Salon has a great new feature:
“Ask a Wingnut” is written by a real live conservative and former Bush official who chooses to remain anonymous. Each week “Glenallen Walken” will bridge the cultural divide and answer questions from liberals about why conservatives think and do what they think and do. If you would like to submit a question to “Ask a Wingnut,” send it to mschone (at) salon (dot) com.
Steve Benen has a good dissection of this week’s wingnut Q&A.
WereBear
Maybe this is a first step towards the “capture and release” program for wingnuts who cause problems in others’ habitats.
freelancer
Benen’s Thread has its share of non sequitur wingnut points a la “liberals hate science more than conservatives because they think solar power will be able to solve the energy crisis. Also, Al Gore is Fat.”
aarrgghh
hmm. at least it sounds like they got a bona fide wingnut to respond.
film at 11.
DougJ
Yeah, I noticed that.
Politically Lost
This week’s ask a WingNut is a straight forward question: Why is the GOP generally hostile to science?
Underlying my general dislike of how the country was run under the W. There was this extreme antipathy that I felt about science issues and how the administration handled them. During all those painful years I distinctly remembered literally dozens of news stories about how the administration was going out of its way to undermine science in just about every conceivable way. I can’t describe how irritating it was for me. A person so enthralled with the love of science.
But, at the same time there was this continuing assault on our liberties and the rule of law. Attacking our liberties as a way to fight terror just seems insane. Fighting all of that sucked all of the oxygen out of other struggles. Like trying to keep science from becoming just another interest group with “funny” ideas.
I can’t help but think that the disregard for science is about just two things. a.) Making the religious right happy and b.) (The big bonus) pissing off liberals/pointy headed college types.
I can’t think of which one is more attractive to the GOP.
I also can’t think of anything more irritating than “debating” evolution. So maybe that answers the question.
Sarcastro
Benen’s response thread was POEed on the first post.
Nicely done.
Sarcastro
I can’t think of which one is more attractive to the GOP.
Step three is always the most attractive to the GOP.
Step 3: $$$
JenJen
Oh, my. Quite the comments section over at Steve’s place!
Incertus
Hmmm. There’s a significant contingent of Republicans who want to teach creationism or ID in schools, there’s another contingent who denies that humans are contributing to global warming, and another major contingent who argues that 8-celled globs are alive, but the Republicans are not anti-science. Gotcha.
Andre
Al (the first commenter over at WM) has been around since Kevin Drum was a boy. He’s a parody troll, but very good at what he does.
jrg
How about “teach a wingnut how to use Google”:
Results 1 – 10 of about 4,320,000 for republican attacks on science.
Results 1 – 10 of about 1,330,000 for democratic attacks on science.
Of course, the Internet is a liberal place. I hear it’s funded by George Soros and operated by an elite group of Hollywood Jews, bent on the creation of human-animal hybrids to use as extras their films.
dbrown
Better still was the missle defense system – the warhead (A large area meltalized balloon if I recall correctly) that had a radio homeing device built in and removal of all decoys (the few dozen or so a real war head deploys) and the fact that the ‘warhead couldn’t manuver (like most do) and … some more methods to defeat a defensive system, even then the system missed every time but once. Yeah, that is supporting real science (I guess funding bullets is also funding science by this wingnut.)
Martin
Um, didn’t the GOP primary debate have the candidates put their hands up if they believed in evolution or not? At that moment the GOP embraced creationism as a political issue. Just entertaining the question suggests they are anti-science.
TenguPhule
They’re paying someone to do what Bob and Paul L do here for free?
Calouste
The Republican war on science is an extension of the Republican war on logic and rationalism. Because if the American voters made logical and rational decisions, the GOP would be limited to a few odd state representatives in Utah and Alabama.
Jay B.
I think whoever reads that Salon series is getting punked. Whether he’s real or not hardly matters, because he argues in the same vanilla bad faith as a garden variety wingnut, it’s hardly enlightening.
It’s an “anonymous”/fake/moronic spoof (or not!) who could just as easily be the real life Johnny Hindrocket — there’s not a single thing that sheds light on the pervasive, curdled, aggressive, stupidity or why the other side has lost their fucking minds.
Me, I don’t like the ultra-cynical people like Lee Atwater — people who know what they are selling is more or less packaged bullshit, but they enjoy it. But, at least if you’re giving them anonymity, they’d admit to it and explain why it works. Or something.
Years ago, I met David Beckwith, who’s right out of the Atwater school. He was Kay Bailey Hutchinson’s campaign manager at the time. A one-time campus lefty, he “felt” that the insurgent GOP (during the Reagan era) was more to his ‘anti-establishment’ liking. Whatever. He was also fully aware of his cynical responses. Shit, he was the devil and liked it.
When we talked about his life outside of politics, he was a normal soccer dad kind of guy. He was also funny and smart.
Give him anonymity and I guarantee he’d tell you how he sells Republicanism to the rubes. It would be enlightening, possibly.
Shit, Josh Marshall gets GOP apparatchiks on the record to spout on things with greater insight than Salon does. It’s a fucking joke, even if it isn’t.
Shygetz
@Incertus: 8-celled globs are alive–there is no debate in science over that. The question is, are they people.
flounder
I sent this earlier, I doubt it will be answered:
dmsilev
@WereBear:
As long as they’re fixed before being released, that sounds like a good plan to me.
-dms
MikeJ
My thought exactly. They really, really, don’t likes facts. Of any kind. Waterboarding is torture.
Everybody except Bush administration officials agree with this, including the US military. Bad fact. There was no evidence for Iraqi WMDs. Hans Blix told them so. Bad fact. Lower tax rates do not lead to higher government revenue. Bad fact.
We could do this all day.
geg6
Heyyyy. Is that DougJ over at Bennen’s place calling himself Magruber? Sure sounds like him.
Zifnab
@dmsilev:
What? You’re going to cut off their feet and remove their ability to wear diapers?
jenniebee
@Shygetz:
That and what any one person’s obligation is to provide life-support for another person. Even if a zygote is a person it doesn’t follow that I have to put my body at the disposal of that person for an extended period of time, possibly at the risk of my own life. Switch “zygote” to “home invader” and you might get an idea of why so many women view being forced to be an incubator with distaste.
And I’m saying that as a woman who knows the joys of Clomid injections, IUI, and crying into her cornflakes because the stick just won’t turn blue. I want a kid more than just about anything, but that doesn’t change the fact that forced occupation of a woman’s sexual organs is generally considered to be rape. Just because the creature doing the occupying is very very small, unless I’m willing to let him or her in, it’s still an invasion of my body and my autonomy is diminished by it.
bvac
This is the first comment I saw at that link:
Now, can someone tell me if that is meant to be sarcastic, snarky, or otherwise trollish? I’m not familiar enough with the site to know if it is real or not, but if it is I’d like to put it in my file of insane conservative pull-quotes.
InflatableCommenter
I read the “Ask a wingnut” response to the question “Why do you guys hate science?”
As near as I can tell, the answer is spoof, and was written by you, DougJ. Whether it was or not, it could have been, and therefore, it’s perfect.
chuck
Yep, yep, nothing says “pro-science” like the breathless claim that the entire scientific community is on The Other Side.
DougJ
@Jay B
@InflatableCommenter
I find it interesting, because I think it’s how these guys actually think. Call me crazy, but I think there is real value in trying to figure out the other half — make that 21% — thinks. Yes, much of it is so stupid that it can only be comprehended via theatrical/comical exercises, but that doesn’t make it a useless proposition.
Xecklothxayyquou Gilchrist
Hasn’t this already been done?
Bob could use the work, I guess.
Chris Johnson
It’s Karl Rove. There isn’t any particular value to the responses other than to see them as “OK, so THIS is how the previous administration wants this question slanted”. What, us hate science? We have always been at war with EastAsia, I mean loved science :D
It’s not very useful when all you get is the talking point. Talking points are NOT what wingnuts think. Talking points are what wingnuts are coached to say. By now, I would think we would be permitted to hear what wingnuts actually do think- and in other forums we obviously do, at least what they think of (insert target liberal here): the specific target is supplied them by their authority figures but what they think is ‘two bullets to the head plz kthxbai’.
But this is just the covering of bases. It’s a defensive ploy by somebody who is still trying to manipulate things beyond all reasonable limits, with no shame whatsoever: hence, probably Rove.
Chris Johnson
To figure out what wingnuts actually THINK, read ‘The Authoritarians’.
http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey/
asiangrrlMN
@jrg: ACORN! You forgot ACORN!
El Tiburon
If by “great” you mean more conservative obfuscation, red herrings and moving of the goalposts, then you are correct, sir.
I tried it out the first few episodes, and frankly it is very unsatisfying.
To make it a great column, the wingnut would have to begin his response thusly, “While it’s true many in our party are idiots, ahem Sen. Inhofe, when it comes to science and yes we do try and destroy scientific findings but it contradicts our ideology…”
If it started that way, they may be on to something.
Douche Baggins
El Tiburon esta correcto. “Ask a Wingnut” is infuriating, because it’s all talking points and so, so easily refuted. Forget fish in a barrel; it’s embarrassingly moronic. And we lost power to these fuckwits?
Joel
Other than the times when Greenwald gets his longwinded impulses under wraps, Salon basically sucks. It’s liberal coverage is barely better, mostly unabashed spin and propaganda.
bago
Interesting that anyone who worked at the bush administration other than Cheney demands that they be cited as anonymous these days.
Jackie
@jenniebee:
I always propose a law that everyone has to be an organ donor for anyone who would like a piece of your liver or that other kidney. Even if you don’t have health insurance to pay for the surgery, even if you don’t get paid time off and your family will go homeless. Even if your asshole boss thinks organ donation is immoral and will fire you.
even if you don’t want to risk your health and life. Even if the person the organ will go to is on death row.
Hey if we’re going to go all “culture of life,” let’s go all in.
Shygetz
@jenniebee: Yes, that also.
Persia
@jenniebee: I had a wingnut husband of a friend ask me, ‘now you’re pregnant, don’t you realize how alive and real that baby is?’ Because he was married to my friend I refrained from cockpunching him. But I did say, ‘now I’m pregnant, I realize how much physical work and stress goes into having a baby. And just because this pregnancy feels ike a ‘real baby’ to me doesn’t mean every other woman is obligated to feel the same way.’
Good luck with your own struggles.
KidA
@flounder, I think it was at the knee of Miss Manners I learned this bit of wisdom, decant everything. Sure it takes more effort, and more clean-up, but friction is avoided and your table top will be worthy of a photo shoot for Bon Appetit. Bon Appetit.
Brian Schmidt
I emailed in this question:
I don’t understand how it is that many conservatives 1. agree that Stephen Colbert presents conservative opinion in a satirical fashion, and 2. think his presentation actually (and maybe intentionally) supports conservative opinion. Do they think he demonstrates that the left has only a simplistic understanding of the arguments of the right? Do they not understand that the purpose of satire is to exaggerate the satirized principle to show its falsity and flaws? Do they REALLY understand satire at all?