Sheesh Louise. What a fantastic find, D. But you're posting at nearly 4 am ... and I'm posting at 6 am. Get some sleep (I should do the same!).
jjoyce | 05.31.05 - 6:17 am | #

Whatever would we do without the overpaid, know-it-all court jesters who enlighten, educate, and tell us how to vote?
Faith | 05.31.05 - 8:22 am | #

What a find! You found the key to all the problems in the world! You are amazing! Simply amazing! Imagine an inconsequential actress made a mistake! Wow! I cannot believe your astuteness to point it out! Like I said, you are amazing! More amazing the Michelle Malkin! You also have a highly astute ability to make puns on movie titles! Wow!
skippy | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 8:42 am | #

skippy:

Go away.
John J. Simmins | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 9:08 am | #

Everyone should have a look at NewsMax's column about how the leftist news media has totally ignored a major breakthrough by Austalian scientists in ADULT stem cell research.

see:
http://www.newsmax.com/archives/.../30/ 84930.shtml
Auzerais | 05.31.05 - 9:09 am | #

Sometimes people get the message a bit late but come on Scarlett!
Paul | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 9:28 am | #

Cure for polio?

A vaccine sure, but a cure?

Who is calling who dumb?

Using wikipedia as a reference? Not too smart either.
LTC8K6 | 05.31.05 - 9:41 am | #

Some get the news a bit late? If you depend on the left wing MSM you will never get the real news, only some hyped gabage. I sometimes walk in a friends home and they have one of the MSN propaganda stations on, I can't believe the brainwashing they participate in. No news, just pure garbage and outright lies.
Scraoiron | 05.31.05 - 9:41 am | #

And for his next trick, Skippy the Sarcastic will amaze us all with astounding feats of juggling ... if Dawn or Michelle will be kind enough to lend him some balls.
Saint Kansas | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 9:47 am | #

Saint...Easy! I just about choked on my coffee!!
reese | 05.31.05 - 10:07 am | #

Why denigrate someone for speaking their opinion by telling them to 'shut their big fat yap'? It's one thing to disagree with them but its another to stifle any opinions that conflict with your own.
Phil | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 10:24 am | #

A cure for polio?

Funny, I seem to remember my math teacher in eighth grade having to hobble around on crutches because of something called "polio." Someone should have told her that there's a cure for her condition!

In seriousness, while I don't support embryonic stem cell research and this Johansson chick sounds like a ditz, a vaccine is not a cure. It does diddly for the people who already have the disease. A cure for polio is still needed.
TrollSlayer | 05.31.05 - 10:27 am | #

Yeah, Dawn, stop stifling opinions that conflict with your own. Stifler.
Saint Kansas | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 10:34 am | #

But without embryonic stem cell research, how can Hollywood actors live forever?
BillyHW | 05.31.05 - 10:49 am | #

If you prevent people from getting polio, you have cured it. If you are refering to curing people disabled by the disease, then have enough smarts to make the flipping distinction!!!!
Jinx | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 10:52 am | #

Others have drawn the distinction, but you really need to be piled on here. A vaccine is not a cure. Yes, most of the cases of polio in the world today could have been prevented, but should we just stop looking for help for those unfortunates who didn't get vaccinated?

Heartless.
Matt | 05.31.05 - 11:23 am | #

By creating embryo humans just to kill them? No, that's not help.

A cure would be great, wouldn't it, but at least there's a vaccine.

Maybe our priorities should remain where they are: cancer, diabetes, AIDS, things WITHOUT vaccines.

And then go back to work and get everybody vaccinated again. It only takes a generation to let polio and smallpox back out of their cages.
Therese Z | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 11:32 am | #

Hollywood loves the idea of stem-cell injections...Botox is sooo 2003.
E-Dub | 05.31.05 - 11:45 am | #

Distinctions between "cure" and "vaccine" are secondary in this post. Dawn took issue with Johansson's use of the term "eliminate." And Polio has been all but eliminated. Generally the medical community hails the vaccine as a victory --score one more for the good guys.

The point is, how the heck does polio become the burning issue of the day for Scarlett, right up there with Alzheimer's? It's not an unanswerable epidemic anymore. What's next, stem cell research for tetanus?
Joel | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 12:22 pm | #

If you prevent people from getting polio, you have cured it.

Uhhh, no. It is a preventative not a cure.

Second it is fallacious reasoning to conclude that since one disease had a preventative that was developed without embryonic stem cells that all medical problems can be addressed in like manner.

Maybe our priorities should remain where they are: cancer, diabetes, AIDS, things WITHOUT vaccines.


Alzheimer’s does not have a vaccine either.
Steve | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 12:26 pm | #

Distinctions between "cure" and "vaccine" are secondary in this post. Dawn took issue with Johansson's use of the term "eliminate."

So the quote, "a cure for polio's been available for 50 years" is wrong but accurate? You guys would crucify the mainstream media if they made a mistake like that.
Matt | 05.31.05 - 12:48 pm | #

Or how about "accurate but suppressed?" There was a cure published by Fred Klenner, M.D. in 1949. Sadly, it involved a naturally occuring substance that no drug company could patent, and thus didn't catch on. So why isn't Scarlett advocating embryonic stem cell research for a cure for scurvy? It makes as much sense.
Joel | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 2:39 pm | #

A point of clarification. Just as Dawn was inaccurate in using the term "cure" as opposed to "vaccinate" when she was mocking Ms. Johansson, Ms. Johansson was a bit inaccurate with her phrasing. Stem cell therapy is being looked at, not as a cure for polio, but as a possible way to repair the damage done by polio. Stem cell therapy is not being looked at as a cure for the polio virus.

From http://www.polioeradication.org/...org/ disease.asp

"POLIO PARALYSIS
Once established in the intestines, poliovirus can enter the blood stream and invade the central nervous system - spreading along nerve fibres. As it multiplies, the virus destroys nerve cells (motor neurons) which activate muscles. These nerve cells cannot be regenerated and the affected muscles no longer function. The muscles of the legs are affected more often than the arm muscles. The limb becomes floppy and lifeless - a condition known as acute flaccid paralysis (AFP). More extensive paralysis, involving the trunk and muscles of the thorax and abdomen, can result in quadriplegia. In the most severe cases (bulbar polio), poliovirus attacks the motor neurons of the brain stem - reducing breathing capacity and causing difficulty in swallowing and speaking. Without respiratory support, bulbar polio can result in death."

For information on Post-Polio Syndrome see http://www.polioeradication.org/ ...olioSyndrom.pdf

As for "splitting hairs", call me crazy but I don't think that the hundreds of thousands of people who are currently living with the paralyzing effects of polio think that finding a way to repair their damaged nerves and muscles, as opposed to carrying out an effective polio vaccination program, is splitting hairs.
Fluffy Bunny | 05.31.05 - 2:53 pm | #

Just to throw my two cents into the ring as the daughter of someone who is a paraplegic as a result of contracting the polio virus at age four: my mother is completely opposed to embryonic stem cell research.
Katie | 05.31.05 - 4:21 pm | #

it's also a good example of why bigots should shut their mouth.
jess | 05.31.05 - 4:35 pm | #

Jess: now there's a workable plan; freedom of speech for everyone except bigots. Can we start with my list of bigots or do we have to work off of your list?

It reminds me of an old Bill Cosby routine in which he says something along the lines of I hate bigots, every one of 'em. I think we should put all the bigots in a big hole and shoot 'em.
Joel | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 4:48 pm | #

Joel - I think I remember that routine. Cosby proceeds to make a huge list of other things he hates: blacks, Jews, gays, etc. etc. He ends with something like, "I'm a bigot, too. There's only two of us left in the whole world. I don't much care for the other one, either."

It's nice to know, however, that disagreement on one's own blog makes one a stifler of other people's fora. Then again, you know where you go when you're not on Patrol? The Bunker. Heheheheheh.
Nightfly | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 4:54 pm | #

I've been trying to figure out why I've been so reluctant to back embryonic stem cell research. Now I know why:

Proponents of the research always trot out cancer, Alzheimer's, and childhood deseases, so that they can get large segments of the poulation to think, "Hey this could benefit me or my family! of course, I need to support it."

Unfortunately, there is no evidence that the research will do any of these things. They just promise that it COULD lead to treatments/cures for...

It's snake oil.
JoeB | 05.31.05 - 4:56 pm | #

Oh, and Phil, Dawn is hardly stifling dissent:

"Why denigrate someone for speaking their opinion by telling them to 'shut their big fat yap'? It's one thing to disagree with them but its another to stifle any opinions that conflict with your own."

I would guess that Ms. Johanssen's comments were read by million of people. Dawn's blog, great as it is, hardly reaches that many (Oh that it did!).

By your logic, I would be "stifl[ing] any opinions that conflict with your own" if I said to a group of friends at dinner, "Michael Moore is an idiot and he ought to shut his mouth."
JoeB | 05.31.05 - 5:03 pm | #

I'm here to nitpick too, of course. (I came here through a link from Malkin this time, cool) - the phrase "no embryonic stem cells were harmed in it's making" is the kind of thing Time magazine tries to hypnotize people into saying; It makes it sound as if people are objecting to harming the stem cells themselves, instead of objecting to killing the embryos in the process of harvesting the stem cells.
Dave Munger | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 5:33 pm | #

Great, another conservative twit who thinks her opinion really matters.
Jesus | 05.31.05 - 6:00 pm | #

I knew you'd be back, Jesus!
saintkansas | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 6:22 pm | #

Hopefully the earth will not swallow me whole after I hit "send," but if that post is the extent of the Second Coming, I'm going to be disappointed.

BTW, not only did Dave M. get here via Malkin, but there's a Corner post back to this as well! JoeB, your millions may not be so far off! Kudos, Dawn-eleh.
Nightfly | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 6:28 pm | #

Telling an actress or any showbiz personality to "shut their big fat yap" seems not so much an attempt to silence opinion, but to save said personality from public embarrassment. I'd love to hear Alec Baldwin's treatise on method acting, but he's no expert when it comes to politics. Oh wait, didn't he move to France?
Lesthanzero | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 6:28 pm | #

Hi Dawn. It's too bad it's vogue to be vomitously liberal. I wish it were vogue to follow God. Then these self-proclaimed righteous pukes would have to do a 180. But we have to pray for them anyway.
GALA | 05.31.05 - 7:00 pm | #

I almost forgot. Hey "Jesus" by any chance is your father Levon?
GALA | 05.31.05 - 7:02 pm | #

Actually, I mostly agree with Jesus' sentiment...although I wouldn't call Scarlett Johanson "conservative."
saintkansas | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 7:27 pm | #

I knew that Dawn's new found fame was going to change the tone of the comments for the worse. I hate being right 100% of the time.

John J. Simmins-- in two words (that had me rotfl) you dealt with Skippy as fully as he deserved.

Joel-- you showed far more compassion towards that feeb Jess, than I can muster.

Nightfly-- you are always terrific but I didn't need lime coke (which is ghastly btw) all over my screen. I'll be more than ticked, if this is it for the 2nd coming. I am going to go out and ... and... drink!

I knew that the most civil blog commentariat could not last forever. But at least Dawn remains a terrific writer.
Colleen | 05.31.05 - 8:48 pm | #

Great, another conservative twit who thinks her opinion really matters.

I've been trying to figure out why I've been so reluctant to back embryonic stem cell research. Now I know why...
Joel | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 9:39 pm | #

Yo, Jo: The correct name for the disease is "Alzheimer".
nihi obstat | Homepage | 05.31.05 - 10:07 pm | #

I have just found your blog site. Fantastic! Keep up the great work. I will definitely quote from your writings in my Worldviews class of Christian high school seniors in the fall.
Finley McKinney | 05.31.05 - 11:02 pm | #

Apparently, Scarlett has donated a few to many stem cells, and now suffers from stupidity.

And frankly, my dear.....
The Capitalist | Homepage | 06.01.05 - 12:40 am | #

Scarlett Johansson has never lied to Congress about the need for an unnecessary war. This single fact makes her more credible than anyone in the Bush administration.
Dido | 06.01.05 - 8:05 am | #

And Pee Wee Herman never committed perjury in front of a grand jury...guess that makes him more credible than anyone in the Clinton Administration....By the way, that was just as relevant to this discussion as Dido's comment.
J Rob | Homepage | 06.01.05 - 8:27 am | #

What the heck is happening to the discourse here... Sheesh people ... To quote a great philosopher king named rodney: Can't we all get along? If the Dems and Republicans can in Congress, then so should ... oh, nevermind...
jjoyce | 06.01.05 - 9:17 am | #

Why Music Critics Should Shut Their Big Fat Yaps.

Hilarious. Someone whose only discernable knowledge appears to be of New Wave rock bands, says a movie star should "shut her yap," makes a stupid error, and then retreats into non-sequitur, utterly oblivious to the irony.
Big Worm | 06.01.05 - 10:40 am | #

Something worth noting, as part of this, is that commentary by actresses or actors is particularly suspect.

Actors make their living portraying someone else, and as a group, seem particularly prone to personality defects. Witness their high level of drug use, repeated marriages, and all sorts of other odd problems. Their attraction to acting is, in some instances, due to their desire to have an identity they feel they lack. But it isn't substantive, so they then go on to try to add some substance by commenting on things they know nothing about.
YL | Homepage | 06.01.05 - 12:09 pm | #

Um, actors? Or Hollywood? Being drawn to the theater has very little to do with trying to "have an identity they feel they lack." Some people, regardless of profession, will shoot off at the mouth without thinking first. The issue isn't one of "Oh, your profession makes you a liar." It's "Oh, I'm not sure you've considered the question fully."
Kate B. | 06.01.05 - 12:32 pm | #

While you were all rushing to prove who is the most witty and right (no pun intended), you missed something truly wacky in this post.

"The reason polio is resurging now in Africa and the Arab world is not due to a lack of available vaccine, but rather to the kind of anti-American conspiracy theories perpetuated by the actress's Hollywood colleagues."

WTF? Can anyone explain that Rube Goldberg analysis to me?

So, Hollywood liberals are indirectly responsible for the rise in polio? Read the article she linked to:

This fear of polio vaccines caught on because of the war in Iraq, explained a doctor with the World Health Organization. "If America is fighting people in the Middle East," goes the Islamist logic, "the conclusion is that they are fighting Muslims.
Timbo | 06.01.05 - 1:31 pm | #

Tim, I won't speak for the hostess, but I see a lot of Hollywood blithely accepting such crackpot logic as you quoted from the article, or worse, as long as America looks bad. Never underestimate the importance of winning the mind - Hollywood is a big source of propaganda for anti-American sentiment, in roughly three classes:

1. Overt. This is the purest Bravo Sierra, refined and distilled, as dispensed by Michael Moore's crock pot cookery. You could also think of about any public pronouncement from Robbins, Sarandon, Sean Penn, or about 90% or what comes from 90% of the stand-up comics.

2. Covert. Tougher to quantify, and in most cases no willful bias: a quiet, unassuming default that America and Western civ in general must be wrong. Kingdom of Heaven is a recent example. George Lucas' ham-fisted "Anakin W Bush" lines in SW III also come to mind. They simply can't help smuggling in shots, even when the shots are non-sequitors.

3. Inadvertant. A lot of this category would be cultural stuff - the casual attitude toward sex, the dismissiveness toward morality, the sort of things that make even patriots and friends of the US cringe at the crassness of popular culture.

Taken all together, no, nobody thinks that Scarlett Johansson is spreading polio. She is merely a small part of a large worldview that enjoys casting suspicion on everything the West does. For example, there is a lot of bloviating about eeeeeevil crop genetics; this contributes to the fear of such crops in the Third World and works against using them to prevent famine. When starlets drone on about how wicked their country is, it works against getting vaccines from that country into the Third World (the people wildly believe that they will be poisoned or something) and preventable diseases claim thousands. She's not going about this sort of work on purpose, but she certainly isn't helping put a stop to it.
Nightfly | Homepage | 06.01.05 - 2:21 pm | #

Kate B,

I would add, Is the problem with the famous actors or musicians who make political statements or is the problem with the MSM who is printing every little thing they say?

Maybe it is a little of both. Actors and musicians should be careful about what they say because of the likelihood that it will get reported, but why aren't we more critical of the MSM for reporting every little thing that they say?

Why is what famous actors and musicians say any more worthy of reporting in the MSM than what any of us are saying on Dawn's blog?
Fluffy Bunny | 06.01.05 - 2:34 pm | #

That last comment says it for me... why does anyone care what Scarlett Johansson thinks? The press may not tell us what our Nobel Prize winners think about this issue, but thank God they keep us informed on the opinions of our actors and athletes on the important issues of the day.
Tom | Homepage | 06.01.05 - 4:32 pm | #

If Scarlett had come out as pro-life and made a factual error, would there be as much leaping on her here, or would those errors be explained away? Just curious from a member of the MSM (I love painting it all with that brush, a personal pet peeve.)
Neil | 06.01.05 - 4:37 pm | #

Hey, as long as we're talking about killing people (embryos), we can wipe out Alzheimers quite easily: just kill everyone over the age of 50.

Somehow that seems more humane that killing off millions and millions of babies in the mere HOPE that a cure will be found. Just knock off the few who are most likeley to come down with the disease. Ya think?
Marty | 06.01.05 - 6:56 pm | #

Marty,
Shhh...don't give Judge Greer any ideas.
J Rob | Homepage | 06.01.05 - 7:54 pm | #

If Scarlett had come out as prolife and made a factual error, the MSM would be all over it.
Faith | 06.01.05 - 9:26 pm | #

Neil,

It wouldn't be explained away, she would just be forgiven.

And why would the MSM have misquoted her in the first place?
GALA | 06.01.05 - 10:06 pm | #

I'm sorry, working at newspapers for 10 years (mostly sports departments, usually the most conservative departments), I have yet to see this supposed 'bias'. I think the only bias is trying to beat the deadline, I doubt most papers, except for the Post and the Times have real political agendas. There was more investigative reporting going on during the Clinton years than now. But that's the opionion of someone who's been called a 'moral relativist'
neil cohen | 06.01.05 - 11:07 pm | #

nobody says 'bias' - it's not like there are cadres of reporters clustering the water cooler dreaming of ways to stick it to W. But if a topic comes up, a great majority of them run along the same track when they think about it, and that track sometimes turns their choices about what to run, where to run it, what quotes to carry...etc.
Nightfly | Homepage | 06.02.05 - 12:03 am | #

Marty:

Much the same idea came to my mind when I read about how Nancy Reagan was supporting embryonic stem cell research because she thought it might yield cures for diseases like her husband's Alzheimer's. Heck, I thought, if embryos can be vivisected in hopes of finding a cure for Alzheimer's, then by the same reasoning we ought to be able to vivisect Ronnie in hopes of finding cures for the ailments of the unborn.
Seamus | 06.03.05 - 3:18 pm | #

She should be tried for treason!
Hondo | Homepage | 06.04.05 - 1:32 pm | #

my sister, brother and I had all of our vaccinations when we were little but that did not stop my sister from getting whooping cough... similar thing with polio, although there is a vaccine people still get polio, and there are many people out there with polio who would be helped by stem cell research...
Rachel | Homepage | 06.05.05 - 7:39 am | #