Encyclopedia of American Loons

Jonathan Cahn is a messianic Jewish Rabbi (another one) and pastor at the Jerusalem Center-Beth Israel Congregation in Wayne, N.J., best known for his best-selling The Harbinger, a completely insane screed comparing the US and the September 11 attacks to ancient Israel and the destruction of the Kingdom of Israel. In particular, Cahn sees an obscure Bible passage, Isaiah 9:10, as a prophetic warning to America; that passage is “being uncannily re-enacted [since 9/11] in the U.S. just the way it originally played out in the time of the great prophet of Israel leading to the nation’s captivity and dispersions”. The book was heavily promoted by the WND in some of their classic advertisements-concealed-as-news articles. And the similarity is simply that the ancient Israelites showed determination in the face of tragedy and so are we, but to the WND and Cahn that is apparently a stunning parallel. Therefore the end-times are near. Some details can be found in the incoherent ramble described here. The book was followed by the no less impressively idiotic The Harbinger Companion: With Study Guide.

In an interview with televangelist Joni Lamb, Cahn also explained that God “allowed” 9/11 to take place because the country’s sins “brought a crack into the foundation” and removed America’s “hedge of protection,” and that the real lesson of 9/11 was that we need to ban gay marriage. Accordingly (but of course) Obama and other leaders are currently working to bring about God’s judgment, just as forewarned in the Bible – Cahn, however, claims to be working with (unnamed) members of Congress, whom he also claims are reading his book, to reverse the trend, pray and repent. (He was, in fact, scheduled to speak with Michele Bachmann at the unofficial Presidential Inaugural Prayer Breakfast where he asserted that President Obama was leading the country into further judgment, and has palled around with the fundie crazy segments of American politics, Bachmann, Gohmert, Huckabee and so on, on several occasions.) It is, admittedly, a bit unclear what Cahn’s endgame actually is, given that he presumably is in favor of the coming of the Messiah, but I suppose the mind and religious fervor of Jonathan Cahn transcends even minimal levels of coherence and consistency.

As so many fundamentalist semi-celebrities Cahn has praised Putin for Russia’s draconian anti-gay laws and opposition to religious freedom. In the US, meanwhile, gay marriage will incur God’s wrath (or at least a “great shaking”), and God will surely judge America for rainbow lights on the White House – yeah, when you’ve run already with God’s wrath for the Supreme Court verdict it’s a bit hard to figure out what to do when something new comes up. But gay rights will at least also lead to fascism. So will Harry Potter. And apparently the Vietnam war was a divine warning related to Roe v. Wade.

More recently, Cahn has apparently penned a book about The Mystery of the Shemitah. Well, the idea is a bit complex (here is a brief intro), but the conclusion is that, based on some Old-Testament-derived number magic and impressively desperate shoehorning, the Bible turns out to predict all the stock market crashes of the last hundred years – in retrospect, of course, but apparently it is something true Christians can now use to make money (as well as, once again, heralding God’s nasty judgment). Glenn Beck pushed that one for a while until someone dangled some other garbage in front of his nose.

For a good example of how delusional Cahn actually is, this one is as good as any.

Diagnosis: Incoherently delusional madman. Needs serious help.

Josephine Briggs is the Director of the Nactional Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM; currently the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH)), former senator Tom Harkin’s heavily subsidized heartchild devoted to studying woo. Now, at least in its infancy NCCAM applied rigorous scientific methods to their studies, which of course meant that little or no actual support for altmed quackery would be forthcoming. Harkin and others were predictably disappointed, and over the years the NCCAM appears, perhaps as a result of political pressure, to have adopted more “flexible approaches” – as one of the original Board Members, Barrie Cassileth, put it, “The degree to which nonsense has trickled down to every aspect of this office is astonishing ... It’s the only place where opinions are counted as equal to data.”

Although some of the previous directors of NCCAM have been pretty rigorous, with Briggs the political sponsors seem to have found the kind of leader they wanted all along. And Briggs appears to have no more than a half-hearted intention of letting reality determine NCCAM’s recommendations. For instance, one great thing about doing research on woo is that one can ignore the base-rate fallacy and credulously push any false positive one wants, and Briggs seems intent on trying that one.

Briggs’s favorite trick, however, is the false balance gambit, and she seems genuinely unaware of what the problem with that gambit from a critical-thinking related point of view might be. So, for instance, although she has been willing to listen to scientists and evidence, she also listens to homeopaths (and promotes a balanced assessment of their claims). It was apparently in response to a meeting with scientists that she produced a post on the NCCAM blog entitled “Listening to Differing Voices”, in which she distinguished between CAM advocates, on the one hand, and skeptics who reflexively dismiss CAM and want to eliminate it, on the other, “open-mindedly” concluding that hers is the only reasonable position between them, and pointing out that: “As I’ve stated before, our position is that science must remain neutral, and we should be strictly objective. There are compelling reasons to explore many CAM modalities, and the science should speak for itself.” The problem, of course, is that the science does, indeed, speak for itself, and has decisevly refuted the very hypotheses Briggs wishes to take seriously. Indeed, her responseto data seems to have become reflexive: the continued refutation of altmed claims continue to be met with Briggs’s calls for“rebooting” the debate and a “nuanced and balanced” conversation.

And, heck, there is a good argument to be made that she is utterly incompetent at what she is trying to do – if by “what she is trying to do” we mean trying to determine whether treatments work rather than making savvy political moves (as in this, since this) Here, for instance, she discovers Bayesian probability and fails so miserably that it would have been hilarious if it wasn’t so sad because she is actually in a position of power and influence.

Indeed, Briggs has lent her imprimatur, along with those of the NIH and the federal government, to the formal celebration of quackery titled the “25th Anniversary Convention of the American Association of Naturopathic Physicians.” Moreover Briggs nominated Jane Guiltinan, former President of the AANP and Dean of Naturopathic Medicine for Bastyr University, to membership of the National Advisory Council for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NACCAM). Guiltinan, according to herself, “emphasizes the concepts of treating the cause of a problem, supporting the body’s own healing process and encouraging patients to create their own wellness even in the face of serious illness. Dr. Guiltinan uses nutrition, plant medicine and homeopathy [!] in her practice and believes that air, water, food, touch, love and laughter are some of the most powerful healing agents.” The NCCAM has previously nominated homeopath Brian M.Berman to their advisory committee.

Antivaxx sentiments are widespread in the altmed community, and one would think that NCCAM – if it were a responsible organization – would help defuse the antivaxx myths. Briggs has officially agreed to do this, but the NCCAM has abundantly failed to follow up on that promise.

Diagnosis: It could be argued that Briggs may not qualify as an outright loon, and that as a director of NCCAM she is put in something of an awkward position, but she is certainly a great facilitator of and legitimizer of quackery; given her position the only respectable stance would have been a staunch defense of reality, critical thinking and evidence. By hedging on those points she is really causing a lot of harm.

Addendum: Oh, the hell: Josephine Briggs is an advocate for anti-science and a loon. Her series – published as a supplement Science, no less – “The Art and Science of Traditional Medicine Part 1: TCM Today—A Case for Integration” (with contributions from a number of powerful quacks and pseudoscientists such as Margaret Chan, Director-General of the WHO and Alan Leshner, CEO of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and Executive Publisher of Science) is so fundamentally dishonest that we cannot give her the benefit of doubt anymore. It is, however, worth quoting the goal of the series (a series of issues, in fact):

“… we present a series of articles making a case for the integration of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) into modern medical practice. From the new WHO Traditional Medicine Strategy to the application of systems biology in studying TCM, we aim to highlight the potential for creating an integrated, network-based health care system. The next two issues will cover herbal genomics and highlight the importance of quality control, standardization, regulation, and safety for traditional therapies. An overview of indigenous medicines in Europe, Africa, the Middle East, India, and the Americas will also be provided.”

Notice what’s missing? That’s right. They will not consider the evidence or scientific foundation for TCM. Apparently that doesn’t matter. TCM is popular, and that’s enough, ostensible becuase if people want to use TCM then it works for them and we all create our own realities and energy flows and vibrations and so on and so forth.

Josephine Briggs is a disgrace to her profession, to decency and to civilization.

Ah, the state legislatures. (Yes, again). This time it’s South Carolina’s turn, since that’s where you find Lee Bright, representing the 12^th district (Spartanburg and Greenville) since 2008. In fact, Bright enjoyed a career as a village idiot even before he got elected – more precisely as the resident village idiot on the Spartanburg School District Six Board from 1999 to 2008. As a school board member, Bright called for teaching creationism in school science classes instead of evolution, explaining that “they’re teaching evolution right now in school, and it’s only a theory.” No, he didn’t even bother to try the deceptive approaches recommended by the Discovery Institute.

As a state senator Bright is just a little bit more extreme on most issues than your crazy uncle, leading to posturing events that usually ends in him submitting quixotic bills just to prove a point to his constituencies, presumably (as well as to move the overton window, perhaps). As an outspoken opponent of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, for instance, Bright sponsored a bill that would criminalize the act. (Yes, Bright is a proponent of the unconstitutional idea of state nullification). It’s all a fight against tyranny, you know, and Bright later warned that the IRS “Brown Shirts” might start enforcing Obamacare with semiautomatic rifles, adding that FEMA is a scam and disaster relief is much more efficiently managed through private donations.

In 2013 Bright announced that he’d seek the nomination for US Senate (against Republican Lindsey Graham; his competitorsBill Connor and Nancy Mace deserve separate entries), on a platform not only asserting that income tax is something out of Nazi Germany and opposition to women with nice nails and pocketbooks getting food assistance (able-bodied food stamp recipients “shouldn’t eat” and the social safety net is “the role of the church”), but – it seems– on refighting the civil war (“If the Tenth Amendment won’t protect the Second, we might have to use the Second to protect the Tenth”). It’s all Lincoln’s fault, really, that Bright is no longer able to enjoy genuine liberty – in particular, Lincoln’s Revenue Act of 1862 “was when government started becoming God and taking over this country.”

He has also warned his fans that Justices Kagan and Sotomayor might want to dissolve the states, and that Obama wants to be king and that Americans today are in fact under “the chains of slavery.” Indeed, he reassured them that in a conflict President Obama wouldn’t send troops to South Carolina because armed forces from the state would turn against him. “I’ve talked to plenty of soldiers,” said Bright. In 2015, after landing a spot as one of three state co-chairs of Sen. Ted Cruz’s presidential campaign, Bright assured his followers that he was ready to stave off Obama’s invasion of South Carolina.

His opposition to immigration is of course based on the idea that “a lot of these folks from terrorist nations are coming in on student visas,” and that the Muslim Brotherhood may be behind the “invasion” going on at the southern border, and he has promised to oppose the “indoctrination” of the “homosexual agenda.” In fact, Bright has taken up what he seems to think is an urgent and desperate fight against the the scourge of gay “recruitment” that apparently has become a major problem in South Carolina – Bright (and fellow state senator Mike Fair) is deeply worried for instance that the “homosexual agenda” has “seized the educational establishment” and has gone on “full march in our institutions of higher ed and we’ve gone from education to indoctrination.” Keep in mind that this is the guy who would prohibit teaching evolution in public schools in favor of creationism.

Of course, like most of these people, Bright claims to revere the constitution, but has apparently never read it. Nullification is one thing, but Bright also argues that federal judges who disagree with him should be impeached.

Here is Bright on marriage equality, the Confederate flag and possession by the devil. It’s strikingly unhinged, even for Lee Bright.

Diagnosis: Hysterical moron, but that hasn’t stopped anyone from winning a political race, it seems. Dangerous.

Peter Brimelow was born in Britain, but is currently American. He used to have a career as a writer and editor for various more or less respectable magazines (no, he really did have a quite substantial influence on American and Canadian politics), until he doubled down and founded the webzine VDARE, a platform for Brimelow’s anti-immigration views, white nationalism and “racial realism” (other topics covered seem to be just so much window dressing, though they do seem to want to take credit for popularizing the idea of a War on Christmas). VDARE takes it name from Virginia Dare, the original anchor baby (a point that seems to be lost on them), and is designated as a hate group by the SPLC – Brimelow’s response was to call the SPLC “the notorious Treason Group.”

Brimelow’s main target is, unsurprisingly, multiculturalism, and as he put it in his talk “The Failure of Multiculturalism: How the pursuit of diversity is weakening the American Identity” at the 2012 CPAC (oh, yes), diversity is the greatest threat we are facing and “immigration is polluting America.” The host of the session, Robert Vandervoort, former leader of the White Nationalist group Chicagoland Friends of the American Renaissance, thanked CPAC for hosting the panel despite the work of “leftist thugs” trying to “shut down freedom of speech and freedom of assembly,” since not giving people a platform to speak is obviously a violation of their constitutional rights.

As expected, Brimelow is a fierce critic of “Obama’s racial-socialist coup,” and fears that the U.S. is doomed to face a “minority occupation government.” In fact, according to Brimelow, the Democrats’ supposed support of an “invasion” and “colonization” of the US by non-white immigrants is treason because it reduces the percentage of the white population. Accordingly, he called on the Republican Party to start focusing on becoming the party of white voters by attacking “ethnic lobbies,” affirmative action, bilingual education and “taxpayer subsidies to illegal aliens.”

And the connection to the War on Christmas? In his book Alien Nation, Brimelow wrote that “weird aliens with dubious habits” were damaging the “ethnic core” of white Christian America and were part of a “multicultural struggle to abolish America;” seeing the trend toward saying “happy holidays” as part of this sinister movement, he decided to do something about it: an annual competition in the magazine for the “the most egregious attempt to suppress Christmas.” It should be mentioned that the idea had already been promoted by the John Birch Society for years.

In 2015 Brimelow, in a Martin Luther King day speech, argued that states must secede to protect “white rights” (i.e. the right not to have to see black people). Instead of promoting unity, Brimelow said, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day “has just turned into anti-white indoctrination.” And unless “cultural Marxists” who are behind “political correctness” and “the war on Christmas” are resisted, he claimed, the U.S. will collapse. Again. With regard to the Ferguson protests, he argued that force is needed to counter the inherent “criminality in the American underclass”.

Steve King is a positively giddy fan of Brimelow’s.

Diagnosis: Dude, this guy’s views on immigration are too extreme for the WND. He nevertheless maintains quite a bit of influence.

Joel Brind is a professor of human biology and endocrinology at Baruch College, CUNY, a pro-lifer and a by now famous pseudoscientist. He is best known for his association with the discredited link between abortion and breast cancer; it was Brind’s 1996 meta-analysis that popularized the idea (and got him famous). That study, which despite Brind’s strongly worded conclusions showed a barely statistically significant increase, was not particularly professionally done, and the results were quickly discredited (summaries here, here and here). What makes Brind a pseudoscientist is not the initial claim – the hypothesis really wasn’t that far-fetched given the available information – but that he has continued to push the link after it has been thoroughly refuted (yet another study discussed here). At present he is primarily pushing it through his organization “The Breast Cancer Prevention Institute”. He has been active in the anti-abortion movement (e.g. through Christ’s Bride Ministries) for several decades.

Though his original analysis appeared in a respectable journal, his later papers on the same theme (presumably because they didn’t manage to overcome the refutations using proper methodology) was published in places like the pseudojournal JPANDS, the house journal of the crank organization Association of American Physicians and Surgeons. Brind, on his side, remains contemptuous of mainstream medical professional organizations and journals, accusing them of conducting a deliberate cover-up with the goal of “protecting the abortion industry”, asserting in print that the National Cancer Institute “… is just another corrupt federal agency like the IRS and the NSA.” Ah, yes, but of course; that’s the proper reaction when everyone else refutes your claims. Conspriacy mongering is, of course, as much a staple fare among this particular group of science denialists as it is among other groups promoting similarly refuted ideas.

To further cement his reputation as a pseudoscientist, Brind is also a signatory to the Discovery Institute’s anti-evolution petition A Scientific Dissent from Darwinism.

Diagnosis: Though he has credentials, Brind is not reluctant to let any commitment to truth, evidence or sound methodology fly when truth, evidence or sound methodology doesn’t serve his ideologically driven purposes.

Felicia Briones-Colman is another MD who has turned to the dark side, yet again reminding us that MDs are not scientists, and are not necessarily trained in anything remotely resembling evidence assessment or proper methodology. Briones-Colman is, in fact, so extreme in her rejection of evidence, facts, and science in recommending healthcare strategies that she has contributed to NaturalNews. Yes, that NaturalNews.

As she will point out, Briones-Colman is not only an MD; she is “board certified in both Internal Medicine and the American Board of Integrative Holistic Medicine,” the latter of which is nothing to be proud of. Nonetheless, she recommends that you should “[c]hoose a doctor certified by the American Board of Integrative Holistic Medicine” when you need holistic medical help. We don’t want to share the market, do we (it’s not like the board in question bases the certification process on evidence and reality in any case)? According to her, “[t]he practice of Integrative Medicine i[…] requires knowledge about alternative therapies that are scientifically proven to be effective and which can cause harm,” which is inaccurate in that any treatment that is “scientifically proven to be effective” is by definition not an alternative therapy, and seeing a board certified alternative practitioner rather than a non-certified is advisable to make sure that you receive the most efficacious woo and avoid harmful practices; “… a doctor who is board certified provides assurance of excellence,” says Briones-Colman, a claim so stupid and crazy it easily justifies an entry in our Encyclopedia.

Diagnosis: A useful reminder that a proper appeal to expertise on the efficacy of medical treatments is not the same as an appeal to your local MD. That’s the best I can manage to say about her.

Dr. Kelly Brogan was educated at Cornell and MIT, so one would think she ought to know a thing or two about methods for aligning beliefs to reality. Well, clearly Cornell and MIT need to do something somewhat differently, for Brogan has managed to delude herself into a pretty impressive array of ridiculous denialist and pseudoscienfic beliefs and conspiracy theories, and she has shown a remarkable inability to read scientific literature or evaluate hypotheses. You can read her articles on Sayer Ji’s abysmally insane website GreenMedInfo, as well as on her own website, where she claims to be practicing “holistic women’s health psychiatry,” for some examples. Oh, yes, Brogan has embraced a whole range of woo, including homeopathy, acupuncture, antivaccine views, anti-GMO views, functional medicine and pretty much every kind of medical nonsense you’ll ever encounter.

Given that she has some (nominal) background in topics related to science, she is dimly aware of the value of using scientific studies to support her views. But managing to find a single scientific study that could be twisted into looking like it supports your view isn’t enough to make those views respectable, and Brogan’s writings constitute some spectacular examples of how a professional denialist can dishonestly twist and distort and cherrypick real (as well as less respectable) studies to seem to support her cherished, otherwise non-evidence based views. What she does to an extent know how to do, is to mask her own unscientific rants in the format of something resembling real, serious writing (to those who don’t know better). Take a look, for instance, at her writings about the HPV vaccine (or here).

What is clear, is that Brogan is a hardcore antivaccine conspiracy theorist, who has managed to become a rather influential figure in the antivaccine movement, and she has been caught touting even the most egregious examples of inane pseudoscience published in profoundly disgraced pseudojournals to “support” her own insane ideas, such as the idea that vaccines are a likely cause of SIDS. She even appeared in the whale.to-level conspiracy flick “Bought” (oh yes, Brogan is a frequently cited “authority” over at whale.to, which is something that should make anyone with an even minimal wish to appear respectable stop up and wonder what they’re doing with their lives). The premise of “Bought” is the pharma shill gambit, one of Brogan’s own favorite tricks. Of course, the fact that she herself is constantly trying to sell stuff – speeches and suchlike – while she bashes Big Pharma is an irony lost on both her and her followers. (Here, for instance, if you buy the Depression Summit, you get the Sexyback summit Free!)

Much of her writings seem to boil down to fallacious appeals to nature, which are often also based on false premises. For instance, Brogan characterizes vaccines as working by “bypass[ing] natural immunity and provoke inflammatory response.” Vaccines do not bypass natural immunity, however; they induce immunity completely naturally. But that’s how Brogan starts off when discussing the HPV vaccine. It is hardly surprising that the results of her line of reasoning are absolute nonsense as well. It does, however, seems to suggest that Brogan really doesn’t understand even basic stuff about the topics about which she more than willingly shares her unsupported opinions. She is not above rank dishonesty either, as long as it can look like it lends support to views she has already convinced herself are true based on no good evidence or reason whatsoever.

She’s even been toying HIV denialism (oh, yes). Of the idea that HIV causes AIDS she has pointed out that AIDS is “a syndrome of 25 illnesses that does not satisfy Koch’s postulates of infectious disease” (Koch’s postulates date from 1890 and have been obsolete since then), and in the process positioned herself dangerously close to germ theory denialism – she probably doesn’t notice, though, since she doesn’t seem to have the faintest idea what she’s talking about. At least she rejects the effect of antiretroviral drugs on the mortality associated with this disease: “That drug toxicity associated with AIDS treatment may very well be what accounts for the majority of deaths,” says Brogan. “may very well” means there is no evidence or plausibility behind this claim I pulled out of my ass concerning topics I do not understand but you dear reader – since you are reading my bullshit – probably don’t know that. A collaboration of 12 prospective studies that included more than 62,000 HIV infected individuals found, contrary to what Brogan believes, that mortality was halved in the treated groups. We also know that in South Africa there were an estimated 3.8 million person-years lost between 2000 and 2005 because of delays in implementing treatment programs in part because central figures in the government had been convinced by pseudoscientists that HIV was not the cause of AIDS and that the drugs were not useful. We leave it to the reader to evaluate how, in light of that, Brogan’s recommendation should be used to judge her as a member of humanity.

Diagnosis: Raging pseudoscientific conspiracy theorist, who has managed to make something of a name for herself among conspiracy-minded “natural” healing gohmerts. One of those who, on balance, has made the world a worse place to live, and she appears to be just getting started. Dangerous.

Yes, yes, the state legislatures. This time its Tennessee, which is saddled with Kevin Brooks (24^th district). Brooks is a Tea Party candidate and a conspiracy theorist. For instance, Brooks sponsored a resolution condemning Agenda 21, a UN environmental plan and a common target for unhinged conspiracy theories, as a “destructive and insidious” effort to advance a communist agenda through the guise of community planning. The plan called on members of the UN to adopt sustainable development principles to alleviate poverty and combat global warming. According to Tennessee lawmakers, however, it is as a plan for the “socialist/communist redistribution of wealth” through energy conservation policies, zoning restrictions and forced abortions. “It reads well. It has nice words like sustainability and helping the poor,” said state Rep. Glen Casada, R-Franklin, “[b]ut what these people want to do is they want to cap the number of people this planet can have. … So ladies and gentlemen, if that doesn’t bother you, if those words don’t scare you, we’ve got to talk.” Yes, I do think you need to talk to someone, Casada. What is particularly interesting about the bill is that it used a language almost identical to a John Birch Society model bill.

The resolution passed 72-23, so Brooks is hardly the only lunatic in the Tennessee House of Representatives. But we knew that. Brooks was also one of the representatives at the House General Subcommittee of Education meeting on March 16, 2011, who voted for Tennessee’s infamous “teach the controversy” bill. The others – they all deserve mentioning – were Harry Brooks (R-District 19), Joe Carr (R-District 48), John J. DeBerry Jr. (D-District 90), the bill’s sponsor Bill Dunn (R-District 16), Joey Hensley (R-District 70), Ron Lollar (R-District 99), Debra Young Maggar (R-District 45), and Richard Montgomery (R-District 12)

Diagnosis: Tennessee: wtf is wrong with you? Wingnuttery or no, this is lizard-people, whale.to-level lunacy at the House level. You have a House of Representatives filled with weapons-grade tinfoil hatters!

Floyd Brown is a co-founder of Citizens United (yes, that Citizens United) and president of Excellentia Inc. (helping clients “achieve success in the conservative and Christian marketplace”) and a range of other wingnut organizations. Brown specializes in mudslinging and devising dishonest political ad campaigns and is widely renowned for his brazen rejection of facts, evidence, reason and similar liberal conspiracies – and he’s for hire. Indeed, has established himself as one of the nation’s dirtiest political strategists, for instance by devising the infamous Willie Horton ad during the Bush sr.-Dukakis election, and many of his campaigns are undeniably effective. He also pushes “insider” stock tips and advice, gold coins and municipal bonds (here is a report from the Western Conservative Conference, which he organized; it reads just like your average spam mail).

During recent presidential elections Brown and his company released ads asserting for instance that Obama was registered as a Muslim student in Indonesia, and that he attended an Indonesian school that taught Islam as a child. Moreover, according to Brown, “for the international socialist movement of which Barack Obama is a card-carrying member, the U.S. must be brought to its knees, and I guarantee you that Barack Hussein Obama is doing everything he can to bring the country to its knees. He wants to bring it to its knees.” In fact, “[d]oes he simply hate Christianity … Does he hate the United States … or both?” – those were the questions he asked in his 2009 campaign to impeach President Obama (which were, of course, amply covered by the WND). According to the campaign, Obama should be impeached for his “high crimes and misdemeanors,” including the crime that “Obama has consistently refused to approve the release of his actual birth certificate, college transcripts and his medical records ... It's almost as if Obama is intentionally trying to destroy the country ...”

He even teamed up with Jerome Corsi to promote the latter’s book Obama Nationvia viral web campaigns and emailings. Few people who have been in the vicinity of Corsi can avoid being in the extension of the description “hysterically insane”. And for a recent example, have a look at this email from Brown declaring that Obamacare “just killed its millionth person.” He doesn’t not even try to back up the claim.

So why the question mark by Brown’s name at the beginning of this entry. The thing is, we don’t really think that Brown believes any of the shit he is promoting, any more than he believes the claims behind the gold coins he is pushing. But he is a wingnut, and he does realize that many of his fellow wingnuts are crazy enough to take any crazy conspiracy theory at face value.

Diagnosis: If you ever listen to anything Brown says about politics and find it reasonable, you are probably a loon yourself. We doubt that Floyd Brown does. He is immensely influential nonetheless.

There are, in fact, creationists with real credentials. Donald Calbreath, for instance, seems to have an education in chemistry and served as a professor in the Department of Chemistry, Whitworth College (a small Presbyterian liberal arts college) until retiring some years ago. No, he doesn’t have relevant credentials, but what did you expect? He isn’t a scientist, either (at least we are unable to locate any scientific research record), but he is a signatory to the Discovery Institute-instigated petition A Scientific Dissent from Darwinism.

He is currently a research team member at Science and the Spirit: Pentecostal Perspectives on the Science/Religion Dialogue at Calvin College, which is not a research team – Calbreath himself, for instance, specializes in defending non-materialist neuroscience through the standard fallacies and by demonstrating complete ignorance of and failure to engage with the literature on consciousness. He also has a record of tracts and screeds on stem cell research, abortion, “miracles of healing”, the relationship between Pentecostalism and science (particularly notable is the paper “7 Serotonin and Spirit: Can There Be a Holistic Pentecostal Approach to Mental Illness”), creationism, and zeh gays. He has also been a critic of public education, claiming – in American Laboratory– that schools are indoctrinating students with truth and reason, and complaining that students risk getting lower grades just because they get the wrong answers to questions on tests.

Diagnosis: Fundamentalist who hates truth, reason and freedom but desperately tries to convince himself otherwise. One of many, and we are reluctant to say that his influence is negligible.

Honorable mention to Jim Campbell, but giving him a separate entry would be rather ridiculous. Instead we return to … the state legislatures – Tennessee, this time. Stacey Campfield served as a state representative from 2005 to 2010, and despite a record of being a stupid bigot got elected to the state senate in 2010. In 2014 even the good people of Tennessee’s 7^th district seems to have had enough and managed to ditch him in the Republican primary elections.

Much of his work as a representative concerned standard wingnut issues, like sponsoring a bill to issue death certificates for aborted fetuses in 2007 (he said wanted people to be able to find out how many abortions were being performed in Tennessee and to note the loss of human lives, but those figures are, of course, already available, so Campfield was lying – big surprise), and in 2009 he introduced a bill to limit lottery winnings to $600 for people on public assistance and prisoners because ~~he is evil~~ people on public assistance should not be buying lottery tickets. (Tennessee law already prohibited the use of public assistance money to purchase lottery tickets, so the point was presumably really to show that he is merciless on poverty.) Rather unsurprisingly Campfield didn’t restrict his feelings of disgust to poor people and criminals, and in 2008, he proposed a bill to ban teachers from teaching as part of the lesson plan about homosexuality in Tennessee's public elementary and middle schools, saying that the topic should only be discussed by each student’s family. He has also expressed incredulity over the fact that psychology departments aren’t teaching their students how to pray away the gay with homosexual clients.

But his efforts in the house of Representatives pale when compared to his efforts as a state senator (a more detailed narrative can be found here). In 2011 he managed to gain international attention when he revived his 2008 “pro traditional family education” – the infamous “Don’t Say Gay” bill – complaining that gay activists were using claims about “bullying” as a cover for pushing “their social agenda in schools” and that Hollywood is “glorifying” homosexuality. To make sure no one would suspect him of being reasonable he also pointed out that“[m]ost people realize that AIDS came from the homosexual community – it was one guy screwing a monkey, if I recall correctly, and then having sex with men,” an urban legend, and that “[m]y understanding is that it is virtually – not completely, but virtually – impossible to contract AIDS through heterosexual sex,” estimating the odds of heterosexual vaginal transmission at 1 in 5 million. And “[w]hat’s the average lifespan of a homosexual? It’s very short. Google it yourself,” said Campfield, apparently referring to the insane and methodologically laughable ramblings-poorly-dressed-as-scientific-investigations of lunatic pseudo-psychologist Paul Cameron. Meanwhile, Campfield’s colleague, representative John Ragan, tried to explainhow homosexuality doesn’t really exist.

In 2014 Campfield compared mandatory signups under the Affordable Care Act to the “train rides” the Jews took under Nazi Germany (“Democrats bragging about the number of mandatory sign ups for Obamacare is like Germans bragging about the number of mandatory sign ups for ‘train rides’ for Jews in the 40s”). He later complained that critics missed the point, which they surely didn’t (“the post was meant to draw attention to the loss of freedom that we are currently experiencing,” said Campfield, so the critics definitely didn’t misunderstand it), and besides there are death panels and government funding abortions (false), concluding that “I think Jewish people should be the first to stand up against Obamacare.”

In 2014 he also passed legislation protecting schools, teachers and students from possible prosecution for using traditional winter holiday greetings or displays. Though innocuous-sounding, it is pretty clear that it was intended as means to encourage religious proselytazion by teachers in public schools.

And if you wish to know Campfield’s views on the separation of church and state, as well as on evolution, this one is illuminating – virtually none of the “facts” cited are correct. It complains that evolutionists build “supposition upon supposition” and that scientific theories are both removed from common sense and always changing, therefore they should be viewed with suspicion (as should the separation of church and state be because [some oblique analogy]).

To date there have been two musicals and one play written about Campfield and his life in the legislature.

Diagnosis: And they just keep coming, don’t they? Hopefully Campfield’s been retired from the game by now, but we’re not optimistic that Tennessee will avoid similar embarrassments in the future.

Anthony “Tony” Campolo is a sociologist, pastor, author and public speaker, and as former spiritual advisor to Bill Clinton he is something of a celebrity fundie – one of the most influential leaders in the Evangelical left, in fact, and a proponent of progressivism and reform within the evangelical community. He has also become a leader of the Red-Letter Christian movement, and enjoys a career as a popular commentator on religious, political, and social issues.

But deep down, Campolo is in most respects just your standard lunatic fundie. In particular, Campolo is an ardent critic of the theory of evolution. Of course, Campolo doesn’t have the faintest idea what the theory actually says, but he claims that teaching evolution in public schools is problematic at best since Darwin endorsed “an extreme laissez faire political ideology that legitimates the neglect of the suffering poor by the ruling elite” (no, he doesn’t provide references) and that he wished to carry out a genocide to exterminate what he perceived to be inferior races (the idea might be based on the quote mining performed by Richard Weikart). Thus, we “should really fear the ethical implications of Darwinism,” it’s pretty much the Nazi ideology in a nutshell. Every claim is, of course, false, and what Darwin’s personal views, even if they were what Campolo claims they were, which they weren’t, have to do with modern biology is left very open, but I suppose many of Campolo’s readers don’t understand or know modern biology any better than he does. Concludes Campolo: “Personally, I hold to the belief that, regardless of how we got here, we should recognise that there is an infinite qualitative difference between the most highly developed ape and each and every human being. Darwin never recognised this disjuncture. And that is why his theories are dangerous.” Right. Shame on you, reality, for promoting a continuum rather than discrete, eternal kinds.

Diagnosis: Oh, yes, a liar for Jesus engaged in mortal combat with reality, reason and science. That state leaders have ever sought his advice is horrifying.

Apparently one of the easy roads to recognition among paranoid, fundamentalist wingnuts is being an “ex-terrorist”, and there is a number of converts from Islam to Christianity on the far right (after all, the distance between the religious right and Taliban-style Muslim fundamentalism is often short) who claim to be former terrorists but have seen the errors of their ways, and who are currently busy confirming wingnut misperceptions of Islam as well as vigorously fighting against religious freedom, secularism, gay rights and the science of evolution and climate change – just for good measure. Their “ex-terrorist” status never stand up to scrutiny, but dishonesty is only a sin if you are not doing the work of Jesus.

Ergun Michael Caner is a fine example. A Swedish-American Baptist minister, Caner rose to fame (and wealth) with his 2002 book Unveiling Islam, quickly co-authored with his brother Emir in the wake of 9/11, about Islam and his claims that he was a devout Muslim trained as a terrorist. He is currently the President of Brewton-Parker College in Mt. Vernon, GA – not a place you should take seriously as an educational institution – and has previously served as the Provost and Vice President of Academic Affairs at Arlington Baptist College as well as (and most famously) dean of the Liberty Baptist Theological Seminary and Graduate School of Liberty University (the perhaps most influential fake university in the US, if you were unaware) – he was invited by Jerry Falwell himself, apparently a fan of his book. He lost this position after, as Wikipedia laconically puts it, “it became clear to Liberty University faculty and the Liberty University Board that he contradicted himself while making factual statements.”

The background for his fall from grace were pretty well corroborated accusations, in the beginning by bloggers, that Caner had made up much of his life story, for instance his claims to have grown up in Turkey when he actually grew up in Ohio; being raised in a devout Muslim home, rather than a nominal one, having been trained as an Islamic jihadist, and having debated dozens of Muslims – sort of the whole story that initially made him famous post 9/11. Caner was quick to play the persecution card, lamenting that “I never thought I would see the day when alleged ‘Christians’ join with Muslims to attack converts,” whereas his fans were quick to call employers and associates of his critics to put pressure on them to take down their critical posts. Liberty University’s Elmer Towns, dean of the school of religion, initially responded that the university’s board was satisfied that Caner has done nothing “theologically inappropriate. It’s not an ethical issue, it’s not a moral issue,” i.e. they refused to address the charges. By May 10, 2010, however, heat was sufficiently turned up for Liberty University to announce a formal inquiry into allegations of discrepancies in his background stroy. Caner claimed to be “thrilled that Liberty University is forming this committee, and I look forward to this entire process coming to a close,” and was promptly removed from his position as Dean of the seminary in June after the committee found “discrepancies related to the matters such as dates, names and places of residence.” He kept his job as a full-time faculty member of the seminary for the 2010–2011 school year, though.

His fans didn’t seem to care all that much, and Caner remains a popular speaker among wingnut groups who are “aware of the controversy” but nevertheless appear to take his claims at face value (case in point: the Twin City’s 12th Annual Community Prayer Breakfast in Bristol, Virginia, where organizer Sid Oakley more or less dismissed the charges as irrelevant). Caner himself claims that his critics are simply “frustrated people in their basements,” which is not really addressing the charges.

In 2011 Caner left Liberty to become Provost and Vice President of Academic Affairs for the Arlington Baptist College, best known for the anti-evolution crusades of its founder J. Frank Norris (whom Caner describes as “one of Christianity’s most courageous voices”) – the President, Dan Moody, stated that Caner’s controversy was in the past and the new Vice President had his full confidence. Caner is currently the President of Brewton-Parker College in Mt. Vernon. That “college” stated that they needed “a warrior”, and that Caner “endured relentless and pagan attacks like a warrior” (i.e. because he lied about his background and was caught). Real universities, meanwhile, tend to at least pretend to care for truth, evidence, wisdom and moral integrity. Most of Caner’s critics, by the way, were evangelical Christians.

In 2013 Caner filed a lawsuit in the U.S. district court in North Texas claiming copyright infringement for reproducing, uploading and maintaining his videos without permission on youtube in order to silence (and punish) his critics. The lawsuits were ruled to be frivolous, partially because Caner never had the copyrights to the videos in question and partially because fair use is a sort of important legal concept (also here), but Caner’s behavior seems to have exhibited precisely the kind of “character” that Brewton-Parker Colleges was looking for.

Diagnosis: Perhaps more of a spineless opportunist than a loon, one wonders whether anyone – including Caner – would be able to live his life without at least believing that his actions are somehow justified by some higher goal. So, he’s probably a loon as well.

Note that we won’t give a separate entry to celebrity-of-questionable-character Jose Canseco for this, regardless of its weapons-grade lunacy.

An embarrassment to Tea Partiers, rightwing politicians and Thanksgiving family dinner parties everywhere, birtherism remains popular despite mainstream politicians’ attempts to avoid (without alienating) its proponents – it’s almost as if there were a conspiracy against them. Still, some – usually particularly aggressively lunatic – birthers sometimes manage to draw public attention to themselves. Theresa Cao, a big fan of the WND, is a case in point. Cao, a self-proclaimed birther and nutcase (the latter is not her description, admittedly), drew attention to herself by interrupting the second day of the 112th Congress by screaming, “except Obama, help us Jesus Christ,” during a reading of Article II, Section I of the Constitution (which deals with the requirement for Presidential eligibility). Cao was subsequently removed from the gallery by Capitol police and persecuted for being a good Christian. According to herself Cao felt compelled to let representatives know of the absence of proof for Barack Obama’s eligibility, pointing out that the only hope for the United States is a return to the faith of the Founding Fathers and that doing so is the opposite of Obama’s “socialism” as exemplified by the Affordable Care Act and government takeover of private companies including banks, insurance companies and car companies. Which, of course, is more or less equivalent to saying that Obama is technically ineligible for the presidency because he is not a citizen only using different words.

Diagnosis: Obama’s political views are objectionable; America is a Christian nation; Marxism is bad; therefore, if Chewbacca lives on Endor, you must acquit. Why is that so hard to see? Perhaps “the Chewbacca implosion” is an apt epithet?

Sometimes bigots make inane arguments against gay marriage, and Paul Caprio – leader of the Coalition to Protect Children and Marriage (currently FamilyPAC) a “family values” coalition in Illinois – is no exception. In essence, Caprio’s argument is that there are very high murder rates in Chicago, and we should therefore (yes, the connection is … nebulous) ensure that kids are raised by married couples. The obvious conclusion to draw from that is of course that gays should be allowed to marry, but Caprio has some trouble recognizing entailments and logical structures and arrives at the opposite proposition. Here is another one of his campaigns.

He is also the signatory to letters to the president (then Bush jr.) opposing any restrictions on CO₂ emissions or measures to prevent global warming, just to make sure that no reasonable person ever takes him seriously.

Diagnosis: Apparently he has a certain amount of influence in wingnut circles, which doesn’t reflect well on those circles. There’s otherwise nothing novel about Caprio; he’s quite simply your typical, predictable, bigoted loon.

A.k.a. The Long Island Medium

We have a hard time deciding what counts as the most disgusting job description there is, but “celebrity medium” is certainly in the running. Theresa Caputo, the Long Island Medium, is precisely that, and portrays herself as a medium on the television show Long Island Medium, featured on the Orwellianly named The Learning Channel. Caputo claims to have seen spirits since she was four and claims that in her family this is a normal thing. If correct, "hereditary ability to see spirits" would probably not quite be the right medical term for it.

Her sessions are glittering examples of cold reading and the Forer effect at work and, needless to say, no evidence of special abilities beyond those she share with any charismatic pyramid scheme pusher. Caputo’s chats with those who have passed away and are on “the other side” are usually wrapped in loving and moving messages that say precisely what her victims want them to say (as all mediums and predators in the wild Caputo preys on and targets people in difficult situations – and the sheer evil of it should break your heart; and no, it’s not harmless). Indeed, in 2014 Ron Tebo publicly accused Caputo of going far beyond mere cold reading; she also sends staff members to interview audience members in advance in order to be able to pretend that she acquires knowledge from communicating with the deceased.

Dr. Oz is apparently a fan. At least Oz brought Caputo on his show to use a brain scan to “prove” that her “psychic” powers are real and true while she performs bad cold readings (no, really – he did). The scan was performed by Daniel Amen. Amen admitted that there could be multiple explanations for the results, so he concluded that Caputo likely has psychic abilities (yeah, that’s how it works). The test, accordingly, tells you nothing about Caputo, but quite a bit about the quality of Dr. Oz’s critical thinking skills (or honesty) and thus about the trustworthiness of his medical advice in general.

At least Caputo is the proud recipient of a Pigasus Award.

Diagnosis: Another “unsinkable rubber duck,” as those who understand how psychic scams work call them. It doesn’t matter that these mediums are wrong, and caught in the act; they tell the audience – who has no clue how subjective validation works – what they want to hear, and any criticism is accordingly interpreted as persecution.

According to antivaxxers, vaccines cause autism. But some of them have expanded their search for causes of autism to other, equally silly targets as well, in particular wireless technology. Yes, the idea is that electromagnetic fields (EMFs) and wifi cause autism. And among the proponents of this link there is at least one epidemiologist gone rough to become a “brave maverick doctor” named George Louis Carlo, whose work has been picked up by familiar antivaxxers such as homeopath Heidi Stevenson. To be sure, there’s no biologically plausible mechanism behind the hypothesis, and there’s no evidence of a link, but that has never stopped a good pseudoscientist.

Carlo thinks that cell phone and wireless signals can somehow affect children’s brains so the neurons can’t get rid of toxic heavy metals, including mercury (how did the mercury get there? The obvious target is of course vaccines that never contained mercury in the first place). Of course, the hypothesis that autism is caused by mercury poisoning is a completely dead hypothesis, but never mind – according to Carlo, the important thing is that the alleged effects of EMFs explain why chelation therapy (a popular, useless and horrific thing to expose children to) “doesn’t work” for some children. Now, once again, chelation doesn’t work because autism isn’t mercury poisoning, but the heavy-metal connection is religious creed among antivaxxers, and Carlo gives them the means to explain why their favored treatments don’t work.

Carlo’s evidence for his bullshit consists primarily of fallacious appeal to nature: Radio waves that carry information do not occur naturally; therefore they are toxic (in any dose). He has actually done some “studies” as well (with one Tamara Mariea) – non-blinded, non-randomized observations of children in (relatively) EMF-free environments; needless to say, they’re crap and accordingly not published in even minimally reputable venues.

He has apparently written a book about it (with one Martin Schram) as well, Cell Phones: Invisible Hazards in the Wireless Age: An Insider’s Alarming Discoveries about Cancer (Carlo once worked for the industry), which seems to be treated with caution even by committed EMF cranks (but they still refer to it since, you know, they favor the conclusions). Carlo is currently fighting for the electrosensitivity lobby through an organization called the Safe Wireless Initiative project. They have done studies (e.g. “a number of scientific papers in various stages of the peer-review process expected to be published by year’s end [2007] addressing this emerging medical problem”) and are very keen on sharing the results (but talk little about the, you know, methods by which they obtained the results, which is kind of important). Here is Carlo criticizing Ben Goldacre for being mean-spirited (he doesn’t just accept their conclusions without evidence) and committing factual errors while neglecting to actually mention any.

Diagnosis: Pseudoscience through and through, but the conclusions – for which there is no evidence – have become sufficiently popular among certain kinds of people for his work to potentially have some influence.

Holly Carmichael may be worth a mention for this, but hardly a separate entry. It is hard to question the significance and perniciousness of Ted Carrick, however.

Frederick “Ted” Carrick is a Canadian-American “Chiropractic Neurologist” and usually considered the father of modern chiropractic neurology. Chiropractic neurology is, of course, utter bullshit, but that hasn’t prevented the idea from gaining some currency among the reality-challenged segments of the population, and Carrick currently runs the Carrick Brain Centers, places to avoid like the plague if you suffer from any serious condition.

His wikipedia page might even give some people the impression of a distinguished career. In the 1980s, for instance, Carrick was asked to establish the chiropractic neurology diplomat certification program by the American Chiropractic Association, which is an organization to be wary of (partially, of course, precisely because they asked someone like Carrick to establish a diplomat certification program for them). He has also been a member of the clinical faculty of Life University’s LIFE Functional Neurology Center, Professor Emeritus of Neurology at Parker College,Distinguished Post Graduate Professor of Clinical Neurology at Logan College and Professor of Clinical Neurology at Carrick Institute, all organizations you’d be well advised to avoid. We are talking some serious pseudoscience here.

Among Carrick’s dubious contributions to pseudoscience are his “studies” on “blind spot mapping”. The mapping, which achieved frightening popularity in its time, is a simple paper-and-pencil test that the practitioners say can tell how your brain is functioning (other names include “brain function testing”, “brain mapping” or “cortical mapping”) by detecting an enlarged blind spot in one eye, which is supposed to reflect a malfunction in the brain that can be treated by manipulating the neck on the same side. It is utter, complete nonsense, but the practice is often defended by Carrick’s “study”, which is methodologically so bankrupt that he could just as well just have made it all up. Indeed, it is so bad that the James Randi Educational Foundation contacted Carrick and offered him the famous $1,000,000 prize (awarded to anyone who can demonstrate the existence of the paranormal under controlled conditions to eliminate the possibility of deliberate trickery or self-delusion) if he could demonstrate that his blind spot test worked. Carrick refused.

There is a report on one of his presentations here. The presentation was apparently … light on facts and science, but heavy on anecdotes.

Glenn Beck is apparently a fan of Carrick’s (after Carrick diagnosed him with a condition he almost certainly did not have and offered him a treatment that almost certainly does not work), which is, needless to say, not something to be proud of.

Diagnosis: A fine specimen of the cargo cult scientist, Carrick apparently enjoys a rather substantial fan base. Dangerous, in other words.

It’s been a while since last time, but we’ve got plenty of whale.to-level conspiracy theorists in store. Donna and David Carrico run the website ritualabusefree, and David Carrico is an annual speaker at something called the Ministry to Masons Conferences (read that again). They are also affiliated with EX-MASONS FOR JESUS and other counter-cult ministries (oh, the irony), and are proud to have been guests on the 700 Club doing a 3-day program called “The New World Order and Secret Societies.” They even appear to run an online Bible school. According to themselves, their “counter-cult ministry is dedicated to exposing deeds of darkness and educating anyone interested about Bible Doctrines, Apologetics, Topical Bible Studies, Cults, Ritual Abuse, The Occult, False Religions, and Secret Societies such as Freemasonry,” and you can buy a variety of merchandise (including “VCR and cassette tapes”) from their website, the most popular of which seems to be David’s book The Egyptian-Masonic-Satanic Connection, which is frequently cited by people like Ron Patton over at Whale.to. They also contributed a chapter to The Dark Side of Freemasonry (ed. Ed Decker, whom we have encountered before), and their videos have enticing titles like Satanic Ritual Abuse and Secret Societies, The Masonic Concept of God and Freemasonry – Satan’s Wellspring of Satanism. Here are some of Donna’s visions and prophecies (yes, you’re looking at an important part of the data on which they build their claims).

As the “VCR and cassette tape” thing suggests, the Carricos are totally out of the loop. They are still pushing the Satanic Ritual Abuse myth so popular in the 1980s, and relying on the same discredited anecdotes (but then, doesn’t the fact that there is evidence that these stories are false just show that someone among the Powers That Be and Those Who Knows What They Don’t Want You to Know cares enough to try to cover things up?) You can also get information about The Truth of the Da Vinci Code, the heresy of Catholicism and Calvinism, various end-time rubbish, UFOs and fallen angels, survivalism and the structure of Satan’s Kingdom from the Carricos. Mostly, though, their rants seem to be concerned with freemasons (which is apparently at the core of all the other topics).

And as there always is when you descend into the epistemic hell that is secret-government conspiracy theories, there will be others there who think you are a double agent and part of the conspiracy. Craig Portwood of The Christian Underground, for instance, has argued that the Carricos are false prophets and probably part on the conspiracies themselves.

Diagnosis: Off to la-la land, and their particular brand seems to have gotten stuck in the 1980s, and freemasons are Satanists and communists and perhaps really cenobites in disguise. Probably harmless.

Jennifer Sandra Carroll was the 18th Lieutenant Governor of Florida, and the first black American and first woman elected to the position. She was elected in 2011, after having served in the Florida House of Representatives from 2003 to 2010. She is also batshit crazy (but was probably not the first batshit crazy person elected to that position).

As The New York Times put it, Carroll’s tenure as lieutenant governor was “marred by scandal and poor judgment” and she was “increasingly viewed as an embarrassment to the man who chose her for the job.” Although Carroll emphasized that we need “good, solid Christians to step up and lead this country on a proper moral path” she herself had to resign her post as lieutenant governor in 2013, following allegations that she was involved in an effort to steer money into Internet cafés that are fronts for gambling, the subject of federal and state criminal investigations. They should have had an idea, though. Carroll had earlier resigned her position on the National Commission of Presidential Scholars after a CBS investigation revealed that her “Master of Business Administration” was obtained from the now defunct diploma-mill Kensington University.

But that’s background. Her qualifications for an entry here is that she is insane. Her stance on certain issues may be illustrated by her contribution to Ralph Reed’s Faith and Freedom Coalition’s pre-debate gathering in Florida in 2011, where she went on the attack against the media, scientists, blasphemers, secular Americans and all those who don’t fit into her idea of a “righteous government.” It really is worth a view. According to Carroll:

“[T]oday unfortunately many in the media would like nothing better to ridicule Christians: they promote ‘The Da Vinci Code,’ they place doubt in the public’s mind that Christ was not risen and they condemn the ‘Passion of Christ,’ yet they sensationalize stories that call for the end of prayer in school and removing the name of God from our country’s pledge. Ladies and gentlemen, these are very sad times when we allow the minority to poison the minds of the majority. This is exactly what dictators and socialist rulers did.”

Yes, she said that: It is sad that “the minority is allowed to” say things the majority does not want to hear. And apparently, this is “exactly what dictators and socialist rulers did.” The mind boggles. But freedom of religion wasn’t her only target: “Man does not have all the answers, some of our political leaders bow down to scientists and let them have the stage to push their evolution, but there’s nothing, nothing a scientist can make, that is exactly like what God creates.” Yeah, take that evolutionists, and your liberal agenda “to take God out of our country” and engage in “blasphemy of His name.”

At some point Carroll was also accused of having a lesbian affair. She responded by saying that women who look like her can’t be lesbians.

Diagnosis: As stupid, insane and dishonest as people come. Hopefully neutralized by now.

#1439: Jonathan Cahn

#1417: Josephine Briggs(?)

#1418: Lee Bright

#1419: Peter Brimelow

#1420: Joel Brind

#1421: Felicia Briones-Colman

#1422: Kelly Brogan

#1423: Kevin Brooks (and more or less the entire Tennessee House of Representatives)

#1424: Floyd Brown(?)

#1440: Donald Calbreath

#1441: Stacey Campfield

#1442: Tony Campolo

#1443: Ergun Mehmet Caner

#1444: Theresa Cao

#1445: Paul Caprio

#1446: Theresa Caputo

#1447: George Louis Carlo

#1448: Ted Carrick

#1449: Donna & David Carrico

#1450: Jennifer Carroll