Michele Bachmann - You Must Be Stupid, Stupid, Stupid (Or Not?)

If you are a John Grisham fan, you are likely familiar with the quote "you must be stupid, stupid, stupid" from The Runaway Jury.

If you read my site you also know that I have been highly critical of Michele Bachmann's political positions because she seems to just make shit up.

Dr. Paul Joseph Goebbels (29 October 1897 – 1 May 1945) was Adolf Hitler's Propaganda Minister in Nazi Germany. He also served as Chancellor for one day, following Hitler's death. He was known for his zealous and energetic oratory and virulent anti-Semitism. He is often credited with saying (although there are no proven allocations of the lines):

 If you repeat a lie often enough, it becomes the truth. // If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. // If you repeat a lie often enough, people will believe it. // If you repeat a lie long enough, it becomes truth. // If you repeat a lie many times, people are bound to start believing it.

Michele Bachmann must be a fan of Goebbels. Just say something enough times and it must be true.

 But at least one person, a high school student no less, is calling her on her lies. In his Article "Michele Bachmann's Stance on Evolution Demolished by High School Student" Michael Zimmerman calls out Michele Bachman to meet the high schooler's challenge.

 "What most don't know, though, is that her educational policies are being challenged by an amazing high school student from Baton Rouge, La. You should get to know this student, Zack Kopplin, and his efforts because he's likely to make a difference.

I've written about Zack previously because both his story and his commitment are incredibly impressive. As I first noted, he recently began an effort to repeal an atrocious stealth-creationism law in Louisiana. The law, the Louisiana Science Education Act of 2008, encourages attacks on evolution to be taught in Louisiana's public schools under the banner of critical thinking. This is the only state law of its sort in the country and, as Zack so well points out, Louisiana students interested in science are being done a huge disservice by its very existence.

Zack hasn't been content to simply complain about an educationally irresponsible law, however. His organizational skills have been nothing short of phenomenal and he's gathered a collection of supporters second to none. His repeal effort has been endorsed by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the largest general science organization in the world with over 10 million members; the National Association of Biology Teachers, the country's main organization for biological educators; The Clergy Letter Project, an organization of more than 14,000 clergy and scientists recognizing that religion and science need not be in conflict; as well as a host of other scientific groups including the American Institute for Biological Sciences, The American Society for Cell Biology, the Society for the Study of Evolution, The Society of Vertebrate Paleontology and The American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. Additionally, the New Orleans City Council voted unanimously to support the repeal.

Zack's work didn't stop there. He wrote a petition that was adopted as Change.org's featured one of the week where it has amassed more than 65,000 supporters. And, as I reported in April, in his most extraordinary effort, he collected the endorsement of 43 individuals who won a Nobel Prize in science.

Which brings me back to Michele Bachmann. Not only is Bachmann a fan of creationism and its anti-intellectual offshoot, intelligent design, she's made some outlandish claims about the pseudoscientific subject. For example, she's asserted, "there is a controversy among scientists about whether evolution is a fact ... hundreds and hundreds of scientists, many of them holding Nobel prizes, believe in intelligent design."

Zack has now challenged Bachmann on her claims. Using a poker analogy and the huge number of scientists who have endorsed evolution, in general, and his repeal effort, in particular, Zack has written, "Congresswoman Bachmann, I see your 'hundreds' of scientists, and raise you millions of scientists."

Given the strength of the hand he has, he doesn't stop there.

For the next hand, I raise you 43 Nobel Laureate scientists. That's right: 43 Nobel Laureate scientists have endorsed our effort to repeal Louisiana's creationism law. ... Congresswoman Bachmann, you claim that Nobel Laureates support creationism. Show me your hand. If you want to be taken seriously by voters while you run for President, back up your claims with facts. Can you match 43 Nobel Laureates, or do you fold?

It would be difficult for someone with a sincere interest in science education not to take Zack Kopplin's challenge seriously. Having said that, I fully expect that Michele Bachmann will completely ignore Zack, the voice of the scientific community, the combined pleas of 43 Nobel scientists and thousands of religious leaders.

Michele Bachmannn you must just be stupid, stupid, stupid. Or perhaps, like Goebbels you just believe if you lie enough then people will accept it as true.
What may even be worse is that you have been outsmarted by Zack, a high school kid.  Education is not dead in American, but Michele Bachmann would like to kill it.  Perhaps Bachmann is more like Goebbels, who according to Otto Ohlendorf:

Goebbels considered humans as objects to be used for political purposes - for the moment.

Does Bachmann really believe all the lies she tells or is she just using "humans as objects to be used for political purposes - for the moment."  Her only objective to be President, truth be damned.

No?  What about these great statements:

• ''Carbon dioxide is portrayed as harmful. But there isn't even one study that can be produced that shows that carbon dioxide is a harmful gas.''
• “But we also know that the very founders that wrote those documents worked tirelessly until slavery was no more in the United States.” (Note, many of the founders owned slaves and never fought for their elimination)
• ''Not all cultures are equal.'' (Sounds dangerously like Goebbells)
• “Unelected bureaucracies will decide what we can and can't get in future health insurance policy. That's why they are called death panels."
• ''This cannot pass. What we have to do today is make a covenant, to slit our wrists, be blood brothers on this thing. This will not pass. We will do whatever it takes to make sure this doesn't pass.'' (Perhaps she was in the same coven as that lunatic from Delaware)
• ''If we took away the minimum wage — if conceivably it was gone — we could potentially virtually wipe out unemployment completely because we would be able to offer jobs at whatever level.'' (Didn't she just complain about slavery?  I guess getting paid nothing (or little to nothing) for work doesn't count because you need it to feed your starving children.)
• ''Normalization (of gayness) through desensitization. Very effective way to do this with a bunch of second graders, is take a picture of 'The Lion King' for instance, and a teacher might say, 'Do you know that the music for this movie was written by a gay man?' The message is: I'm better at what I do, because I'm gay.''
• ''I don't know where they're going to get all this money because we're running out of rich people in this country.''
• ''I find it interesting that it was back in the 1970s that the swine flu broke out under another, then under another Democrat president, Jimmy Carter. I'm not blaming this on President Obama, I just think it's an interesting coincidence.''
• “The big thing we are working on now is the global warming hoax. Its all voodoo, nonsense, hokum, a hoax.”
• “I just take the Bible for what it is, I guess, and recognize that I am not a scientist, not trained to be a scientist. I'm not a deep thinker on all of this. I wish I was. I wish I was more knowledgeable, but I'm not a scientist.”

Yes Michele we wish you were a deep thinker or at least took time to think before you just make shit up.  And perhaps you should rethink your positions on some issues.  Bachmann has called for phasing out of Social Security and Medicare.  Bachmann says in dealing with Iran, diplomacy "is our option", but that other options, including a nuclear strike, shouldn't be taken off the table.

Is this someone you want as your President? 

Michele Bachmann - You Must Be Stupid, Stupid, Stupid.