{"id":17571,"date":"2012-11-23T21:41:09","date_gmt":"2012-11-23T21:41:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=17571"},"modified":"2012-11-23T21:41:09","modified_gmt":"2012-11-23T21:41:09","slug":"doublequoting-rubio-and-obama","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=17571","title":{"rendered":"DoubleQuoting Rubio and Obama"},"content":{"rendered":"

[ by Charles Cameron<\/strong> — one fault-line in current American political tectonics runs through the age of the planet ]
\n.<\/p>\n

I thought Daniel Engber<\/strong>‘s piece in Slate<\/a> doublequoted Rubio <\/strong>and Obama <\/strong>very nicely the other day:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The top quote is from Sen. Rubio, the second from then-Sen. Obama, and indeed, they both hedge their bets, as Engber goes on to suggest:<\/p>\n

1) Both senators refuse to give an honest answer to the question. Neither deigns to mention that the Earth is 4.54 billion years old.<\/p>\n

2) They both go so far as to disqualify themselves from even pronouncing an opinion. I’m not a scientist, says Rubio. I don\u2019t presume to know, says Obama.<\/p>\n

3) That’s because they both agree that the question is a tough one, and subject to vigorous debate. I think there are multiple theories out there on how this universe was created, says Rubio. I think it’s a legitimate debate within the Christian community of which I’m a part, says Obama.<\/p>\n

4) Finally they both profess confusion over whether the Bible should be taken literally. Maybe the “days” in Genesis were actual eras, says Rubio. They might not have been standard 24-hour days, says Obama.<\/p>\n

In light of these concordances, to call Rubio a liar or a fool would be to call our nation’s president the same …<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

**<\/p>\n

I don’t however think Engber is right in saying of Sen. Rubio — and by implication of Pres. Obama too:<\/p>\n

By arguing that every viewpoint has a claim to truth — that the geologists and theologians are each entitled to their own opinions — the senator gave up on dealing with reality at all.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This runs deeper than the “age of the earth” question, it seems to me, and the two sides currently facing off on a whole slate of issues seem to articulate, respectively, these two questions<\/p>\n

\n
  • Doesn’t anyone recognize the truth of Revelation when they see it?\n
  • Doesn’t anyone recognize the truth of Science when they see it?<\/blockquote>\n

    My own question — which I think has the capacity to reconcile the two — would be along the lines of:<\/p>\n

    \n
  • Doesn’t anyone recognize the truth of Poetry when they see it?<\/blockquote>\n

    **<\/p>\n

    An afterthought:<\/p>\n

    Current American political tectonics<\/strong>: an issue of homeland security?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    [ by Charles Cameron — one fault-line in current American political tectonics runs through the age of the planet ] . I thought Daniel Engber‘s piece in Slate doublequoted Rubio and Obama very nicely the other day: The top quote is from Sen. Rubio, the second from then-Sen. Obama, and indeed, they both hedge their […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[361,526,497,627,741,32,687,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17571","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-america","category-charles-cameron","category-christianity","category-doublequotes","category-poetry","category-science","category-specs","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17571","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17571"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17571\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17588,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17571\/revisions\/17588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17571"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17571"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17571"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}