unCommonSense: The Missing Link or Marketing Ploy?

“Scientists have unveiled a 47-million-year-old fossilized skeleton of a monkey hailed as the missing link in human evolution.” – Sky News

This amazing fossil discovery, dubbed “Ida”, has been described by experts as the “eighth wonder of the world” and on par with the famous unearthing of the Rosetta Stone which allowed the world to decipher ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics.  It’s impact on paleontology has also been described as “somewhat like an asteroid falling down to earth”.  In other words, its a big deal.  This is the one, the holy grail of Darwinism.  The fossil that proves without a shadow of a doubt that humans evolved from apes. Sky Net summed up this crushing blow to skeptics of evolution in the final paragraph of their article:

unCommon Sense: Torture Abuse?

With the release of the CIA interview today claiming water boarding saved American lives, and Obama suggesting he might prosecute such actions, we all have a fresh new hypothetical moral dilemma to mentally chew on.  I think most people can agree that there is some point at which everyone supports the use of aggression as a peace keeping tool.  Where each of your friends, coworkers, and family draw that line depends on their past experience and worldview, and no one will ever unanimously agree on where that point is.  Maybe for some it is when a cop is forced to shoot a criminal who is attacking a defenseless citizen.  It might even be when a strong country is obligated to help a defenseless country resist an aggressive and hostile neighbor.  Maybe for some that line is never drawn until they are personally attacked in some manner.

For me, whenever I hear one of these moral dilemmas that people love to use to put you on the spot, I generally approach the question by looking at the worst case scenario.  In this particular case I would say that the potential loss of even one single innocent American citizen’s life trumps a *proven radical jihadist getting some water up his nose.  But does that make torture ok, even a form of torture that is (slightly) more civilized than its gory predecessors?   The answer is: I don’t know and neither do you, because like every hypothetical dilemma you’ve ever heard, it can only be realistically addressed in the “moment of truth” by whoever is in the position of authority.  This decision maker must carefully consider the big picture and the small picture, weigh all the pros and cons, and make a really tough call.

Take torture and aggression completely off the table and Americans face a potentially devastating and possibly avoidable worst case scenario. Make torture and aggression something only used in the most extreme and dangerous situations, requiring approval from the president himself, and we enable our highest elected office to make the tough decisions that come with the job of protecting the free world.

*Proven meaning authentic evidence of crimes against the United States.

UPDATE:  Michelle Malkin has a nice summary of the entire torture circus, and evidence that the public is more in tune with Dick Cheney’s stance than the current administration’s stance.  HotAir also uncovered a compelling article – buried by WaPo – that suggests the torture memos were released in response to Cheney’s original criticisms that Obama was endangering the US with lax security policies.  Talk about your all-time biggest backfire…

unCommon Sense: to TeaBag, or not to TeaBag

The politically charged “Tea Parties” that seem to have become more widespread in the US recently have gotten a lot of people on both sides of the fence up in arms. The typical conservative response so far has been (not surprisingly) full support, while accusing the democratic controlled congress of attacks on their liberty and their futures; they say the protesters are just average folks fed up with big government. Ok…  Meanwhile, the typical liberal response has been to paint these protesters as anarchists and maybe even the newly minted and potentially dangerous “rightwing extremists”.  However, most major outlets largely ignored the protesters altogether… One commentator, Rachel Maddow, even went so far as to mock sexual innocence, wondering aloud on her MSNBC show tonight if the protesters realized what the dirty implication of a “tea bag” meant. The current guest on the show casually suggested that the protesters probably weren’t aware – since they didn’t watch her show, but rather the “other” channel.

So, to quickly sum up how Maddow was trying to rip conservatives: The Fox News Channel’s idea of a Tea Bag; protesting with some flavored water. MSNBC {Rachel Maddow}’s idea of a Tea Bag; dipping some testicles in an open mouth.*  Oh, those silly, out-of-touch-with-crude-sexual-terms Fox News watchers…  I guess they all must have graduated from high school more than 5 years ago.  Stay classy, Maddow.

* The Common Sense Republic’s official stance is that while we appreciate the humor inherent to both Tea Bags, we simply cannot choose sides.

Shockingly enough, MSNBC wasn’t the only network to associate the Murdox Empire with all this tea-baggery today:

Now this video was shown in a number of conservative outlets, and yes, on the surface, this lady seems to lack any journalistic skill. Maybe it’s just me, but she didn’t sound like she was there to really hear what people had to say or how they felt. She asked condescending questions, cut off responses, and had a pretty obvious “I am better than you” air about her. The real gem comes when she inanely accuses the tea parties of being “anti-cnn”, because “this is highly promoted by the right wing conservative, Fox” (probably the biggest giveaway of her lack of common sense) I think the video pretty much speaks for itself.

As I watched the video I thought her behavior was very out of the ordinary for a CNN reporter, who generally seem to be middle of the road, and I wondered what got her so riled up. So I did a little research and discovered another, longer piece of the clip, which actually explains why she was so abrasive with the average guy just trying to be a dad while saving a buck.  Right before talking to him she interviewed this guy…

So this guy… This friggin’ guy… He single handedly tries to help prove the whole liberal anarchist position right there with a stupid, off topic sign about the President.  Not only that, but this philosopher makes such excellent points and backs them up with such well thought-out arguments, how could he possibly be ignored by logical human beings? Granted, he probably wasn’t ready to defend himself, but does this guy really think that calling a sitting president a fascist is going to get his conservative and/or possibly redneck agenda anywhere? It just made him look like an idiot. That can be a big problem with the right, they sometimes can get caught up in the moment and take things too far. One day they are listening to a little too much talk radio, they get all riled up, suddenly the feathers are good and ruffled, and now they want to run out and shank something. (usually the only thing that ends up dying is their personal cause). And a great example is this overzealous or maybe even complete kook of a guy… this friggin’ guy… who makes all the good folks out there, everyone who stood in the rain and cold for a legitimate political concern, look like they have no common sense.

So once again it boils down to two opposite and overly extreme points of view playing a little game of “shoot myself in the foot roulette”.  And who ends up losing?  We all do.

It appears Im not the only one who thinks this way, respected blogger Michelle Malkin apparently saw it coming a mile away, and even exposes some further hypocrisy by the reporter, based on some actions during a protest back in 2006.

Update: HotAir is linking to a new Youtube video that contains a key former CNN reporter calling for an apology from the “journalist” above for being rude and crossing a journalistic line.  Good Stuff.

So what do you think? Are you going to let the liberals, conservatives, or even the Republic tell you what you think about this new plan for a bigger government with increased spending, taxes, and bailouts? Do average people think it’s a bad idea or is it just the extremists? Only you can decide.

Related Post: Liberals vs Conservatives vs. Common Sense: Most Offensive Protest Signs