After watching that I was deeply impressed with how cool headed Dawkins was.

On a deeper note, this was a very instructive video. She was quite well spoken for a wingnut, and she says falsehoods with utter conviction. Most people don’t decide issues based on facts. They argue based on how much they “trust” the speaker. A level headed speaker who repeats simple lie after simple lie (like no transitional fossils) with utter conviction will be very believable. The concept the lie expresses is easy to understand. The truth is more complex and not as easy a concept. If the scientist does not carefully press a point, as in the point that Dawkins made about genetics, in a way that the third party listener can quickly grasp, then the conviction of the “other side” that dismisses the evidence will carry because what the other side is saying is easy to understand even if it is false and it is said with utter conviction.

The most important thing I have gotten from this is how we are loosing.

This also carries through into the anti-Israel propaganda. The supporters of Israel try to make elaborate, fact based arguments that they know are historically accurate. The detractors simply speak simple lies with utter conviction. The most effective propaganda is not complex. It is a simple lie. There are no transitional fossils, There is no Jewish connection to the Land, There is no evidence of AGW. Darwinism is a conspiracy that forces other scientists who disagree to be black balled. Israel lobbyists are a conspiracy that keeps the evil truth about Israel hidden by black baling other academics. AGW is a conspiracy that forces other scientists who disagree to be black balled. Evolution has an evil history that lead to Nazism. Israel has an evil history that makes them Nazis. AGW has an evil agenda that will produce a one world Nazi government.

Again the point is in how much we have the cards stacked against us, because the average person does not look into the facts. The facts are much more complicated than the easy and simple lies said with utter conviction.