Stupidity corner
I linked to this piece conversion therapies before, but this little gem is worth airing:
She moves on. "Any Freemasonry in the family?" No, I say, again asking her to elaborate. "Because that often encourages it as well. It has a spiritual effect on males and it often comes out as SSA."
SSA=same-sex attraction.
If one remembers that the "evil" of Freemasonry was a common theme back in the days when the Catholic Church's favourite hate objects were Jews, one sees that some things just keep repeating.
I have also linked to this piece where a Fairfax journalist opines on it not being a good first year for President Obama before, but the evidence-free assertion at the end of this passage:
Obama ends his first year in office with the worst ratings of any modern president at the end of his first year - 49 per cent approve and 46 per cent disapprove of his job performance.
His problems have provided new momentum to the Republican Party and the conservative movement, whose protests have swelled to a political outpouring of discontent over causes as diverse as bank bail-outs, taxes, government spending, health-care reforms, immigration and discomfort with having an African-American president
just gets sillier the more one thinks about it. It simply does not apply to most politically active US conservatives. These are the sort of people who thought Condi Rice was great (and should probably have run for President), hang off Thomas Sowell's every word, have Shelby Steele as Chairman of the Republican Party and hold Clarence Thomas to be their favourite Supreme Court justice: indeed, that he should be Chief Justice.
Of course there are racists in the US. There are racists in Europe too (indeed, on the polling evidence, rather more of them). But American conservatism really has moved on. As indicated by the fact that when Trent Lott made his spectacularly inappropriate comments about Strom Thurmond, it was young conservative bloggers who led the charge to get Trott dumped as Republican Senate leader.
There are serious pockets of disadvantage in the US, but they have far more to do with class than race. If American voters can demonstrate how things have changed by electing an African-American president with a popular majority (not something that often happens to Democratic nominees), perhaps Fairfax journos could also move on.
She moves on. "Any Freemasonry in the family?" No, I say, again asking her to elaborate. "Because that often encourages it as well. It has a spiritual effect on males and it often comes out as SSA."
SSA=same-sex attraction.
If one remembers that the "evil" of Freemasonry was a common theme back in the days when the Catholic Church's favourite hate objects were Jews, one sees that some things just keep repeating.
I have also linked to this piece where a Fairfax journalist opines on it not being a good first year for President Obama before, but the evidence-free assertion at the end of this passage:
Obama ends his first year in office with the worst ratings of any modern president at the end of his first year - 49 per cent approve and 46 per cent disapprove of his job performance.
His problems have provided new momentum to the Republican Party and the conservative movement, whose protests have swelled to a political outpouring of discontent over causes as diverse as bank bail-outs, taxes, government spending, health-care reforms, immigration and discomfort with having an African-American president
just gets sillier the more one thinks about it. It simply does not apply to most politically active US conservatives. These are the sort of people who thought Condi Rice was great (and should probably have run for President), hang off Thomas Sowell's every word, have Shelby Steele as Chairman of the Republican Party and hold Clarence Thomas to be their favourite Supreme Court justice: indeed, that he should be Chief Justice.
Of course there are racists in the US. There are racists in Europe too (indeed, on the polling evidence, rather more of them). But American conservatism really has moved on. As indicated by the fact that when Trent Lott made his spectacularly inappropriate comments about Strom Thurmond, it was young conservative bloggers who led the charge to get Trott dumped as Republican Senate leader.
There are serious pockets of disadvantage in the US, but they have far more to do with class than race. If American voters can demonstrate how things have changed by electing an African-American president with a popular majority (not something that often happens to Democratic nominees), perhaps Fairfax journos could also move on.