Firestarter

Yes. And disturbing.

Here's a link to an article with a couple of excerpts from the show. Franken took that guy apart.

Anyone who can play a rural Frenchman with an upper class British accent and make it sound even vaguely plausible for so much as an instant deserves respect.

Indeed. Telling someone "you lose" or "I win" in an argument is the ultimate concession.

<passes her hand over her head and makes a "whoosh" sound>

Quiet, you. Patrick Stewart owns your soul.

Childish dogma? Unfortunately, yes. Being a thick-skulled, thin-skinned, holier-than-thou Christian is not yet grounds for banning.

My philosophy is very simple: if you love something, set it free. If it doesn't come back, hunt it down and kill it.

... People want the weirdest things.

Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah... God can never lose. Greeks who didn't believe in him invented a certain concept BUT he must have put that concept in their heads because he's the source of everything; if Jesus said something that was clearly bigoted it's obvious that he meant something entirely different because Jesus COULDN'T have been a bigot; if the Church was once a font of immorality it doesn't matter anymore because it's CHANGED, and we'll just ignore the priests who still rape children; if the Old Testament tells you to torture, murder, and enslave, well that doesn't matter anymore because there's a New Testament which replaces it BUT we still have to revere the Ten Commandments which are in the Old Testament for some insanely delusional reason I can't be bothered to even speculate about. What a reeking pile of unprovable, circular, self-justifying shit. You two are a perfect spectrum of reasons for not taking Christians seriously. You're stupid, you're ignorant, you're illogical, you're deluded, you're intractable. Your minds are made up. You aren't arguing, you're preaching. Fuck you and fuck your childish dogma. I refused to blindly suck Jesus's cock when smelly old transvestites tried to make me believe this shit, and I won't blindly accept this garbage now. If being a Catholic means acting like a two year-old sticking his fingers in his ears and yelling at the top of his lungs, "LA LA LA LA LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU LA LA LA LA LA LA I LOVE JESUS LA LA LA LA LA LA," then kindly take this post as my resignation from the Church.

Excuse me? You admit in one breath that the traditional values associated with the Judeo-Christian values are in fact derived from pre-Christian "pagan" Hellenes who worshipped Zeus and Hera, and in the next breath you say that they're founded on the religion they predate? WTF! Can we at least agree on the concept of linear time? SOMETHING MUST EXIST FOR ANOTHER THING TO BE FOUNDED ON IT. As for such values gaining "legitimacy" from their association with religion, the very idea is ridiculous. For a very long period of time Christianity denied heathens and heretics the most basic of rights, like say the right not to be tortured to death, or the right not to be burned alive screaming. It took a massive secular bitchslap to turn the Church into an even marginally moral institution. It doesn't do anything of the sort. That was an absolutely direct and absolutely immoral and unlawful command from God to Saul, which Saul disobeyed, and God punished him for it. It wasn't a "random inconsistency;" see Joshua and the Canaanites, the babies in Egypt, and countless others. Again, a revisionist lie: "I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel" references a specific group within a specific race. Jesus denied her his blessing because she was not a part of it. The facts are stark and crystal clear. Spin it as much as you like; the facts will not change.

True: "The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise." (Proverbs 51:17) But that passage does not illustrate that principle.

What revisionist feel-good nonsense. James Carville would be proud of you. But let's set the spin aside for a moment and take a look at what the Bible actually says, shall we? The Canaanite said: "Have mercy on me, O Lord, thou Son of David; my daughter is grievously vexed with a devil." Matthew 15:23-28 continues: "But he answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought him, saying, Send her away; for she crieth after us. But he answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord, help me. But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs. And she said, Truth, Lord: yet the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters' table. Then Jesus answered and said unto her, O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour." The passage clearly demonstrates that Jesus relented from his bigotry when the woman begged him further and demeaned herself before him. He wasn't testing her; he didn't say that her race wasn't worthy of him to her, he said it to his disciples. And when she importuned him a second time, he denigrated her. Only when she accepted his abuse did he change his mind. It doesn't matter what you doubt or what you believe. The simple fact is that the New Testament is internally inconsistent, as inconsistent as the Bible as a whole. Kill everyone who doesn't believe in God; butcher the idolators - but love your fellow man and turn the other cheek when struck upon the one. One person is a child, fit to eat at God's table; another is a dog, unfit even to receive the blessings of God - simply because of where she comes from. But everyone can attain the kingdom of God and no one's beyond redemption! The whole goddamn book is full of contradictions like that. You can't just hold up the garbage and pretend it's gold; some of us Christians took off our blindfolds a long, long time ago.

La de fucking da. I guess that excuses Matthew 15:22-24. The fact that he changed his mind after the Canaanite rebuked him doesn't excuse his initial racism. Even easier to use selective quotes to illustrate a demonstrably false position, it seems.

Tell that to the Amalekites. Bullshit. They were founded in ancient Greece and predate Christianity by centuries. Again, bullshit. They developed side by side but neither one was a foundation for the other.

Partially correct; uninformed nonsense nonetheless. America was based on Judeo-Christian values and Judeo-Christian cultural traditions; however, the most important of the values and traditions referenced by the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence have nothing to do with Judeo-Christian religion. There are vanishingly few instances of dogma codified as law (save for anti-homosexual laws, which can have secular foundations) and in at least one formal treaty it is explicitly stated that America neither is nor ever has been founded on the Christian religion. It is primarily through association that western concepts such as liberty, democracy, and justice were incorporated into the Judeo-Christian tradition. Oh, and if I were you, I'd shut my mouth about Islam and Hinduism unless I were prepared to get into Leviticus, original sin, fornication, and all the rest of that shit. I hate Islam at least as much as anyone else with more than two brain cells to rub together, but holding up the fucking Bible in contrast as the basis of American values is downright ridiculous. It contains more than enough immoral, dishonourable, cruel, murderous, disgusting, illogical, and fanatical sentiments to put it on the same level as the Koran.

Did notice, was going to comment about everything being Israel's fault, decided it wasn't worth the time it'd take to type, didn't. No harm done. The comment about the Palestinians was just on the side, so to speak, since Tyler seems to think he was murdered brutally and without cause, and that's the left's usual reaction to the deaths of suicide bombers as well.

Fair enough. I just take issue with Tyler's interpretation that the cameraman was somehow guaranteed absolute safety and that our soldiers committed a horrible atrocity by accidentally shooting him.

Given that it's absolutely illegal to enforce the First Commandment under any and all circumstances, I do.

All the better, I say. Franken will get more publicity, his book's sales will continue to skyrocket, and Fox will just look more and more ridiculous with every appeal they make. Can't see any downsides there.

Really. People like Tyler almost make me think Ann Coulter has a point when she says that any given liberal's first instinct under any circumstances is to attack America and support our enemies: that treason is the livelihood of the left. Doesn't matter what the facts are; if you're in the armed forces of the United States, you are physically and psychologically incapable of doing not only anything right, but anything even vaguely justified or understandable. Christ Jesus. The camera guy was in the wrong, and he got shot. People get shot in a war zone, especially if they're stupid. He isn't a goddamn martyr just because he's one of your ever so fucking precious Palestinians.

Great news. Thanks for the heads-up, JMA. Here's a more extensive CNN article on the ruling - apparently the chapter on O'Reilly is subtitled "Lying, Splotchy Bully." Since it's nothing more than the objective truth, that makes it fair and balanced in my book.

Well, wasn't that special.

Too true. "Mr Attorney General, sir, we have a problem - " "Build more jails." "Uh, sir... don't you want to know what the problem is?" "No. Build more jails."

I believe it is safe to say that this cannot happen to Tyler.