RationalWiki:What is going on in the blogosphere?/July 2011

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July 2011[edit]

10

Quackery: It also evolves.

15

What drives creationism? The scientific principle of Oogity Boogity.

6

Ratings agencies are totally impartial organizations with no ulterior political or financial motives.Do You Believe That?

5

More shrillness! First it was Bobo, now Kathleen Parker has joined in the shrillfest.

12

Uncyclopedia: Successful government trolls are successful.

15

Global warming denialism ends now.

8

Get ready for a climate crank-gasm: The entire CRUTEM3 database excepting Poland has been released. (Obviously, Polish temps are the key to debunking global warming and are being suppressed.)

8

Maureen Dowd compares and contrasts the cozy relationship between British PM Gordon Brown and the "pope of Fleet Street" with the now-strained relationship between Irish Taoiseach Enda Kenny and the actual pope, whom Kenny has accused of attempting "to frustrate an inquiry (into another local church sex scandal) in a sovereign, democratic republic as little as three years ago, not three decades ago." (Video)

3

Johann Hari: The IMF should be on trial

16

Box Office Mojo takes to task the right-wing spin over the lackluster debut for Sarah Palin's hilariously titled new documentary The Undefeated.

20

Summer heat records are outpacing cold records 8 to 1. Cue the mantra of "It's not global warming...it's not global warming...it snowed a lot last winter..." Update: You fools, the heat-wave is a concoction of the liberal media!

12

Good rundown of stupid House bills, including the emergency vote (!) to defund the dreaded NPR.

13

The Onion: US concedes, Soviets win the space race.

12

Climategate-gate? Neil Wallis is implicated in helping to feed the denialist echo chamber. More: Joe Romm on Olbermann on re-opening Climategate

8

Butthurt billionaires' greatest hits.

12

Yes, ratings agencies suck at rating public debt as well as private.

17

There is a clash of civilsations, but not as usually understood

12

A free thinker is Satan's slave! Wat.

12

Does local weather affect people's opinions of climate change?

12

A petition to save the funding for the James Webb Space Telescope.

9

Worst Congress ever?

12

Creationist school appears out of nowhere. "‘I was as surprised as anyone to find myself here,’ said newly created headmaster, Dr William Jennings Bryan."

-7

60% texans suspended by the time they graduated, says study. There's a smart, ironic snark at creationist "studies" re: atheists somewhere in there, but i'm too dumb to spell it out.

19

Epic takedown of an anti-gay witness by sen. Al Franken.

7

How UK libel laws may have influenced the press' use of underhand tactics, i.e., phone hacking.

8

Obamageddon: The Novel!

5

Steve Novella looks at "nudges" for public health.

7

Justice Stephen Breyer fails at neuroscience.

5

Jan "Why there was nothing 'natural' about Stephen Gately's death" Moir quote-mines Stewart Lee to death, and Lee hits back.

9

On the Historicity of Goldilocks and the Three Bears.

13

Republican governors try to pray away the gay heat.

9

A Bloomberg gov't app lets you decide who to screw over if the debt ceiling isn't raised.

19

As a Christian, I scoff at superstitions. I leave those to non-believers. (via Ed Brayton)

10

What happened to the anti-war movement?

8

The Daily Telegraph is live-blogging the hackgate scandal; get popcorn.

5

Marcus Bachmann: possibly straight man.

15

A blog called Unequally Yoked is running an "ideological Turing test": in the first round, atheists answer questions about their beliefs honestly, and Christians answer those same questions pretending to be atheists; the second round is the reverse. The readers then vote on which entries they thought were telling the truth and which were lying. Voting for the first round is over, but you can still vote for the second, and stick around for the results!

14

That News International apology translated.

24

The lies I told as a psychic - Confessions of a former phone psychic.

9

Deficit fetishes.

18

The general trend in the retreat of arctic sea ice has been greater than predicted by most climate models, and July is already a record-setting month.

2

(Self promotion!) Forget the News of the World, Coulson and Brooks. There's a revolution to be had here.

26

Comedy site Cracked.com takes up arms versus anti-gay marriage nutters.

4

Steve Coogan and Greg Dyke lay into former News of the World hack Paul McMullen

5

Five myths about the debt ceiling.

5

How Fundamentalist Religion Is Destroying the World.

6

Thunderf00t + Bible + Westboro Baptist Church = Shouty-shouty Time!

10

In honor of The Young Turks reaching nearly half a billion video views on YouTube, have a classic clip of Cenk Uygur going fucking ballistic.

22

Get a bad review on your bullshit creationist book? Let the libel case begin...

22

Brian Cox: "...this is not a political statement, but the Iraq conflict so far has cost significantly more than a manned mission to Mars." In fact, the entire Shuttle Program cost approximately the same as the UK bank bailout, and we found the money for that.

7

Author Andrew Morantz works for a summer at an Indian call center, and learns some interesting things about Australians.

7

Britain's press and politicians enjoy a far too cosy relationship.

15

New research exposes "Big Wind" and how its windmills will blow the Earth out of its orbit.

13

Frequently bandied about statistics on income inequality receive a "mostly true" rating from PolitiFact.

8

A Royal Navy medic objects to fighting in Afghanistan, but as he is an atheist he only has a "slight political reservation, not a moral conviction".

8

Bobo, of all people, decides to get "shrill." (Update: Krugman notices the shrillness. Update II: Comment gold.)

23

You ask question about stone tablet, you no go to meatland!

10

Phil Plait explains away the "mysterious bubble in the sky" filmed by a Hawaiian observatory webcam and gets New Scientist coverage. Countdown to a fresh batch of conspiracy and UFO nutjob theories begins.

15

Richard Dawkins basically tells Rebecca Watson "You didn't get raped so stop whining". PZ Myers weighs in fairly sensibly. (oh dear fuck, someone is going to have a field day...)

13

Microevolution and macroevolution explained for more visual learners.

7

The latest facepalm-worthy homeopathy indication: Malaria

13

GOP spews more crank-onomics: Romney signs a pledge encouraging the US to default unless a balanced budget amendment is passed while Bachmann and Pawlenty go goldbug. Former Republican Senator Alan Simpson calls it "absolute bullshit."