Godwin's Law

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Ahh, Rick Santorum, always the voice of reason, when he's not fantasizing about man-on-dog sex, that is:

"What the Democrats are doing is the equivalent of Adolf Hitler in 1942 saying, 'I'm in Paris. How dare you invade me. How dare you bomb my city? It's mine.' This is no more the rule of the senate than it was the rule of the senate before not to filibuster."

-- Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA), quoted on the Senate floor

So, according to Usenet tradition, the discussion is over, and Rick has automatically lost.

Many people have extended Godwin's law to imply that the invoking of the Nazis as a debating tactic (in any argument not directly related to World War II or the Holocaust) automatically loses the argument, simply because the nature of these events is such that any comparison to any event less serious than genocide, ethnic cleansing or extinction is invalid and in poor taste.

What's even better is that Santorum lambasted former KKK member (that one is for you, Mark), and senior West Virginia Senator Robert Byrd for the same tactic on March 1.

As long as we're tinkering with the Senate rules, howabout we rein in the wackos in both parties? I call for the adoption of Godwin's law in the Senate, and if you don't agree with me, you're obviously a Nazi.

[via Scripting News]

Not faking it

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I stayed home from work yesterday, since I didn't feel all that great in the morning, which progressed to feeling awful by the afternoon. I made an appointment to see the doctor this morning, and after a chest x-ray in which he saw some "haziness", he thinks I've got pneumonia, but it's going to the Radiologist for confirmation. Great, just great. So, I'm at home on Doxycycline now, where I'll probably remain for the next several days, as the diagnosis pneumonia jives with what I think I've got.

The Greatest American

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The Discovery Channel is running a series about deciding who the "Greatest American" is, and we, the people get some voice in deciding. To me, it's all bogus though, as their list of nominees doesn't even include Norman Borlaug.

He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 for his work in increasing wheat yields, and is widely credited with saving more human lives than anyone else in history. I'm not talking about saving a dozen people, or saving a thousand people, or even saving a hundred thousand people. Norman Borlaug's work has probably saved the lives of more people than live in your entire state. His work is what has kept millions of people from dying of starvation worldwide.

To see that somehow Borlaug isn't even ranked in the top 100 Greatest Americans is extremely depressing. To see Borlaug left off in favor of Tom Cruise, Bret Favre, Mel Gibson, Michael Jackson, and Donald Trump makes me profoundly sad.

We, as a society, value two religious nutjob actors, a football player, a pedophile weirdo, and a slezy real estate developer more than Norman Borlaug? Where's the "culture of life" crowd now?

Did I also mention Borlaug is originally from Iowa?