JUNE 2017 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

1. Donald Trump. Where would the boneheads be without Donald Trump,  so I’ll start out with two. This morsel derives from his absurd decision to withdraw from the Paris accords. Included is a selection of comments he’s made in the past on climate change.

In the years before running for president, he called it “nonexistent,” “mythical,” and a total con job.”

Reminiscent of Senator “Snowball” Inhoff, whenever snow would fall in New York, Trump would be prompted to mockingly observe” “Global warming has been proven to be a canard repeatedly over and over again,” he tweeted in 2012. Later that year he said the concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.” A year later he wrote that “global warming is a total and expensive hoax.”

Did belief in the phoniness of global warming lead Trump to pull out of the Paris accord, or was it, as he stated, because the accord was hurting the American economy (or maybe it was that hard Macron handshake)? As with Trump, you never know. As usual, his muzzled staff offers no clue to his "thinking." What we do know is Trump thinks playing to his base is a formula for success. I don’t know what’s worse, Trump or his base?

May 2017 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

1. Rep. Raul Labrador (R-Idaho). A constituent told Labrador at a town hall meeting at Lewis-Clark State College: “You are mandating people on Medicaid to accept dying …. You are making a mandate that will kill people,” to which Labrador responded:

“No one wants anybody to die. That line is so indefensible. . . . Nobody dies because they don’t have access to health care,” he continued, drawing loud jeers from the audience.

Not only is this untrue, this is so transparently untrue that you would have to be in a Guyana cult leader's camp for the last decade to even give him the benefit of contemplating it for a half-moment. Americans attempting to struggle along despite not having access to health care is a staple of the news cycle. Americans showing up in emergency rooms suffering from acute dangers that would have never happened in the first place, had they been given access to preventative care beforehand.

Not only do Americans die from a lack of access to health care, they do so regularly, and by the tens of thousands. Labrador's insistence otherwise is not just a lie, it's a thumbing of his nose at everyone in the room. There's no way Labrador believed what he said to be true.

It's rare that we can conclusively answer the age-old question of dishonest politicians—evil, or just stupid?—but in this case it's fairly clear that Idaho Rep. Raul Labrador is lying on purpose and sincerely does not care if his constituents know it.

APRIL 2017 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

1. Donald Trump. The Donald allegedly told Tea Party groups at the White House that if the GOP health care plan dies, he will let Obamacare fail and let Democrats take the blame. So the Donald would allow our healthcare system to fail, destroying the lives of millions and millions of Americans, because he can’t get his way. What a baby! This should be a huge story.
 
Trump is like an attack dog. Whether its enemy Democrats, the enemy press, the enemy former President, the enemy healthcare system, or anyone else who speaks ill of him or his policies, he’s quick to move in for a kill. God help us.
 

MARCH 2017 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

1. Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX). Fact-conscious Americans understand that Donald Trump is a notorious liar. What’s most alarming is that many Americans, including most Republican Party identifiers, believe anything The Donald wants them to believe—that humans don’t cause climate change, all Muslims should be presumed dangerous, vaccinations cause autism, scientists shouldn’t be trusted, Obama was born in Kenya, massive voter fraud stripped him of a popular majority, his inauguration attracted a record number of attendees, the media pumps out vicious lies about the president-elect, and on and on. Chalk up Lamar Smith, chairman of the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee, as a devoted Trump believer. According to Smith, it is:
 
“ … better to get your news directly from the president. In fact it might be the only way to get unvarnished truth.”
 
This is what it’s come to in America: a significant portion of the public trusts Trump’s direct communications more than it trusts the media, not to mention the truth. When this happens, as is perilously close, our democracy ends.

FEBRUARY 2017 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

1. Religions Right Activist, Gordon Klingenschmitt. On the latest episode of his “Pray In Jesus Name” program, Klingenschmitt said that gay people should never be allowed to serve as school teachers because they “should be disqualified immediately because of their immorality.”
 
Klingenschmitt was commenting on a report about a Minnesota elementary school teacher and his husband who allegedly abused multiple boys over the course of several years and then killed themselves once an investigation was launched. Klingenschmitt said that while these men were obviously possessed by “a demonic spirit of child abuse,” the school system and society as a whole also share the blame for allowing gay people to teach in public schools in the first place.
 
“As a culture now, the demonic spirit of homosexuality has taken over and redefined marriage, particularly in Minnesota, to tell these boys that it is okay,” he said. “And the demonic spirit of deception has taken over the school board or whoever decided, maybe the principal, decided to hire these child abusers to teach elementary school. Well, if anything, they should have been disqualified immediately because of their immorality, because the immorality inside of these two men are indicators that they are unfit to be a good example to little children.”
 
“This is evil upon evil and it’s not just these two men who are at fault,” Klingenschmitt added. “It is our laws as a society that need to be changed to prevent and protect children from this kind of abuse in the future.”
 
It’s always good to know that religiously righteous folks are protecting our morality.

JANUARY 2017 BONEHED ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

1. Mick Mulvaney, Ultra-Conservative South Carolina Congressman. How do you prove you're really the anti-science administration? It’s not enough just to deny climate change or spout anti-evolution slogans—any Republican can do that much. To be a serious member of the anti-science brigade, you need to stop funding research, including medical research.
 
Mulvaney, whom Donald Trump has tapped to be his budget director, has questioned whether the federal government should spend any money on scientific research. He recently delivered his brilliant insights to the flouride-is-a-communist-plot John Birch Society, and for those really craving a flashback to the days of “the AIDS virus does not cause AIDS,” the man who would have his finger on the figures for the nation’s research budgets justified the attack on basic science by questioning the connection between the Zika virus and birth defects.
 
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) concluded in April that the Zika virus causes microcephaly and other defects. But Mulvaney wrote:
 
“Brazil's microcephaly epidemic continues to pose a mystery -- if Zika is the culprit, why are there no similar epidemics in countries also hit hard by the virus?”
 
The answer is likely one that Mulvaney never even paused to consider—abortion. Brazil was hit first, but as the disease spread to other areas, increased awareness of its effects made detection and treatment more available. 
 
But for those like Mulvaney, who regard all of science as some sort of mystery religion run by a cabal of leftists who only want excuses to steal money from hard-working billionaires and halt the righteous profits that could be made selling DDT, the idea that Zika only caused 1,500 cases of microcephaly is a reason to stop the payments on science.
 

DECEMBER 2016 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

1. Senator Jeff Sessions. Back in 2000, Sessions put his finger squarely on the source of problems in America’s schools: disabled children. Donald Trump’s pick for attorney general claimed, on the floor of the Senate, that while it was a good thing for schools to make accommodations for disabled students, it had just plain gone too far:

 

… we have created a complex system of federal regulations and laws that have created lawsuit after lawsuit, special treatment for certain children, and that are a big factor in accelerating the decline in civility and discipline in classrooms all over America. I say that very sincerely….Teachers I have been talking to have shared stories with me. I have been in 15 schools around Alabama this year. I have talked to them about a lot of subjects. I ask them about this subject in every school I go to, and I am told in every school that this is a major problem for them. In fact, it may be the single most irritating problem for teachers throughout America today.

 

In his statement, Sessions repeatedly cited the federal government falling short of its funding commitments to help schools comply with the law—but his answer was not full funding, it was going harder on disabled kids. Don’t think this is just Sessions rhetoric; the new AG has also walked the walk. As Alabama’s attorney general in the mid 1990s, he fought school equality after a judge ruled on behalf of about 30 of the state’s poor school districts who sought reforms. The case continued to languish in the courts while disability advocates worried that the poorest school systems didn’t have enough to fund the bare essentials for special needs students, according to a New York Times account. The case ended in 1997 ― after Sessions won a senate seat.

 

Add disabled children to the long list of people and principles Jeff Sessions won’t be protecting as attorney general.

 

NOVEMBER 2016 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

 

1. Alabama Secretary of State John Merrill. Merrill, Alabama’s top election official, thinks that making it easier to vote would “cheapen” the legacy of civil rights leaders who fought for voting rights:
 
"These people fought—some of them were beaten, some of them were killed—because of their desire to ensure that everybody that wanted to had the right to register to vote and participate in the process. I’m not going to cheapen the work that they did. I’m not going to embarrass them by allowing somebody that’s too sorry to get up off of their rear end to go register to vote," he said.
 
Merrill’s statement translates as: “if you’re too sorry or lazy to get up off of your rear and travel to where you can get voter ID, which may be in the next county or in your county but only open one day a month, then you don’t deserve the voting privilege.”
 
This from the top elections official of a state that enacted a strict voter ID law and then announced it was closing dozens of locations where people could get those voter IDs, with heavily black areas hardest hit. Seriously, the logic that black people are no longer risking death to vote, so making it any easier would be disrespectful to the people who fought to get to this point and really the most respectful thing is to make black people work extra hard to vote is the logic of racism, which, by the way, happens to benefit the Republican Party.
 

OCTOBER 2016 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

I tried to disregard Donald Trump absurdities this month, but it’s impossible. So, I included some at the end.

1. Former Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann. Bachmann dismissed Donald Trump’s comments bragging about sexually assaulting women by bizarrely claiming Hillary Clinton’s election would “lead to even more sexual assaults.” Speaking with American Pastors Network President Sam Rohrer in a radio interview, Bachmann claimed that the Clinton campaign is trying to drive a wedge among evangelicals by focusing on Trump’s “grab their pussy” tape.
 
“There’s no similarity between what Donald Trump said 11 years ago and what Bill Clinton did,” Bachmann said. “Is sexual assault against women a big issue? You bet it is. And the best thing that Christian men can do is make sure that Hillary Clinton does not become president and the best thing that Christian women can do is make sure that Hillary Clinton does not become president.” And more:
 
“Donald Trump has already released a list of only pro-life judges that he will support. Hillary Clinton will set a standard in this country that will lead to even more sexual assaults against women because she will be setting an anti-biblical agenda.”
 
Bachmann went on to claim that billionaire George Soros is looking for “ways to get into the Christian community to divide us.”
“We need to wake up and resist these lies.”
 
Leave it to the evangelicals; God endorses Trump. With that endorsement, how can he lose?
 

SEPTEMBER 2016 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

NOTE:  It seems media sorts are only interested in Donald Trump these days. As a result, it has been hard to find bonehead absurdities from other prominent figures, although I'm sure there were many that didn't get wide coverage.  Though I’d like to avoid boring Phronesis readers with yet more Trump absurdities, I couldn't help but include the following dillies. With apologies, I offer this month’s Trump-dominated selections.

1. Former Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann. Bachmann warns of an “impending apocalypse” in which godly moral principles will no longer be defended if Hillary Clinton is elected.
 
“I don't want to be melodramatic but I do want to be truthful,” the evangelical Christian said in an interview on the Christian Broadcasting Network’s “Brody File.” “I believe without a shadow of a doubt this is the last election. This is it. This is the last election.”
 
Bachmann, who advises Donald Trump on religious issues and foreign policy (go figure), explained that demographic change in the United States posed a disadvantage to Republican candidates since the country’s growing share of minority voters were more inclined to vote for Democrats.
 
“It's a math problem of demographics and a changing United States,” she said. “If you look at the numbers of people who vote and who lives in the country and who Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton want to bring in to the country, this is the last election when we even have a chance to vote for somebody who will stand up for godly moral principles. This is it.”
 
Bachmann said that if Clinton were elected, she would offer “wholesale amnesty” to undocumented immigrants “so that Republicans will never again have the chance at winning Florida or Texas” and therefore be unable to secure the White House. "She's going to change the demographics of the United States so that no Republican will ever win again," Bachmann insisted.
 
What’s absurd is her insinuation that brown people don’t stand up for “godly, moral principles, not her prediction of future doom for the white-only GOP-- an intriguing prospect, indeed.
 

AUGUST 2016 BONEHEAD ABUSRDITY OF THE MONTH

1. Republican Senator Snowball Jim Inhofe. The lunatic, Imhofe has become infamous for the ridiculous arguments he offers to deny climate change science, like tossing a snowball on the floor of the Senate in an effort to prove that the globe isn’t warming. Recently he recounted a story of his granddaughter asking him why he didn’t know anything about climate change. His response: kids are being “brainwashed.”
 
During a radio interview, Inhofe stated:
 
“You know, our kids are being brainwashed? I never forget because I was the first one back in 2002 to tell the truth about global warming stuff and all of that. And my own granddaughter came home one day and said ‘Popi . . . why is it you don’t understand global warming?’ I did some checking and Eric, the stuff that they teach our kids nowadays, you have to un-brainwash them when they get out.”
 
I’d like to think Imhofe could be “un-brainwashed” when he leaves the Congress, but his anti-science brain has not only been washed, its been dried and bleached. The saddest thing is that he and his climate-science-denying colleagues probably won’t live to see the full horrors their ignorance has wrought on the earth.
 

JULY 2016 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

 

1. U.S. Senator Ron Johnson (R-Wis), you know-- the guy who got rich (net worth over $24 million) by finding someone to support him, has a pearl of wisdom for all the working single moms out there:  If she wants to "increase her take-home pay” instead of having yet "another child out of wedlock" to increase her welfare windfall, she should instead "find someone to support her."
 
Johnson is quick to admit that he stole this incredibly sexist riff from his uber-misogynist pal, U.S. Rep. Glenn Grothman.  But some things are so awesome, that you just have to use them yourself! Some variation of this single mom marrying the government instead of a marrying real man has become a central talking point of Johnson's stump speech as he gears up for re-election 2016.  
 
As anyone who works and has kids would expect, Johnson and Grothman's modern redux of the "welfare queen" has been rated "Mostly False" by Politifact and was given "Two Pinocchios" by the Washington Post's fact checker. Why?  Because it is a ridiculous notion to suggest that when you’re a single parent, working below the poverty line, you would intentionally have another child to get more government assistance and "increase your take-home pay."  Obviously, food stamps, health care and other government assistance don't come close covering all the expenses that come with having a child and what Johnson and Grothman fail to grasp in their misleading calculations of "income," is that children actually eat and children actually get sick-- the "increased income" they're talking about comes in the form of increased benefits that all (in most cases literally) get eaten-up by the children.
 
Besides, most single women with children don't receive government assistance that we typically think of as "welfare."  And, most single women are in the workforce. Most new college graduates today are women and there are even more lady lawyers and lady doctors coming down the pike than men!  
 
Of all the statements that demonstrate that Ron Johnson doesn't live in the same world as the rest of us, this one really takes the cake.  Of course, what would we expect from someone who has never had to worry about job security and making ends meet, as he coos from the protective cocoon that his wife's wealthy family has built for him? 
 

JUNE 2016 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

 
1. Linda Storm, Chairwoman of the Delta County (Colorado) Republican Party. On her facebook page, Sorenson had the absurd, racist wisdom to share the following John Frank Pelicano’s photo.

I thought this was the kind of thing Republicans talk about behind closed doors, but going public? The Delta Country Republican Central Committee jumped into action blaming the posting on hackers, saying :
 
“This whole thing is a hoax. Someone got into the Facebook somehow,” said Vic Ullrey, vice chairman of the committee. “It was hacked and somebody got into it, definitely . . . someone trying “to damage the Republican Party, no doubt…. Just to make us look bad”
 
They went on to point fingers at Media Matters. Damn liberal media! Sorenson, however, told a different story to Jason Salzman, who broke the story of the shared meme on his blog, Bigmedia.org, last week, telling him the post was a joke, and, “I really don’t care if people are offended by it.”
 
Sorenson, who has been the chairwoman of the DCRCC for 4 years, seems a prime candidate for Trump’s running mate. Birds of a feather.
 

MAY 2016 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

 
NOTE: I’ve been in Italy for the month of May, so this month’s absurdities are being posted a bit late.  Despite my Italian preoccupation, I was still able to find some worthy candidates.
 
1. GOP Representative Louie Gohmert. America's Dumbest Congressman is still alive. We hadn't heard from him in a while, so I was worried we were going to find his corpse in a snowy parking lot somewhere, his tongue still firmly frozen to a lamppost.
 
Last month on “Washington Watch,” Gohmert railed against “the hate crimes by this administration” against conservative Christians, such as the nuns of the Little Sisters of the Poor. "Washington Watch" is a program of the Tony Perkins hate group Family Research Council, and yes Republicans still continue to genuflect to the hate group leader because it's the right kind of hate group. The kind that will host America's Dumbest Congressman to fret about how this administration is rounding up Christians and, hell if I know, taking their good Christian ammo. He's not exactly the most coherent of our legislators.
 
The two also blasted an Obama administration's effort to fight hate crimes directed at Muslim-Americans. Gohmert dismissed concerns about such hate crimes while saying that the White House is ignoring crimes against Christians and Jews throughout the world because “we have a United States leadership that will not protect Christians [and] puts a real prize on protecting Muslims.”
 
For those of you who don't remember, our primary purpose in highlighting the stylings of America's Dumbest Congressman is to point out that this person is actually in charge of writing our nation's laws. And he, like a great many of his compatriots, is a stone-cold moron. A lunatic. A crackpot. A man who in any other country would likely have to be content holding up badly spelled rants on cardboard signs--but in America we elect these people to Congress, apparently because states like Texas think it’s funny.
 
The congressman then quoted from the book of Hosea to suggest that America is facing God’s wrath because “nations are made to account when they put leaders in place that persecute those who are trying to follow the words of God.”
 
It’s always fun to look in on Rep. Louie Gohmert from time to time to make sure he is not sticking forks in wall outlets or trying to swallow one of his own socks. Phronesis will continue to watch over him as best we can, at least until the eventual Republican nominee declares him their vice presidential pick. After that, he's their problem.
 

APRIL 2016 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

 

I decided to organize this month’s absurdities around the theme of women’s rights, which have come under frequent attack during the current GOP presidential campaign season. Lest you think we’ve made notable progress on women’s rights, take a look at the following:

 
1. New Hampshire Republican Representatives Josh Moore and Al Baldasaro. Moore and Baldasaro support a bill in the state legislature that would make it a misdemeanor for women to purposely expose their nipples publicly without regard to whether it might offend or alarm someone. Noting that it had only male sponsors, Democratic representative Amanda Bouldin, strongly condemned the bill, which brought crude comments from Moore and Baldasaro on Facebook.
 
Moore, a co-sponsor of the bill, wrote that women who want to expose their breasts should have no problem with a man’s inclination to stare at it and “grab it.”
 
Baldasaro chimed in to disparage Bouldin’s appearance:
 
“No disrespect, but your nipple would be the last one I would want to see… “You want to turn our family beach’s (sic) into a pervert show?”
 
Public outrage forced Moore to withdraw his name from the bill, but Baldasaro was not to be deterred. He accused Bouldin of trying to quash free speech, saying:
 
“We have a constitution… It’s there for a reason, and I’ll never be silent.”
 
No comment necessary.
 

MARCH 2016 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

1. Rock and Roller Ted Nugent. I’m used to Nugent’s angry screeds against liberals, but his latest outburst against American Jews ramps his hate up a notch. On his Facebook page, Nugent posted a graphic which pointed to American Jews as being responsible for the push for more gun regulations in the United States.  Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan A. Greenblatt was quick to respond:
 
“Ted Nugent has a long history of being an equal opportunity offender. But his latest share on Facebook, making the outrageous suggestion that Jews are behind gun control, is nothing short of conspiratorial anti-Semitism. Regardless of one’s views on gun control, this kind of scapegoating of an entire religious group is completely unacceptable and completely divorced from reality.”
 
It should go without saying that anti-Semitism has no place in the gun control debate. Nugent should be ashamed for promoting anti-Semitic content, and we hope that good people on both sides of the gun control debate will reject his tactics and his message. We hope that Nugent will have the good sense to remove this share immediately so that it does not spread virally across the internet. No chance!
 
Not only did Nugent refuse to remove the graphic, he doubled down:
 
“Just when you thought that mankind couldn’t possibly get any dumber or more dishonest, superFreaks rise to the occasion. What sort of racist prejudiced POS could possibly not know that Jews for gun control are Nazis in disguise? "NEVER AGAIN!" Anyone? Anyone?? RUFKM! The founder of Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership called me his 2nd Amendment/Freedom hero. The NEVER AGAIN battle cry was universally embraced by all good people who will make sure another Holocaust never happens again. Freaks have plummeted to whole new low. Plummet on punks. Plummet on. Meanwhile I adjust my yamika at my barmitzva playing my kosher guitar. My dad killed Nazis & saved Jews in WWII. Eat me.”
 
Ted Nugent has been on the board of the National Rifle Association since 1995.
 

FEBRUARY 2016 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

1. Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott. After the US Supreme Court struck down Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act, Abbott wasted little time in filing a brief to re-institute the state’s discriminatory redistricting plan, the same plan the Supreme Court had ruled as unconstitutional. When US Attorney General Eric Holder denied Abbott’s request, Texas filed a lawsuit under Section 2 basing its claim on the following arguments. Give Texas credit for honesty. From the filed brief:
 
DOJ’s accusations of racial discrimination are baseless. In 2011, both houses of the Texas Legislature were controlled by large Republican majorities, and their redistricting decisions were designed to increase the Republican Party’s electoral prospects at the expense of the Democrats....The redistricting decisions of which DOJ complains were motivated by partisan rather than racial considerations, and the plaintiffs and DOJ have zero evidence to prove the contrary. It is perfectly constitutional for a Republican-controlled legislature to make partisan districting decisions, even if there are incidental effects on minority voters who support Democratic candidates.
 
You know, having them actually come right out and say it--that they wanted to restrict potential Democratic voters--is long overdue. But wait!  There's more. To address the actual accusations of racial bias and discrimination, Texas is using the argument that "Yeah, there may be an isolated incident or two, but it's NOTHING like it was in 1965".  
 
Texas claims that even if it did discriminate, and it stresses that it did not, it was nothing as bad as “the ‘pervasive,’ ‘flagrant,’ ‘widespread,’ and ‘rampant’ discrimination that originally justified preclearance in 1965.”
 
So as long as Texas skies aren’t alight with flames from burning crosses, what’s the big whoop? So, Texas is arguing that Section 2, and in fact the entire reasons for preclearance are all based on conditions in 1965.  And that since "things are better than in 1965" then Section 2 is null and void. Better than 1965? With Texas strict registration rules disenfranchising an estimated nearly one million voters in the 2014 election, this assertion is highly questionable. The only thing lacking is a literacy test.
 

JANUARY 2016 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

 

1. House Speaker Paul Ryan. The new House Speaker, who insists on lots of family time for himself, explained his opposition to paid family leave for other people:

"I don't think people asked me to be speaker so I can take more money from hardworking taxpayers to create some new federal entitlement. But I think people want to have members of Congress that represent them, that are like them," Ryan said. "Don't you want your member of Congress to be a citizen legislator who lives with you, among you, who has your own kinds of concerns, who wants to spend time with his children on Saturdays and Sundays? "That I think is what most people want in their life, a balance. So if you're asking me because I want to continue being the best dad and husband and speaker I can be — getting that work-life balance correct — means I should sign up for some new unfunded entitlement, that doesn't make any sense to me."

He doesn't want to take money from hardworking taxpayers ... to give those hardworking taxpayers paid leave if they have a child or need to care for a sick family member. He opposes an unfunded entitlement ... except that "unfunded entitlement" is, in California for instance, actually a small payroll deduction that's helped 1.8 million Californians take paid leave, 90 percent of them to care for a new baby, over the law's first decade, without hurting businesses or killing jobs.

In short, Paul Ryan does not care about the facts. He cares about spending time with his family while standing in the way of you doing the same. He has a job that lets him make that kind of demand, and if you're not so lucky and powerful, screw you. Basic rights for you—the kind of thing that three American states and virtually every other country on earth can somehow provide—can be boiled down to meaningless Republican buzzwords for "no."

DECEMBER 2015 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

1. Colorado State Republican Representative JoAnn Windholz. Windholz issued a statement on the Colorado Springs Planned Parenthood attack that left 3 dead and 9 wounded last week. The Colorado Independent published her jaw-dropping statement:​
 
“The freedoms we enjoy in the United States include those that were made up to fit the audience and unsubstantiated numerical support, specifically the right to an abortion. When a violent act happens at a Planned Parenthood (pph) facility (most recent in Colorado Springs) the left goes on “auto-pilot” blaming everyone in sight when they should be looking in a mirror. Free Speech has brought to light the insidious selling of baby body parts (PPH has no shame). These facts and overall mission of the abortion industry would easily send anyone over the hill who wasn’t rational.”
 
Oh, but wait—there’s more. Rep. Windholz was just getting started:
 
“Violence is never the answer, but we must start pointing out who is the real culprit. The true instigator of this violence and all violence at any Planned Parenthood facility is Planned Parenthood themselves. Violence begets violence. So Planned Parenthood: YOU STOP THE VIOLENCE INSIDE YOUR WALLS.”
 
Blaming an organization that provides vital legal and medical services to women, including abortions (3 % of its funding), and circulating false information about what PPH does, has become the stock in trade for far-right conservatives. They have no qualms about making up facts to push their sick notions. Worse, though, are the gullible people who believe their lies.
 
Windholz won her seat in 2014 by only 106 votes. Let us hope her outrageous statement will seal her electoral doom.  The full statement from Rep. Windholz can be read at the Colorado Independent.
 

NOVEMBER 2015 BONEHEAD ABSURDITY OF THE MONTH

1. Rush Limbaugh. Leave it to Mr. Bombastic to link the discovery of water on Mars to his anti-climate science agenda. In true Limbaughian bombast, he said on this radio show:
 
“What's the big deal about flowing water on Mars?” . . . “You know what, when they start selling iPhones on Mars, that's when it'll matter to me.”
 
Limbaugh said he knew what they would do with the news:
 
“. . . look at the temperature data, that has been reported by NASA, has been made up, it's fraudulent for however many years, there isn't any warming, there hasn't been for 18.5 years. And yet, they're lying about it. They're just making up the amount of ice in the North and South Poles, they're making up the temperatures, they're lying and making up false charts and so forth. So what's to stop them from making up something that happened on Mars that will help advance their left-wing agenda on this planet?”
 
This vile, hate-filled blowhard has probably caused more harm to a warm and friendly America than any other individual. It’s sad that so many people still listen to him.