Wondering, on Wednesday (v25)

Listening to the wind blow outside, and also in many other places around the country. Sort of like the intro to ABC's Wide World of Sports. You know, "spanning the globe... the thrill of victory...the agony of defeat." That kind of wind blowing.

There was the wind from the Duck Dynasty Dude, Phil Robertson, for example.  The man who, with a simple turn of a phrase, likely caused a payer breakfast full of indigestion.  Robertson was talking about the dangers of atheism, which apparently include being victimized in horrific camouflaged bearded-man fantasies.  Listen, or just read it, for yourself.

I'll make a bet with you. Two guys break into an atheist's home. He has a little atheist wife and two little atheist daughters. Two guys break into his home and time him up in a chair and gag him. And then they take his two daughters in front of him and rape both of them and then shoot them and they take his wife and they decapitate her head off in front of him. And they the can look at him and say "isn't it great that I don't have to worry about being judged? Isn't it great that there's nothing wrong with this?  There's no right or wrong, now is it dude?  Then you take a sharp knife and take his manhood and hold it in front of him and say "wouldn't it be something if there was something wrong with this?" But you're the one who says there is no God, there's no right, there's no wrong, so we're just having fun. We're sick in the head! Have a nice day. 

I'm wondering, on Wednesday, if the bet Robertson wanted to make (which is unclear to me after reading this and listening to it a few times) was something along the lines of "I bet I can make you hurl your sausage biscuits and gravy."  Do you think anyone at the Vero Beach Prayer Breakfast managed to keep their breakfast down?

Their goal this:

Through the inspiration of this gathering, the Vero Beach Prayer Breakfast hopes to encourage each participant to be a part of a small group that cultivates growth and facilitates positive change to create God-centered communities. 

Are you ready to go out and create the kind of communities Robertson was invited to inspire?

And then there's the wind out of Missouri. The Show Me State appears to have one of those forward-thinking conservative legislatures, the kind that takes up bills like the ones pushed by State Representative Richard Brattin.  Last year, Brattin wanted women to have to get permission from the man who got her pregnant before she could have an abortion - unless of course there was proof of a legitimate rape or proof that the man was dead.

Brattin's back; this time, he wants to make it impossible for anyone receiving Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits from purchasing fish, steak, soda, cookies, chips and energy drinks.

Do you think that Brattin thinks lobster and shrimp are fish? Or is he looking out for these folks, and not letting them eat fish sticks?

The editors at the St Louis Post-Dispatch aren't wondering much:

Among many, if not most, Republican lawmakers in Missouri, it is an article of faith that people on "welfare" are lazy good-for-nothings who prefer to sit on the sofa watching TV, eating steak, gawking at pornography and soaking up fabulous government benefits instead of hauling their able bodies to work. The facts behind poverty in Missouri belie this notion, but never mind! Why let facts get in the way when stereotypes are so much easier?

I'm having a hard time not being stereotypical myself.  The editors are right - it is so much easier to stereotype than it is trying to understand statements like Robertson's gleeful expression of pornographic violence against someone who does not believe as he does, or than trying to understand people like Brattin, the Republican legislator from Missouri, who boldly (if blindly) go there with their plans to improve the lot of those less fortunate.

I just don't get these people.