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Speaking of dirtbags and contradictions:
Department of Justice (DOJ) official Bruce Ohr told Congress in August that he met before the 2016 election with Glenn Simpson, a direct contradiction to what the Fusion GPS founder said in a congressional deposition in 2017.
Sources familiar with Ohr’s Aug. 28 testimony tell The Daily Caller News Foundation that Ohr said he met with Simpson in August 2016. But Simpson, whose firm commissioned the infamous Steele dossier, told the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence during a Nov. 14 deposition that he did not have contact with anyone from the DOJ or FBI until after the election.
Ohr’s comments came during an exchange with Ohio Republican Rep. Jim Jordan, sources tell TheDCNF.
“I think you said earlier today sometime this morning that you met with Glenn Simpson twice in person,” Jordan said, according to a transcript of the interview read out to TheDCNF.
“But you met in person in 2016, is that right?” Jordan pressed.
“That is my recollection,” Ohr said.
“Once in August and once in December?” Jordan asked.
“Yes,” said Ohr.
Simpson told House investigators in November that he had contact with Ohr only after the 2016 election.
“Did the FBI ever reach out to you or Fusion GPS in relation to the matters that Mr. Steele informed them upon?” investigators with the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence asked Simpson during a Nov. 14, 2017, interview.
“No,” said Simpson.
“You’ve never heard from anyone in the U.S. government in relation to those matters, either the FBI or the Department of Justice?” investigators asked.
“After the election. I mean, during the election, no,” Simpson said.
Simpson went on to identify Ohr as his Justice Department contact, though he left out information about Ohr’s wife, a Russia expert who worked for Fusion GPS.
When asked how he came into contact with Ohr, Simpson told the intelligence committee: “Chris [Steele] told me that he had been talking to Bruce, that he had told Bruce about what happened, and that Bruce wanted more information and suggested that I speak with Bruce.”
“The context of this is that it was after the election. A very surprising thing had happened, which is that Donald Trump had won.”
Source.
Now why would Fusion GPS lie about when it started when it met with Ohr and started working with the FBI?
But yeah, it looks like Nunes (or someone in the government) is making good on the pledge to release the transcripts before the election. Now we just need to see the FISA applications.
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On September 18 2018 01:42 Danglars wrote:
If MeToo becomes just another political tool for Washington DC, the movement dies. Ellison is doing fine, no news there.
I think that democrats are badly miscalculating on this one. Ellison is a big problem for them. The other big problem is their presumption that people are really going to care about allegations of a 35-year-old incident that were never made until now. I had a neighbor over for cigars this weekend who is rabidly anti-Trump and detests Kavanaugh. But he was very much not on board with airing these allegations now given that no one said anything 35 years ago. I get that the more rabid democrats/liberals aren't going to care, but I very much doubt that using Ford as a rallying cry to stop Kavanaugh is going to working out in the long run.
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On September 18 2018 01:41 xDaunt wrote:I'm not accusing her of being a dirtbag yet, though I tend to think that it is likely that she is (or maybe she's just crazy as is suggested by many of her former students). There are already discrepancies in her story. Throw in her patent dishonesty regarding her intentions in bringing all of this out now ( she actually has the gall to say that she's not saying that Kavanaugh shouldn't be confirmed) and the timing issues noted above, and there's plenty to suggest that her intentions are less than honorable.
So that's a no on detailing how you account for the evidence she's got? Again, is the theory that she lied to her therapist in 2012 in case he ever got nominated? That the therapist's notes were fabricated in 2018? That she was assaulted by someone other than Kavanaugh? That she only thought she was assaulted at the timing? Until you acciunt for the evidence at hand, fussing about the timing or how long Feinstein had the letter or how willing Ford was to talk sbout it at various times is all red herring.
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On September 16 2018 17:41 GreenHorizons wrote:*looks coyly at introvert* Show nested quote +Meet the Creationist Helping to Change Arizona School Standards on Evolution
Arizona Superintendent Diane Douglas tapped a young-earth creationist to serve last month on a committee tasked with revising the state's science curriculum standards on evolution.
Joseph Kezele, the president of the Arizona Origin Science Association, is a staunch believer in the idea that enough scientific evidence exists to back up the biblical story of creation. Douglas appointed him to an eight-member special working group at the Arizona Department of Education that completed a final review of the draft evolution teaching standards on August 30.
Kezele teaches biology at Arizona Christian University in Phoenix. He advocates teaching his version of "established, real science" in classrooms.
Evolution, he said, is a false explanation for life and should be taught so that students "can defend against it, if they want to."
"I'm not saying to put the Bible into the classroom, although the real science will confirm the Bible,"
He argued that scientific evidence supports his creationist ideas, including the claims that the Earth is only 6,000 years old and that dinosaurs were on board Noah's Ark.
ADE spokesperson Stefan Swiat said that Kezele was selected because of his position at Arizona Christian University. Swiat was unaware if Douglas knew that Kezele was a creationist when she selected him.
"One of the aims of the working group is to include a broad collection of contributors from the scientific community," Swiat wrote in an email. "Both the working group, as well as the head of ADE’s science standards, were completely unaware that Dr. Kezele was a creationist."
Kezele did not discuss his "personal creationist beliefs" with the working group, Swiat added.
As examples of the science that should be taught in classrooms to disprove evolution, Kezele offered unintelligible explanations about the human appendix and the strength of Earth's magnetic field.
Students should be able to judge for themselves whether the creation model or the evolutionary model "actually is consistent with the real scientific evidence that we have," Kezele said. "And then the students can do some thinking and see which one holds up. In general, that's what education should be, not just indoctrination." www.phoenixnewtimes.comI think what's most interesting about this is the guy isn't dumb. He knows he couldn't bring creationism into the curriculum so he slipped in just what he could. While I have my own personal issues with religion in general young earth creationism carries with it a whole host of other problematic issues. Namely that anyone adhering to it has a terribly distorted understanding of geological history. From which it makes a great deal of other discussions near impossible. A private university having the guy teach is fine for them I guess, but having him influence (even if only slightly) so many kids in a public school system is dangerously irresponsible and damaging to children's education. That said, he's right about it being important to think critically about evolution and where it might fall short in explaining various phenomena.
Critically thinking about stuff is never wrong. The problem here is that thatperson quite obviously is not critically thinking about stuff. He has a dogma that must never be questioned ("The bible is literally true in every single aspect"), and arranges all of his "critical thinking" to make sure that that dogma is never violated.
Creationism is such an incredibly weird thing, and it is very strange that it is actually a relevant force in the 21st century in a modern country. It is an ideaset entirely based on people wanting very much to believe one thing and using confirmation bias to produce a "theory" (which probably does not actually clear the necessary threshholds of scientific theories) to somehow deal with the fact that actual science is very clear that their base belief is utter nonsense. I am not talking about religion in general here. Religion in general is fine. I am talking about a very literal interpretation of the bible. That is very clearly nonsense. If you want to believe in the metaphorical truth of the bible, or whatever, that is totally fine and probably doesn't lead to as many problems with actual science. But if you claim that the earth was created in 7 days 6000 years ago, that is clearly and obviously nonsense.
That shit can be some weird cult on a farm in the middle of nowhere, but it is very scary that these crazies are anywhere near education, and that apparently people are fine with that.
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On September 18 2018 02:14 ChristianS wrote:Show nested quote +On September 18 2018 01:41 xDaunt wrote:I'm not accusing her of being a dirtbag yet, though I tend to think that it is likely that she is (or maybe she's just crazy as is suggested by many of her former students). There are already discrepancies in her story. Throw in her patent dishonesty regarding her intentions in bringing all of this out now ( she actually has the gall to say that she's not saying that Kavanaugh shouldn't be confirmed) and the timing issues noted above, and there's plenty to suggest that her intentions are less than honorable. So that's a no on detailing how you account for the evidence she's got? Again, is the theory that she lied to her therapist in 2012 in case he ever got nominated? That the therapist's notes were fabricated in 2018? That she was assaulted by someone other than Kavanaugh? That she only thought she was assaulted at the timing? Until you acciunt for the evidence at hand, fussing about the timing or how long Feinstein had the letter or how willing Ford was to talk sbout it at various times is all red herring.
She has no evidence other than her own story and the therapists notes from 2012 which partially contradict her story. No one is independently corroborating her story. She's the one making the claim, so the burden is on her. And her credibility is suspect for all of the reasons that I have laid out.
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It’s really going to be the millenial’s and Gen Y’s version of Anita Hill as best I can tell. Only two people really know about that pubic hair on a can of coke, so what to do?
Trump’s got the younger people a little tired of partisanship and the PC culture and sacred cows. Democrats are investing heavily in revenge for Garland in the most partisan way possible. That doesn’t endear them as the party you can trust to take matters in a better direction than Trump. That’s lower voter turnout and more disgust for the anti-Trump choice. That’s more push for the Obama-style or Sanders-style outsider to buck the Dem establishment.
Those are my musings at this moment. Also, this Mueller thing really looks like it’ll blow up in his face. He’s going to come out with a financial crimes and process crimes sheet for campaign workers, and call it a victory. Voters will stare a little puzzled and wonder where all the Trump/collusion/Russia stuff went.
Now that’s for the two-faced Dems. I wonder how the country will react to sworn testimony of this Dr Ford on national TV accusing Kavanaugh of sexual assault or attempted rape? The sight of a bunch of old white guys ferreting out her inaccuracies (as already have started to be revealed) might cast her as a sympathetic figure.
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The other point that bears mentioning is this: just because Ford may genuinely believe something happened does not mean that it did. A substantial part of my legal practice has involved victim advocacy. It never ceases to amaze me how frequently my clients’ perceived grievances are simply untrue or grossly exaggerated. This is why corroborative evidence is so important and contradictions in victim testimony are so damning.
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On September 18 2018 02:34 xDaunt wrote:
The other point that bears mentioning is this: just because Ford may genuinely believe something happened does not mean that it did. A substantial part of my legal practice has involved victim advocacy. It never ceases to amaze me how frequently my clients’ perceived grievances are simply untrue or grossly exaggerated. This why corroborative evidence is so important and contradictions in victim testimony are so damning.
So at first you were going with "she was lying in 2012 and/or changed her story." Now you're going with "maybe she just thought he pinned her on a bed and tried to pull her clothes off and covered her mouth when she screamed." I suppose you're just floating possibilities so there's nothing requiring you to pick only one alternate story. But in the first case, why did she tell her therapist about it if it didn't happen? Was she trying to establish credibility for a lie she would tell if he ever got nominated? And in the second case, doesn't that mean she's a totally honest actor who legitimately (if mistakenly) believes she was assaulted, meaning all your complaints about her timing suggesting an ulterior motive were off the mark?
Otherwise, the "contradictions" are a pretty weak objection. If someone tells you "I got raped thirty years ago" and you ask what day of the week it happened and they say "Tuesday I think," and then six years later you ask again and they say "I'm not sure, Sunday maybe?" that could be because it was a lie from the beginning, but it seems much more likely that over the intervening years some of the details got fuzzy. Here there's the added possibility that the therapist misunderstood/misannotated her story.
Fundamentally, the therapist notes seem to prove this wasn't fabricated in response to the nomination, and the details of her story make a mistaken identity or imagined offense unlikely. If you're claiming she's lying, you have to answer why she would have made it up in 2012. If you're claiming she's mistaken, you have to come up with plausible alternate events that a faulty human memory could eventually transform to "I was pinned to a bed, assaulted, and almost raped by Brett Kavanaugh."
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On September 18 2018 02:57 ChristianS wrote:Show nested quote +On September 18 2018 02:34 xDaunt wrote:
The other point that bears mentioning is this: just because Ford may genuinely believe something happened does not mean that it did. A substantial part of my legal practice has involved victim advocacy. It never ceases to amaze me how frequently my clients’ perceived grievances are simply untrue or grossly exaggerated. This why corroborative evidence is so important and contradictions in victim testimony are so damning. So at first you were going with "she was lying in 2012 and/or changed her story." Now you're going with "maybe she just thought he pinned her on a bed and tried to pull her clothes off and covered her mouth when she screamed." I suppose you're just floating possibilities so there's nothing requiring you to pick only one alternate story. But in the first case, why did she tell her therapist about it if it didn't happen? Was she trying to establish credibility for a lie she would tell if he ever got nominated? And in the second case, doesn't that mean she's a totally honest actor who legitimately (if mistakenly) believes she was assaulted, meaning all your complaints about her timing suggesting an ulterior motive were off the mark?
I'm not going with either. My position is that I fundamentally don't give a shit because it was 35 years ago, and, if it was really a big deal, then she should have said something back then. There is zero independent evidence corroborating her story (which, unsurprisingly, I have yet to see you acknowledge), so I really have no reasonable basis to believe that Kavanaugh is a bad guy.
Otherwise, the "contradictions" are a pretty weak objection. If someone tells you "I got raped thirty years ago" and you ask what day of the week it happened and they say "Tuesday I think," and then six years later you ask again and they say "I'm not sure, Sunday maybe?" that could be because it was a lie from the beginning, but it seems much more likely that over the intervening years some of the details got fuzzy. Here there's the added possibility that the therapist misunderstood/misannotated her story.
Sure, medical professionals get stuff wrong in their records all of the time. That doesn't mean that the medical professional got it wrong this time. It's a glaring inconsistency and must be recognized as such, regardless of its origin.
Fundamentally, the therapist notes seem to prove this wasn't fabricated in response to the nomination, and the details of her story make a mistaken identity or imagined offense unlikely. If you're claiming she's lying, you have to answer why she would have made it up in 2012. If you're claiming she's mistaken, you have to come up with plausible alternate events that a faulty human memory could eventually transform to "I was pinned to a bed, assaulted, and almost raped by Brett Kavanaugh."
There are people who are floating the idea that she went to the therapist only after it seemed like Romney might win in 2012 and when it was believed that Kavanaugh would be Romney's pick for a SCOTUS opening. I'm not on board with that one yet, but it does bear mentioning that this individual is a rabid anti-Trump advocate, which she seems to be going out of her way to hide now by scrubbing her online presence. There are red flags all over the place. What I tell my clients heading into trial about credibility issues like these is the following: "You can only ask for so many favors from the trier of fact. Only so much can be explained away." Ford is very clearly in this position with the time lapse, the inconsistencies, history of mental health issues, the plethora of bias evidence, etc.
But like I said before, none of this really matters to me. It's just noise. At the end of the day, we have an unsubstantiated and uncorroborated allegation of misconduct that went un-aired for 35 years. It's a nothing burger. Of course, that doesn't stop people like you from swallowing it hook, line, and sinker without any reasonable basis for doing so. The question to ask isn't "why shouldn't we believe her?" The real question is "why should we?"
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Sure, there's no physical evidence or witnesses at present, but the issue at hand is whether to wait for an investigation, which is where that stuff would turn up. "There's no corroborating evidence" is a good objection to convicting someone, but a weak objection to opening an investigation.
Discrepancies in details in a decades-old story told from memory over years are completely expected and normal. You're really not gonna get much mileage on that.
Scrubbing her online presence is completely expected too. Whether she's lying or not, anybody could have told you coming out with an allegation like this at this time is opening yourself up to an avelanche of abuse. This could very well ruin her life. Basic defensive measures like deleting social media stuff is a no-brainer, whether her story is true, mistaken or manufactured.
And I know you're on the defensive, but saying a sexual assault victim should have made public accusations at the time or else it "wasn't really a big deal" is bullshit and I think you know it. If you're gonna generalize that "assault and rape victims who wait a long time to make public accusations shouldn't be believed," then say it and we can talk about that. Otherwise, give up the point.
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Nope, there definitely is not enough here to warrant opening an investigation. Kavanaugh is going to be confirmed on schedule.
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So there are three possibilities: either the accuser is right, the accuser is lying, or the accuser is mistaken. You've given no plausible explanation for how someone could mistakenly come to believe that Brett Kavanaugh pinned them to a bed, tried to rape them, and covered their mouth when they screamed, so that leaves lying. The only possible motive you've provided for why a person would decide in 2012 to lie to their therapist and claim Brett Kavanaugh pinned them to a bed, tried to rape them, and covered their mouth when they screamed is "maybe she thought Romney was gonna win and she wanted to torpedo his possible nomination." If that's all you've got we can discuss the plausibility of it, but I think you know how weak a story that is.
So we're in a situation where you're struggling to come up with a plausible explanation that isn't contradicted by either existing evidence or common sense, and yet you don't even think it's worth looking into it? If we're at the point of you just asserting "not enough evidence to open an investigation" without supporting argument, I think we might be done here.
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I already said that people genuinely believe misperceptions all of the time. This isn't even a controversial idea, and it's also why the therapy notes from 2012 don't constitute independent corroboration of what happened. She's the source of the information in those notes. This isn't a situation where it's strictly a choice between the accuser is lying or is accurate. Hell, by her own admission, the accuser's memory of what happened is poor. She doesn't remember where the incident happened. She doesn't even remember when it happened. She can't even identify the precise year. Kavanaugh and his cohort(s) (again, she can't even remember how many there were) were allegedly drunk at the time. Perhaps she was drunk off her ass at this party, too? Wouldn't that more than explain the glaring gaps in her memory?
There's nothing independently credible about her story, and everything that she has said is inherently incredible for a variety of reasons already discussed. Nonetheless, like I pointed out, you seem to have no problem believing all of this without an an ounce of critical review. Of course, it's certainly politically convenient for you to do so, but let's not get mired in the details, shall we?
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Having two different threads creates some weird redundancy, so here's what I said to Intro in the main thread the other day:
Which of these do you think a rape victim is more likely to remember:
1. Whose party it was at/whose house it was
2. The day/month/year on which it occurred
3. The name and face of the rapist
To me, it's obviously 3, distantly followed by 1, then 2. So fussing about whether she remembers the date or what color dress she wore or precisely how many minutes she locked herself in the bathroom after is being obtuse. A woman has apparently claimed since at least 2012 that Brett Kavanaugh pinned her to a bed, tried to rape her, and covered her mouth when she screamed. The simplest explanation for that fact is that she believes it. And the simplest explanation for her believing it is that it happened. Of course, Occam's Razor isn't grounds for conviction, but nobody is advocating for 20 to life yet. They're advocating for looking into it more. And so far the only other explanations I've heard are "maybe she made it up in 2012 in case Romney won" or "maybe she got drunk and ??? and faulty human menory transformed that into thinking Brett Kavanaugh pinned her to a bed, tried to rape her, and covered her mouth when she screamed." Both of which are a hell of a lot more convoluted and hard to believe than that she's telling the truth.
You keep attacking me for being credulous and politically opportunist, but the only real reason for Republicans not to investigate is political expediency; Republicans are scared they'll investigate, find corroborating evidence, have to turn him down, and not have time to get somebody else before the new session of Congress. If they investigate and corroborating evidence isn't found, they can just confirm him and move on. Or if they prefer, they can pull him now, nominate someone else, and still push them through this year.
Answer me this: suppose evidence is discovered tomorrow that incontrovertibly confirms her account. Would you still favor confirmation? What if there were other victims? And if such evidence came out after his confirmation, what would you think should happen then?
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On September 18 2018 04:55 ChristianS wrote:Having two different threads creates some weird redundancy, so here's what I said to Intro in the main thread the other day: Show nested quote +Which of these do you think a rape victim is more likely to remember:
1. Whose party it was at/whose house it was
2. The day/month/year on which it occurred
3. The name and face of the rapist
To me, it's obviously 3, distantly followed by 1, then 2.
If you say so. I presume by offering this opinion you have some basis -- at a minimum personal experience -- for doing so?
Oh, and let's not forget that the allegation here isn't rape.
So fussing about whether she remembers the date or what color dress she wore or precisely how many minutes she locked herself in the bathroom after is being obtuse. A woman has apparently claimed since at least 2012 that Brett Kavanaugh pinned her to a bed, tried to rape her, and covered her mouth when she screamed. The simplest explanation for that fact is that she believes it. And the simplest explanation for her believing it is that it happened. Of course, Occam's Razor isn't grounds for conviction, but nobody is advocating for 20 to life yet.
If you ignore everything else that makes her story suspect, yes, you can apply Occam's Razor this way. Of course, it it is readily apparent to everyone that ignoring everything else is quite dishonest.
They're advocating for looking into it more. And so far the only other explanations I've heard are "maybe she made it up in 2012 in case Romney won" or "maybe she got drunk and ??? and faulty human menory transformed that into thinking Brett Kavanaugh pinned her to a bed, tried to rape her, and covered her mouth when she screamed." Both of which are a hell of a lot more convoluted and hard to believe than that she's telling the truth.
Again, you are accepting her bald allegations as true without a reasonable basis for doing so. You're the one making the charge that the authorities need to turn a presumably innocent man's life upside-down with an investigation. As such, it is incumbent upon you to explain why this woman and her allegations are credible.
You keep attacking me for being credulous and politically opportunist, but the only real reason for Republicans not to investigate is political expediency; Republicans are scared they'll investigate, find corroborating evidence, have to turn him down, and not have time to get somebody else before the new session of Congress. If they investigate and corroborating evidence isn't found, they can just confirm him and move on. Or if they prefer, they can pull him now, nominate someone else, and still push them through this year.
I'm not scared that they'll investigate at all. I don't think that they should turn a man's life upside down based upon an obviously faulty allegation that has been made under incredibly dubious circumstances by someone that has an abundance of red flags attached to her. If there was anything that independently corroborated her charge, then I'd reconsider. As things stand, all of the independent evidence (attestations of classmates, etc) supports Kavanaugh -- which you seem to be ignoring.
Answer me this: suppose evidence is discovered tomorrow that incontrovertibly confirms her account. Would you still favor confirmation? What if there were other victims? And if such evidence came out after his confirmation, what would you think should happen then?
If there were other allegations from other people, I'd support an investigation. Beyond that, I'm not going to answer a bunch of speculative nonsense on matters that are rarely black and white. At a very minimum your question about whether I'd support Kavanaugh if her account was confirmed is flawed because her account -- as is currently known -- is incredibly incomplete. But rest assured, I'm not in favor of putting rapists on the US Supreme Court.
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On September 18 2018 02:19 Simberto wrote:Show nested quote +On September 16 2018 17:41 GreenHorizons wrote:*looks coyly at introvert* Meet the Creationist Helping to Change Arizona School Standards on Evolution
Arizona Superintendent Diane Douglas tapped a young-earth creationist to serve last month on a committee tasked with revising the state's science curriculum standards on evolution.
Joseph Kezele, the president of the Arizona Origin Science Association, is a staunch believer in the idea that enough scientific evidence exists to back up the biblical story of creation. Douglas appointed him to an eight-member special working group at the Arizona Department of Education that completed a final review of the draft evolution teaching standards on August 30.
Kezele teaches biology at Arizona Christian University in Phoenix. He advocates teaching his version of "established, real science" in classrooms.
Evolution, he said, is a false explanation for life and should be taught so that students "can defend against it, if they want to."
"I'm not saying to put the Bible into the classroom, although the real science will confirm the Bible,"
He argued that scientific evidence supports his creationist ideas, including the claims that the Earth is only 6,000 years old and that dinosaurs were on board Noah's Ark.
ADE spokesperson Stefan Swiat said that Kezele was selected because of his position at Arizona Christian University. Swiat was unaware if Douglas knew that Kezele was a creationist when she selected him.
"One of the aims of the working group is to include a broad collection of contributors from the scientific community," Swiat wrote in an email. "Both the working group, as well as the head of ADE’s science standards, were completely unaware that Dr. Kezele was a creationist."
Kezele did not discuss his "personal creationist beliefs" with the working group, Swiat added.
As examples of the science that should be taught in classrooms to disprove evolution, Kezele offered unintelligible explanations about the human appendix and the strength of Earth's magnetic field.
Students should be able to judge for themselves whether the creation model or the evolutionary model "actually is consistent with the real scientific evidence that we have," Kezele said. "And then the students can do some thinking and see which one holds up. In general, that's what education should be, not just indoctrination." www.phoenixnewtimes.comI think what's most interesting about this is the guy isn't dumb. He knows he couldn't bring creationism into the curriculum so he slipped in just what he could. While I have my own personal issues with religion in general young earth creationism carries with it a whole host of other problematic issues. Namely that anyone adhering to it has a terribly distorted understanding of geological history. From which it makes a great deal of other discussions near impossible. A private university having the guy teach is fine for them I guess, but having him influence (even if only slightly) so many kids in a public school system is dangerously irresponsible and damaging to children's education. That said, he's right about it being important to think critically about evolution and where it might fall short in explaining various phenomena. Critically thinking about stuff is never wrong. The problem here is that thatperson quite obviously is not critically thinking about stuff. He has a dogma that must never be questioned ("The bible is literally true in every single aspect"), and arranges all of his "critical thinking" to make sure that that dogma is never violated. Creationism is such an incredibly weird thing, and it is very strange that it is actually a relevant force in the 21st century in a modern country. It is an ideaset entirely based on people wanting very much to believe one thing and using confirmation bias to produce a "theory" (which probably does not actually clear the necessary threshholds of scientific theories) to somehow deal with the fact that actual science is very clear that their base belief is utter nonsense. I am not talking about religion in general here. Religion in general is fine. I am talking about a very literal interpretation of the bible. That is very clearly nonsense. If you want to believe in the metaphorical truth of the bible, or whatever, that is totally fine and probably doesn't lead to as many problems with actual science. But if you claim that the earth was created in 7 days 6000 years ago, that is clearly and obviously nonsense. That shit can be some weird cult on a farm in the middle of nowhere, but it is very scary that these crazies are anywhere near education, and that apparently people are fine with that.
Right, it's taken me a while to come to an acceptance of religion in general, but Dinosaurs on the Ark is just too damn much for me to have to worry about dispelling from kids that learned it from church and then had their pastor point to the theory part of evolution in textbooks as evidence it's all wrong.
The key takeaway in my opinion is that there is a remarkable parallel between his argument and the argument from the center to the right for platforming white supremacists. Marketplace of ideas and all that.
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As for Kavanaugh, he is getting confirmed and getting Democrat votes, unless the anti Kavanaugh people plan on pressuring those Democrats out of the party (by not giving them any party support election wise or committee seats), then they have no room to get upset by Republicans voting the way that will get them reelected, regardless of whatever Kavanaugh did or didn't do to that woman.
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Here it comes:
At the request of a number of committees of Congress, and for reasons of transparency, the President has directed the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Department of Justice (including the FBI) to provide for the immediate declassification of the following materials: (1) pages 10-12 and 17-34 of the June 2017 application to the FISA court in the matter of Carter W. Page; (2) all FBI reports of interviews with Bruce G. Ohr prepared in connection with the Russia investigation; and (3) all FBI reports of interviews prepared in connection with all Carter Page FISA applications.
In addition, President Donald J. Trump has directed the Department of Justice (including the FBI) to publicly release all text messages relating to the Russia investigation, without redaction, of James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, and Bruce Ohr.
Source.
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On September 18 2018 06:51 xDaunt wrote:Here it comes: Show nested quote +At the request of a number of committees of Congress, and for reasons of transparency, the President has directed the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Department of Justice (including the FBI) to provide for the immediate declassification of the following materials: (1) pages 10-12 and 17-34 of the June 2017 application to the FISA court in the matter of Carter W. Page; (2) all FBI reports of interviews with Bruce G. Ohr prepared in connection with the Russia investigation; and (3) all FBI reports of interviews prepared in connection with all Carter Page FISA applications.
In addition, President Donald J. Trump has directed the Department of Justice (including the FBI) to publicly release all text messages relating to the Russia investigation, without redaction, of James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, and Bruce Ohr. Source.
Doubt there is going to be any real meat in there, but it should sufficiently distract and play well for Republicans in the midterm. I've always been of the opinion that the Russia investigation was a farce all along anyway though, so I suppose my threshold for "bombshell" is a bit higher than many.
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On September 18 2018 06:51 xDaunt wrote:Here it comes: Show nested quote +At the request of a number of committees of Congress, and for reasons of transparency, the President has directed the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Department of Justice (including the FBI) to provide for the immediate declassification of the following materials: (1) pages 10-12 and 17-34 of the June 2017 application to the FISA court in the matter of Carter W. Page; (2) all FBI reports of interviews with Bruce G. Ohr prepared in connection with the Russia investigation; and (3) all FBI reports of interviews prepared in connection with all Carter Page FISA applications.
In addition, President Donald J. Trump has directed the Department of Justice (including the FBI) to publicly release all text messages relating to the Russia investigation, without redaction, of James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Peter Strzok, Lisa Page, and Bruce Ohr. Source.
Finally. This is long overdue. The American people must be able to size up the scope of the problem within the FBI’s counterintelligence unit and DoJ top brass during the period the pee-tape dossier was used to justify domestic surveillance. Ohr and Comey are chief among these. Rest are basically already sunk and implicating others.
I wonder if we get some juicy Susan Rice tie-ins out of all this.
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On September 18 2018 06:24 GreenHorizons wrote:Show nested quote +On September 18 2018 02:19 Simberto wrote:On September 16 2018 17:41 GreenHorizons wrote:*looks coyly at introvert* Meet the Creationist Helping to Change Arizona School Standards on Evolution
Arizona Superintendent Diane Douglas tapped a young-earth creationist to serve last month on a committee tasked with revising the state's science curriculum standards on evolution.
Joseph Kezele, the president of the Arizona Origin Science Association, is a staunch believer in the idea that enough scientific evidence exists to back up the biblical story of creation. Douglas appointed him to an eight-member special working group at the Arizona Department of Education that completed a final review of the draft evolution teaching standards on August 30.
Kezele teaches biology at Arizona Christian University in Phoenix. He advocates teaching his version of "established, real science" in classrooms.
Evolution, he said, is a false explanation for life and should be taught so that students "can defend against it, if they want to."
"I'm not saying to put the Bible into the classroom, although the real science will confirm the Bible,"
He argued that scientific evidence supports his creationist ideas, including the claims that the Earth is only 6,000 years old and that dinosaurs were on board Noah's Ark.
ADE spokesperson Stefan Swiat said that Kezele was selected because of his position at Arizona Christian University. Swiat was unaware if Douglas knew that Kezele was a creationist when she selected him.
"One of the aims of the working group is to include a broad collection of contributors from the scientific community," Swiat wrote in an email. "Both the working group, as well as the head of ADE’s science standards, were completely unaware that Dr. Kezele was a creationist."
Kezele did not discuss his "personal creationist beliefs" with the working group, Swiat added.
As examples of the science that should be taught in classrooms to disprove evolution, Kezele offered unintelligible explanations about the human appendix and the strength of Earth's magnetic field.
Students should be able to judge for themselves whether the creation model or the evolutionary model "actually is consistent with the real scientific evidence that we have," Kezele said. "And then the students can do some thinking and see which one holds up. In general, that's what education should be, not just indoctrination." www.phoenixnewtimes.comI think what's most interesting about this is the guy isn't dumb. He knows he couldn't bring creationism into the curriculum so he slipped in just what he could. While I have my own personal issues with religion in general young earth creationism carries with it a whole host of other problematic issues. Namely that anyone adhering to it has a terribly distorted understanding of geological history. From which it makes a great deal of other discussions near impossible. A private university having the guy teach is fine for them I guess, but having him influence (even if only slightly) so many kids in a public school system is dangerously irresponsible and damaging to children's education. That said, he's right about it being important to think critically about evolution and where it might fall short in explaining various phenomena. Critically thinking about stuff is never wrong. The problem here is that thatperson quite obviously is not critically thinking about stuff. He has a dogma that must never be questioned ("The bible is literally true in every single aspect"), and arranges all of his "critical thinking" to make sure that that dogma is never violated. Creationism is such an incredibly weird thing, and it is very strange that it is actually a relevant force in the 21st century in a modern country. It is an ideaset entirely based on people wanting very much to believe one thing and using confirmation bias to produce a "theory" (which probably does not actually clear the necessary threshholds of scientific theories) to somehow deal with the fact that actual science is very clear that their base belief is utter nonsense. I am not talking about religion in general here. Religion in general is fine. I am talking about a very literal interpretation of the bible. That is very clearly nonsense. If you want to believe in the metaphorical truth of the bible, or whatever, that is totally fine and probably doesn't lead to as many problems with actual science. But if you claim that the earth was created in 7 days 6000 years ago, that is clearly and obviously nonsense. That shit can be some weird cult on a farm in the middle of nowhere, but it is very scary that these crazies are anywhere near education, and that apparently people are fine with that. Right, it's taken me a while to come to an acceptance of religion in general, but Dinosaurs on the Ark is just too damn much for me to have to worry about dispelling from kids that learned it from church and then had their pastor point to the theory part of evolution in textbooks as evidence it's all wrong. The key takeaway in my opinion is that there is a remarkable parallel between his argument and the argument from the center to the right for platforming white supremacists. Marketplace of ideas and all that. ___________________________________________________________________________ As for Kavanaugh, he is getting confirmed and getting Democrat votes, unless the anti Kavanaugh people plan on pressuring those Democrats out of the party (by not giving them any party support election wise or committee seats), then they have no room to get upset by Republicans voting the way that will get them reelected, regardless of whatever Kavanaugh did or didn't do to that woman.
It is important to note that if you are into young-earth creationism, you don't "only" run afoul of evolution. You have major consistency problems with a lot of established scientific knowledge in a lot of fields. (Of course, all of those can be "solved" by claiming "god did it that way!", since there is by definition nothing an all-powerful being could not have done) You get problems with anything that dates something to before 4000 BC. So history might barely work out, but anything prehistoric doesn't work anymore. Astronomy leads to gigantic problems. You'll probably get a lot of problems with some of physics (Anything to do with nuclear radiation leads to dating methods that lead to ages larger than 6000 years.) And since a lot of sciences are interlocked, my guess would be that you cannot really deal with any science after the 18th century or so if you claim that the earth is 6000 years old.
Would you mind expounding a bit on your point with regards to white supremacists? I am a bit uncertain as to what you want to say here.
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Kavanaugh: I have given up on predicting stuff in american politics after that 2016 election, where i was utterly certain that there is no way that any country would elect such an incompetent and unlikeable idiot. I HOPE that he doesn't get confirmed, since he seems to be an extraordinary bad choice for a lifetime appointment for a high judge.
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