Bob's Quest for Government Control of Women

Over the last few years, I've learned much about Bob Dutko's beliefs on how the government should control a woman's reproductive system. For instance, I've learned that Bob believes the government should outlaw the sale or distribution of oral contraceptives because they might cause a fertilized egg to be expelled in a woman's monthly period. We also know that Bob would imprison women who have abortions (at taxpayers expense, of course) because they are guilty of "murder".

But I learned something new last Tuesday. A caller asked Bob if he would allow a woman to have an abortion if her life was at risk. Bob replied, saying he would "need to have several doctors, a good three or four doctors, including Christian doctors, verify exactly the same situation that there is no chance whatsoever the mother is going to survive unless we take that baby out of there." Bob also opined, "what I think happens is this is a risky birth, and the mother is in some kind of risk by ... carrying the baby to term and we tend to call that 'protecting the mother's life'." (Bob's emphasis)

Wow, look at all that. So, if a woman is told by her doctor that her life is in danger by continuing a pregnancy, Bob would require that the woman visit two or three more doctors to verify the diagnosis. Also, one of those doctors needs to be a professing Christian, even though the woman may not be a Christian and one's religion really shouldn't have anything to do with a medical diagnosis. Furthermore, each doctor must believe, with 100% certainty, that there is "no chance whatsoever" that the woman would survive without the abortion. Apparently, if the doctor thinks there is a 70, 80, or 90% chance of death, those odds would not be good enough to permit the woman to have an abortion.

Bob doesn't say how he would enforce such a cumbersome system. I'm guessing that since abortion would be generally illegal in Bob's ideal world, an agency of the government would have to review the woman's medical records before clearing her to have a legal abortion. Plus, the government would have to check all the doctor's Christian credentials. Would that include records of attendance at church? And I thought Bob didn't want government involved in health care!

Folks, I just don't think Bob has thought this one through. In fact, I don't think Bob thinks a lot of things through. But one thing is clear: if Bob and his ilk get their way, we're headed for a dangerous and depressing future as far as medicine is concerned...

The Hippocratic Oath

Bob is fond of omitting key information about something when that information tends to be adverse to his position. This is sometimes called "quote mining" but I like to call it the "lie of omission". But whatever you call it, Bob is a true master. However, it's completely dishonest since he leaves out crucial information that typically deflates his argument.

For example, during Bob's coverage of abortion last Tuesday, he started talking about the Hippocratic Oath. Here's what he said (Bob's emphasis is shown in italics and his sound effects are in brackets):

I'm gonna give you a doctor's perspective, kind of a medical perspective, on this issue of abortion and I thought the first place I would go is the Hippocratic oath. We've all heard about this, right? Doctor's take the Hippocractic oath. Have you ever actually read the Hippocratic oath? Did you know that the Hippocratic oath itself specifically addresses abortion? And specifically says, 'we will not do this.' [Bob chuckling] Most people are completely unaware ... that's what it actually ... I've got a copy right here [paper shaking] of the Hippocratic oath. It was written in about 400 B.C. from Hippocrates and I'm going to read you ... I'm not going to read the whole thing, just an excerpt of it. 'I will give no deadly medicine to anyone if asked, nor suggest, any such counsel, and in like manner, I will not give to a woman a pessary to produce abortion.' It's in the actual hypocratic oath. I wonder if abortion doctors are taking that oath? [whistles]"

Well, first of all, the section that Bob read was a translation from the original Greek text from 400 years before Jesus. You can find plenty of translations of this classical oath online (here's one from MIT and another from Nova on PBS). Bob asserts that this classical oath is what doctors are pledging when they graduate medical school. However, most new doctors actually swear to a modern version of the oath, such as this one written in 1964 by the Academic Dean at Tufts Medical School. Note that this modern oath says nothing about abortion.

Getting back to the classical oath, it's very telling to see what Bob didn't mention. First, the classical oath starts out with "I swear by Apollo Physician and Asclepius and Hygieia an Panaceia and all the gods and goddesses..." That's right, the classical oath starts out by calling the names of a bunch of Greek gods which Christianity specifically rejects. Shouldn't the entire oath be rejected by Bob based on this fact?

But wait, it gets better. The classical oath also rejects surgery when it states, "I will not use the knife, not even on sufferers from stone, but will withdraw in favor of such men as are engaged in this work." This is obviously not the case in modern medicine and has not been for hundreds of years.

It's ludicrous for Bob to use this oath that nobody follows in his "discussion" of abortion as if it had any relevance. Once again, we see that Bob provides no substance in his his arguments, if you can call them that.

Bob can't stop talking about Bill Clinton

I turned on Dutko today to hear him ranting and raving about Bill Clinton and how he lied and therefore denied Paula Jones a fair trial.

Geez-o-pete, when will Bob stop talking about this? This all happened over a decade ago! Can't he find something more recent and relevant to talk about?

Well, here's something more recent and relevent: The Center for Public Integrity has published a report documenting 935 false statements given on 532 seperate occasions by the Bush Administration during the run-up to the Iraq War. And before you think, well, that must be some liberal group with an axe to grind, keep in mind that this same group also exposed all sorts of shenanigans by Bill Clinton.

But Bob doesn't care about the false statements of Bush and his administration which led to the death of thousands of Americans as well as an ever-growing price tag that will eventually have to be borne by the taxpayers. Instead, Bob talks about the sex-life of Bill Clinton. Incredible.

Margaret Sanger

On Tuesday (January 22, 2008), to commemorate the 35th Anniversary of the Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade, Bob dedicated most of the show to abortion. Of course, Bob served up a generous helping of lies, half-truths, misinformation, and irrelevancies.

Case in point is Bob's opening screed against Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood. It's interesting that Bob would start off a discussion about abortion with Mrs. Sanger since she wasn't an advocate for abortion. Instead, she was a fervent advocate for birth control. Last time I checked, birth control wasn't the same as abortion, but Bob probably wouldn't agree since he wants to outlaw certain forms of birth control as well.

In actuality, Sanger wrote a whole chapter in her book, Woman and the New Race, specifically arguing that women should utilize birth control instead of abortion. In fact, she wrote, on page 126, that the "hundreds of thousands of abortions performed in America each year are a disgrace to civilization." (my emphasis) So given this knowledge, why would Bob start off an abortion discussion with a demonization of Margaret Sanger? Your guess is as good as mine!

Bob starts off by calling Mrs. Sanger "a eugenicist and a racist." (his emphasis) Let's take a look at his arguments, which he mistakenly calls "facts" and "evidence."

1) "She was a member of the American Eugenics Society until the day of her death."

That's probably true, but so what? Bob never explains that eugenics, which is now objectionable to most people, was an extremely popular social theory in the first half of the 20th century. And Bob never delves into Mrs. Sanger's actual beliefs, including the any disagreements she had with other eugenicists (and she had plenty of disagreements). Bob is simply trying to create some sort of causal connection where none exists. Bug there is simply no reason to discount the life work of Margaret Sanger because she was a eugenicist. After all, most people wouldn't discount the life work of Thomas Jefferson because he owned slaves. By following Bob's logic, we must also question the work of others simply because they believed in eugenics. Accordingly, we would also have to question the contributions to society of inventor Alexander Graham Bell, President Woodrow Wilson, and author H.G. Wells. (I certainly haven't heard Bob say we shouldn't use our telephones simply because its inventor was a eugenecist!)

2) "She's quoted as praising Adolf Hitler's eugenics program."

What "program" is Bob talking about? What's the statement that Sanger allegedly made? Bob doesn't say. But, it's obvious that Bob is implying that Sanger agreed with the mass extermination of Jews by the Nazis. That is clearly not true and its disingenuous for Bob to make that implication.

3) "She spoke as the keynote speaker at a KKK rally in Silverlake, New Jersey in 1926."

Nope, wrong again, Bob. Bob would have us believe that Sanger spoke at a Ku Klux Klan rally because she a racist who hated Blacks just like the Klan did. But, as usual, reality is different from Bob's imagination. As stated above, Sanger was an advocate for access to birth control and would lecture on birth control to just about any group that asked. With that in mind, let's read from Sanger's autobiography:

"Always to me any aroused group was a good group, and therefore I accepted an invitation to talk to the women's branch of the Ku Klux Klan at Silver Lake, New Jersey, one of the weirdest experiences I had in lecturing. . . Never before had I looked into a sea of faces like these. I was sure that if I uttered one word, such as abortion, outside the usual vocabulary of these women they would go off into hysteria. And so my address that night had to be in the most elementary terms, as though I were trying to make children understand. In the end, through simple illustrations I believed I had accomplished my purpose." (my emphasis)

You see, Sanger wasn't a "keynote speaker" at a Klan "rally" like Bob suggests. Instead, she was addressing the wives of the Klan members to teach them how to not get pregnant! She clearly wasn't advocating the positions of the KKK. Therefore, this is not in any way, shape, or form, "evidence" that Sanger was racist.

But, of course, Bob saved the biggest set of lies for last...

4a) "She incorporated something called 'the Negro project' ... designed to sterilize Blacks and reduce the number of Black children being born ... to promote sterilization through the Black communities because she wanted less Black people."

Well, Sanger's organization, the Birth Control Foundation of America did promote a project to educate southern Blacks about birth control in order to reduce poverty by reducing birth rate. But there's absolutely no evidence that Sanger wanted to "sterilize Blacks" or "promote sterilization through the Black communities." As far as wanting "less Black people," wouldn't it also be true to say she wanted less white people, since she also advocated birth control to white women, e.g., the Klansman's wives?

4b) "She referred to Black people as 'human waste' [and] 'human weeds'."

No, she didn't. This is just a flat-out lie.

4c) "And she even used influential Black ministers to try to tell [that] we're trying to help the Black community... but in secret what she was really doing was trying to exterminate the Black race. She wrote a letter on October 19th, 1939 to Clarence Gamble, and here's what she said in that letter to him, quote, 'We propose to hire three or four colored ministers, preferably with social service backgrounds, and with engaging personalities. The most successful educational approach to the Negro is through a religious appeal and we do not want word to get out that we want to exterminate the Negro population and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members.' End-quote. She flat-out admitted in a private letter that she did not intend to eventually be made public that, let's use some Black ministers because they can dispel any notions and ideas if they ever figure out that what we're really trying to do is exterminate the Black population."

First, it looks like Dutko, or the crazy source that he's cribbed from, mangled the Sanger quote from the letter. But, let's take a look at the substance of his argument anyway.

Bob is purporting that when Sanger says, "we do not want word to get out that we want to exterminate the Negro population," that she actually wanted to exterminate Blacks. Obviously, Bob is ignoring the fact that this line could be construed to mean that she didn't want a false perception to be conveyed. You can read more of the letter presented in context on Planned Parenthood's website (they're obviously not embarrassed by it!).

But even if you think that Sanger really wanted to "exterminate the Black population," then, pray tell, what was her plan to accomplish this? Gas chambers ala the Nazis? Forced sterilization of every Black citizen which would result in the eventual extermination of all Blacks? Or did Sanger think that if they handed out enough condoms and pamphlets that the Black population would exterminate itself by never voluntarily reproducing? As you can see, Bob's interpretation of Sanger's line is obviously wrong.

Still think that Margaret Sanger was a racist? Well, Martin Luther King, Jr., obviously didn't think so. Here's some of his speech to Planned Parenthood while accepting the Margaret Sanger Award:

There is a striking kinship between our movement and Margaret Sanger's early efforts. She, like we, saw the horrifying conditions of ghetto life. Like we, she knew that all of society is poisoned by cancerous slums. Like we, she was a direct actionist — a nonviolent resister. She was willing to accept scorn and abuse until the truth she saw was revealed to the millions. At the turn of the century she went into the slums and set up a birth control clinic, and for this deed she went to jail because she was violating an unjust law. Yet the years have justified her actions. She launched a movement which is obeying a higher law to preserve human life under humane conditions. Margaret Sanger had to commit what was then called a crime in order to enrich humanity, and today we honor her courage and vision; for without them there would have been no beginning. Our sure beginning in the struggle for equality by nonviolent direct action may not have been so resolute without the tradition established by Margaret Sanger and people like her. Negroes have no mere academic nor ordinary interest in family planning. They have a special and urgent concern.

It sure doesn't sound like King thought Sanger was a racist. But who are we to believe? (1) A cherished leader of the civil rights movement who has his own holiday or (2) a crazy radio hack who clearly can't engage in the simplest of research? I'm gonna go with the prior.

I'll conclude by reminding Bob and his listeners that Margaret Sanger died in 1966, which was over 40 years ago. In my humble opinion, it doesn't take a lot of courage to attack the life of a dead person who, obviously, can't defend oneself. And besides, what's the point of Bob's attack? I think Bob is just trying to cast a black cloud over Planned Parenthood because they perform abortions in addition to their numerous other reproductive health services. It does nothing to address the moral and/or legal issues surrounding abortion. It's just more B.S. from Dutko, which is all I've come to expect at this point.

Bob's wrong again, in less than 10 seconds

I turned Bob on today and heard him respond to a caller by saying that it took the United States 11 years to develop a Constitution after declaring Independence. (In comparison, the Iraqis developed their own constitution in about 2.5 years.) This is all I heard of the conversation and it was literally 10 seconds after I turned the radio on.

But of course, Bob is wrong as usual. The Articles of Confederation, which was the United States first constitution, was written and adopted in 1777, which is just a year after independence (1776). Of course, the government managed to do this while simultaneously fighting the British. After the fighting was over, Congress went back and developed a brand new Constitution in 1783.

(As an aside, if any of Bob's listeners want to understand the actual horrifying situation in Iraq, I highly suggest you turn off Dutko and start reading Informed Comment, a blog written by Juan Cole of the University of Michigan. Dr. Cole is an expert on the Middle East while Bob is just some radio hack. This assessment of the success of the "surge" is particularly depressing.)

How would Bob do science?

On Monday, Bob went on a tirade against those portions of the charter of European nations that favor teaching evolution over creation or intelligent design. This triggered yet another of his recurring rants on creationists excluded from publication in peer reviewed science journals.

He demonstrated how badly misinformed he is about science, as it relates to the evolution versus creation debate. Bob stated:

"If you are a scientist and you write a paper saying evolution is false or you write a scientific piece based upon the presupposition that creation is true, you are not going to get it published."

Bob, in this instance, is absolutely correct.

Presupposing creation by God is the end of science. Should a scientist "presuppose creation is true," and base his findings on the presupposition, he has just announced to the world he has incorporated the supernatural in his explanations of nature. Reviewers will reject the non-scientific content of the paper reject it. Every time.

Bob forgets that science is a tool with limitations and boundaries. Science is limited to naturalistic explanations just as a catcher is constrained to fielding pop-up fly balls within boundaries defining the field of play. The catcher will not chase a towering fly into the box seats; nor can a scientist identify some supernatural force as a cause of a phenomenon. Simply put, while the supernatural may exist, science cannot include it in hypotheses, theories or explanations. The supernatural cannot be described in field notes, quantified nor replicated.

Had Bob read the opinion of Judge Jones in the Kitzmiller case, he would understand that intelligent design proponents admitted that intelligent design is not science as defined since Francis Bacon. The intelligent design proponents would require that the boundaries of science be expanded to accommodate the supernatural underpinnings of ID. If that were to happen, astrology could then be deemed a science.

Bob Lies About Lucy

For those who missed it, last week Bob talked about his Christmas vacation trip to the Creation Museum.

That's right, Bob packed up the wife and kids in the Family Truckster and headed down to Kentucky for some old fashioned fake science at the bargain price of $20/head. But a funny thing happened on the path to reinforced ignorance. It turned out that...Bob hated the museum!

Apparently, there simply wasn't enough made-up Creation Science for Bob. He complained that only the Biblical explanations for Creation were presented and not the pseudo-science that Bob is used to from Ken Ham.

At one point in his rant he got off on a tangent about Lucy, the fossilized Australopithecus afarensis skeleton found in 1974. Apparently, they had a recreation of the skeleton at the museum with no explanation as to why it was there. So, Bob decided to tell his family the standard creationist lie about Lucy. Specifically, Bob said:

"Do you know why evolutionists say this Lucy skeleton is proof of evolution? Because a knee joint; the knee joint in this Lucy skeleton is supposedly at an angle that is closer to human leg angles than most monkeys. And so therefore, they say that this monkey was actually evolving into a man merely because of the angle of the knee joint, that's it. And then I point out to them that the rest of the information is that first of all the angle of this knee is no different than spider monkeys and orangutans walking the Earth today. And then secondly, the knee joint itself wasn't even found with the rest of the bones, it was found two hundred feet deeper and one and a half miles away. It was just assumed to be part of this monkey's skeleton."

Let's take this mess of misinformation one falsehood at a time.

1. No "evolutionist", i.e., the vast majority of biologists, would ever say that the Lucy skeleton is "proof" of evolution. Instead, they would argue that the skeleton is merely one piece of evidence, among thousands of other pieces of evidence, that shows that evolutionary biology is correct. Science doesn't deal in proofs. "Proof" is for mathematicians and Dutko.
2. The Lucy skeleton was not found with an intact knee. It's true that a knee joint was found some distance away from the Lucy skeleton. But the knee was never represented as part of Lucy. Therefore, Bob's statement that the knee joint was the important part of Lucy is just wrong. It's a flat out creationist falsehood that has been debunked long ago, yet Bob continues to repeat it because it fits his narrative that evolutionary scientists are somehow conspiring to falsify the facts.
3. The knee joint, that is not part of Lucy, therefore, is not evidence that Lucy walked upright. Instead, the length ratio of her humerous to femur, along with the presence of a lumbar curve, provides evidence that Lucy was bipedal.

So basically, everything that Bob told his family, and his listeners, was demonstrably false. Is it any wonder that the museum would not want to print these lies on a sign by the Lucy replica?

Someone let me know when Bob retracts this latest falsehood on the show. I, of course, won't hold my breath.

Bob Lets His Listeners do the Attacking

I just came across this article written by Eric Elnes as part of a group called CrossWalk America. It highlights an interviewing technique that Bob uses, and I don't think we've talked about before.

In this technique, Bob will have a non-typical guest on the show to be interviewed, such as a liberal/progressive Christian, a Christian whose views don't exactly jive with Bob's, or a non-Christian (e.g., an atheist). During the interview, Bob will be quite cordial and even allow the guest to speak uninterrupted. But after the guest is off the air, the knives come out. Usually, Bob will open up the phone lines and let his most sycophantic listeners berate the guest. Bob will break out his "gee golly" voice and have to "reluctantly" agree with the caller.

This technique was used on Elnes and he clearly wasn't impressed. Bob's thoughtful listeners shouldn't be impressed, either.

I first remember this technique being used when Bob had a priest on from St. Andrew's Episcopal Church in Clawson. The priest sounded like an intelligent, compassionate person. But Bob and his listeners carved him up after he was off the air. It was sad, really.

Bob hates Hillary, Part LXII

Today, Bob outsourced his Hillary obsession to one Peter F. Paul. Paul currently is pimping a homemade DVD (conveniently for sale through WorldNetDaily) about Hillary's "crimes" and "illegalities."

After listening to this idiotic crank go on without interruption or questioning from Bob for what seemed like hours, I thought, "who the heck is this guy?"

Well, it turns out he's quite the character. Paul, originally a lawyer, was convicted in the late 70s for defrauding the Cuban government (!) out of over $8 million and for having a big stash of cocaine in his house (yeah, he was going to sell it). After serving three years, he was released on parole, only to be thrown back in the federal pen for trying to enter Canada using a false identity. Much later, as a co-founder of Stan Lee Media, Paul defrauded investors by artificially inflating the company's stock price. Facing bankruptcy, he fled to Brazil, where he fought extradition back to the U.S. for SEC violations.

Before he left for South America, and late in the Bill Clinton presidency, Paul did quite a bit of fund raising for the Clintons. Chances are he was fishing for a pardon from Bill on the forthcoming SEC violations before he left office, which he never received. Obviously scorned, Paul sued the Clintons and the SEC. None of these suits have panned out and he's now left selling DVDs.

This is a perfect example of the quality of political discussion and intellectual discourse you can find every day on The Bob Dutko Show. In order to show that Hillary Clinton would be a bad, bad President, Bob digs up this two-time felon and drug dealer who has an ax to grind and puts him on the public airwaves. Does Bob have even a shred of dignity?