Paul Revere by Cyrus Dallin, North End, Boston

~~~

~~~

Thursday, November 5, 2015

The Wall Street Journal...



...that bastion of Liberal ideas (NOT) called out Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson Thursday for wrongly claiming the Founding Fathers "had no elected office experience." In a Facebook post late Wednesday, Carson wrote: "Every signer of the Declaration of Independence had no elected office experience...What they had was a deep belief that freedom is a gift from God."


The Journal pointed out the historical inaccuracy Thursday. Thomas Jefferson, Sam Adams, John Hancock and many other signer of the Declaration of Independence all held elected seats in colonial assemblies, Benjamin Carp, an associate history professor at Brooklyn College, told the paper. 



Another example of Kindly Dr. Carson not knowing what the hell he's talking about.

But that doesn't matter to his fans because he's a Republican Blah! and that means they're not racist!


9 comments:

Les Carpenter said...

He's Christian with a devout belief in the mystical so knowledge of actual historical fact or evolutionary truth is of little importance to him or his supporters.

To Dr. Ben and his flock we're being used by Satan in the struggle against conservative and fundamentalist righteousness.

We are in deep sh*t should either Dr. Ben or the Donald get elected to the presidency. Our nation can't be that stupid; or can it?

Dave Miller said...

Along with the story of where the pyramids of Egypt came from, this just further shows why some people should not be president.

And when given a chance to say he was wrong before, he has changed his mind, or his thinking has evolved, Carson doubled down on his errors in thinking, or stupidity.

These are not errors in expressions, as candidate Obama made in his famous 57 states mistake, rather, these are factually significant errors, showing a basic lack of knowledge we should expect in our presidents.

Dave Miller said...

More on Carson, from Kareem Abdul Jabbar, yes a former basketball player, but as of late, a respected historian and author...

"Although Carson is a celebrated physician, he has expressed several opinions that are contrary to scientific evidence and therefore call into question his logic—a quality crucial in a president. His claim that sexual orientation is a choice is remarkably unscientific. He has argued that “a lot of people” in prison change their sexual orientation. As many people have pointed out, sexual behavior is not the same as orientation. Plus, studies indicate the most significant causes of sexual orientation are genetics and in utero hormonal exposure. According to the American Psychological Association, “most people experience little or no sense of choice about their sexual orientation.” For a physician to ignore the preponderance of scientific proof in favor of his own religious beliefs is dangerous because is it justifies enacting laws that restrict human and civil rights. Carson has since apologized, but we should never forget that pseudo-science was used to prove blacks were physically and mentally inferior to whites and to justify slavery."

Kareem

Anonymous said...

Rather then denigrating the right wing candidates would we progressives be better served extolling the attributes of Hillary Clinton?
No one on this blog would ever pull the lever for a rebubliturd so it seems we are doing a disservice to ourselves by not reminding each other why we are in lock step support of Hillary Clinton.

Shaw Kenawe said...

Anonymous, you sound like a concern troll. First of all reporting on what the Republican candidates say is not "denigrating" them, it's passing along information on their positions and their ideas.

Also, this blog is NOT in "lock step" in support of Hillary Clinton.

Shaw Kenawe said...

Dave, I read that statement from Abdul Jabbar. Dr. Carson's supporters contend that when the opposition writes about his strange ideas and statements, that means we're "scared" of him.

In a way, they're correct. We're "scared" that his supporters are so uninformed that they believe what Dr. Carson says makes sense. It would be very dangerous to have as president a man who, as RN pointed out, adheres to mysticism and not facts.

Remember when Mr. Obama was a presidential candidate and the opposition clamored about his not having any executive experience? How the opposition held up Sarah Palin as a far more experienced candidate than Obama because she was a one-time mayor of a village and a half-term governor of Alaska? Where are these people now? Dr. Carson has zero experience in government and yet this time around the opposition isn't bothered by that.

Shaw Kenawe said...

From Forbes Magazine on another one of Dr. Carson's nonsensical statements:

Archaeologists To Ben Carson: Ancient Egyptians Wrote Down Why The Pyramids Were Built

"Just to be clear, no scientists think that aliens built the pyramids. There is a small but vocal contingent of people who believe in pseudoarchaeological explanations, but archaeologists have dismantled those harebrained theories at every possible turn. (See, for example, my piece, “What Archaeologists Really Think about Ancient Aliens, Lost Colonies, and Fingerprints of the Gods.”) So while it may look good for Carson to deny alien involvement in pyramid building, he also attributes them to some dude who may or may not have existed rather than, well, the ancient Egyptians."


[skip]

"As a Seventh-Day Adventist, Carson appears to subscribe to the idea that the book of Genesis is literal history. And therefore that the Joseph of the Old Testament, who was sold into slavery in Egypt, built the pyramids to store grain during the seven years of abundance mentioned in Genesis. As Carson specifically said in the 1998 talk, “My own personal theory is that Joseph built the pyramids in order to store grain.”

[skip]

"It might be nice to think that Carson has learned since his talk, nearly two decades ago, more about the ancient Egyptian civilization. But no; Carson affirmed this belief in Joseph and his amazing technicolor grain silo to CBS News last night, doubling down on a profound, willful ignorance of science."


Old saying advice to Dr. Carson:

"It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt."

Infidel753 said...

Anon 2:21: It's not yet a foregone conclusion that Hillary will be the Democratic nominee, though that's the most likely possibility. Also, since some voters will have reservations about the Democratic nominee whoever it is, it's valuable to point out that the Republican alternatives are all far worse.

Anonymous said...

"In the end, does it really matter what Carson thinks about the Egyptian pyramids? There will always be science deniers, there will always be people swayed by pseudoarchaeology, and there will always be people who believe what they want no matter the facts. It does matter, though, because Carson is vying for the job of representing the United States. So it matters that Carson casually rejects hundreds of years’ worth of research because in denying science, he throws the U.S. back into the past. It matters that he brazenly denies the Egyptian people their rightful history because this marginalizes an entire culture and makes the U.S. look like an ignorant bully."