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Today’s Crazy State Winner

[ 100 ] February 22, 2013 | Erik Loomis

It’s Oklahoma, for its bill that would ban teachers from failing students if they turned in homework in biology or other classes that pushed creationist ideology.

I suspect if I start doing this every day, Oklahoma is going to win Crazy State a lot of days.

Comments (100)

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  1. Craigo says:
    February 22, 2013 at 5:25 pm

    Nothing about the Montana legislator who wants to give votes to out-of-staters who own property?

    Reply
    • Erik Loomis says:
      February 22, 2013 at 5:26 pm

      I hadn’t heard about that yet. There’s always room for the Treasure State tomorrow. Or most days.

      Reply
      • Craigo says:
        February 22, 2013 at 5:30 pm

        Alas, I see the bill was tabled today.

        Back when I would subject myself to the Economist’s comments section, there was a consensus that we should restrict the franchise to property owners (or alternatively award greater votes to the wealthy). I await the day when some legislator (R-Bumfuck) introduces that bill. Shouldn’t be long.

        Reply
        • Benjamin says:
          February 22, 2013 at 5:35 pm

          And Montana wouldn’t have to worry about losing congressmen under the 14th Amendment since they can’t drop below one.

          Reply
        • Lee Rudolph says:
          February 22, 2013 at 9:08 pm

          a consensus that we should restrict the franchise to property owners (or alternatively award greater votes to the wealthy)
          John D. Campbell promoted that in Analog editorials, once upon a time. As in so many things, he was just ahead of his time!

          Reply
          • Dave says:
            February 23, 2013 at 3:43 am

            It would simply be to end a short-lived and unsuccessful experiment in the unrestricted franchise, and return to an era of greater stability, racism, and sectional conflicts, which would make everyone happy…

            Reply
          • William Berry says:
            February 23, 2013 at 9:12 am

            Is that John W. Campbell?

            I knew a lot of the early S.F. writers were right-wingers, but I hadn’t heard that one.

            Campbell was a weird writer, also. Bizarre syntax and vocab. And, as an editor, he wanted his writers to write just like he did.

            There’s a story of his in my “Oxford Book of Science Fiction Short Stories” called “Night” that used the adjective “horrible” like three or four times in just the first few sentences!

            Reply
    • commie atheist says:
      February 22, 2013 at 6:52 pm

      Yes, Montana does seem to be in the running.

      Provision for vote by corporate property owner. (1) Subject to subsection (2), if a firm, partnership, company, or corporation owns real property within the municipality, the president, vice president, secretary, or other designee of the entity is eligible to vote in a municipal election as provided in [section 1].

      (2) The individual who is designated to vote by the entity is subject to the provisions of [section 1] and shall also provide to the election administrator documentation of the entity’s registration with the secretary of state under 35-1-217 and proof of the individual’s designation to vote on behalf of the entity.

      Reply
      • Linnaeus says:
        February 22, 2013 at 9:29 pm

        Neofeudalism marches on.

        Reply
      • Ken says:
        February 22, 2013 at 10:06 pm

        So basically, if I’m able to buy a quarter-acre lot, pay enough fees to incorporate a thousand shell corporations with me as director, and subdivide the quarter-acre among them – I get to vote a thousand times in the city election?

        Pity there’s no towns in Montana I want to take over.

        Reply
        • commie atheist says:
          February 22, 2013 at 10:18 pm

          I understand there are a large number of dental floss tycoons planning to take up residence. One pygmy pony, one vote!

          Reply
        • Ken says:
          February 22, 2013 at 11:34 pm

          And I just realized: A municipal government can grant articles of incorporation, right? So it’s only the first town where you have to pay Delaware’s $89 per incorporation – from then on its the special bulk rate you arrange with your municipal government.

          Reply
  2. Peter Hovde says:
    February 22, 2013 at 5:40 pm

    I just heard about the Montana bill authorizing sheriffs to arrest federal agents who make arrests for violation of federal gun law without clearing them with the sheriff first. Calhoun lives!

    Reply
  3. BlueLoom says:
    February 22, 2013 at 5:54 pm

    Gov. Mary Fallin (R,CrazyState) has decided to turn down the federal funding for increased Medicaid coverage in the Affordable Care Act. She has stated that most health problems of low-income Oklahomans come from smoking and obesity. She is going to use state money to fund anti-smoking and anti-obesity programs for low-income people. Tough luck if you’re the kid born with spina bifida or the woman who gets breast cancer.

    Reply
    • Incontinentia Buttocks says:
      February 22, 2013 at 6:49 pm

      Thing is, she can’t even do that, ’cause the ALEC-enhanced legislature just refused to vote out of committee the bill allowing localities to impose more strict anti-smoking measures that had been the centerpiece of her anti-smoking campaign. The GOPer leading the charge against this bill was on the radio this morning opining that the _real_ problem with smoking is that too many Oklahomans are addicted to tobacco and (somehow) local smoking laws don’t address this.

      There’s of course, an obvious Oklahoma solution here: make smoking, obesity, breast cancer, spina bifida, etc. felonies, punishable with long jail sentences!

      Reply
    • elm says:
      February 22, 2013 at 8:22 pm

      Dang, when your governor won’t even cave after Rick Scott caved, you know you have problems.

      Reply
      • LosGatosCA says:
        February 22, 2013 at 9:24 pm

        Scott only caved because he’s thinking of how he can set up the new MedicAid in Florida so he can privatize enough of it to support his post-governorship grifting requirements.

        Reply
    • wengler says:
      February 22, 2013 at 11:55 pm

      Oil-soaked Jesus tells us what to do.

      I heard Obama doesn’t like smoking or fat kids, so we are gonna start a program to get fat kids to smoke.

      Reply
  4. Karate Bearfighter says:
    February 22, 2013 at 6:00 pm

    You can read the full text of the bill here.

    I think the subsection that Erik highlights is actually the less offensive part of the bill. The bill expressly states that “subscrib[ing] to a particular position on scientific theories [does not] exempt students from learning, understanding and being tested on curriculum as prescribed by state and local education standards.” I doubt most science teachers would penalize a student who demonstrates a command of the material for expressing a religious belief. A poorly reasoned promotion of creationism that demonstrates a lack of understanding of evolutionary biology — and yeah, that’s a tautology — can still be marked down for failing to demonstrate scientific reasoning.

    If I were an Oklahoman, I’d be more concerned about the section that says a school district can’t “prohibit any teacher … from helping students understand, analyze, critique, and review in an objective manner the scientific strengths and scientific weaknesses of existing scientific theories.” That seems like an open invitation to teachers to divert limited resources and class time to creationist materials and lectures.

    Reply
  5. Jim Lynch says:
    February 22, 2013 at 6:17 pm

    Jeezuz, I know they have TV in Oklahoma. Or has the movie Inherit The Wind been banned from the airwaves?

    Reply
  6. DocAmazing says:
    February 22, 2013 at 6:32 pm

    Irony part: much of Oklahoma’s wealth as a state comes from petroleum, which is, of course, the remains of archaic animals, none of which served as mounts for Jesus.

    Reply
    • Alan Tomlinson says:
      February 22, 2013 at 6:49 pm

      Are you suggesting that Jesus had repeated sexual relations with dinosaurs, because that might upset some of the “Christians” a bit. Personally, I don’t care if he fucked goats, but mounting dinosaurs, hmm, must’ve been hung.

      Cheers,

      Alan Tomlinson
      (feeling a bit snarky tonight)

      Reply
    • cpinva says:
      February 22, 2013 at 6:50 pm

      oh sure, that’s what you want us to believe!

      “Irony part: much of Oklahoma’s wealth as a state comes from petroleum, which is, of course, the remains of archaic animals, none of which served as mounts for Jesus.”

      to deny a student credit, for expressing deeply held, personal beliefs, lacking any factual foundation, in science classes, is tantamount to religious discrimination! this is simply another, egregious example, of liberal/progressive persecution of people of faith. if jesus had had his pet t-rex with him, in the garden of gethsemane, he would have kicked those roman soldier’s asses, you betcha!

      Reply
    • NonyNony says:
      February 22, 2013 at 8:15 pm

      much of Oklahoma’s wealth as a state comes from petroleum, which is, of course, the remains of archaic animals, none of which served as mounts for Jesus.

      I’m sorry, but oil is a result of The Flood suddenly wiping out all of those plants and animals and shoving them under the muck where they turned to oil (and coal) over the course of a few hundred years.

      Which means all that garbage that liberals keep spewing about Peak Oil is a lie – all we need to do is bury a few rain forests for a few hundred years and we’ll have all of the oil we need!

      Reply
    • kgus says:
      February 23, 2013 at 3:25 am

      Sorry, but I work with a few nutters — they all subscribe to the Russian theory (although none of them knew it started in Russia) that petroleum is constantly regenerating.

      Reply
  7. somethingblue says:
    February 22, 2013 at 8:01 pm

    I suspect if I start doing this every day, Oklahoma is going to win Crazy State a lot of days.

    I was going to say that they’ll have a lot of competition from Kansas, but thinking it over, I think Oklahoma will probably do better on teh crazy. Kansans aren’t imaginative, they’re just straightforwardly mean.

    Reply
    • bw says:
      February 22, 2013 at 10:26 pm

      Funny, “straightforwardly man” rather than crazy is exactly what I think of mmany of the oklahomans I’ve enountered. Of course, my basis of comparison is Florida…

      Reply
      • bw says:
        February 22, 2013 at 10:35 pm

        Straightforwardly mean, not man. Stupid phone keyboard.

        Reply
      • wengler says:
        February 23, 2013 at 12:06 am

        Nah, crazy makes more sense. Oklahoma has a huge divide between rich and poor, and a lot of what drives policy there is rich people preserving their wealth.

        Religious ignorance is the tool that the oil rich- some of the very worst people in the world- use to blind everyone to the massive maldistribution of wealth.

        Reply
  8. Thers says:
    February 22, 2013 at 9:53 pm

    To be fair, there is very little evidence that evolution is an observable phenomenon within Oklahoma political culture.

    Reply
  9. Erik the Parrot says:
    February 22, 2013 at 10:38 pm

    SQUAAAAWK
    *whistles*

    RACE CLASS GENDER
    RACE CLASS GENDER
    RACE CLASS GENDER
    RACE CLASS GENDER
    RACE CLASS GENDER
    RACE CLASS GENDER
    RACE CLASS GENDER
    RACE CLASS GENDER
    RACE CLASS GENDER
    RACE CLASS GENDER
    RACE CLASS GENDER
    CRITICAL THEORY
    CRITICAL THEORY

    SQUAAAAWK
    *whistles*

    Reply
    • Erik Loomis says:
      February 22, 2013 at 11:01 pm

      Wait, does this have anything to do with race, class, or gender?

      Reply
      • delurking says:
        February 22, 2013 at 11:09 pm

        Silly Erik, because students have to study creationism in *class* of course.

        Reply
      • olexicon says:
        February 22, 2013 at 11:09 pm

        Forget it Erik, it’s Wingnut-town

        Reply
      • Carbon Man says:
        February 22, 2013 at 11:14 pm

        Basically this whole post is an exercise in “I thank thee, Lord Earth Goddess, that I am not as other –men androgynous LGBTLMNOP and/or polygender agender and trigender persons–Evangelicals, rednecks, white trash, hillbillies” and so on, which is ironic given your profession of ‘solidarity’ with the ‘working class’. In truth, you despise them and despise their culture.

        Reply
        • Matt T. in New Orleans says:
          February 22, 2013 at 11:20 pm

          Man, you can read all that into this post? Damn, son, you might want to see someone about that. Perhaps they’ll have pancakes.

          Reply
          • Carbon Man says:
            February 22, 2013 at 11:23 pm

            Perhaps you should look up the definition of “satire”. I know Marxists don’t really do satire, but do try to learn.

            Reply
            • Erik Loomis says:
              February 22, 2013 at 11:25 pm

              Satirical pancakes? Is the syrup also satirical?

              Reply
            • Matt T. in New Orleans says:
              February 22, 2013 at 11:33 pm

              I refuse to be schooled in “satire” by an individual who lacks a proper grasp of just what “Marxism” is. Have some poffertjes and crack a book, son.

              Reply
              • Carbon Man says:
                February 22, 2013 at 11:39 pm

                Marxism is what ruined your once-great city.

                Reply
                • Malaclypse says:
                  February 22, 2013 at 11:42 pm

                  I remember back when Ray Nagin liquidated the kulaks as a class. That, and underfunded levees at the federal level under Bush. Nagin was one powerful fucking Marxist. Dude at 12 stacks of fucking pancakes a day.

                • Matt T. in New Orleans says:
                  February 23, 2013 at 12:03 am

                  One, no, we’re not “ruined”. We hosted the Super Bowl, boy, and it takes more than a little water to wash away New Orleans. And two, it was a friggin’ hurricane and conservative indifference that nearly ruined my city. So, no, what you wrote probably isn’t “satire”.

                • Carbon Man says:
                  February 23, 2013 at 12:09 am

                  We hosted the Super Bowl

                  …and couldn’t even keep the power on in your stadium. Not exactly something to brag about.

                • Matt T. in New Orleans says:
                  February 23, 2013 at 12:18 am

                  That, apparently, was an issue between a private concern and a de-regulated utility concern, mostly the private business. Or Roger Goddall was trying to get one last insult to Saints fans before the season ended. Either way, it had nothing to do with Marxism, and I remained unconvinced that you have any sort of grasp on the subject. Seriously, waffles then book. It’d do you good.

                • Brien Jackson says:
                  February 23, 2013 at 5:32 pm

                  And, incidentally, the rest of Superbowl week apparently went so smashingly that even having the lights go out for over half an hour couldn’t keep Goodell and the flipping national football media from raving about what a great venue for the Superbowl New Orleans is for a solid week after.

                  Also heard nothing but good things from local media and fans who went down from here in Baltimore.

                • ddt says:
                  February 23, 2013 at 6:30 pm

                  On the contrary. We built this city on Marx and Roll.

            • Sly says:
              February 23, 2013 at 12:53 am

              It’s actually hard to break into the field of satire, what with all the stiff competition from wingnut satirists.

              I mean, between that one movie by David Zucker that no one bothered to see, and reruns of The Half-Hour News Hour that are stored in the flammable section of the Fox News vault, how is an aspiring satirist supposed to gain any kind of market share?

              Reply
            • Anonymous says:
              February 23, 2013 at 5:22 pm

              After reading your last post, perhaps you should figure out how the English language works.

              Reply
        • Malaclypse says:
          February 22, 2013 at 11:32 pm

          Obsessed troll is obsessed.

          Reply
        • wengler says:
          February 23, 2013 at 12:11 am

          You dope, the biggest part of redneck culture is preserving the top 15 percent rate on long-term capital gains. Republicans for life!

          Reply
        • American Tumescence says:
          February 23, 2013 at 12:13 am

          Gol-durn them Marksists, shovin’ thur “Polygender agender” down air throwts.

          Reply
        • bgn says:
          February 23, 2013 at 8:08 am

          I don’t usually respond to trolls these days but–creationism a part of white working class culture? And therefore what?–to be lovingly preserved and encouraged as one lovingly preserves and encourages bluegrass and rodeo, rather than laughed off the stage along with the other pseudo-sciences like astrology and phrenology?

          Reply
  10. Icarus Wright says:
    February 22, 2013 at 10:55 pm

    Oklahoma!

    Because.

    Reply
  11. Carbon Man says:
    February 22, 2013 at 11:24 pm

    Erik Loomis is very adept in the Frankfurt School.

    Reply
  12. Carbon Man says:
    February 22, 2013 at 11:26 pm

    BTW, Erik, have you given up your car yet?

    You should since global warming ‘climate change’ is the Greatest Disaster that Will Doom Us All, right?

    Reply
    • Erik Loomis says:
      February 22, 2013 at 11:28 pm

      Did you have a bit too much powdered sugar on your waffles?

      Reply
      • Carbon Man says:
        February 22, 2013 at 11:32 pm

        I wonder if Erik will take the following pledge? Namely:

        As a believer:
        (1) That human-caused global warming is a moral, ethical, and spiritual issue affecting our survival,

        (2) That personal energy use is a key component of overall energy use,

        (3) That reducing my fossil fuel-based personal energy usage will lead to lower greenhouse gas emissions, and

        (4) That leaders on moral issues should lead by example,

        (5) Therefore, I pledge to consume as half as much energy for my personal use than the average American household by April 22nd, 2013.

        Reply
      • MAJeff says:
        February 23, 2013 at 1:13 am

        Someone has a crush on you, Erik.

        Reply
  13. The Dark Avenger says:
    February 22, 2013 at 11:30 pm

    Carbonacious, you might want to consider what you’re asking:

    False choice

    The presentation of a false choice often reflects a deliberate attempt to eliminate the middle ground on an issue. A common argument against noise pollution laws involves a false choice. It might be argued that in New York City noise should not be regulated, because if it were, the city would drastically change in a negative way. This argument assumes that, for example, a bar must be shut down for it to not cause disturbing levels of noise after midnight. This ignores the fact that the bar could simply lower its noise levels, and/or install soundproofing structural elements to keep the noise from excessively transmitting onto others’ properties, but this is also a false choice because it ignores the fact that the noise could be emanating from the patrons outside the bar.

    Excluded middle, it’s what’s for breakfast.

    http://img2.etsystatic.com/006/0/7047263/il_fullxfull.353074438_qyg4.jpg

    Reply
  14. SatanicPanic says:
    February 23, 2013 at 12:52 am

    Isn’t this exactly the kind of everyone gets a medalism they’re always complaining about?

    Reply

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