Cognitive Dissonance - Episode 3: Rapture

Episode Date: June 1, 2011

When is Judgment Day and what's going to happen on Judgment Day? I had learned several decades ago that the flood was 4990. I knew now that the end was 2011 when we had 4,000... When you break down 722,500 into its key numbers, it's 5 times 10 times 17 times 5 times 10 times 17. Richard, you'd like to respond? Do you believe the world is less than 10,000 years old? Look... Now, do you believe that?

I think that there are a lot of questions in this area, and I think people will come to their own conclusions. I don't want to force people into one way or the other. You're not being after force. And I'm a new Earth creationist for an old Earth creationist. So, which is it, Steve? You're a young Earth creationist who believes the world is less than 10,000 years old. You're a parliamentarian in Australia who believes the world you live in is less than 10,000 years old. I didn't...

Be advised that this show is not for children, the faint of heart, or the easily offended. The explicit tag is there for a reason. This is Cognitive Dissonance. Every episode we blast anyone who gets in our way. We bring critical thinking, skepticism, and irreverence to any topic that makes the news, makes it big, or makes us mad. It's skeptical, it's political, and there is no welcome mat. Cecil, we're back after a little bit of a break. Sort of my fault there for a little bit going on. I just moved, just bought a new house, just moved all the packing and unpacking and all that nonsense, but this is our third show and I'm glad to be back. And hopefully our future shows will be much more consistent because I will die in this house. Well, and another thing too, is we don't have to worry about the rapture anymore.

And I was really putting things off for that. You know, the rapture is over and all those people were raptured to heaven. We're, we're totally safe now. And we know exactly what's happening with all the rapture stuff. So I think now that that is out of the way and those, what was it, 30 million people were raptured to heaven? Now I think we can sort of get down to business. I was surprised I didn't go. I really – I had my cell phone charged because I didn't know how he was going to get in touch with me. Right, right. So I had my cell phone and I thought didn't know how he was going to get in touch with me. Right, right. So I had my cell phone, and I thought, if someone's going, I'm going.

I mean, if there's a rapture where all the faithful are drawn up to heaven to sit at the right or left hand or, I don't know, by his ankle, I'm not sure where you sit. But, you know, I figured I would be one of them. And I was very surprised when I didn't get the nod. I'm not going to lie to you. I was very surprised when I didn't get the nod. I'm not going to lie to you. I just sort of see you sitting at Jesus' feet, almost like kindergarten style. He's going to read you a book.

Oh, sure. You're like all crisscross applesauce on the floor. Yeah, like Indian style at Jesus' feet waiting for him to throw some manna at you or something. I don't know what he'd do. And of all the fucking despicable fucks in the world, Tom, you would be the first to go to heaven. I think, I think you would be the first. I like that I'm at least in the list of despicable fucks though. And by the way, Cecil, I have to correct you because, um, I discovered last week that you're not allowed to call it sitting Indian style anymore. Oh really? Yeah. You, I, my, my preschooler, you have to call it crisscross applesauce. I guess everybody calls it that now. And I don't know where the applesauce comes in at all, but Indian style is racist.

Well, I'm not talking about, I'm not talking about native Americans. I'm talking about Indians. I think they won't let them call it that anymore. I told Finn to sit like he sits Indian style all the time. I'm like, okay, buddy, just sit Indian style. And he's just looking at me like, you're so old. You're so old. You're a racist old man. I'm like, oh, right. Crisscross applesauce.

It's already starting. You're becoming a racist father. You can't help it. Once you become a father, you have to become a racist. I guess so. It's the way of the world. That Harold Camping, though, I mean, this this that guy talk about some backpedaling on a fucking jackass, huh? Like immediately, as soon as it doesn't happen, he locks himself in his little compound because, you know, the rapture. I think

everybody knew the rapture. Who who was fucking surprised that it didn't happen, right? And then here he is coming out the next day. He's like, oh, I made a mistake in my math. Fucking asshole. You didn't check that first? Like before you announced the day of the rapture, you weren't just like, you know, I'm going to run that number again. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I'm going to, I got, I know I got the adding machine out and everything. And I was, you know, Mark the Beast times the perfect number plus John 316.

I mean, like, weren't you double checking this nonsense, you fucking fool? And he told me what? I didn't carry the four. Six months off. Oh, fuck. We're all going to die in six months. The people, those assholes, those people, you know, I shouldn't say that. Those people that got duped by him, the gullible, because, I mean, you can't be anything but gullible, I think, and be duped by this guy.

And the gullible that got duped, there was a group of people in, like, South Africa that had fucking put themselves up in a really nice hotel waiting for the end times. And then the next day they get the bill. It's like, um, you know, you were supposed to check out yesterday and, uh, I was supposed to check out yesterday. There's over 30 million other people. You know, this is, this is another, like, this is a, this is a kind of a funny, but also a, another example of why this shit isn't harmless. Right. I mean, we've talked about this a million times, but it feels like a big joke. And of course, everybody with any sense knows that the fucking rapture is not a real thing.

And that some guy didn't crunch the fucking numbers in the Bible and figure out when we all get wiped up into the atmosphere or whatever. But people made decisions based on this, like real decisions, like spending their kids' college fund decisions, disowning. I heard stories about people disowning family members. But there's even more extreme examples of that. There's a story, Cecil, which you actually sent me about a mom who cut her kids throats because she didn't believe that they were going to get raptured and she didn't want them to live through, you know, all the chaos and, you know, the fucking end times, like the the horrible fever dream, nonsensical revelation predictions of the end times. Right. This shit was real. I wouldn't want to live through it either. Right. So she wrapped her kids up in blankets and cut their fucking throats and wrists

and did the same to herself. They all lived, thankfully. They all lived, but I mean— She had a dull-ass knife, I guess. I know. You know, it strikes me as like one of those things that like she did, but didn't have the heart to really, you know, give it the old seesaw, you know, probably just like nicked him across the gullet there. She didn't machete him. That's for sure.

What's that? She didn't machete him. Yeah, right. Yeah. I mean, she wasn't like bungee jumping with their innards or anything. Although I wish she was. Well, the thing about this story that I think is kind of telling is she knew her kids weren't going to be raptured. I know.

Like that's the thing. Mom, you really don't think a lot of me because you tried to fucking murder me because you knew that God wasn't going to take me. And what's better, though? Like, think about it. You didn't get raptured, okay? So you basically are still alive. Like, this is the fucking stuff that just, I mean, it just bothers my mind, Tom. I don't fucking get it at all.

Like, my brain, when I was a kid, I remember getting scared about the rapture. I remember being, like, afraid of it because it's a fearful thing. It's a thing that people use to try to get you to believe. It's a coercion technique to get you to try to go to God. And it's a very effective tool if you don't think about it. If you think about it for any length of time, it doesn't make any sense because if you believe in the rapture, right, if you believe that people will be actually raptured, then you also, I think, necessarily have to believe that there's a hell. And if you believe that there's a hell, then hell is eternal torment anyway. So I would much rather be alive and at

least have some sort of say in the matter during the post-rapture times, during the apocalyptic times, the seven years or whatever, that you are still alive but not in hell? Because guess what? After that seven years, you're going to hell, dude. So it's way worse later. So don't kill yourself during the rapture. Shit, live through that shit. You've got to fight through that shit, man. What the fuck?

And maybe I misunderstand, and that's possible, but I think the rapture is win-win for atheists, right? So it's rapture day. Rapture doesn't happen. When? It's rapture is win-win for atheists, right? So it's rapture day. Rapture doesn't happen. When? It's rapture day. Rapture happens. I look around.

Ooh, I was wrong. I repent. Rapture. Rapture. Right? I mean, like, is it, I don't know. Is it like, is that like a due date, right? Is there like a deadline?

Like if you're not. I think so. I think you have to have your paper in by that time. If you don't, you definitely get a D minus. So the only fucking evidence that you're ever going to get, like it's like you cannot convert post evidence. No. That dude's a dick.

Pre-evidence. It's pre-evidence only. That sucks so bad, right? I don't want to believe in you anyway then, you asshole. Right, like, well, you didn't convert. Well, I did convert. I believed in your stupid shit, but it was after your deadline or whatever. Now I got to go to hell, but you know what?

I was going there anyway. I went to the wrong office. I went to the unemployment office. Suck my balls. This rapture is so ridiculous. In six months, we'll have to be talking about this shit again, Cecil. Every prediction, my favorite day is the day after all of these end of the world predictions. They're so fucking delightful.

When you wake up. I also love that he's like, it's going to be at six o'clock. Really? Which six o'clock? Which time zone is God on? Well, then he said it's the 6 p.m. every time zone. So as you go around the world, each time zone would have its own little rapture. So God would rapture per time zone.

That is insane. Because God is, you know, it's a lot of work to rapture that many people. So what he's got to do is he's got to segment the population up. And the best segmenting he can do is the way humans decide in which time works. It's like the whole time he's like, I have to rapture people, but I have to wait for them to invent longitude and latitude so that we can figure out time zones so we can wait i'm god right i'm made of magic i pretty much don't have to do any of this i made a fucking infinite magic i don't have to do any of this that's so crazy

didn't we know like we knew we knew friday this shit wasn't gonna happen then like six o'clock in australia yeah people in new zealand and Zealand and Australia were posting on, I was on Reddit's atheist board, the morning of the 20th, I think it was, or the evening of the 20th. And the people were posting like, yeah, six o'clock has come and gone and there's no zombies. It's basically the same thing. I mean, they're like, I'm in Australia, so it's still kind of fucked up. But, you know, I mean, like there's still kind of fucked up, but there's still spiders that can catch the fucking full-sized birds.

That's normal. That's the normal life down here. Our whole country is still parched and poisonous. The most dangerous country in the world. Australia has really sharp edges. The entire country is really dangerous. One thing that I want Harold Camping to do for the next time, because he's revised his decision.

And I'm like, okay, cool. A lot of fucking people had a lot hanging on this that you duped. What I want him to do, though, is not fucking hide in his compound next time. I want him to schedule a fucking interview for the day after. I want him to be on fucking Good Morning America or whatever the fuck in his favorite show, not Fox, anything else but Fox, be on a fucking regular reporting show

the next day. Schedule that shit. If you're fucking, if you're so sure and you're gonna fucking preach to your believers that you're so sure of this shit, then you should be able to fucking stand up and take it like a man and not hide in your fucking compound when your shit doesn't come fucking to fruition. So get on a fucking show.

Hell, come on this show, Harold. I would love to have that fuck went on this show. God. You'd be like, the internets? What's the internets? Fucking crazy fuck. Ridiculous old man. Lord, we just asked it to be covered with the blood of Jesus.

Open hearts, Lord. Open hearts. Speaking of ridiculous old men, Cecil, Pope made another bad call, I think. You know, this is a man who is infallible. I know we've talked about this before. Yeah, absolutely. Infallible. Far be it from me to question his decisions.

But he did pick kind of the exact wrong guy to head up his don't diddle the kids committee in that he picked a kiddie diddler. Right, right. Not only did he pick a 51-year-old parish priest who was recently arrested on pedophilia and drug charges, but investigators have tapped conversations with him and a Moroccan drug dealer to arrange encounters with young and vulnerable boys. He specifically wants them vulnerable. It's like this guy is the most... He's not just like, you know, I just like them a little young.

He wants them damaged. He asks them for... I'm going to read what he says in the tape. I do not want 16-year-old boys but younger. 14-year-olds are okay. Look for needy boys who have family issues.

That's what he said to a Moroccan drug dealer who was arranging to bring victims to him to rape. Oh my god. This is the head of your Don't Diddle the Kids committee, man. You're doing it wrong. Okay, imagine we're on a

life raft, Tom. And imagine on that life raft you have like six Hershey bars. And you look and you're like, who's the fattest motherfucker on this boat that I can give the Hershey bars to? And you give them the

fat Albers like, hey, I ate your fucking Hershey bars. Rashing it up. All we got is wrappers. Wait, what? You mean all the candy bars? They didn't put any candy in these. I loved it on this article.

This is a Time Magazine article online. And then right underneath where it says that he's looking for damaged people to rape, there's a link. Read, Vatican gets tough on child abuse, but not tough enough. Fucking tough at all. Where's the getting tough? Where is the getting tough on child abuse?

The head of your guy who's trying to make sure this shit doesn't happen is doing this shit. Do you guys not understand what vetting means fucking vet people good grief i this sort of stuff is just insane your organization has some problems with this yeah that needs to be addressed and then fixed. And the thing is, Cecil, there's a mechanism to fix it. You take the people who rape kids and you put them in prison. Right. It doesn't matter what your job is. Right. Right?

Like I'm in title insurance. I think that if I were to diddle kids, I would end up in jail. I wouldn't get a strongly worded lecture by the Pope. The problem is, is the money, right? Like here they have, the church has a lot of money and then they pay for the people to have lawyers and stuff to get them out of this stuff. Look, I understand. And I'm not going to be one of these people that screams about how everything the church does is poisonous. I know that there's people out there that think this.

I'm not one of those people. I know that there are good works done by people in the church. I just feel like the organization itself has some fucking work it needs to do. I think – I guess I think where all the problem comes from is just the power, right? You're giving these people power that they don't deserve and then they're just abusing. And then they wonder why people – they have a bad image. What? Bad image because you're fucking horrible people because the people that are involved in your organization that are the face of it now.

Because tell me the face of your – I mean fucking Senator Palpatine, the fucking emperor, is the face of your fucking, your church first off. That guy's terrifying just to even look at. Big sunken fucking eyes on that guy. Terrifying. But then like all the shit that he's done in his past and then all the people that he employs, all these people that are doing all the wrong things.

There's a lot of people that do a lot of good things but those people are completely covered up by all the people that are doing all the rotten things, like looking for children that are damaged. Yeah, that's only exactly evil though. Yeah. But, you know, I mean that's only like – Yeah. Exactly evil.

It's just like there's no way to get around that. And it is a shame because they're – like, you know, I know you work for an institution that's a Catholic institution. And you've told me so many times that like the people you work with are good people. They're by and large really good people and that you feel very, very fortunate to be around a lot of these people. And it is a shame because this sort of shit completely sullies their image. It doesn't just sully their image. It destroys their image. Right. And it sully their image. It destroys their image. Right.

And it seems like such a fixable problem. Right. Imagine any other organization with this problem. It's kind of easy to fix. You just, you just actually get, you say, okay, we're going to have a zero tolerance policy on, on, on sex abuse. It's a really easy thing to have a zero tolerance policy on. You're not breaking any fucking new ground when you have a zero tolerance policy on fucking

Kitty Diddley. Right. Like no pedophilia in the office. Right. Like there's not. It's like, please clean the coffee pot and don't fuck kids in our kitchen. This kitchen is for everybody. And then you have that meeting about what a kid is.

Like, define a kid for me. Because I need to know what I can fuck at the office. But the best thing is like, okay, we've done that. Like, there's laws. They do that. All that groundwork has been laid. It's done. So you don't need to get laid with kids.

This is done. It's over. We're laughing a lot about it, but it really is a shame because there's a lot of victims out there. Right. These guys are still prowling around. Look, if you want to continue to minister to them, do it in jail. I get that.

Like, you don't want to turn your back on these guys because they're part of your fraternity or whatever. I hear you. Don't turn your back on them. If you feel like they need help, if you feel like they need counseling, if you feel like what they need is a helping hand, great. Do that in prison. Yeah. Because what they did earns them a spot there. Are we considered acceptable losses? Jenny, let's bring it down just a notch here for a second. Okay. When we look at autism, 75% of kids with autism, there's demonstrated change that the child has in the first year of life before they get to this period where they're getting the measles, Mumps, German measles vaccine.

Give me a ton of measles. I'll take that way over autism any day. So the measles are back, Cecil. Well, yeah, of course they are. You know, it's a big surprise. there. You know, it's a big surprise. You know, this this might come as a surprise, but 118 cases of measles reported in the United States. But that's that's actually the busiest year for measles in 16 years. It's kind of a it's actually kind of a big deal. And, you know, it's pretty much exactly because people aren't vaccinating. Right. It's not a shocker here.

If you were to time this out and look at it, you would see the rise of Jenny McCarthyism. Jenny McCarthyism. That's awesome. Time perfectly with this. It all comes down to inadequate vaccination. That's what this exactly boils down to. It's insane that there's diseases that's what this this was this exactly boils down to it's insane that there's diseases that we could fucking eradicate like like that disease doesn't need to be anymore just by thing what happened to smallpox i don't know we fucking weaponized to put in a drawer and

destroyed it that's it there's no more smallpox nobody Nobody gets the smallpox anymore. Right. Like polio has been on the edge of eradication forever. Diseases can be wiped out. They can be controlled. They can be wiped out. They can be eliminated entirely. It's a it is a possible thing. And we just don't vaccinate. We're just we're just afraid of vaccination vaccination. There's no reason to be afraid of vaccination. There's none at all. It's insane. There's no credible studies linking vaccination to any of the

shit that people continuously link vaccination to. But there's really credible studies linking measles to getting measles. Yeah. You know, here's my understanding of what's going on here is that you have a lot of ways where they'll say things like, OK, the research was falsified. But it was falsified in such a way to make me think that it's a big organization like Big Pharma or whatever is making it seem like it's falsified even though it's not really falsified. They just did it to make more money. And they keep saying they're did it to make more money. And they keep

saying they're doing it to make more money. Let me tell you how the doctors are going to make a shitload of money is when everybody has measles. The doctors are going to make a lot of money when people when people that don't get vaccinated have measles. You know, here's the thing. You're either going to get sick because everybody gets sick or you're going to be able to prevent that sickness. Now, if you prevent the sickness, it sick or you're going to be able to prevent that sickness. Now, if you prevent the sickness, it's not that much money and you get to prevent the sickness. Or you get to get sick and you get to spend that money basically taking care of somebody who's sick. Which would you rather do?

It doesn't make any sense. Like the money argument makes no sense. You know, it's part of this worldview that the bigger an organization is, the more likely it is to be evil, right? You know, something like a pharmaceutical company, and don't get me wrong, I'm not suggesting that pharmaceutical companies don't behave irresponsibly from time to time. They do. But, you know, things like health and medicine, Yeah. But, you know, things like health and medicine, they've got a set of checks and balances. So especially stuff like vaccines, vaccines have been very, very rigorously studied.

Yes, the vaccines are sold by pharmaceutical companies, but, you know, they are the vaccines themselves are rigorously studied. The studies that are peer reviewed. They're constantly under scrutinization. That's why that is why bad studies get redacted. Right. That's why bad studies like the study in The Lancet, they don't just exist and then just become part of this sort of grand scientific canon that can never be repealed. The study in The Lancet that caused a lot of this uproar was completely false. It was proven to be falsified. It was proven to be actual fraud, not just a bad study, but genuine fraud, like intentional malicious fraud. So there's a set of checks and balances that are in place with these massive organizations because they're under so much regulation, because they are under so much

scrutiny. And I understand not wanting to put, as a father, I get it. I understand not wanting to risk your child's health because the government says so. Like, I do. I genuinely understand that. But at the same time, I think you have to temper that sort of irrational fear with the rational risk-benefit analysis that says, hey, these are real diseases that real people contract that become very sick, that have significant consequences on your future health and your immediate health.

You know, I hear the argument from the vaccine nutters occasionally that, well, it's not fatal, you know, almost. I mean, a lot of things aren't fatal, but they're still fucking awful. Right. You know, like FDR got fucking polio. It didn't kill him, but he was crippled in a goddamn wheelchair. Well, it wasn't fatal. Okay. Yeah. I mean, you don't got me there. It's fatality is not the only way to look at whether or not a disease is something you want. A disease is never something you want. The fears, the fears make sense to me until you think about them, until you look at them, until you say, okay, what are the, you know, what are the real risks here of not getting my

kid vaccinated? And what are the benefits of getting vaccinated? And what, you know, what could go wrong here? Autism, you got to take that shit out of the, out of the running. And when you take that out of the running, there's just not a hell of a lot of risk. Right, right. There is there is obvious risk about getting your kids vaccinated. There are some risks, some bad reactions can happen with with vaccines. But again, it's risk versus reward here. And the reward is your kid is not going to get sick from measles ever. And one of the things, too, that I want to point out, especially about the big pharma argument, which happens all the time, people always say, oh, big pharma, you know, they'll hide anything and they'll be able to manipulate the statistics and be able to get behind all

these researchers and change everything around. First off, I want to point out that that Lancet article, that guy was actually paid by the lawyers who were trying to sue the vaccine companies. So there's some backhanded stuff going on there with your own research. With the research that you want to tout, there's some fucking under the table money handing going on already. But I want to point out Vioxx. And Vioxx is one of these drugs that was like a wonder drug for pain.

A lot of people loved it. They thought it was great. Well, then they started doing some studies. And one guy, just a researcher, just a guy saw some of the studies and was like, didn't make a lot of sense to him. And he went in and basically proved that Vioxx was actually increasing chances of people getting damaged, getting heart attacks and shit. And then they pulled it off the shelves because they wound up doing some research that it didn't look like they were collating the data correctly and maybe they were trying to cover it up

or whatever, but it was found out. Like it was found out. So the fact that something like that can happen to big pharma with Vioxx, I mean, come on. It's a huge seller. If they're going to be able to hide anything they want, they're going to be able to hide anything they want, they're going to, they're

going to be able to hide the information on the shit that makes them a lot of fucking money. Right. Not vaccines. This whole, like, you know, that people are getting rich, giving your kids vaccine shots. It's just nonsense. You just don't pay enough for those shots. Right.

You don't pay enough for those shots. They're, they're, they're old hat. They're not a patent protected anymore. I mean, this is not where pharmacies are making their real money. You know, it's a nonsense argument. What's not a nonsense argument is measles are on the rise. Right. That's ironclad.

So way to go. I would really like the herd immunity to be in place actually so maybe get your fucking kids vaccinated irresponsible twits i know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully the gop is at it again cecil with uh some some interesting decisions about uh what prisoners um are allowed to have in south carolina jails and what they're not what they are allowed to have in South Carolina jails and what they're not, what they are allowed to have is the Bible. Surprisingly, in South Carolina. What they're not allowed to have is any other book.

You want to read a Ziggy cartoon? No dice. Ziggy? Uh-uh. Nope, not going to happen. Calvin and Hobbes? Get fucked. Uh-uh.

No way. The Bible, though? Yeah, Leviticus all day long. That'll keep them happy. Yeah, right. You want to give somebody in solitary confinement a fucking complete breakdown? Here's Revelation. Yeah, there's dragons and lions and destruction.

You would think that they'd pick a more moral book, like a book that has better morals than the Bible. Like the Bible doesn't have very good morals, and the Bible doesn't really profess a deep sort of sense of morality. Shit, give them Tuesdays with fucking Maury. That has more fucking depth than this. Like the Bible is, I mean, if you're going to give them fucking Puff the Magic Dragon, give them kids' books. Give them shit that, there's a lot of books out there. I think that you could give them that would, that would at least in state some sort of

values or at least whatever you're trying to do. I don't know what you're trying to do with this. Obviously they're trying to, they're trying to make a claim that morality only stems from a religion. Like that's your claim, right? Is that, is that morality can only stems from religion. That's your claim, right, is that morality can only come from religion. But when you look at the prison population, you find out that most of those people are religious anyway.

Right. That's my favorite part is the numbers for religious conviction in prison is actually higher than in the general population. And it didn't serve them terribly well. Look, the Bible has some nice ideas in the New Testament, right? I mean, it's also got some fucking crazy shit in the New Testament.

I'm sorry, but it does. It has some fucking lunacy shit in the New Testament. Timothy is particularly unkind to half the population, also known as women. But, okay, you know, that's cool.

The Old Testament is unforgivably evil. It's just crazy. You're going to give somebody the Old Testament and be like, this is all 100% true. It is the only thing you're allowed to read. Welcome to to jail here's your book really because uh deuteronomy says if my dad did some mean shit i'm fucked anyway

and my dad was kind of an asshole hence i ended up in prison right leviticus says i can have slaves there's stories about giving my daughter over to be gang raped in this thing. Like there's there's genocide. There's I mean, it's like every sort of you. I don't believe that you can come up with something deplorable and not have it in the Old Testament. Give him back Ziggy, man. Like where's Marmaduke? You know, here's the thing. You can't give people—you want these people to—these people that got into prison were acting barbaric in some way, right? You cannot give them the barbarian's handbook when they walk in. I mean, seriously, like, you're giving them an Iron Age book, for Christ's sakes. Like, and you expect them to get, like, understand the world better because you're giving them a book that was written fucking 2,000 to 4,000 years ago?

Fuck you. Yeah. Like, we've thought about shit since then. Maybe give them something. Give them something by Bertrand Russell. What the fuck? That would be fucking terrific. In the name of Jesus, we speak that.

Jesus, we speak that. Oh, Ramana. Shanda. Karaba. No. Corrine. I mean, I'm high on the Minnesota House Republicans invited a really respectable guy, Bradley Dean, of the You Can Run But You Cannot Hide,

to give the morning prayer to open. I don't even know why they have a morning prayer. First of all, I think that's crazy. Yeah, I agree. I think that's fucking stupid. You know who they should have to give the morning prayer is me. They should have me give the morning prayer. Tom. They should have me give the morning prayer. Tom, why don't you give us a morning prayer? Good morning.

Oh, man. So, uh, but Bradley Dean, um, sort of a crazy guy, sort of a, uh, really crazy guy, sort of outspoken. He advocates things like the incarceration of gays and lesbians. Sure. And has said that the LGBT community is trying to usher in Sharia law in Minnesota. That doesn't strike me as a good deal for the LGBT community, since basically like usher in laws that would allow them to be stoned to death.

Right. And that gay men molest an average of 117 children before they get caught. Clearly taking a page out of the you can make numbers up as you go along handbook. It wasn't intended to be a factual statement. This is not intended to be a factual statement. I love this idea. This Muslim nations that execute gays are more moral

than American Christians. The murdering of other people. Like, this guy doesn't understand what morality is. No. Like, you don't, you really don't know what moral means if you think murdering someone because of how they're how they fucking

are born is a moral choice like then just murder all the handicapped people in the world right like like what I don't it doesn't make any sense to me it's like you were born this way right like you're born I'm not don't I'm not conflating gays with handicapped people I'm just saying that that they're both born in a way that this person is seeing. I'm like, oh, they're wrong. Well, they're not wrong. They're just born that way. Like, fuck, dude. You kill everybody with fucking blonde

hair then. They're born that way. I don't know if you remember this. Back in the 1940s, who gave this a whirl. Follow me on this one. Follow me on this one. I don't know if this actually is a correlation,

but there's this dude, right? I mean, he's a little-known guy, sort of short dude with a mustache. You may have heard of him. Fucking douche. And you know this fucking guy, this Bradley Dean, he's been balls deep in some guy's ass. You know he has.

You fucking know it. There's no way that this guy, this guy who hates gays this much, has not fucking had some homosexual experience in his life. I guarantee it. This guy is full of self-loathing because of the society that we live in. That's why. It's the only thing that these guys always turn up gay. They always do. They don't ever not turn out gay.

They always turn out gay. They hate themselves so much they just have to like externalize that shit. It's lunacy, Cecil. This is not the guy you want giving. What is wrong with Minnesota that they would allow this guy to give a prayer in front of a people. Right. That's crazy that they would do that. And I guess, you know, the one thing I like about this article is that so many people were so offended. I like that that it didn't just go unnoticed or, you know, that that people didn't didn't sort of stop and say,

you know, this is some bullshit and we can't allow it. You know, this really caused something of an uproar within the chambers. And they actually made him do a new prayer, like get somebody else to do a new prayer, I think. But it is insane. It is fucking insane that they would invite this guy to begin with. Also, his video, have you seen the video of this guy to begin with. Also, his video. Have you seen the video of this guy? I didn't watch it, no.

He looks like Brett Michaels. I need to keep my coffee down because I'm going to vomit if I fucking watch it. He looks like Brett Michaels. Yeah, dude. He's got the Kentucky waterfall going on for sure. He has fucking business up front party in the back mullet going on. How do you take that man seriously? I love the comment here.

There's a great comment. It's like the fourth one. It says, wasn't that the guy? Wasn't that guy the guitar player for Winger? That's a very up to date style. It's very up to date. I wish the American media would take a great look at the views of the people in Congress and find out, are they pro-America or anti-America? Minnesota, though.

Minnesota has itself a nice set of people in the GOP party that are fucking full of crazy. Are you perhaps referring to Michelle Bachman? Yes, I am. Why, yes, I am. I don't know how we came to this natural segue, Cecil. Michelle Bachman, she's been getting... We ordered the news items just so this would come up this way. Michelle Bachman's been really taking a lot of heat from teenagers lately,

from high school kids, for accuracy in her statements, about pretty much all of her statements. This is the second time now she's been challenged twice in very recent history by high schoolers. One of them was a sophomore, which puts you at about 15, like cannot drive. I love that shit. She's been challenged to a debate, a civics debate about the constitution and general civics knowledge. The letter that she

wrote that this, this girl wrote, um, is one of the most delightful things I've ever read. And she basically, I'm paraphrasing, but she's, she's like, look, if you're going to be, you know, leading the country, I think, uh, which I see as grossly inaccurate, need to be addressed. And so maybe we should have you on and we'll do a little debate action here. Right. I would like to see her respond to these challenges because it's just insane. Now a 17-year-old has challenged Michelle Bachman on a law allowing creationism to be taught in public school classes, science classes, again, not like mythology. Yeah, right, in science classes. He actually challenges her.

One of the things he challenges her on, and he even says it's bullshit. He even comes out and says, well, it doesn't make any difference, And he even says it's bullshit. He even comes out and says, well, it doesn't make any difference. But she claims to have like a number of Nobel laureates who believe in ID. And he's like, well, I have 47 that don't. So how many do you have and what are their names? Like if you're willing to use that as a measurement of a validity test, well, then I have 47.

Right. Like if we're going to start off with an argument from authority. Right. Fine. Like we'll start off on some shaky ass ground. Fine. But you're still wrong. Your shaky ass ground is still wrong.

This is this is a woman who's going to make going to try to make, I think, a serious bid for the presidency. I don't understand what's wrong with the GOP. This is I know that we've talked about this, but I mean, what do you have to be crazy to be in the GOP? Like, do you have to be small minded? Is it is that a requirement? Can't we just get somebody who's fiscally conservative, small government, and not batshit fucking crazy? Because this is batshit, Cecil. This is complete batshit.

I mean, creationism is nonsense. There's nobody with a fucking brain in their head who believes in creationism. There's nobody. There are no people. Because that's kind of a yardstick, right? Oh, yeah, really? You're into creationism? You're clearly a dumb person.

I mean, if your rhetoric's that bad that you're getting fucking pwned by a fucking 17-year-old, you know, I mean, and don't get me wrong, these are some intelligent, Tina, they're fucking smarter than I am. So, I mean, they're intelligent teenagers,

but if you're a politician, don't you think you should fucking at least have some sort of ammo ready to go? But instead you're just ignoring them. You're not even responding to them. This is the youth of America. These are the people you're going to be ruling over. This person's going to be voting age in a year. You better fucking, you know, as a, as a person who's, who's trying to run on a platform, you've got to at least defend your shit once in a while. You can't just say shit and then just be like, well, nobody's ever going to challenge me on it.

The fucking youngest people that can't even vote are challenging you on it. Your shit is so offensive that people who aren't even voting yet, because fucking 17, I didn't know dick was going on. Your shit is so offensive that these kids know exactly what you're fucking wrong about. So, you know, this whole thing with her and with Palin, I don't understand what the draw is. I have a feeling that it's got this sort of folksy, going rogue sort of thing to it,

but I don't know if that's what is the draw. But there's something to Bachman and Palin that are very similar. They're both Tea Party people. They're both people who sort of latched onto the Tea Party pretty early. So I don't know what the draw is. And I'd love for somebody, if you're listening by fucking accident, because that's the only way you'd be

listening to this show and you're fucking, you like either of these people, tell me why you like them. Why you like Sarah Palin or why you like Michelle Bachman. And I don't even care if you don't like them at all, but like one thing about them, just tell me the one tiny little thing or the multitude of things that you like about either of these people. Cause I find them completely unlikable, unintelligent bags of flesh. That's what I think they are.

You're hiring somebody to do a job that is the biggest job that can be done in this country. That's, that's what you're, you're saying like, well, don't you want the more, the most qualified person in that, in that seat? Don't you want the person who, when you, when you look at them, you say convincingly, I could not have done better than to hire that person. Isn't that the, I mean, granted we very to hire that person. Isn't that the problem? Granted, we very rarely get that, but isn't that the ideal we're striving for? I've been a part of interview processes where I've been up against candidates that are fucking impressive for jobs that are a lot less impressive than presidents of the United States. Like there's a lot of, there's no shortage actually of really impressive, well-rounded, incredibly bright people in the world.

And we don't seem to find them. We seem to find these yutzes. What the fuck? If it's really just a popularity contest, let's at least have a swimsuit competition. Let's let's just call that a swimsuit competition. Let's, let's just call that shit what it is. Right. I mean,

let's just say, Hey, this is really all just about, you know, who Tina's taken to the prom. So fuck it. Who cares? Right.

If we want it to be about more than that, we should never have politicians being considered for a job that, you know, for a moment could look you in the eye and say, yeah, Earth might be 6,000 years old. Also, it was created by a magic man in the sky, and dinosaurs were ridden around by He-Man. Right? Like, that's fucking lunacy.

You're an atheist. Give me a fucking break, Michael. All right, you know what? We need to start going to church every week. So a billboard went up, Cecil. You sent me this video in Westminster indicating that it's an atheist billboard. It says, don't believe in God, you're not alone,

and it has a website for the Orange County, I don't know, Center of Reason or something along those lines. I don't remember what the hell it was called. And it somehow made the news that a billboard went up. I mean, I see a lot of billboards go up that say, like, come to our church and I miss you, God. And, you know, I see a lot of stuff. I see a lot of theist billboards that go up, and I rarely see news coverage of them. You know, we've talked on this show quite a bit about the need for there to be a place

for atheists to sort of exist in the world and to do so without necessarily being marginalized. And I know that I've received some criticism like, well, you know, why does it matter? I mean, nobody really cares that people are atheists. Well, no, people do care. And this is evidence that people care. And there's a clip I know that you want to play that is direct evidence that people care very much and have some very bizarre attitudes when you just put a billboard up that says, hey, you're not alone. So what's your reaction? It makes me very angry. I've been sober for four years and I got sober with God. And it's just really sad that it's shown here and for kids

and other people to see that. I mean, I think it's a load of crap, honestly. I mean, obviously everyone's entitled to their own opinion but and i believe in free speech but it's i don't know kind of disappointing honestly i get if something you put something up that was like your god sucks my balls or you know like fucking uh i shit in your god's mouth or something you don't even like whatever you're gonna say that's offensive to somebody's imaginary friend i get it I understand if somebody's going to be offensive, man, I'm fucking down. This is the fucking least offensive billboard I've ever seen about atheism. There's, it says, don't believe in God question mark.

So like the question mark specifically makes it like a question to the audience. Like, Hey guys, uh, I was wondering, do you guys believe in God? Like, is that offensive? How could that possibly be offensive, that statement? And then to say, you're not alone. Those two statements, even put together, even with fucking barbed wire wrapped around them, is not an offensive statement. I don't care how you try to make it offensive.

It is the least offensive thing I've ever seen. There's a fucking billboard on I-65 in Indiana. I was driving through Indiana the other day. It just says fucking hell is real. Hell is real is what it says. And that's not offensive? Shit, that's more offensive

than this to say hell is real. Basically what you're saying is I mean, let's fucking, let's break it down here. Hell is real? Well, there's an interesting statement. Basically, you're fucking condemning people to torture forever, which is more offensive. It's a threat, right?

That's what that is. Hell is real. It's a threat. There's no other reason to put it out there other than to say, other than to wag your finger via billboard, which is the best finger-wagging vehicle, by the way. Oh, it is, because it's huge. It's a giant finger. It's, um, yeah, I got a finger I want to wag, but it's a big wagging

finger that says, believe what we believe and do what we tell you to do, or eternal torment is all you, big guy. Right. That's, really? I mean, that's kind of threatening. Like, it's not a little threatening either, because if hell's real, it's like a big threat. It's like the biggest possible threat.

No kidding. The worst thing that can happen. Because it's eternal torture. Eternal torture sucks. Imagine the worst thing that can happen all the time forever. Really? That's pretty bad. That is, by definition, the worst thing I can imagine. Right, right.

For the longest period of time. Yeah, that's awful. But you can put that up, and that's not on the news, right? Like, where's the outrage? Where's people saying, like, oh, I find that vaguely offensive? I find that threatening and confrontational. Okay, well, nobody, you know, there's no news stories about that. But, you know, here people get to say like, oh, well, I quit.

I quit drinking because of God. No, you quit drinking because you fucking did the work. Yeah. That's why you quit drinking. Give yourself a little credit. You did the work. You stopped drinking. You didn't put the bottle.

Why did God make you start drinking? Why did God make you start then? Yeah. Like, did he fucking care that little for you that he was like, hey, asshole, you should fucking go through a fucking crippling addiction. Fuck you. Why do you fucking believe in him that like if he made you stop, he made you start. You give God all the credit for the good shit and none of the blame for the bad shit. Right. So nothing that's in your life is the result of your own action. You didn't do it. You know, you didn't become addicted to alcohol.

You know, that was Satan that did that. And, you know, Satan was created by God, but he's not, you know, God can't be responsible for that. It's like if you have, like, a dog that bites somebody, you know, like a really mean dog. Right. Yeah. Then it's sort of your fault but sort of not your fault.

It's kind of a nebulous Judge Judy sort of a region. It's even of your fault, but sort of not your fault. It's kind of a nebulous Judge Judy sort of a region. It's even worse than that. It's like you fucking genetically designed a mean animal that is just covered in teeth that all it does is bite people. That's more fucking analogous. Yeah, right. Then you let it loose on the world, and it can never die, right? You can't shoot it. You can't do it.

It just devours people. And it bites everybody. It bites little kids, and when it bites you, it gives you fucking cancer. That's how bad it is. And you're just like, hey, hey, hey, look. It was a dog, man. It wasn't me. All right?

Then you show up an hour later and you put a fucking Band-Aid over a gaping wound. And you're like, woo! Oh, man. You really hooked me up, G. I appreciate that. You really helped hook me up, G. Like, I appreciate that. I mean, it's disappointing that a billboard is up there to give people, like, some hope that they're not the only person who.

Because it can be like when you're a kid, if you're surrounded by theists, it can be very difficult to be an atheist. I mean, and most people are surrounded by people of religion. Like, that, that, that is, that is most people's experience in the United States that you're surrounded by, by religious people. And I mean, it could be, if, if that's just not, if it didn't take for you, if it's just not your, your worldview, it's, it's a little isolating, you know? I mean, I never had any faith in, in, in any higher power. And, you know, I went to things like, because my dad brought me. I went to church functions. We went to church twice a week

when we were kids growing up, Wednesdays and Sundays. I was part of the Methodist youth group when I was a preteen or what have you. We'd go on Saturday night and hang out and do Methodist youth group things. It's not your gig, man.

It just doesn't work. It'd be very nice to be like, oh, wow, I'm not the only one that questions the validity of this nonsense. Like there are organizations I can log on. I can have a life outside of the life that's sort of created for me by my parents and the environment that's created for me by my parents. And I can exist in, you know, in a place in the world it's it's it's really a welcoming message just what are you disappointed in just disappoint i'm just very disappointed i feel sad sometimes

in my heart i just i feel so sad you want answers answers? I think I'm entitled. You want answers. I want the truth. You can't handle the truth. So, Cecil, we talked about the tsunami and earthquake in Japan. We talked about that a few weeks ago, a month and a half ago. You know, we played some clips for some people who were extraordinarily unkind to the Japanese. And, you know, there were a lot of people who were saying things, you know, like, you know, just wait till we start sending aid over there. And, you know, Japan donates one hundred and twenty thousand dollars in relief supplies to Alabama.

A little news story that you found. This is actually a very heartening story. The tornadoes have been absolutely devastating in the south, in the southeast this year. There's been a couple of them that have claimed over 100 lives. One of them, I think, 300 lives. It was a series of tornadoes, but one weather event claimed 300-some lives. Another one in Joplin claimed, I think, 120 lives they're up to now, right around. Yeah.

Absolutely insane, the tornadoes and the damage that's been wreaked by these things. Nothing in comparison to the tsunami. Right. I mean, it's fucking pebbles in the ocean by comparison to the tsunami. But the Japanese are here. This just goes to show that, you know, you reap what you sow with these things. That when you give aid and then at some point you become in need of aid, you will then receive aid. Didn't even need to crack the Bible for that one, Cecil.

Yeah, right. We didn't even need it. You know, the thing about this is, is that the people were all screaming about Pearl Harbor in the past, right? They were all like all happy that the Japanese got a tsunami and people were saying, oh, Pearl Harbor, oh, Pearl Harbor. Well, here we go. They're fucking they've they've gone out of their way to help us during a, you know, a very what could be a very insignificant thing in the scope of the world. I know it's not insignificant if you're sitting in fucking, you know, Montgomery, Alabama. I know it doesn't feel insignificant.

But in the scope of the world, in the scope of the six billion people in the world, it's a pretty minute number of people that died. It's a small amount of destruction in comparison to what happened in Japan. But yet they're here. Here they are. And they're not saying oh, that's fucking retribution for Nagasaki. Right. Right. They're just like, hey, here's some money. Here's some blankets. Here's some

tarps. You do with them as you will. Because it's kind of like what good people do, right? Right. Like, you help people that need help. Just kind of basic, man. But it is very nice to see, and I think this should shut up

a lot of those goddamn dimwits. Oh, I don't know about that. At least I hope so. Those dimwits, they don't listen to things. Yeah. One popular thing to do in American politics is to note that the summers in the United States over the past few years have

been very warm. As a result, global warming must be real. What's wrong with this reasoning? It's only gone up 0.6 degrees. Yeah, it's not really a big problem, is it? No, I don't think that it's going to hurt us. So this is kind of an interesting story you sent me, Cecil. Germany is closing down all of its nuclear power plants by 2022. I thought this was a very interesting story. Germany gets about 25% of its power from nuclear power plants, and they're hoping to have them all closed in the next 11 years. I'm kind of stuck on this one.

You know, part of me understands where you're coming from, right? Obviously, nuclear power is not one of those things that we can look at and say, OK, it's completely safe. It's completely risk free. It's completely risk-free. But I understand that the people in Japan may be looking at it and being like, well, we're kind of on a fault line and we've got some problems with some tsunamis that could happen. But in Germany, like the – I think that the tragic chances of something happening are more human error there than they are sort of the environment is going to fuck you. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know a lot about Germany's energy situation, but this this actually strikes me as kind of a bad idea and somewhat reactionary.

I think looking at Japan, I think I see the nuclear crisis that happened in Japan very differently. I see a 30 year old or so nuclear power plant that got rocked by a massive earthquake, one of the largest earthquakes. 9.0. Yeah, to have ever been measured since we began measuring them. Then it got wailed on by a goddamn tsunami. So pretty much the worst possible thing happened to an older reactor. And it was bad, but it was not Chernobyl bad. It was not dying in the streets, explosions in the air, radioactive fallout, you know,

creating Godzilla bad, right? I mean, to me, I see this as proof of the success and safety of nuclear power. Let's turn this on its head just a little bit. Imagine if that same earthquake happened right by a coal mine. How many people die from that? A lot. Miners die in coal mines all the time. Take a 9.0 earthquake, you know, because really, what are your other options? Your other options are coal.

You know, wind power, sure, but you're not going to power 25% of Germany on wind and solar. You'd have to cover the entire fucking country with windmills. Right, I mean, the Dutch did that. That's... And little wooden shoes. You can't take their... That's their schtick. That's their schtick. You can't take that away from them.

It's... Next thing you know, the Germans will be wearing wooden shoes. Tulips for everybody. Oh, my God. Oh, man. I really do. I see the power plant in Japan as proof of nuclear power safety. You cannot have a bigger event.

You just can't. That's the biggest event. And it shut the reactor down, but people went in there and they fucking fixed it. Like, it didn't blow up. It didn't melt down in the truest sense of the word. Did it release a little bit of radioactivity? Yes, it did. But, you know, by all measures, the amount of radioactivity it released has not been a public health hazard.

So nuclear power is by and large very, very, very safe. It's incredibly safe even when you hit it with the biggest disasters that – natural disasters that we've recorded. It's still by and large safe. You cannot say the same thing for coal. You can't even come close. Well, look at the amount of time that that reactor has gone on, too. It's an old reactor. Right.

It's not new technology. So that thing has been pumping out power for years and years and years and years, and then this bad thing happens and it melts down. They're saying that radioactive material already spewed by the plant could cause 120 cases of leukemia in Japanese children over the next 10 years. Now that's serious. That's very serious, and that's an awful thing. I mean, just to have leukemia because you're fucking by a plant,

that's all that happened. That's an awful thing to happen. And I don't want to minimize that. But at the same time, I agree with what you're saying. I think that there are some risks with what we do. And I did, they didn't talk about a plant that was built this year, melt melting down. They're talking about a plant that was built many, many years ago, melting down. And I think, you know, you need to learn from your mistakes and you need to go on with nuclear power. I think you're absolutely right. I think it need to learn from your mistakes and you need to go on with nuclear power. I think you're absolutely right.

I think it is reactionary. And I think these people are – they're definitely looking at some things that are probably the worst things that can happen and thinking it's the norm. In 2010 in the US alone, 48 people died in coal mines. That's half of that same number of kids who are going to get leukemia or are likely to get leukemia. It's about half. So I'm not suggesting that it's risk-free, but I guess, you know, there is no such thing as risk-free energy. I know. That's exactly it, right? Credulity is not a virtue.

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