An astronomy professor who sued the University of Kentucky after claiming he lost out on a top job because of his Christian beliefs reached a settlement Tuesday with the school.
The university agreed to pay $125,000 to Martin Gaskell in exchange for dropping a federal religious discrimination suit he filed in Lexington in 2009. A trial was set for next month.
Gaskell claimed he was passed over to be director of UK’s MacAdam Student Observatory because of his religion and statements that were perceived to be critical of evolution.
Court records showed Gaskell was a front-runner for the job, but some professors called him “something close to a creationist” and “potentially evangelical” in interoffice e-mails to other university scientists.
“We never thought from the start that everybody at UK was some sort of anti-religious bigot,” said Frank Manion, Gaskell’s attorney. “However, what I do think this case disclosed is a kind of endemic, almost knee-jerk reaction in academia towards people, especially scientists, of a strong religious faith.”
A statement from University of Kentucky counsel Barbara Jones Tuesday said the school’s “hiring processes were and are fundamentally sound and were followed in this case.” The university does not admit any wrongdoing.
[…]After applying for the job in 2007, Gaskell said he learned from a friend at UK that professors had discussed his purported religious views. E-mails turned over as evidence in the case showed that university scientists wondered if Gaskell’s faith would interfere with the job, which included public outreach and education.
One astrophysics professor at UK told department chair Michael Cavagnero in an e-mail that hiring Gaskell would be a “huge public relations mistake.”
[…]Manion said documents and e-mail communications turned over by UK in the case showed strong evidence of religious bias, including a professor who surmised that Gaskell was “potentially evangelical.”
“The fact that somebody could say that without realizing the implications, speaks volumes,” Manion said. “Because all you have to do is substitute any other label – potentially Jewish, potentially Muslim. Nobody would say that.”
I think we should definitely de-fund these universities, put the money into the hands of taxpayers, and let the taxpayers decide where to send their children to college – or WHETHER to send their children to college.
Here’s Zach Osler, a friend of the Tucson murderer.
That’s an Associated Press video.
Transcript excerpt:
“There was a lot of talk about lucid dreaming and understanding reality. . . . And there were a lot of books and movies . . . things that I never would have heard about or watched — things like Loose Change about the 9/11 conspiracy . . . He watched things like that. . . . He had basically nothing going for him, and I think he just couldn’t deal with reality anymore. . . . I know that he was experimenting with the drug, or herb or whatever it is, salvia divinorum. And from what I hear, he used it quite frequently. . . . It’s like a hallucinogenic type of effect.”
Loughner, now 22, would come over several times a week from 2007 to 2008, the Oslers said.
The boys listened to the heavy-metal band Slipknot and progressive rockers the Mars Volta, studied the form of meditative movement called tai chi and watched and discussed movies.
Loughner’s favorites included little-known conspiracy theory documentaries such as “Zeitgeist” and “Loose Change” as well as bigger studio productions with cult followings and themes of brainwashing, science fiction and altered states of consciousness, including “Donnie Darko” and “A Scanner Darkly.” . . .
Roxanne Osler [said]: “Jared struck me as a young man who craved attention and acceptance.”
This segment has been called “The Da Vinci Code on steroids.” Toward the end, the narrator says, “Christianity, along with all other theistic belief systems, is the fraud of the age. It serves to detach the species from the natural world and likewise, from each other. It supports blind submission to authority. It reduces human responsibility to the effect that God controls everything.”
PART II: 9/11 Was a Conspiracy
Not much to say here. You’ve seen one 9/11 “Truther” documentary, you’ve seen ‘em all. But the guys at Loose Change can’t sue for copyright infringement because, hey, it’s a “documentary,” and you can’t copyright crazy.
PART III: TOTAL FREAKING KOOKINESS!
This is the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test of Zeitgeist where, if you’ve gone along with the Jesus-Was-a-Myth stuff and the 9/11-Was-a-U.S.-Plot stuff, you’re going to find yourself throbbing helplessly in spasms of conspiratorial ecstasy, covered in kook-splooge. The U.S. government and “international bankers” scheme behind the scenes to control every damned thing in the world — and plant computer chips in your brain, to boot!
Guess who liked Zeitgeist? Jared Loughner. He liked Zeitgeist a whole lot.
Does Zeitgeist sound like right-wing Tea Party material? It’s an atheistic, anti-American, anti-capitalist movie. And that’s what Jared believed. That’s why he favorited flag-burning videos. He is the complete opposite of a Tea Party conservative.
I wonder why the left-wing mainstream news media isn’t reporting on what Jared’s friends are saying about his views?
In fact, I wonder what the left-wing media thinks of Zeitgeist? I wonder what the left-wing media thinks of Loose Change? I wonder what the left-wing media thinks of capitalism? I wonder what the left-wing media thinks on the war against Islamic extremism? I wonder what the left-wing media thinks of American exceptionalism? I wonder what the left-wing media thinks of Christian theism?
Can they afford to tell the truth about this story?
The point is that there’s room in a democracy for people who ridicule and denounce those who disagree with them; there isn’t any place for eliminationist rhetoric, for suggestions that those on the other side of a debate must be removed from that debate by whatever means necessary.
And it’s the saturation of our political discourse — and especially our airwaves — with eliminationist rhetoric that lies behind the rising tide of violence.
Where’s that toxic rhetoric coming from? Let’s not make a false pretense of balance: it’s coming, overwhelmingly, from the right. It’s hard to imagine a Democratic member of Congress urging constituents to be “armed and dangerous” without being ostracized; but Representative Michele Bachmann, who did just that, is a rising star in the G.O.P.
So what he is saying is that Michele Bachmann wants conservatives to arm themselves and eliminate their opponents violently. This was in the New York Times.
So, let’s take a look at what Michele Bachmann actually said.
Transcript:
Really now in Washington, I’m a foreign correspondent behind enemy lines. And I try to let everyone back here in Minnesota know exactly the nefarious activities that are taking place in Washington.
But you can get all the latest information on this event. This is a must-go-to event with [the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s] Chris Horner. People will learn. It will be fascinating.
We met with Chris Horner last week, 20 members of Congress. It takes a lot to wow members of Congress after a while. This wows them.
And I am going to have materials for people when they leave. I want people in Minnesota armed and dangerous on this issue of the energy tax: because we need to fight back.
Thomas Jefferson told us, “Having a revolution every now and then is a good thing.” And we the people are going to have to fight back hard if we’re not going to lose our country.
And I think this has the potential of changing the dynamic of changing freedom forever in the United States. And that’s why I want everyone to come out and hear [Chris Horner]. So go to Bachmann.house.gov and you can get all [of] the information.
See, in context, it’s quite clear that by armed, she means armed with material from Chris Horner on energy taxes (e.g. – the cap and trade bill) and by dangerous she means winning arguments using “all the information”.
If you do a search for “armed and dangerous” and “michele bachmann”, you will find that everybody and their mother on the left is taking the quote out of context in order to smear Michele Bachmann. And I hope that will be a lesson to you about dealing with the claims of people on the left. They hear these things on talk radio or MSNBC and they take them uncritically.
Here is a rule of thumb: any time a liberal quotes a fragment of a sentence, or, as in this case, a three-word phrase, a red flag should go up. When liberals quote sentence fragments, they are usually misleading when they aren’t out-and-out fabricated.
My guess is that Krugman has no idea when Michele referred to being “armed and dangerous,” or why, or what the rest of the sentence was. Krugman’s biggest problem isn’t that he is stupid. His biggest problem is that he is lazy. He is incapable of doing even the most rudimentary research, which is why his columns rarely contain many facts, and when they do, his “facts” are often wrong.
As it happens, I–unlike Krugman–know all about Michele’s “armed and dangerous” quote, because she said it in an interview with Brian Ward and me, on our radio show. It was on March 21, 2009. The subject was the Obama administration’s cap and trade proposal. Michele organized a couple of informational meetings in her district with an expert on global warming and cap and trade, and she came on our show to promote those meetings. She wanted her constituents to be armed with information on cap and trade so that they would understand how unnecessary, and how damaging to our economy, the Obama administration’s proposal was. That would make them dangerous to the administration’s left-wing plans.
The interview illustrates quite well the difference between Michele Bachmann and Paul Krugman. Krugman is a vicious hater. He rarely argues any issue on the merits, but prefers to smear those who disagree with him. Bachmann is infinitely better informed than Krugman. All she wants to do is debate her opponents on the facts. Unlike Krugman, she doesn’t hate anyone; her irrepressible good humor is considered a marvel by everyone who knows her.
You can listen to the whole interview at that post on Powerline. I do occasionally listen to the Northern Alliance Radio show.
Is Paul Krugman civil with his opponents?
Of course not!
He writes:
A message to progressives: By all means, hang Senator Joe Lieberman in effigy.
This is the first sentence in one of his New York Times columns. I put the link for context, so you can check it out yourself. If I were a leftist journalist, I would have left out the “in effigy” and then spread all over the Internet and on MSNBC. MSNBC edits the news to suit their narrative all the time – it’s not really a news channel at all, it’s just propaganda for the far-left fringe.
Always read the New York Times with a skeptical eye.
You need to watch Fox News and listen to Hugh Hewitt
I really recommend that if any of you who are watching MSNBC and listening to NPR stop that and try an experiment. Switch to watching Special Report on Fox News at 6 PM Eastern every day for an hour. Bret Baier is fair, and you will see him do an amazing thing. The entire second half of the show is a panel discussion with people on the left present, and they get equal time. And if you can watch Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace on Sundays, you get another panel discussion with TWO leftists, usually Juan Williams and Mara Liasson – who work for NPR!!!! (Yes, I know NPR fired Juan) Neither Juan nor Mara are insane – in fact they are quite sensible leftists. Sometimes Bret will have other leftists on, but even they are not too crazy. Do you know why? Because they can’t be crazy when there are conservatives on the panel who get to hold them to account. And the conservatives can’t be crazy, either. That’s how you get the truth – each side corrects the other, and they all get along well – laughing and joking. That’s what Fox News is famous for – fair and balanced. Balanced means you get BOTH sides. Fair means both sides get equal time to talk. It’s a debate every night.
I do not recommend watching the O’Reilly Factor or even Sean Hannity, and especially not Shepherd Smith, who is a radical left wing extremist.
WINTERY KNIGHT 