested.

MY TAKE: The principal "had no choice"? Over a few moments of some profanities and the finger — both of which are unambiguously protected free speech, even in "dignified" (the principal's term) settings such as, e.g., a courthouse? Without more, this sounds not only like a improper arrest but also a civil rights violation that would survive a qualified immunity challenge. (Related late entry here — it is graduation season, after all.)

---

ITEM: Let's switch from "commencement and freedom of speech" to "commencement and freedom of religion" —

Newark Public Schools has settled a lawsuit filed by a former student who claimed he couldn't attend his graduation from West Side High School because it was held in the sanctuary of a local Baptist Church.

Bilal Shareef, a Muslim student, said his religious faith prohibited him from entering a building with religious icons, such as pictures of God or images of the cross. He skipped the ceremony held at New Hope Baptist Church in June 2006.
...
The district also agreed not to sponsor or promote religious events, not to hold student events in places of worship and not to hold student events in other religious buildings unless religious images are covered.

MY TAKE: It is beyond absurd to suggest that a public school district as large as Newark's cannot find suitable secular locations to hold high school graduations and therefore simply "must" have them in churches. If all else fails, then have them at the schools themselves — that's where mine was held. I don't buy the "no other suitable site" excuse for using churches as polling places, and I don't buy it here. (Via Religion Clause.)

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ITEM: And will students be reading about such stories in the school newspaper?

A high school newspaper in Northern California has been disbanded after it published a front-page photo of a student burning an American flag, triggering criticism that the administration was stifling free expression.
...
The Redding controversy is the latest example in recent years of high school and college administrators in California attempting to censure [sic] student-run newspapers or punish those who oversee them.

MY TAKE: I always tread lightly on this topic, since I am not convinced that there is a "right to a (taxpayer-funded) school newspaper." And no student was disciplined or penalized for exercising her free speech rights (cf., the Doninger case I recently updated here). But the fact that the topic that resulted in the newspaper's termination — flag burning — is itself protected expression and generates so much faux indignation by activist legislators and other anti-rights malcontents certainly gets my libertarian dander up.

While so much attention was (rightly) focused on the outrageous proposal in the District of Columbia to initiate a patently unconstitutional "papers please" vehicle checkpoint regime, another just-as-patently unconstitutional display (no pun intended) of police power occured here in New York City:

New York City police detectives and Secret Service agents briefly detained and questioned an artist on Wednesday morning as he installed an exhibition with the title, "The Assassination of Hillary Clinton / The Assassination of Barack Obama."

The artist, Yazmany Arboleda, tried to set up the exhibition in a vacant storefront at 264 West 40th Street in Midtown Manhattan, and had finished stenciling letters of the title on the plate glass windows at street level.
...
"I'm renting that space; the space was allocated for an exhibition, and it's my right to put those words up," he said. "They said it could incite someone to do something crazy, like break the window. It's terrible, because they’re violating my rights. If someone breaks a window, they're committing a crime."

He added: "The exhibition is supposed to be about character assassination. It's philosophical and metaphorical."

The Secret Service seems to have possibly overreacted but in the end respected Mr. Arboleda's First Amendment rights. The same cannot be said for the NYPD:

Speaking to reporters around noon, Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly said Mr. Arboleda had been questioned because the police wanted to determine his motives. "Obviously, they could be interpreted as advocating harm to protectees," Mr. Kelly said.

Put aside the pesky facts that (1) "having motives" is not a crime, and (2) "detained" is just a slick way of saying "seized" — as in a Fourth Amendment "seizure." Kelly's final attempt to wiggle off the hook, "could be interpreted as advocating harm to protectees," is also worthless as a rationale for abridging First Amendment rights.

The test for censoring speech based on potential civic disruption is Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444 (1969), which provides the famous "imminent lawlessness" test:

[T]he constitutional guarantees of free speech and free press do not permit a State to forbid or proscribe advocacy of the use of force or of law violation except where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.

That's a far cry from Kelly's "could be interpreted as advocating harm" — failing both the "imminent" and the "likely" prongs of the Brandenburg test. Not to mention that art is generally not considered "advocacy of the use of force or of law violation."

The exhibit display was covered up by the owner of the building Arboleda rented. That is not state action and does not implicate the First Amendment; it is merely a contract dispute. Point conceded. And there may well be little constitutional harm in law enforcement or the Secret Service seeking to question the artist at his convenience. But forcibly detaining an artist, even for "mere" questioning and then applying the wrong constitutional test to the answers generated by such "mere" questioning crosses both Fourth and First Amendment lines that yet again demonstrate that liberty requires eternal vigilance at least as much as does the War on Terror.

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I am furious at myself for not saving the link, but someone, somewhere, left what may be the best comment ever in reference to this story:

This isn't shouting "Fire!" in a crowded theater — this is yelling "Theater!" in a crowded fire.

Dang, I wish I had thought of that, for there is much truth in it.

Today's Religion of Peace oxymoron is: Jordanian Justice Act —

Eleven Danes have been summoned to appear before the Jordanian public prosecutor to answer charges of blasphemy and threatening the national peace. They include the cartoonist who drew one of the Mohammed cartoons and editors from 10 of the 17 newspapers that reprinted them.

The group behind the announcement is called The Prophet Unites Us, a union of Jordanian media organisations, organisations and private individuals.
...
Osama al-Bettar, the group's lawyer, said that if the Danes do not appear, the next step will be to inform Interpol and seek their arrest.
...
The case is being brought under changes made to the Jordanian Justice Act in 2006.

So now Islam's bloodthirsty goatherders actually imagine themselves to be the moral equivalent of Nuremberg or The Hague?

Besides the fact that any government that fails to recognize the inviolability of the natural right of free speech is per se illegitimate — and its "laws" on the topic are therefore summarily null and void — is the precedent principle that no jurisdiction may export its criminal laws into another jurisdiction. It's true among states in the U.S., and it's true among nations. All civilized societies understand, accept and even celebrate this basic tenet of jurisprudence.

But of course "Islam" and "civilized" rarely fit well in the same sentence.

I look forward to Interpol telling the Jordanian regime to kiss the free world's collective ass.

(Via Religion Clause. More on Jordan's retrogression into barbarism here.)

Today's Religion of Peace oxymoron is: Jordanian Justice Act —

Eleven Danes have been summoned to appear before the Jordanian public prosecutor to answer charges of blasphemy and threatening the national peace. They include the cartoonist who drew one of the Mohammed cartoons and editors from 10 of the 17 newspapers that reprinted them.

The group behind the announcement is called The Prophet Unites Us, a union of Jordanian media organisations, organisations and private individuals.
...
Osama al-Bettar, the group's lawyer, said that if the Danes do not appear, the next step will be to inform Interpol and seek their arrest.
...
The case is being brought under changes made to the Jordanian Justice Act in 2006.

So now Islam's bloodthirsty goatherders actually imagine themselves to be the moral equivalent of Nuremberg or The Hague?

Besides the fact that any government that fails to recognize the inviolability of the natural right of free speech is per se illegitimate — and its "laws" on the topic are therefore summarily null and void — is the precedent principle that no jurisdiction may export its criminal laws into another jurisdiction. It's true among states in the U.S., and it's true among nations. All civilized societies understand, accept and even celebrate this basic tenet of jurisprudence.

But of course "Islam" and "civilized" rarely fit well in the same sentence.

I look forward to Interpol telling the Jordanian regime to kiss the free world's collective ass.

(Via Religion Clause. More on Jordan's retrogression into barbarism here.)

To review: One of the most embarrassing forest-trees error that libertarians can make is to argue that, since "government should get out of the marriage business" (a dubious proposition in and of itself), then it must follow that libertarians should oppose gay marriage, because at least that way somebody isn't getting married, which (the argument goes) advances the (allegedly) libertarian end-goal of abolishing marriage as a legal status altogether.

It's a mind-bogglingly stupid (not to mention cruel) argument — one that not only ignores reality but also ignores theory: Since when is equal protection (writ large, very large) acceptable collateral damage in the libertarian war on governmental meddling (writ small, very small)?

On the other hand, and for the sake of perspective, here's an instance where I think all libertarians can indeed agree: Government should definitely get out of this part of the marriage business —

The [Kern County, California] office will issue same-sex marriage licenses beginning June 17 as state law requires but will stop solemnizing weddings due to lack of staff and space, Auditor-Controller-County Clerk Ann Barnett announced in a news release Wednesday evening.
...
Julie Poochigian, chief deputy clerk-recorder of Tulare County, said her office plans to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples starting June 17. She said the office has never performed wedding ceremonies for couples.

"Some other counties do that, but Tulare County does not," she said. "We are not staffed to perform the services."

I simply do not see how it is a proper function of government to provide a wedding ceremony, any more than it would be a proper function of government to provide a wedding gown or a tuxedo. The only requirement is fair and equal treatment in the issuance and recognition of marriage licenses.

By contrast, recall that this is utterly unacceptable:

San Diego County plans to comply with a state Supreme Court ruling that allows same-sex marriages but will not force employees to perform the ceremonies if they cite religious or moral objections.

County Assessor-Recorder-Clerk Greg Smith, whose office issues marriage licenses, said he has informed the roughly 115 employees deputized to conduct ceremonies to tell him if they object to same-sex marriages.

It's quite simple really: If your taxpayer-funded job requires you to treat all comers fairly and equally, but your bigotry religion prevents you from doing so, then quit. That's the only "reasonable accommodation" you're entitled to. (Compare to my previous posts on when private pharmacists object to dispensing contraception.)

(Via Good As You, who is a bit more cynical about the county clerk's motivations.)

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Speaking of Kern County and gay marriage: Be sure not to drink the carrot juice.

"Did you see my boy Barack today?"
--Mike Fine, 28, during a weekly Bible study meeting.

The New York Times elaborates:

The Journey, a megachurch of mostly younger evangelicals, is representative of a new generation that refuses to put politics at the center of its faith and rejects identification with the religious right.

They say they are tired of the culture wars. They say they do not want the test of their faith to be the fight against gay rights. They say they want to broaden the traditional evangelical anti-abortion agenda to include care for the poor, the environment, immigrants and people with H.I.V., according to experts on younger evangelicals and the young people themselves.

"Evangelicalism is becoming somewhat less coherent as a movement or as an identity," said Christian Smith, a sociology professor at the University of Notre Dame. "Younger people don't even want the label anymore. They don't believe the main goal of the church is to be political."

The article does note, on the other hand, that the next generation of Evangelicals are not, contra young Mr. Fine, becoming Democrats. Neither are they at all becoming pro-choice — or, for that matter, particularly pro-gay. They still know an abomination when they see one.

They are, however, leaving their Republican voter registration cards at home when they go to church and leaving their fire-and-brimstone sermons home when they go to vote. They see their version of Christianity as a personal guide, not a voting guide. They recognize the difference between winning converts and winning House seats. They worry more about redeeming their own souls through good works and righteous living than about redeeming your soul or mine through theocratic lawmaking and adjudicating.

Good for them. (And better for us.)

Meanwhile, the generation gap on same-sex marriage is well documented — even the bigots acknowledge it in society at large. It even exists among conservatives themselves: "One in three under 30 favors same-sex marriage, compared with one in 10 of their elders." That is why gay marriage is of course inevitable and why the bigots were so desperate to enact as many state constitutional amendments as they could, as quickly as they could: the clock was ticking. They knew they couldn't stop the march of modernity — but they could certainly try to slow it down.

The other age-based maneuver that older Evangelicals are increasingly relying on in their futile War on Progress is of course "Christian" (i.e., redacted) homeschooling — "complete" (so to speak) with no evolution, no sex education and no "Heather Has Two Mommies." Only time will tell just how much anti-intellectual scarring there will be among the pending wave of Evangelical-indoctrinated illiterates and how they will interact, not just with the non-Evangelical real world, but also with their non-isolated "new Evangelical" brethren.

In any case, I'm glad that at least some conservatives are "tired of the culture wars." Because I am too.