Bill Maher on "Picking Your Religion"

Smarmy Time with Bill Maher

New rule: don't put your name on a column unless you actually wrote it

Does anyone seriously believe that Bill Maher actually writes his own lame-ass columns? Whenever I see something "written" by a celebrity, politician, CEO or whatever I can't help but wonder which ghost writer or PR person actually threw it together. (Obviously there are some exceptions.)

If Maher actually is writing these columns, he should put someone else's name on them. 'Cause they suck.

Bill Maher calls for total tyranny

How in the world did Bill Maher ever come to be known as a "libertarian?"

In this video clip, Maher expresses his frustration at the few tiny scraps of freedom remaining in the United States. He is furious that Obama has not yet enacted total Stalinism. Good grief.

Bill O'Reilly's Brain and the Existence of God

I was listening to Blowhard Bill (O'Reilly) on the radio the other night (and thankfully his worthless radio show will be ending soon, sparing innocent radio dialers from hearing his moronic pronouncements accidentally, leaving only brain dead Fox "News" viewers subject to his egomania) as he discussed god. He stated that he was smarter than Bill Maher (an unbeliever) and that therefore, if you're going to base the question on intellect, God exists. Of course, if we really were to decide such a question based on what Bill O'Reilly thinks, we could safely conclude there is no god. Many highly intelligent people, by the way, believe foolish things. There are many high IQ Mormons, but that doesn't make that religion any less silly.

Religulous: Review of a Review Part 2

Part 1

Ann Rodgers, in her review of Bill Maher's new film, also brings out that old "millions killed by Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot in the name of atheism". It was Marxist-Leninist Communist ideology that killed millions, and the religion they were sacrificed to was Statism, not atheism; organized religion has never had a problem with the state when its holy men have controlled or influenced it.

His fears focus on scripture, but at no point does he interview an actual Bible scholar or theologian. Here Ms. Rodgers misses the point of this sort of film (it was directed by the same fellow who gave us Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan) it is obviously not meant to be a serious critical examination of the bible that requires interviewing scholars. Now, such a work would have its place, and perhaps someone should make that kind of film, but not Bill Maher (get serious yourself Ms. Rodgers!). As for theologians, I don't think much of them and neither should anyone else.

Dangerous distortions come from people who try to teach scripture without a background in history or ancient languages and literature. The guy who wrote "88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Be in 1988" wasn't a theologian, he was a rocket scientist. Osama bin Laden isn't a theologian, he's a civil engineer. Bill Maher isn't a theologian, he's a comedian.

Of course, one wonders then how such a book could be God's message to mankind when you have to be a learned scholar and an expert in ancient languages to understand it properly. If anything proves it isn't from any god, that does.

I do like her last sentence, though. Yes, he is a comedian. She finally got it!

Roger Ebert's Review
When one reads Bibles, one is less surprised at what the Deity knows than at what He doesn't know.
- Mark Twain

Sarah Palin and the End of the World (Ann really needs to see this per her comments quoted in part 1)


Via Debunking the Christian Right

Religulous: Review of a Review

I have not seen Bill Maher's new documentary Religulous, so you may be wondering why I'm writing this. Well, wonder away; I'll see the movie in my own good time and write what I want in the meantime.

Ann Rodgers has seen it and has some comments. She writes that Maher "uses a more fundamentalist reading of scripture than most fundamentalists do". Maybe, but that just means that most Christians don't take their religion all that seriously. Even in the United States, which remains more overtly religious than other Western nations, most people are only half-heartedly following the precepts, prohibitions and program of their respective faith. The secular culture has rubbed off on them and they love it more than their invisible god.

It's "Revelation" not "Revelations," and the vast majority of the world's Christians do not share the doomsday interpretation of it that Maher most fears. The vast majority of those who do have no desire to hasten the apocalypse she writes. I must admit I have always been puzzled by those who insist on calling it "Revelations" (the proper name for it in Catholicism is the Apocalypse) but maybe it does make a kind of sense as the John who wrote it seemed to have more than one. I agree with Jefferson that it is merely the ravings of a maniac, no more worthy nor capable of explanation than the incoherencies of our own nightly dreams. At least on first reading anyway.

But it is irrelevant that the "vast majority" of Christians don't believe the end times ravings of the lunatic rapture crowd. It only takes a dedicated few to make a difference (the Islamic fanatics prove that point). On hastening the apocalypse just take a look at John Hagee. Anything that will bring Jesus back is welcome, and these loons have pull with high elected officials in Washington and influence US foreign policy in negative ways. So Ann Rodgers needs a little more study time with Dispensationalism and its followers.

Part 2