JISHOU, HUNAN — So, it goes like this. A high school football coach loaded 20 of his players on a school bus, and took them to his church, where several of them were baptized while the school superintendent watched.

There were just two little problems with this trip. One, not all the kid’s parents signed off on this trip. Two, the kids go to a public school, so the coach and his superintendent more than likely violated federal law (like the Constitution).

Except they don’t see it that way, because the trip was “voluntary.”

Predictably, the high school is smack dab in the Bible Belt, in western Kentucky.

Here’s a little cultural background about western Kentucky, which Coach Scott Mooney and Superintendent Janet Meeks should have already known. Back in Kentucky’s early years, there were two main religious groups, the Baptists and the Catholics. When I lived in western Kentucky, my friends told me about the stories they heard about the “other” people, how Baptists almost drowned their young or Catholics go drunk during services.

Suffice it say, the two groups did not exactly trust each other, for a long time.

So, for Mooney and Meeks to so blithely whisk away 20 teenagers to their Southern Baptist church for a revival, a free steak dinner, and coincidentally to have some of them baptized either indicates the two are stupid or playing some dominionist games.

September 9th, 2009 | Tags: baptize, church, Civil liberties, coach, football team, kentucky | Category: Civil liberties, Commentary, Schools, religion | Comments (2)

JISHOU, HUNAN — The Queen Bee of the Birthers, Orly Taitz Esq., DDS, buzzed over to Kentucky recently to whip up a swarm of angry bee-rthers to visit state officials in Frankfort.

She wanted Kentucky state officials to do something, anything, about the “proof” she had that Pres. Barack Obama was actually born outside the USA and therefore ineligible to be president.

Taitz, who has a correspondence course law degree and is a member of the California bar, brought a federal issue to Kentucky’s attorney general’s public corruption office, the secretary of state, and finally (perhaps as an afterthought) to the Kentucky office of the FBI.

For the full details, read this account in Esquire of another example of Taitz tilting at windmills.

The fact that Taitz could find so many other people who believe the same whacko things she does is just a little scary. That she found them in Kentucky is, well, not so surprising.

[Kentucky factoid: The Esquire piece refers to the Knob Creek Machine Gun Range, which is in West Point, Kentucky, about 40 minutes' drive southwest of Louisville. Travel a bit further south along wide, wide Dixie Highway, and you will come to the Fort Knox Military Reservation. Diagonally opposite West Point, on the other side of Fort Knox, is where I used to live - Lebanon Junction. See map below.]

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August 12th, 2009 | Tags: Barack Obama, birther, birtherism, kentucky, Orly Taitz | Category: China | Leave a comment

JISHOU, HUNAN — I lived in Louisville a long time. I love the River City, but there are way too many religious crazies there tarnishing Louisville’s national image.

Take Ken Pagano, for example, whose invitation to his parishioners to bring their guns to a special event at church tomorrow has made national headlines. Pastor Pagano, shown in The New York Times with a handgun in a holster and a submachine gun in his left hand, wants his church to celebrate their right to carry firearms.

“God and guns were part of the foundation of this country,” Mr. Pagano, 49, said Wednesday in the small brick Assembly of God church, where a large wooden cross hung over the altar and two American flags jutted from side walls. “I don’t see any contradiction in this. Not every Christian denomination is pacifist.”

The Times article notes that, in the interests of safety, Jefferson County sheriff’s deputies (who I am sure have better things to do) will check visible weapons to make sure they are unloaded. They will not ask the parishioners of New Bethel Church in Valley Station for any concealed weapons, however.

“That’s the whole point of concealed,” Mr. Pagano said, adding that he was not worried because such owners require training.

Not everyone agrees with Pagano’s gun-love. The church’s insurers, for one, have canceled the church’s liability insurance for the “Bring Your Gun to Church” event, and have advised him they will cancel the policy at the end of the year.

June 26th, 2009 | Tags: dominionist, guns, ken pagano, kentucky, louisville, new bethel church | Category: Civil liberties, Commentary, religion | Leave a comment

JISHOU, HUNAN — The Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky, is NOT a science museum. It is a tool to publicize a narrow religious view of the world and our place in it.

Thus, I found this comment by a Kentucky State Department of Education official particularly disturbing. [From the Louisville Courier-Journal]

Kentucky Department of Education spokeswoman Lisa Gross said nothing in state law would bar public schools from visiting, if it were part of “a lesson” on “how some perceived the world’s beginnings.”

Kentucky does not require the teaching of evolution or creationism (or even science at all) in private schools. And public-school science teachers aren’t prohibited from mentioning creationism, but lessons often include concepts behind evolution, Gross said.

Maybe Ms. Gross was tiptoeing around the religious bias of Kentucky’s bureaucrats, legislators and population. Maybe she has never been to the Creation Museum. Maybe she is just plain stupid. Whatever the case, there should be no reason to bring any public school group to the museum, unless that purpose is to indoctrinate the students in an overtly religious world view.

If a high school teacher, having done a LOT of preparation, intended to use the museum as an example of propaganda or dogmatic religious instruction, then perhaps such a field trip would be worthwhile. I am just not sure how many teachers have the time and inclination to undertake such a lesson, though.

June 19th, 2009 | Tags: creation museum, creationism, Ken Ham, kentucky, seven c's, YEC | Category: Commentary, Schools, Science, Skepticism, evolution, religion | Comments (3)

JISHOU, HUNAN — I used to live in Kentucky. It’s a beautiful state, full of great people, but afflicted with legislators who are mostly terminally stupid.

In that, I suppose, the Bluegrass State is not unique. There’s a whole lotta stupid goin’ on. (Take Zimbabwe, for example.)

Kentucky’s latest contribution to stupidity was the inclusion of “Almighty God” in two state statutes a few years back dealing with the state’s homeland security. Someone finally caught wind of the terminology and has filed suit in state court to have the offending laws rewritten.

The someone is the group, American Atheists. So you can already predict how the religious right and right-wing radioheads will react: “Godless atheists are trying to destroy our Christian nation! Blah blah blah …!”

I mean, the American Atheists have a point, but why couldn’t the plaintiffs been someone less obvious a target for right-wing vitriol, like maybe the Presbyterians headquartered in Louisville?

The right-wing blather will only obscure the real issue, which I hope the courts will settle quickly. Our laws cannot invoke God without running afoul of the US Constitution, specifically this part:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

December 7th, 2008 | Tags: constitution, God, homeland security, kentucky | Category: Civil liberties, Commentary, religion | Leave a comment