It Was True 13 Years Ago

Lawrence Krauss wrote an opinion piece 13 years ago that contained this quote:

[T]he increasingly blatant nature of the nonsense uttered with impunity in public discourse is chilling. Our democratic society is imperiled as much by this as any other single threat, regardless of whether the origins of the nonsense are religious fanaticism, simple ignorance or personal gain.

It is even more true today. We have recently finished eight years of a presidency in which the chief executive was a religious fanatic who was a scientific know-nothing and whom took great pride in his ignorance. His political party may very well choose, as its candidate in 2012, a woman who, in comparison to George W. Bush, makes him look like a Carnegie-Mellon physicist.

When it comes to religion, people are entitled to believe whatever the hell they want, no argument. What they are not entitled to is their own facts. They are not entitled to cloak their religious beliefs with the the law. They are not entitled to ram their religious ideology down the throats of others.

When they use their ideology as the basis for policy decisions, then they endanger us all. I have very little doubt that George Bush's famed indifference to the fate of the planet had much to do with his apparent religious belief that the end of days is very near. We wasted almost a decade of effort to mitigate climate change because that ignorant bag of spooge was putrefying in the Oval Office. Thanks to the delays foisted upon us by Bush's ignorance (and Cheney's greed), the effort will be harder and more costly.

Palin seems to be cut of the same cloth, a despoiler of the world because she thinks it will end soon.