Watcher's Hometown Fundies

Ah, Glens Falls. A land of pristine mountain vistas, sparkling natural lakes, and rich, pre-colonial history. This city is my childhood home (and, for what it's worth, Rachel Ray's).

But we have one other natural resource, in addition to perky celebrity homemakers: rednecks. Toothless, inbred, straw-hat-wearing, reed-chewing, cow-tipping rednecks. Now, most of them are too uneducated to be much of a threat, but somehow, a few have managed to get letters published in the local paper. Probably by dictating to someone literate and having them mail it in.

Here's an example, from Ron Blachut:

Regarding a story that appeared in The Post-Star on Dec. 6: "Rep. Gillibrand announces she is pregnant."

Oh boy. It always bodes well when a letter starts out like that.

First of all, I must admit that I am a male chauvinist and that there are, thankfully, differences between men and women.

Dear Post-Star readers: I am a pig who hasn't updated his values since the Van Buren administration.

There are many occupations suitable for women and their physical attributes.

Are there, Ron? Gee, that's awfully generous of you. I'm sure women everywhere will be thrilled to have your permission to pursue a career. Within your predefined limits, of course, o great one.

Carrying a weapon while serving in the Armed Forces and firefighting are not suitable lines of work for women to prove that they are physically equal to men.

Those sound like perfectly suitable lines of work if women want to prove they are physically equal to men. If a woman can do a physically demanding, traditionally male job, guess what: SHE'S PHYSICALLY EQUAL TO MEN!

How many male police officers feel comfortable with a 100 pound female backup?

I don't know, is she carrying a Glock? Does she know how to use it? Cuz that's good enough for me.

And why do you have to qualify her on size? How many police officers feel comfortable with a 100 pound man as a backup?

And now, I have to add serving in the U.S. House and Senate as an occupation that may not be suitable for women.

I know, it probably pains you to say it. But, you heard him, ladies. Ron says you can't be members of Congress anymore! Pack it in!

Ms. Gillibrand's current pregnancy makes a strong case for my opinion. Ms. Gillibrand was elected to serve her constituency, and while she is away from her elected office she cannot perform those duties.

Well, uh, no? Since the job of a representative involves splitting time between Washington and his or her district, ALL representatives spend a lot of days "away from [their] elected office."

The taxpayers who were duped into voting for her will have to pay for her medical benefits.

Yep. Just like when they had to pay for Rudy to take care of his prostate problems. So since women don't GET prostate cancer, maybe we should stop electing men?

Yes, Mr. and Mrs. Taxpayer, Ms. Gillibrand receives excellent health benefits, courtesy of her constituents. We will be without representation in Congress for a time leading up to and following the child's birth.

Cite please. Actually, let me. Apparently the Family Medical Leave Act gives Ms. Gillibrand 12 weeks of unpaid time off. And, since we're not sure exactly when the baby will be born, Congress may not even be in session during that time. Or, of course, her husband could take the leave, negating this whole problem entirely.

There will be times when she and the new baby will visit doctors. You can add those days to the total that she will not be serving her constituents.

Yeah, or, once again, her husband could take the baby. Or maybe we just shouldn't elect people who have kids, and solve this problem altogether? Don't forget people with sick or elderly relatives; they're gonna need doctor visits too, thus cutting into Ron's "taxpayer time." We aren't paying for our representatives in Congress to have a life, we're paying them to work, right Ron?

The current base salary (2006) for members of the House and Senate is $165,200 per year. I wonder if Ms. Gillibrand will do the right thing and reimburse the U.S. Treasury in the amount of $452.60, her daily salary, for each day that she is unable to perform her elected duties. For some reason, I doubt it.

Did you ever take a sick day, Ron? I'm sure you paid your boss back for it, didn't you?

You know, Ron, we could just make sure that representatives are infertile, done with children, or disinterested in having a family before we elect them. I think you should campaign for that job; you could be the official Menopause Checker of the US Congress! That way, we wouldn't waste so much of your precious money.

Scrolling down a bit, we find another doozy from another Ron, Ronald L. Cote:

Solutions to the school threat dilemma go begging. It may take extreme measures. One is to train and arm several faculty members, have armed guards to patrol classrooms and corridors.

Wow, Ron, you sure do love guns.

Another is search all students at school entrances.

Well, metal detectors might do the job less invasively. Only problem with that is they don't detect the REAL culprits: Yu-Gi-Oh cards, Qur'ans, and filthy, filthy pornography!

Most extreme is having school SWAT teams. What extreme must we take?

A SWAT team? SWAT teams are for ending crisis situations. Why you'd need one permanently assigned to a school is beyond me.

We need to heed Eric Harris’ message. He was a serious devotee and student of Darwinism.

Oh, shit, here we go...

At Columbine on that fateful day, his sweatshirt read "Natural Selection" sending a clear message of the significance of that evolutionary tenet as he and his accomplice massacred 16 people. The significance, relationship or correlation seems never to have been made between his message and the horrific act.

I know I can't make the "correlation!" Considering that natural selection has nothing to do with mowing people down indiscriminately, I don't know what your point is.

Harris and Klebold both killed themselves at the end of their massacre, thus removing the chance for their genes to be passed on and proving that evolution works just fine.

We taxpayers pay science teachers to teach evolution as fact, censoring any counter explanations for the important understanding of the origin of life.

If any science teacher is teaching evolution as "the origin of life," he or she needs to have their degree revoked. But I'm sure ol' Ronnie here, with his extensive knowledge of evolutionary biology, is well aware that evolution and "the origins of life" have nothing to do with each other.

I'm equally sure he's going to show us some fine examples of scientifically legitimate "counter explanations" that contradict evolution.

Evolution espouses no theistic involvement, religious implications are censored.

Uh, no. Evolution does not "censor" religion. Actually, evolution doesn't "do" anything, per se.

Wait, are you talking about the teaching of evolution? Because unless you'd like to have a long sit down with some federal judges, it damn well better not mention religion!

Morals, ethics and values are what the individual decides and, further, humans are no more than grown up germs with little purpose or value.

Well...yep. I mean, sure, that's a laughable oversimplification, but I see what you're trying to get at here. And as much as you don't like it, it's true. Or would you prefer to stop teaching what's true and start making up lies that are more comfortable for you? Maybe we'll teach those instead?

We are products of "natural selection" aka "survival of the fittest."

You've already demonstrated that you don't know what those terms mean. I suggest you stop trying to explain science you don't understand and crack a textbook.

For an already troubled youth, evolution equips him to despair and empowers him to decide who should survive. Life is cheap. With the handgun, one becomes the "fittest" now having power over who should "survive."

Yeah, I'm sure if we tried to teach Harris and Klebold some creationism, they wouldn't have opened fire at their high school! It would have made them perfect little angels!

Now, aside from the fact that evolution teaches no such thing, you still seem to be ignoring the fact that it's true. It doesn't matter what you think people will do with it, we don't teach things as being false because we're afraid of what people might think of them.

Do we teach holocaust denial? After all, we wouldn't want kids to get "ideas," would we?

Evolution is not the sole factor, but Eric sent a message that conveyed its impact on his actions. No one listened nor realized the destructive influence this theory can have on hungry, vulnerable minds. Ironically, we pay to have evolution taught, and the state makes it mandatory!

Yeah, we tend to make mandatory the teaching of science that's true.

There are no simple solutions to the problem, but maybe some introspection into what is taught and its effects on students is a timely and sensible beginning.

Okay, let's teach what evolution's effect on students is:

...

That was fun!

Look, what you idiots can't seem to grasp is that evolution is not prescriptive. It doesn't tell you what to do! It doesn't tell what is moral, immoral, or indifferent. It just describes what is.

By this logic, maybe we should stop teaching ANYTHING about nature. We can stop "spreading the lie" that lions eat gazelles; after all, that might teach kids that it's okay to chase down animals and kill them. We should stop teaching Huckleberry Finn because that book has racism in it and we don't want our kids to be racist.

Do you see the point here, Ron? Does your feeble brain understand the difference between saying what is and what should be?

Will someone please explain to me why I come back here to visit?