Yes, we can.

[scaeagles]

In general, why is it that disagreement in one area can lead to the complete discounting of everything else? Is Stein really without credibility now in everything?

I am guilty of doing the same on occasion, but I wonder why this is.....

[Alex]

It makes up for the assumption that because someone is well informed in one area (let's say economics) that one is therefore an expert in another (let's say evolution).

[flippyshark]

Originally Posted by scaeagles

In general, why is it that disagreement in one area can lead to the complete discounting of everything else? Is Stein really without credibility now in everything?

I am guilty of doing the same on occasion, but I wonder why this is.....

It's a natural tendency, especially if one is already inclined to disagree with the person in question. If you already don't like a certain candidate or public figure, then the first questionable thing they do or say becomes instant justification for your initial hunch. Sometimes, that's all anyone wants or needs.

In principal, you are right, though. This isn't fair. Someone can be absolutely blinkered and deluded about one topic, and rational, lucid or even brilliant in another. Ben Stein has always been a staunch conservative, of course. (He was a speechwriter for Richard Nixon.) Some might, for that reason alone, want to find reason to dismiss him. To me, he's always come off as a smart, likable guy. But, since I accept that evolutionary theory really does explain a great deal of the natural world, (I'm one of those materialist atheistic types), Stein's alliance with the ID'ers does seem tantamount to his joining the Flat Earth Society. (And the fact that the ID movement is primarily driven by fundamentalist Christians, the very Jewish Stein makes a somewhat strange bedfellow. I presume he is a devout Jew who favors a more literal reading of the Torah?)

But to get back on topic, this really shows Barack Obama for what he really is!!!