In which I become a pool-skimmer

Man, I take a few days off and the internet just clogs with morons. They're worse than the squirrels in my pool filter.

Joseph Farah discusses chimps with spears and demonstrates that he doesn't understand how evolution works:

It doesn't surprise me in the least that chimps might make primitive, little spears. It was the evolutionary scientists who taught us a generation ago that the only difference between man and other animals was that we used tools. I never bought that either.

...Charles Darwin had no understanding of molecular biology. That's why he was free to speculate that if an animal flapped its arms long enough they might someday turn into wings – wings he could leave to his offspring. But today we know that's not the way molecular biology works.

Also, back in the days of Darwin, he was free to speculate that certain apes began using tools and became dominant over other apes. The survival of the fittest led to a new breed of apes – tool-using apes.

But the problem with that is you're still dealing with apes. How does the species transition into a new species? How does that happen? Where has that ever happened? How could it without one species dying out first?

Evolutionists don't have answers to these questions.

The DNA of that chimp doesn't change when he starts throwing a spear. The DNA of his descendant doesn't change either. You can go right down the line and the DNA of his grandchimps and great-grandchimps is still going to be the stuff of chimp DNA. It's not going to be another species. Behavior doesn't change molecular biology.

So what do you have after, say, 50 generations of spear-chucking chimps?

Maybe chimps that have perfected the art of spear-making and spear-chucking. But I guaranty for sure they are still chimps. Nothing has happened that could possibly affect their molecular structure – the very essence of what makes them chimps.

Of course, Farah forgets that the whole premise of evolution is that this stuff takes an extremely long time- 50 generations of 20 years per gene-passing (and that's pretty generous, given the little I know about how long it takes chimps to achieve sexual maturity) only amounts to 1000 years. I must have missed when the evolutionary scientists claimed that the chimps of William the Conqueror became Investment Bankers. And the idea is that behavior will affect, not DNA itself, but whose DNA gets passed on: the theory is that present-day-chimps and humans are descended from common ancestors who had different degrees of intelligence and adaptability, not that one day Coco the chimp shaved his hair and went to Law School.

Moving along we come to Walter Williams' bizarrely-titled column, "Minority View". This is what the French call a double-entendre, because Williams is both black and a conservative (or maybe because he's the only one still wearing what looks like a mohair jacket, it's all a little unclear). Walter rips off George Carlin in a poor attempt to make bad grammar jokes by pointing out that expressions are not always technically accurate (what a concept!). Walter starts us off with some easy ones:

Some U.S. companies have been accused of exploiting Third World workers with poor working conditions and low wages. Say that a U.S. company pays a Cambodian factory worker $3 a day. Do you think that worker had a higher-paying alternative but stupidly chose a lower-paying job instead? I'm betting the $3-a-day job was superior to his next best alternative.

That doesn't change the fact that it's exploitation, Walter. Choosing the fate better than death doesn't automatically make that choice "awesome". That would presume that letting someone "choose" between being an indentured servant, child laborer, or sex slave or starving to death means they must really like picking your cotton, or having sex with your grandfather while people hit them with deli meat and take pictures of it.

Does offering a worker a wage higher than what he could earn elsewhere make him worse off or better off? If you answered better off, is the term exploitation an appropriate characterization for an act that makes another better off? If pressure at home forces a U.S. company to cease its Cambodian operations, would that worker be worse off or better off?

This sort of reminds me of when people argue that black people should be happy their ancestors were enslaved because it saved them from being eaten by lions.

Now Walter hits his stride... sort of:

It might be a convenient expression to say that the U.S. trades with Japan, but is it literally true? Is it the U.S. Congress and President Bush who trade with the National Diet of Japan, the Japanese legislature and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe? Or, is it U.S. and Japanese private parties, as individuals and corporations, who trade with one another?

What freaking difference does it make? Nobody really thinks that President Bush buys everybody's Motorolas in bulk and then has his daughters sell them out of the back of Air Force One. What are you talking about, Walter?

Let's break it down further. Which comes closer to the truth: When I purchased my Lexus, did I deal with the U.S. Congress, the Japanese Diet, George Bush, Shinzo Abe, or did I deal with Toyota and its intermediaries? If we erroneously think of international trade as occurring between the U.S. and Japanese governments, then all Americans, as voters, have a say-so. But what is the basis of anyone having a say-so when one American engages in peaceable, voluntary exchange with another person, be they Japanese, Korean, British, Chinese or another American?

Walter, I have no idea what you're talking about now. I can't decide if you're trying to get me to support tariffs or arguing that eBay counts as international trade. The important thing, though, is that you've given me a headache for no apparent reason. Thanks.

Jerry Falwell has joined the ranks of angry Christians pissed that fake facts contradict their theology (which theoretically shouldn't be reliant on facts in the first place, since it's FAITH). The best part is that now Falwell and co. have to refute the bone boxes which up until recently WND and others were still trumpeting as proof of Jesus' historicity. Among the more interesting points:

[Habermas] noted that the ossuaries (bone boxes) at issue have the names of Joseph and Jesus, which were very popular names in the first century, with Joseph being the second-most popular name in first century Jewish history. And the name Jesus was also quite popular during this period. The fact is many Josephs of the time probably had sons named Jesus. In fact, he said that three or four earlier discovered ossuaries have been found and been identified with a father named Joseph and a son named Jesus.

Further, the name Mary was the most common female name of the era. "Every fourth person was a Mary" at the time, Dr. Habermas stated.

...Now what about Joseph? The crypt describes the dead Jesus as the son of Joseph, who is also buried there. However, as Dr. Habermas noted, Jesus was never identified by the disciples or his followers as the son of Joseph. He was the Son of God.

You know the best part of this, Jerry? People were saying all this way back in 2002 too, when you had your chubby fingers in your cauliflowered ears.

The best part is when Falwell tries to use this as a springboard to mention how fact-based Christianity is:

During his speech, Dr. Habermas noted that Christianity is based on data, not blind faith. Here are three key facts on Jesus' life:

• Jesus was both God and man (deity)
• Jesus died on the cross
• Jesus was bodily raised from the dead and appeared to hundreds

I must have missed when he talked about the data. Oh well, I'm sure that slide comes later.

It is important to know that every source – even non-Christian sources – from the ancient world tells us that Jesus' tomb was empty after three days, Dr. Habermas notes. There is no way for critics to discount this fact.

Which non-Christian sources mention Jesus' tomb? How many sources are we talking about? Where do they get their information from? Christians? There are still a lot of open-ended questions here, Docs. None of this stuff looks particularly convincing.

There's something just super-excellent about all this.

Lastly, just when you thought things couldn't get worse, WND decides it needs to do retrospectives:



Egad, my brain seems to have leaked out onto the floor. Oh well, it's not like I could really appreciate it again after reading that.