Jerry Falwell is dead.

This is the definition of "schadenfreude."

This was the man who blamed gay people for 9/11, blurred the line between church and state, and brought us all the mythical and hypocritical "Moral Majority." It’s hard not to feel good about this. This was a man who accused Tinky Winky of being gay. He was a spiteful, evil, bloated, dangerous windbag in the odious tradition of Elmer Gantry.

My condolences to all the gay families he has slandered. To all the children who go unadopted because of his bigotry and ignorance.

Send flowers to all the taxpayers who have had to repeatedly waste monies that could be spent on education, health, infrastructure, but instead were spent on hateful and spiteful state ballot initiatives depriving gay people of civil rights guaranteed under the Constitution.

My heart goes out to the thousands and thousands of people who have had their science education and general intellectual fitness hobbled by his fundamentalist mythologies and tooth fairy Jesus stories.

We are lead in prayer by Kurt Vonnegut, in the voice of his character, The Reverend C. Horner Redwine, from Sirens of Titan:

"Oh Lord Most High, Creator of the Cosmos, Spinner of Galaxies, Soul of Electromagnetic Waves, Inhaler and Exhaler of Inconceivable Volumes of Vacuum, Spitter of Fire and Rock, Trifler with Millennia — what could we do for Thee that Thou couldst not do for Thyself one octillion times better?     Nothing.  What could we do or say that could possibly interest Thee?    Nothing.  Oh, Mankind, rejoice in the apathy of our Creator, for it makes us free and truthful and dignified at last.  No longer can a fool point to a ridiculous accident of good luck and say, ‘Somebody up there likes me.’  And no longer can a tyrant say, ‘God wants this or that to happen, and anyone who doesn’t help this or that to happen is against God.’  O Lord Most High, what a glorious weapon is Thy Apathy, for we have unsheathed it, have thrust and slashed mightily with it, and the claptrap that has so often enslaved us or driven us into the madhouse lies slain!" Sirens of Titan

Contributions in memory of his destructive and hateful life can be made to White Crane Institute.

SF Gate columnist, Mark Morford, wisely allows the man to hoist himself by his own petard, but in closing, we would like to cite President Jimmy Carter: "In a very Christian way, as far as I’m concerned, he can go to hell!"