A Four Word Phrase

I realize that the recent election is barely over, not even a week, and the Democrats have their hands full trying to put democracy back into this Democracy. There is much, much for them to do, and as a Democrat who voted for Democrats, I fully support them and don't want to push.

But tragedies continue to follow tragedies, and catastrophes continue to follow catastrophes, and there are four little words that keep running through my mind, and they are getting louder and louder every day: High crimes and misdemeanors, high crimes and misdemeanors, high crimes and misdemeanors. I hope the Democrats will be able to clear my mind of these four little words before it is too late.

Monday

By Richard Earnhart:

It's 3am and I have a happy cat in my lap. The sky is blue gray from moonlight. It is so still that the stars don't even twinkle. I can't sleep. There shouldn't be a reason why. I am emotionally exhausted from months of politics. Maybe it's because I can hear glaciers melting in my dreams or that I can sense the spirit of a child leave its body in Darfur. I don't know.

The Democrats won Last week. More people will die in Iraq today, and tomorrow, and the day after that. The world, even if you press really hard on the brakes, won't stop on a dime. There is still a very dark momentum. But we came to the precipice and collectively looked over the edge and those of us who thought that maybe we shouldn't jump considered something different, like living, for instance.

Of course there is a lot of work to do. Of course there will be monumental failures along the way. The world really won't feel terribly different at breakfast. Or lunch. Or maybe even dinner. But slowly we will start to push the creeping darkness back. We will talk wiretaps. We will talk about feeding the hungry again instead of cutting taxes. We will start talking serious tax credits for alternative energy and home food production. We will start rewarding people for what they save instead of what they spend. We can start investing in our children again, in education and health, and see that that is the best savings account you can have.

We will still be a materially lustful society, committed to waste. But we didn't go over the edge of the chasm. At least not yet. Collectively we chose hope. We rejected the mantra of hate that we've had shoved in our faces 24/7, for a long time now. Instead, we decided to give ourselves another chance.

I can tell from the clarity of the sky that today is going to be another gorgeous day. There will be deer in the driveway. I will have fewer iris in the morning. If I am really quiet, I can hear the javalina snoring down in the arroyo. It is another magical night in New Mexico. It will be another miraculous day on planet Earth.

Health Club

You can't read this without laughing out loud. This is dedicated to everyone who ever attempted to get into a regular workout routine.

Dear Diary,

For my fiftieth birthday this year, my wife (the dear) purchased a week of personal training at the local health club for me. Although I am still in great shape since playing on my college football team 30 yrs ago, I decided it would be a good idea to go ahead and give it a try.

Called the club and made my reservation with a personal trainer named Belinda, who identified herself as a 26 yr. old aerobics instruc tor and model for athletic clothing and swim wear. My wife seemed pleased with my enthusiasm to get started! The club encouraged me to keep a diary to chart my progress.

MONDAY: Started my day at 6:00 a.m. Tough to get out of bed, but it was well wor th it when I arrived at the health club to find Belinda waiting for me. She was something of a Greek goddess -- with blonde hair, dancing eyes and a dazzling white smile.

Woo Hoo!!!!!

Belinda gave me a tour and showed me the machines. She took my pulse after 5 minutes on the treadmill. She was alarmed that my pulse was so fast, but I attributed it to standing next to her in her Lycra aerobics outfit. I enjoyed watching the skillful way in which she conducted her aerobics class after my workout today.

Very inspiring, Belinda was encouraging as I did my sit-ups, although my gut was already aching from holding it in the whole time she was around. This is going to be a FANTASTIC week!!

TUESDAY: I drank a whole pot of coffee, but I finally made it out the door. Bel i nda made me lie on my back and push a heavy iron bar into the air, and then she put weights on it! My legs were a l ittle wobbly on the treadmill, but I made the full mile. Belinda's rewarding smile made it all worthwhile. I feel GREAT!! It's a whole new life for me.

WEDNESDAY: The only way I can brush my teeth is by laying the toothbrush on the counter and moving my mouth back and forth over it. I believe I have a hernia in both pectorals. Driving was OK as long as I didn't try to steer or stop. I parked on top of a GEO in the club parking lot.

Belinda was impatient with me, insisting that my screams bothered other club members. Her voice is a little too perky for early in the morning and when she scolds, she gets this nasally wh ine that is VERY annoying.

My chest hurt when I got on the treadmill, so Belinda put me on the stair monster. Why the hell would anyone invent a machine to simulate an activity rendered obsolete by elevators? Belinda told me it would he lp me get in shape and enjoy life. She said some other shit too.

THURSDAY: Belinda was waiting for me with her vampire-like teeth exposed as her thin, cruel lips were pulled back in a full snarl. I couldn't help being a half an hour late; it took me that long to tie my shoes.

Belinda took me to work out with dumbbells. When she was not looking, I ran and hid in the men's room.. She sent Lars to find me, then, as punishment, put me on the rowing machine -- which I sank.

FRIDAY: I hate that bitch Belinda more than any human being has ever hated any other human being in the history of the world. Stupid, skinny, anemic little cheerleader. I f there were a part of my body I could move without unbearable pain, I would beat her with it.

Belinda wanted me to work on my triceps. I don't have any triceps. And if you don't want dents in the floor, don't hand me the *&%#(#&**!!@*@ barbells or anything that weighs more than a sandwich .

The treadmill flung me off and I landed on a health and nutrition teacher. Why couldn't it have been someone softer, like the drama coach or the choir director?

SATURDAY: Belinda left a message on my answering machine in her grating, shrilly voice wondering why I did not show up today. Just hearing her made me want to smash the machine with my planner. However, I lacked the strength to even use the TV remote and ended up catching eleven straight hours of the Weather Channel.

SUNDAY: I'm having the Church van pick me up for services today so I can go and thank GOD that this week is over. I will also pray that next year, my wife (the bitch), will choose a gift for me that is fun, like a root canal or a vasectomy.

Facial Body Language

Even though the election is over and has been decided, take a little time to watch the difference in facial body language between Republicans and Democrats. Almost universally, whether separately or in face-to-face discussions, Republicans tend to exhibit a supercilious put-down smile. Bush tends to show a face distorted by anger when he is not making demeaning jokes at the expense of reporters who are forced by the norms of courtesy and official deference to reply with respect. His smile, when he appears in public tends to reflect that he, rather than the audience, is what really matters.

Democrats, on the other hand, usually show serious expressions which reflect the seriousness of the discussion and personal awareness of the problems being considered. Smiles, when they appear, are genuine.

Somebody check this out for me and tell me if I am nuttier than I thought.

Three Strange Days

Transitions

What a strange three days these have been for me! On Monday, I was trying to think of a vocabulary of triumph expressive enough to convey my joy at the possibility of a whole new world on Tuesday.

On Tuesday morning, it suddenly crossed my mind that I had no idea what kind of world we would have by afternoon, so my emotional slate sent blank.

On Tuesday afternoon, just as the returns started to come in, I was at the vet's office having my dear beagle Holmes put to sleep. His body, likely full of cancer, had finally and suddenly given out. Oh, how I miss his baying, which always came at times of my concentration on breaking news or when the phone rang! And last night I watched as my six cats and his best friend, my Jack Russell mix, spent the evening wandering around the house looking for him in vain.

This morning, political things were looking good, but my emotional self had been drained and numbed. I just sat staring into space, not really thinking about anything. At noon my daughter called and said she was coming to get me and drive me to her daughter Anmai's School, where her husband Carl had set up their telescope with a solar filter so that the children could look at Mercury traveling across the Sun. There were children all over the place and cars parked everywhere. It was a madhouse of activity, and someone made it even worse by bringing a bunch of 6-week old kittens to give away.

Anmai came running back and asked her mother if she could have one, but got no for an answer. But there was Grandma. So I asked her if there were any left, and there was just one, the little black runt of the litter. I told her to bring it back to me, and after a great deal of loving mauling by numerous children, he finally settled down in my arm. I named him Mercury in honor of the occasion, but he will be called Merc. (The view of Mercury crossing the Sun by the way, was spectacular.)

This evening, I am calmly excited about the election (if you can comprehend such a reaction), but my loss of an old dog at the end of his life has been tempered at the thought of a little black body in a carrier in the next room who is at the beginning of his.

Altogether Now.....

Everybody, purse your lips together, take a breath, and see if we can't learn how to say....

Madam Speaker!

Not So Much of An Election, As It Is an Intervention

Andrew Sullivan to raise the question of Bush's mental fitness. Sullivan told CNN Bush is so delusional,

so in denial . . . this is not an election anymore, it's an intervention.... It's unhinged. It suggests this man has lost his mind. No one objectively could look at the way this war has been conducted, whether you were for it, as I was, or against it, and say that is has been done well. It's a disaster.

For him to say it's a fantastic job suggests the president has lost it. I'm sorry, there is no other way to say it.

Informed Comment

More Hypocrisy of the Ayatollah Christians?

Oh, no! Tell me it ain't so!!??

Republican Pastor Ted Haggard has resigned as president of the National Association of Evangelicals after a male escort claimed he has been having a sexual relationship with the pastor for the past three years.

A statement from the New Life Church says Pastor Ted Haggard resigned as president of the National Association of Evangelicals Thursday and put himself on leave from his church. Haggard is the founder and senior leader of the New Life Church in Colorado Springs. The church has 14,000 members. Haggard is married with five children and an outspoken critic of gay marriage.

Mike Jones, a gay man and admitted male escort, said on talk radio Wednesday he and Haggard had been in a "sexual business" relationship for the past three years. after being accused of paying the man for monthly trysts over the past three years. Jones also says Haggard used methamphetamine in his presence.

The statement from Martin Nussbaum, legal counsel for New Life Church, says Haggard put himself on administrative leave pending an investigation and a decision by the church’s board of overseers. Haggard said in the statement,

I am voluntarily stepping aside from leadership so that the overseer process can be allowed to proceed with integrity. I hope to be able to discuss this matter in more detail at a later date. In the interim, I will seek both spiritual advice and guidance.

Carolyn Haggard, spokeswoman for the New Life Church and the pastor's niece, said a four-member church panel will investigate the allegations. The board has the authority to discipline Haggard, including removing him from ministry work.

The acting senior pastor at New Life, Ross Parsley, told KKTV-TV of Colorado Springs that Haggard admitted that some of the accusations were true.

I just know that there has been some admission of indiscretion, not admission to all of the material that has been discussed but there is an admission of some guilt

Oh no....! They let me down again......

It's the Solution, Stupid

On Wolf Blitzer’s program just now, the subject was who had what plans for getting out of Iraq. Bill Bennett told Wolf that Bush was “doing the best he can with the world he has inherited.” HELL! IT’S THE WORLD HE HAS CREATED! Bennett was talking about the fact that Bush has certain principles and that he will not give up on them even if it means just himself, his wife, and the dog left holding on! How noble for a man who is surrounded by security and has sent thousands of other men to be killed and to kill hundreds of thousands of others!

As for those who keep asking, well, what plans do the Democrats have for getting out, there can be no plans because there is no solution to the mess that Bush and his tribe have created.

No, I’ll take that back. The only way out is to accept defeat and surrender. And if he had a hint of the values and heroism he professes, he would beg his countrymen, both alive and dead, to forgive him for what he has done to his nation, to the world, and to the Earth.

SWIFTBOATING AGAIN

I am sick to death of the Republican attack on Kerry again. In my opinion as an enlistee in World War II, Kerry was being both ironic and honest at the same time.

There are many educated and wealthy men and women who have enlisted for patriotic and principled reasons. At the same time, military service also appeals to people who, because of lack of privilege and education, find it as a hopeful way out of a life with no future, a way in which to achieve some pride in themselves through serving their country and others.

A recent article in the San Francisco Chronicle stated that new administration policy with regard to recruitment has lowered its requirements to include people with mental deficiencies, health problems, and trouble with the law and with drugs.

Bush’s spinmeisters, and of course, Bush himself have managed to turn things around so that Kerry’s remark is interpreted as an insult to the military, especially those serving in this terrible war. Bush also is positioning himself so that his successors will be saddled with his extreme pronouncements, such as that we will not leave Iraq without total victory for us and total defeat for the enemy, and that we will stay until the job of creating democracy and freedom in an area of the world where it has never existed and probably is not wanted or possible has been accomplished.

You notice that Bush still hasn’t called for a military draft, because that would mean calling up his base on the religious extremes, as well as those of great wealth. Have you also noticed how few from those groups have enlisted?

Bush, Cheney, and Tony Snow should be ashamed of themselves, and shamed by this country.

Bill Moyers on Net Neutrality

Be concerned. Be very concerned.

The debate is hot, the language heady, the metaphors many. Op-ed pages alternately bemoan "The End of the Internet" or curse "Net Neutrality Nonsense." Allegations fly about the stifling of free speech, the holding back of progress and corporate hegemony. Indeed, network neutrality has become something of a cause celebre in the digital world, pitting a slew of high-profile Internet content providers and consumer-advocacy groups against major phone and cable companies, and federal lawmakers against each other.

Here is an opportunity to pursue this issue with Bill Moyers. Everyone concerned with the freedom of the blogosphere should check it out!

Out of the Ruins of Katrina,

Watching a Bill Moyers program on PBS, the thing that touched me most was the dear man who lives on welfare and who lost everything in Katrina. He has his own radio station, which he built himself, and which he ran 24 hours a day by himself during part of that storm just to keep the local people up on what was happening, where to go for food, water, safety, etc.

Would you have any idea of how we bloggers could get together as a group and make him one of our charities, at least once?

The interviewer asked him what makes you want to give and share, when you've lost everything? The answer was, "That's what you do."

Equal to Shakespeare any day!

The Mendacious Candidate

Mystery Man runs for President!

Duncan Hunter is the guy of whom no one (almost) knows anything at all.

All I know about him is that he's got a prestigious seat on the House Committee on Armed Services, which he knows he about to lose with the upcoming political tsunami which will sweep him and his kind out of the majority.

I know the rumors: he has taken dirty money from dirty hands from under a dirty table.

But the really big thing I know is that he's had this really silly idea of making beautiful Santa Rosa Island into a private hunting reserve for disabled veterans to hunt elk on. He has persisted in this, even though the vets have turned him down, expressing complete bewilderment and disinterest. "That's not us," they have said. After failing several times, Hunter has managed to get an earmark in pending legislation about his elk on Santa Rosa.

All of which has caused me to ask every one I know, "What can be this man's ulterior plan for Santa Rosa Island?"

Now he wants to run for President? What is his scheme? I challenge readers to do the research because I am truly stumped as to what this guy is up to and what will he do if he ever gets his smarmy hands on our Island?

Personally, I think George Bush is not only the worse president in history, but also the worse president (possible) of all time, ever. So I am not one who believes Congressman Hunter has a snowball's chance in hell to become president. But I think this man is a crooked as California's fabled Highway 1.

This Fire Was Set!

The Esperanza Fire fueled by winds burns near homes in Banning, Calif., 140 kilometres east of Los Angeles on Friday.

This fire was set by an arsonist. A $500,000 reward has been posted for information leading to his arrest.









Whoever it turns out to have been will be charged with murder. Work on battling the blaze has killed four firefighters, and left a fifth firefighter hospitalized in critical condition with burns over 90 percent of his body.

No punishment will be enough for the person or persons who started that fire, but I have in mind an old Greek or Roman punishment. Each leg and each arm were chained to the backs of four horses facing away from the criminal, and then, at a signal, four men whipped the horses.

Oh No! No Termination of the Terminator?

We nominated this geek.

We shoulda coulda woulda nominated this guy.

Sooo, we're now stuck with this guy!

Wrongwing Religion

Several states will be voting on amendments to the laws of their states denying the right of same-sex partners to marry. These efforts are being led in large part by religious groups who believe strongly that marriage should be solely between one man and one woman, and that God created us to live that way and produce children. If they prefer to live their religious views as they state them (and there are religious people who fail) that is fine. However, this is supposed to be a democracy, where citizens can live in religious freedom, or even without religion. That is a major point of law which religious extremists apparently are not aware of.

But there are some questions which come to mind for me so that, if you are one of the above belief and will or would vote yes on such a proposition, I can understand what exactly motivates you.

If such a law passed, it would undoubtedly be entirely because of yes votes by people who do not approve of the homosexual lifestyle, and it is obvious that there are many more heterosexuals in the world than homosexuals. In other words, homosexuals will never fully benefit from the “freedoms” of this “democracy”.

If such a law passed in your state, how would that benefit YOU? (I assume you would vote yes for your benefit rather than for the people who want to commit to a same-sex marriage.) If you had a same-sex couple living next to you or in your neighborhood, would you expect them to stop living together? Perhaps you could expect them to move away entirely?

In any event, you and the other people who got such a bill passed would be sending a message to homosexuals in general, and possibly to people you know, that they were onto and undesirable. Could that be construed as a kind of punishment?

To show you that I am aware of religion and religious thought, I ask the question so popular with Christians in this day and age, “What would Jesus do?”

Voting for the Future

There are 3 things really eating at me, especially during this election season:

1. Taxes: Who the hell do you think is going to pay for the things which the American people want and need? Do you want clean water, good roads, clean environment, education, etc.? If you do, then don’t you think that you have some responsibilities to achieve them?

I know, a lot of people don’t give a damn about such things, but do you admire them for that? I also know that most Republicans, as well as many Democrats, are for lower taxes, especially the rich. Does that fit into your value system? Do you ever think about the good of the People as a Whole when you vote? The Republicans, in particular, have appealed to your sense of personal greed so that you will think only of yourself and abhor the selfishness of those of little means and no hope when you step into the voting booth.

2. Walls: St. Ronald was also big on using the lower taxes ploy in his agenda. But he said one thing when he was president, “Mr. Gorbachev, take down this wall!”, for which he was applauded by almost all Americans. My, how things have changed!

Now it is ultra-fashionable to hate and fear all illegal immigrants. But can you tell them apart from the legal immigrants? I can’t. Maybe, to be on the safe side, we (in this Nation of Immigrants) should hate all immigrants and wall them all out. That ought to improve international and personal relations!

Also, why do you think they are here? Could it possibly be that they are from countries of even more burgeoning populations than ours, and they are coming with the Statue of Liberty beckoning them? Free trade just ain’t working, except for those on top. And they are coming to hope for work at what amounts to slave wages in this country, where Americans are delighted to welcome them and pay them just that way.

3. Embryo stemcell research, which is really a twofer when you add in overpopulation: What I don’t quite get is why, if you believe using a human embryo for research is murder, throwing them away isn’t also murder. I would think that the Right to Lifers would insist they be brought to life as complete human beings.

But that prospect should be more than a critical thinking mind can absorb. Shouldn’t it be obvious that, if you fill a jar with water, at some point the jar will be unable to hold any more water and will overflow? So, too, if you think of each drop as a human being, there will be no answer to the dilemma already facing the earth except total catastrophe.

“Freedom" in Occupied Iraq

Bush went, uninvited, to Iraq, ousted Sadaam Hussein, and set up a government and its leaders of his own choosing. He announced, after the “election” (we also have had two “elections”, by the way) that the governing of Iraq was to be handled by and for the people of Iraq, as they chose.

Now, however, Iraq has gone absolutely to hell. That, as you might guess, is entirely the fault of Prime Minister Maliki, so the Bush Bunch is going to step back in and do a great deal of governmental oversight.

Now, I understand, many Iraqis wish they had Sadaam back. In spite of his mass graves, which are as nothing compared to Bully Bush’s mass graves, he maintained a semblance of order now missing from Iraq.

The thought has occurred to me, could it just be that Sadaam was right all along?

Bush pulled the plug

I heard someone on TV just now, say that we couldn’t leave Iraq until they could manage their country and the situation there by themselves, something we have heard many times by many people. This was said just as I walked to the sink to wash my coffee cup and empty the water down the sink. Suddenly, it came to me, the analogy that I have been looking for:

Bush may not have liked the water in Iraq’s sink, but the water was cleaner then than it is now. Unfortunately, Bush pulled the plug on the day he invaded Iraq. Iraq has lost its clean water and there is nothing he or anyone else can do to get it back. Anyone who does wrong, whether by design or through poor judgment, owes the person or people he has harmed a mea culpa and a willingness to accept what loss of reputation he deserves, the size and severity of such punishment in accordance with the harm he has done.

The water is rapidly running farther and farther away.

Better living without God?

Richard Dawkins says Religion is a dangerously irrational mirage.

Troy Jollimore's review of Dawkins's book, The God Delusion. Jollimore teaches philosophy at California State University Chico.

"He's a brilliant man," one of my colleagues once said of Richard Dawkins, "but so impolite." I agree, but think he chose the wrong conjunction: If I had to identify Dawkins' cardinal virtues, I would say that he is brilliant, articulate, impassioned and impolite. As Emerson famously said, "Your goodness must have some edge to it -- else it is none." "The God Delusion" is a fine and significant book, and this is largely due to Dawkins' willingness to employ the sharp edges of his intellect to cut through a paralyzing propriety whose main effect is to stifle conversations -- about religion, about intellectual responsibility, about politics -- that we very much need, at this particular moment in our history, to be having.

Some will accuse Dawkins of being not just impolite but also intolerant. He is indeed a kind of crusading atheist, and makes no bones about his opposition not just to religious extremism but also to all species of religious faith -- a phenomenon he regards as fundamentally irrational and deeply dangerous. Religious moderates, he points out, have an unfortunate tendency to lend their perceived legitimacy to more extreme faith-based positions. They do this in large part by encouraging the common belief that accepting religious claims in the utter absence of evidence, and treating them as immune to rational criticism, is perfectly reasonable behavior. Dawkins writes,

As long as we accept the principle that religious faith must be respected simply because it is religious faith, it is hard to withhold respect from the faith of Osama bin Laden and the suicide bombers.

The alternative, one so transparent that it should need no urging, is to abandon the principle of automatic respect for religious faith. This is one reason why I do everything in my power to warn people against faith itself, not just against so-called 'extremist' faith.

Elsewhere he approvingly quotes a statement from Jerry Coyne, University of Chicago professor of evolution and ecology, that

the real nature of the conflict ... [is] not just about evolution versus creationism ... To scientists like Dawkins and [E.O.] Wilson, the real war is between rationalism and superstition.

In a certain sense of "intolerance," this sort of view surely is intolerant of religious faith. And there is no question that it will make some people unhappy. (Others, by contrast, will take great delight in Dawkins' wit and wickedness; he is particularly amusing in his footnotes.) But the danger of offending someone is inherent in any exercise of free speech, particularly speech that is critical of society's sacred cows, and the idea of sacredness is surely the biggest sacred cow of all. Sadly, with respect to religion, tolerance of religious belief is taken to license a profound intolerance toward those who would question such belief. The result is a society in which important political and moral decisions are heavily influenced by voters' religious views but in which people whose lives and behaviors are restricted by these decisions are regarded as rude, subversive or downright immoral if they attempt to raise questions about whether "but I just believe it" (or the equally weak "but my holy book says so") really constitutes an adequate justification.

As Dawkins points out, criticizing someone's religion is almost universally regarded as offensive, whereas a believer's right to criticize behaviors of which they disapprove (homosexuality, promiscuity and any number of other examples) is not only protected but frequently lauded as an expression of religious freedom.

Dawkins is at his best in his exposure of one of the big lies of our time: the claim that there is simply no conflict between religion and science. This claim, which is rendered almost obligatory by the social pressure to tolerate all manner of religious beliefs, can be fleshed out in a number of ways: that science is based on evidence or reason, while religion is a matter of faith; that science answers the "what?" questions, while religion addresses the "why?" questions; that science concerns facts and religion values; and so forth. To borrow Stephen Jay Gould's fancy term, science and religion are "non-overlapping magisteria" -- two entirely distinct areas of inquiry, each with its own subject matter and its own methods of treating that subject matter.

Many find this a lovely thought. But the all-inclusiveness of what Dawkins wittily refers to as the "Neville Chamberlain school of evolutionists," no matter how well intentioned, must ultimately fail because religious believers are themselves committed in their daily lives to the very concepts of evidence and objective truth on which science is founded (we simply couldn't survive without them) and because the account of the universe revealed by the scientific research that proceeds on this foundation is one that leaves increasingly less room for anything recognizable as God.

Advocates of intelligent design are in fact correct to claim that Darwinian biology is not religiously neutral, just as its critics are entirely correct to point out that because intelligent design is presented as a scientific program -- its basis is the claim that there are good scientific reasons for dissatisfaction with the Darwinian position -- it must be evaluated scientifically (a test it spectacularly fails). There is no peculiarly religious "magisterium" within the bounds of which creationism, intelligent design or any other religious view can be legitimate, without its being more broadly legitimate: If the claim that complex life forms display the work of an intelligent designer is correct, then current biological theories are simply flat-out wrong, end of story.

This is true, moreover, whether the designer is pictured as directly creating the complex life in question or as simply guiding or initiating the process of evolution, for it is essential to evolution via natural selection that it is unsupervised, unguided and unintended. Once a designer is introduced, there is nothing left for natural selection to explain. And no intelligent designer -- unless it was a sadist -- would choose to work through such a tedious, inefficient and downright cruel method as natural selection.

Dawkins does not attempt, in this book, to summarize the vast array of experimental findings that support the plausibility of the Darwinian explanation. (Those who desire this might begin with his 1986 book, "The Blind Watchmaker.") Instead he sticks mostly to the conceptual level in an effort to explain why, given that the Darwinian story is indeed supported by the empirical evidence, it provides a much better explanation of the observable phenomena than does "the God hypothesis."

Step 1 of this effort is a whirlwind dismantling of many of the most influential arguments in favor of God's existence, including Aquinas' "first cause" arguments, Anselm's notorious ontological argument and the argument from experience. An entire book could easily be devoted to this topic -- indeed, whole shelves have been dedicated to the ontological argument alone -- but while some readers may find the treatments too quick or, on occasion, a bit glib, Dawkins' dispatchings of various fallacious "proofs" of God's existence are on the whole sensible, and in places quite insightful.

Step 2 deals with the "argument from improbability," which appears most commonly as the well-worn argument from design. The basic structure of the argument, in its traditional form, is admirably simple. Many things in the world appear to have been designed; it is highly improbable that apparently designed objects would occur in the absence of a designer; thus we can conclude that a designer exists. Multitudes of believers have found some version of this argument persuasive. But as Dawkins points out, the argument not only does not work, but it also actually suggests the opposite of what it is supposed to, for the simple reason that any designer capable of producing such complex and intricate mechanisms is at least as unlikely to have occurred on its own as are the mechanisms themselves. (In fact, because designers tend to be considerably more complex than their designs, the "natural" occurrence of the designer is presumably far less likely.) Moreover, the inference to a designer based in the improbability of complex life forms having happened by chance is based on a profound misunderstanding of evolution via natural selection, which, as Dawkins points out, is not in the relevant sense a process of chance:

No indeed, chance is not the likely designer. That is one thing on which we can all agree. The statistical improbability of phenomena such as Euplectella's skeleton is the central problem that any theory of life must solve. The greater the statistical improbability, the less plausible is chance as a solution: that is what improbable means. But the candidate solutions to the riddle of improbability are not, as is falsely implied, design and chance. They are design and natural selection. Chance is not a solution. ... Natural selection is not only a parsimonious, plausible and elegant solution; it is the only workable alternative to chance that has ever been suggested. Intelligent design suffers from exactly the same objection as chance. It is simply not a plausible solution to the riddle of statistical improbability. ... Any entity capable of intelligently designing something as improbable as a Dutchman's pipe (or a universe) would have to be even more improbable than a Dutchman's pipe. Far from terminating the vicious regress, God aggravates it with a vengeance.

"The God Delusion" ranges widely enough that I cannot hope to do justice to all its parts. For my own part, I was greatly cheered to discover that the commonly cited example of Albert Einstein as a scientist who believed in God is flatly contradicted by several of Einstein's own statements (he himself referred to the claim as "a lie which is being systematically repeated"). (The degree of religiosity of the Founding Fathers, it turns out, tends to be similarly overestimated.) I was intrigued by his presentation of John Hartung's argument that the New Testament, while representing a partial improvement over the Old, still falls well short of acceptable moral standards ("Love thy neighbor," it appears, applies only to members of the in-group of Israelites, and most expressly does not include heathens), and I was amused by Dawkins' demolishing of the idea of the Bible as a reliable source of moral guidance.

Do those people who hold up the Bible as an inspiration to moral rectitude have the slightest notion of what is actually written in it?

Indeed, it should be said that while it deals with matters of the utmost gravity and urgency, "The God Delusion," particularly in its early chapters, is a very funny book. To those readers tired of being told that they must bow respectfully before every absurd or bizarre superstition they encounter, and who worry about the effects of this atmosphere of hyper-tolerance on the health of our society, Dawkins' irreverent and penetrating work will seem a breath of fresh air.