We had some fun with the Alternate Reality World’s Conservapedia last month.

Jane Hamsher, of Firedoglake fame, had some more fun with our science- and fact-challenged co-bipeds yesterday. She gave a nod to a delightful post by John Quiggen at Crooked Timber which points up a major factor in the nitrogen-breathing universe. Because the quote contains links to winger sites, and we agree with CorrenteWire (DCOW) if you want to be entertained by fantasy, you’ll have to get your links from John Quiggen.

The construction of the rightwing parallel universe is going on apace. In the course of an otherwise unremarkable whinge over errors in Wikipedia, Brent Bozell of Townhall.com, invokes the parallel-universe Conservapedia as an authoritative source. … All of this, and the continuing sales of the Left Behind series, lead me to wonder if this construction effort will actually be successful. Maybe with sufficient will, the wished-for universe will be brought into existence, and the entire Bush support base raptured into it. [emph added]

The subject of “will” and “will power” is a recurring theme in right wing and Fascist ideology. While many view “will” as being the concept of “free will” i.e. the ability to act as one chooses, albeit normally constrained by external factors such as scientific facts such as gravity, light, or other realities, others take the Nietzschean view that any internally motivated action rises from the will. They believe that a sheer act of willpower, a “creative spark” can vault above many obstacles that limit the action of others.

Many do not accept the concept that willpower can conquer all, and ascribe this belief to “pure obnoxious cussedness” as my Celtic grandfather used to say. Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph des Willens, one of the building blocks of motivational film, tries to depict the establishment and growth of the Third Reich as purely the result of the will of one man. While it is a masterpiece of film-making, it is obviously flawed. No matter what we were told after WWII, that one man did not hold off the Allies for three and one-half years all by himself, and his supreme willpower was not equal to the challenge.

During WWII, Japanese universally believed their soldiers and sailors were filled with “Yamato damashi” or “Yamato kokoro,” a Japanese spirit or Japanese heart, an invincibility that would allow their military to conquer seemingly insuperable odds. This realm of supernatural superiority failed against the hard facts of reality.

Jane Hamsher notes that the winger obsession with creating a world in which their fantasies reign supreme reminds her somewhat of a drug habituated existence. Coincidentally, she notices that one of her favorite fantasists, who she cruelly identifies as “OxyLimbaugh,” (ouch!) was once again caught in an expression of an alternate reality.

Well, we’re used to that by now. When reality disagrees with your desires, just clap louder.