A "sign from GOD" in Texas? "Oh what a tangled web we weave, When first we practice to deceive"

WARNING: If you're an arachnophobic, you might want to skip this post.

If you're from Texas, please excuse my snarky quote from Sir Walter Scott. I couldn't resist!

These pictures are WILD!!!!!!!!


Here's the NYTimes story: Got Arachnophobia? Here’s Your Worst Nightmare




Crossposted at BigBrassBlog

and don't let the screen door hit you on the way out

It's Karl Rove's last day at work.

I'll have a Cuba Libre, por favor.

Poor little Miss Teen South Carolina

I'm sure many of you have seen this today. The youtube link is ON FIRE - almost 9 million views and 30 thousand comments.

I don't whether to laugh or cry. Can you imagine what the poor girl is going through today. Maybe it's just another "being beautiful" as usual day- no big deal. I wonder what her parents must be thinking? Probably thinking "hey, great PR for my beauty queen"

Anyway - HERE IT IS for your viewing. It's Miss SC answering this year's question for the Miss Teen USA 2007 title:

"recent polls show that one-fifth of Americans cannot locate the USA on a world map. Why do you suppose that is?"

I think I know what she was trying to say.....

I am curious to see how my 2 teen daughters will answer the same question when I ask them.


I bet "Little Miss Sunshine" would have had a good answer for that question!


************UPDATE**************

READ
The 2006 National Geographic-Roper Survey of Geographic Literacy
AND WEEP

Only 37% of young Americans can find Iraq on a map—though U.S. troops have been there since 2003.

6 in 10 young Americans don't speak a foreign language fluently.

20% of young Americans think Sudan is in Asia. (It's the largest country in Africa.)

48% of young Americans believe the majority population in India is Muslim. (It's Hindu—by a landslide.)

Half of young Americans can't find New York on a map.


These results suggest that young people in the United States—the most recent graduates of our educational system—are unprepared for an increasingly global future. Far too many lack even the most basic skills for navigating the international economy or understanding the relationships among people and places that provide critical context for world events.

That Vatican, I tell ya......they're always thinking ahead!

Inspectors at Tarbes-Lourdes airport in France refused to give their blessing to holy water that passengers tried to bring on board the Vatican's new pilgrim flights this week, saying it was a security threat just like any other liquid.

The water, which is said to have miraculous healing powers, came from a sacred grotto where Catholics believe the Virgin Mary appeared in 1858.

Passenger Paola Saluzzi told Corriere della Sera newspaper she was carrying the water in eight small plastic bottles "in the shape of the little Madonna". But it was not allowed on board.

"If they gave preference to the water from Lourdes it would be an (irregularity) that would not guarantee the proper procedure," she acknowledged.

But the Vatican had foreseen such an eventuality and placed a small complimentary bottle of holy water on the seat of each pilgrim to drink on board, Saluzzi said.

30 miles of sea foam - can you imagine?

Check out these really cool photos!!! WOW - never seen anything like it! Kind of creepy though:

Foam swallowed an entire beach and half the nearby buildings, including the local lifeguards' centre, in a freak display of nature at Yamba in New South Wales.

One minute a group of teenage surfers were waiting to catch a wave, the next they were swallowed up in a giant bubble bath. The foam was so light that they could puff it out of their hands and watch it float away.

The foam stretched for 30 miles out into the Pacific in a phenomenon not seen at the beach for more than three decades.

Scientists explain that the foam is created by impurities in the ocean, such as salts, chemicals, dead plants, decomposed fish and excretions from seaweed.

All are churned up together by powerful currents which cause the water to form.


h/t to Indigus at
godisnotanasshole

TSA surrealist zen

Xeni Jardin over at boingboing told of a strange experience in LAX yesterday where the TSA stopped travelers in their tracks while walking to the baggage claim area. "STOP WHERE YOU ARE. FREEZE. DO NOT MOVE ," they shouted and no one was allowed to move for 30 minutes. No explanation was given. The commenters there recounted their strange and similar experiences with the TSA. It is surreal and worth a gander.

I don't know if this could happen in NYC airports like JFK and LGA because no one can understand a TSA worker here. I have often asked one of them after being barked at in gibberish, "Huh?" or "What language are you speaking?" and my favorite, "How long have you been in this country.... including today?"

If one of them does know a sentence in "English", they only repeat that sentence no matter what you ask or what you do.

ME: "Where is the ladies room?"
THEM: "own onse leequeed lowed" ("One ounce of liquid is allowed.")
ME:" Am I in the right terminal for ...."
THEM: "own onse leequeed lowed"
ME: "May I see your green card?"
THEM: "OWN ONSE LEEEQUEED!"

The same goes for those who make announcements in NYC airports. "Huh?" "What language was that?" "Why don't they give diction lessons to airport employees?" "What the hell are the qualifications for these jobs?" "Goddammit, I am going to apply for a job with the TSA just to see what the hell is going on here!"

I realize that big brother is using these psy-ops to scare us into submission and all, but seriously, I wonder how dozens of passengers can be obedient and freeze in their places with no explanation, simply by being barked at by TSA employees. It's a freaking joke, man.

We here's got "reefer blindness" in this country

There's new terr'rists in town. Them pot growers want to kill you. I just read Pot Growers Are New Target in "War on Terror" and gosh golly I am scared.

Let's take the War on Terra™ to Redding's Shasta-Trinity National Forest in California where the Office of National Drug Control Policy's (ONDCP) czar John Walters explains:

"We have kind of a reefer blindness... " "These people are armed; they're dangerous. [They're] violent criminal terrorists." He even went so far to argue that the "terrorists" growing weed in Shasta County, as the Redding Record Searchlight reported, "wouldn't hesitate to help other terrorists get into the country with the aim of causing mass casualties."

Yowzers. You mean that pot growers mean to cause us harm as a nation? Why yes. Well um, err... they are doing something illegal, you know- "fire violations, unsanitary conditions, littering, smoking, building unauthorized structures, unauthorized camping and cutting trees..." Gosh. They left out the part about Redding having a big meth problem. This war on pot appears to be more of a Mexican immigration thing. Well thanks to the Military Commissions Act we can declare whatever we want 'terrorist activity' and 'declare a war' on it.

I predicted this a few years ago- Pretty soon everything will be labeled "terr'rism" and real terrorism, if it happens again in Murka will have to be named something else... like HOLY F*CKING SHIT, GOD HELP US, WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!!!

Leon Fisher asks WHAT IS HAPPENING?

Leon Fisher from Unknown News speaks for me:

No-one smiles any more. No-one wants to talk about things that matter. If you want to discuss anything other than sports, sex, or Dancing with the Stars, no-one seems interested.

What is happening? Is it something in the water, or is Invasion of the Body Snatchers actually happening for real?

I do not remember people being like this. They are hostile, impatient, full of suppressed anger, abrupt, suspicious, and some even threatening.

Not so many years ago, you couldn't walk down the street without running into your friends and neighbors wanting to talk about anything and everything, and have a good laugh. People, I remember, used to communicate -- now they just glare at you, or completely ignore you.

No-one wants to complain about anything. No-one seems to be bothered by high taxes or inflation. They just look at you and roll their eyes like you are crazy if you dare to express your dissatisfaction with the status quo. And God forbid, do not mention the wars, that topic really gets people uncomfortable. It is as if you are asking some personal question.

Have our fellow human beings, our friends and neighbors, become overwhelmed by the course of events these last six years, so they're burying their heads in the sand? Or have they become closet fascists, who privately support the dictatorship in Washington? Are they over-medicated with prescription drugs, or are they getting off on the horrors which the "Decider" and his handlers are inflicting on humanity?

Are these the same people whose answer to every problem, real or imagined, is "Bomb Them!? No wonder the Bush Cabal and the rubber stamp Congress have no problem disposing of the Constitution and Bill of Rights. I will not defend them. I will not try to enlighten them any more.

All these vegetables think about is their new shiny cars, the ridiculous clothing they buy, the garbage that passes as entertainment, and the anti-depressant drugs which helps them avoid reality. They do not want to admit to themselves that America is in trouble ... After all, that's not supposed to happen here, we are told.

---------------

I would call myself a "people person". I have been all my life - until recently. It seems all I want to do is shake people when I see them lately. I used to hug everyone I saw. It was a natural reflex, you know, like Baaabra herself says --People who need people are the luckiest people in the world...

I don't know, maybe I never grew up and it's just the child in me, wanting to hug and love all. It just doesn't seem the same anymore. I've noticed more and more people putting up that wall. You know when you see someone and both of your arms kinda go up at the same time? I don't get that "arms up" signal from too many people anymore. More often than not, I just get that "nod the head" greet as they quickly move by.

Even my daughter told me I scare a lot of her friends. I've commented to her that a few seem uncomfortable when they are over. She thinks that they are not used to friendly, touchy people (I'm always hugging them) and that weirds them out. As Leon Fisher says, it's like I am right in the middle of a scene from Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

I am still killing everyone I know with kindness, but I really feel like running for cover instead.

Normally, I would be asking "what has happened to the world these past few years?"; but that's a stupid question.

We all know the answer.

BRAVO Bushies - you have certainly unleashed a mad mad mad mad world.

Yay! We win

We are number 1!
Americans are the most armed people in the world, baby.
The United States has 90 guns for every 100 citizens! We own 270 million of the world's 875 million known firearms!

Reuters: On a per-capita basis, Yemen had the second most heavily armed citizenry behind the United States, with 61 guns per 100 people, followed by Finland with 56, Switzerland with 46, Iraq with 39 and Serbia with 38.

The rest of the world are such pussies.

Since I'm talking about how cool we are--- Americans expect to get the most medals in next year's olympics. This is big news and it would be a national disgrace if our expectations were any lower. However when it comes to our high (and getting higher) infant mortality rate- a baby's chance of survival through it's first year of life, you hardly hear a peep of national outcry. I guess the important thing is that the mother's at least tried to have their babies and let "god" kill them. Freemarketnews.com

2 years after katrina

From Think Progress

Two years after Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans, “none of the 115 ‘critical priority projects’ identified by city officials” for publicly funded rebuilding efforts “has been completed.” Of the $34 billion “earmarked for long-term rebuilding,” less than half “has made its way through federal checks and balances to reach municipal projects.”

It's the hypocrisy, stupid

Sen Craig insisted that he is NOT gay at a press conference.
He would rather be known for being stupid than gay.

Well, he's stupider than I thought.

UPDATE: If you are like me and hadn't a f*cking clue as to how cruising for gay bathroom sex actually works despite all the written explanations lately, a CBS news station recreates it for your edification. Really.

Jesus Christ

He's back. This time as a knot in a fence.
NOT according to me though.
As a theological expert, I would have to discount this particular "appearance" as invalid. True images of Christ must include his nose and mustache. This could be an image of any old bearded dude or old rock star revealed by the wooden backyard fence in Lodi California. He also appears to have some sort of protuberance going over his head starting on his forehead. As everyone knows, Jesus did not have that.

Keep the faith.

Papua New Guinea Aids victims 'buried alive'

"Some people with HIV/Aids in Papua New Guinea are being buried alive by their relatives, a health worker says.
"Margaret Marabe said families were taking the extreme action because they could no longer look after sufferers or feared catching the disease themselves."

Story at the BBC.

Let's talk about Wall Street

Since I swore off religion and politics, I thought I would see what you all thought about what's happening on Wall Street. It seems everyone has gone
Gekko! It blows my mind how people are allowed to trade securities like this.

Sign of the times has an article up about a major selloff in stocks --

some investors are betting tens of millions of dollars that the market is headed for a selloff -- a major selloff.

It's all about "puts" and I have no idea how it works. The only thing I know how to "put" is my right foot in and shake it all about!

and then blondesense reader "stunned" left this link in Red's Gonzo post

WARNING: PUT this on first before reading the above link

Quote - (from who I am not sure):

The following theories are being discussed widely within the stock and options markets today regarding the enormous and very unusual activity reported above and two stories below. Those theories are:

1) A massive terrorist attack is going to take place before Sept. 21 to tank the markets, OR;

2) China, reeling over losing $10 Billion in bad loans to the sub-prime mortgage collapse presently taking place, is going to dump US currency and tank all of Capitalism with a Communist financial revolution. Either scenario is bad and the clock is ticking. The drop-dead date of these contracts is September 21. Whatever is going to happen MUST take place between now and then or the folks involved in these contracts will lose over $1 billion for having engaged in this activity.



I thought this might be a good one for The Dark Wraith, but I figured he would be busy getting ready for school this week so I didn't bother him. Well, I now see Wraith has left a comment after reading stunned's link:

Good morning, Stunned.

Some very large player—some huge, ginormous player—is positioned either to make an absolute fortune or to take an ass-bath like no one has seen in a long time. The structure of this set of trades is about as stupid as stupid gets... unless it's not.

I'll tell you right now: anyone who would put that kind of insane exposure on a poker table either has twelve aces in his five-card hand, or he's trying to scare everyone else into folding. The problem with the analogy is that, in this poker game, folding isn't going to happen.

This isn't a bluff; it's a bet. And anyone who would place a bet like this knows something: he knows the financial markets of several countries are about to go to Hell, or he knows that he's about to become the poorest man the world has ever known.

Either way, 10K of contracts constructed like this takes more guts than anything I've seen before. Personally, I have no desire to even look at what's become of that situation since it opened up last week.

GOD ALMIGHTY!

The Dark Wraith tries to stay calm, but finally loses it.

----------------


So......

now what do you want to talk about?

(I'm hoping the Dark One is only going to lose it because all of this talk is just hype and bullshit at its finest and just a bunch of greedy Gekko wall street types trying to manipulate the market and none of this could possibly happen -- right DW?)


Crossposted at
BigBrassBlog

The Great Iraq Swindle, by Matt Taibbi

I just finished reading the above article in this month's issue of Rollingstone. It is, in daily kos blogger occams hatchet's words: AN ARTICLE THAT COULD END THE WAR:

"I like to believe that Taibbi's article, if it were read by everyone in America, would bring the occupation of Iraq to an end in a hurry. My guess is that it would make people's blood boil to the point that American taxpayers and military families would be screaming for justice upon those responsible for such a travesty...

"he does the best job I have ever seen anywhere in laying out in nauseating detail the workings of this criminal money-laundering scheme that some people have called "the Iraq War." In it, Matt Taibbi descends into - quite literally - the fecal underbelly of the world of Iraq war profiteering. Giving example after infuriating example, Taibbi relentlessly pushes the needle on his readers' Outrage Meters harder and harder against the peg, until finally one cannot read anymore without leaping up from one's chair and screaming out in sheer, visceral, well, outrage."

I've decided to make a few copies of the article IN FULL to pass around. Here's the direct link to Taibbi's article at Rollingstone if you would like to print it out. Occams hatchet requests that you "Please read it, and make sure as many people as you can, read it as well. Better yet, show Rolling Stone some love, and go out and buy a hard copy or three at the newsstand, and leave them around where others can read them.

I like to believe that Taibbi's article, if it were read by everyone in America, would bring the occupation of Iraq to an end in a hurry. My guess is that it would make people's blood boil to the point that American taxpayers and military families would be screaming for justice upon those responsible for such a travesty."

I would spring for a few copies to hand out, but the crowd I want to view this article would never be able to get past the "hippie freaks" (Maroon 5 - one of my favorites) on the cover!

I was thinking maybe a "pass it around" packet with a note on the front cover: Skip the evening news - PLEASE read this. Or, bring it to work and leave it in the break room. Maybe a "WE NEED TO TAKE ACTION" message, or at the very least, just encourage people to pass it around, step out of their happy places for awhile and discuss this dire situation.

This is going to be my last ditch effort for a while. I am so burnt out and frustrated and I know most of you are also. I was even going to suggest that we try to blog for a week straight about anything but politics and religion. I really can't take it anymore. Hubby and I got into it with an older gent at the bar a few nights ago. I behaved (for the most part) and kept my cool. After about 15 minutes of what was becoming a very heated discussion about politics, capitalism, war, etc... the old gent politely says "well, let's just agree to disagree and talk about something else". Of course I can't just leave well enough alone so I ordered us another pitcher, turned to him and asked "Do you believe in God?" Hubby dragged me out of there at that point!

Maybe we should just blog about this story for a whole week?


Anywho - at the moment, my printer is humming along and I am putting together a few packets to deliver this morning. I am putting this quote from Taibbi's article on the front cover:

What the Bush administration has created in Iraq is a sort of paradise of perverted capitalism, where revenues are forcibly extracted from the customer by the state, and obscene profits are handed out not by the market but by an unaccountable government bureauc­racy. This is the triumphant culmination of two centuries of flawed white-people thinking, a preposterous mix of authoritarian socialism and laissez-faire profit­eering, with all the worst aspects of both ideologies rolled up into one pointless, supremely idiotic military adventure -- American men and women dying by the thousands, so that Karl Marx and Adam Smith can blow each other in a Middle Eastern glory hole.

It was an awful idea, perhaps the worst America has ever tried on foreign soil. But if you were in on it, it was great work while it lasted.

We the people need to stop this war.

We the people need to remove OUR government - it's time. And, it's our patriotic duty.

No more talk.

We need to take action.

"BAM" - kick it up a notch....please


crossposted at BigBrassBlog

Oh, God! Not Another One!

Yep. Another Republican DongDiver bites the dust:
"Republican Senator Arrested for "Lewd Conduct"
"Sen. Larry Craig (R-ID) "was arrested in June at a Minnesota airport by a plainclothes police officer investigating lewd conduct complaints in a men's public restroom," according to an arrest report obtained by Roll Call."
More at Signs-of-the-Times.
(Liz, I have an idea. If we start running out of cyber-space reporting these stories, we can just simply report the stories of those political figures who have NOT been arrested for lewd conduct.)

c'm'ere bigboy

click image to find out what it is

YEEEESSSSHHH!!!

Gonzo. Gone.

What do you want to say to him on the way out the door?

Rant of the year - by Layla Anwar, an Arab woman

Her post is titled

Nausea

I think most of us will feel her same frustrations and her complete and utter disgust about what is happening in the middle east.

Here are a few exerpts:

I am so disgusted with everything, I don't even feel like writing.

I am disgusted with the Americans, the Brits, the French, the Germans, the Scandinavians, the Australians, the Iranians, the Arabs, the Muslims, the Christians, the Jews....( am not mentioning the Israelis because they have disgusted me long ago. It's a given)

Everything and everyone disgusts me.

I have run out of words. I don't even know which words to use anymore.
Have you ever felt that way? Not even knowing which words to use?
I can write tons of posts, would not make one single fucking difference.
But I promised someone that I will not stop writing, so here I am...

Imagine, one day, you come to the realization that your country, in the space of 4 years, simply does not exist anymore? Can you even envisage that?
It simply is not there anymore.

Well guess what, you fuckers, I don't have a country anymore!

Are you pleased with yourselves now ? What a great job you have done! Bunch of criminals.

YOU are as responsible as the american army and the american government in the slaughter of innocent Iraqis and the total destruction of their country in the space of 4 fucking years. Just 4 years, you bastards.

You, the academics, the writers, the journalists, the anti- war shit, the political scientists of my ass, the anal-ysts...
All of you are responsible today. All of you.
All of you have the blood of 1 million Iraqis on your hands and all of you have a country in ruins on your conscience.

But you have no fucking conscience, you bunch of paid, sell out bastards. Those of you who sold it to Iran and those who sold it to Israel, and who sold it to America and England.

You are the "intellectual" whores of this world. You are the PROSTITUTES.
I spit on you and on your academic achievements and on your publications and on your press, on your prints and on your books...

I swear even hookers have more integrity than you.......


(there's lots more)

Also, here are some interesting comments at uruknet where I found her post

ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

FROM THE PEN OF RONALD REAGAN, FROM THE JUST PUBLISHED REAGAN DIARIES. ENTRY, MAY 17, l986

'A moment I've been dreading. George brought his ne're-do-well son around this morning and asked me to find the kid a job. Not the political one who lives in Florida. The one who hangs around here all the time looking shiftless. This so-called kid is already almost 40 and has never had a real job. Maybe I'll call Kinsley over at The New Republic and see if they'll hire him as a contributing editor or something. That looks like easy work.'

Anti-abortion = Anti-sex

Oh I've been so naive. I would write pieces about how we can lower the abortion rate in this country in order to shut the fuck up those so called "pro-life" but pro-war people. I had simply thought that they were obsessed with dead babies. I thought, well duh, let's trump up sex education and create a more nurturing environment so that more women could afford to bring a child into the world- you know, stupid socialist stuff like education, prenatal care, post natal care, healthcare for babies whose parents don't have coverage. Free condoms for horny people. You know, silly stuff like that.

Trolls would arrive here to blast me about the evils of birth control. I would feel like I was reading some sort of crazy sermon written in the 19th century by a hateful and ignorant preacher man. I never heard such craziness from Catholics. And the most interesting part of the troll storms here regarding a woman's control of her own body were always written by men. But their opinions turned out to be the norm for the rabid anti-abortion crowd. It really isn't about being anti-abortion at all. It's against S-E-X. Dirty filthy sex to which the only punishment for such a heinous sin is having to get pregnant, give birth and raise a child. They have turned a loving act into a punishment.

The anti-abortion crowd is out to redefine the beginning of life all the way back to the conception- to that unknown moment when the sperm meets the egg. They incorrectly state that a birth control pill prevents a fertilized egg from reaching the uterus. This would make using birth control, even between loving spouses, akin to an abortion.

Teh GOP presidential candidates are going right along with this nonsense. I don't know if they are just pandering to these groups and most presidential candidates do when they need votes, but it's still pretty alarming.

From The quiet campaign against birth control by Cristina Page in the Baltimore Sun:

Mitt Romney speaking in code "implied an opposition to the birth control pill and a willingness to join in their efforts to scale back access to contraception."

Sen. Sam Brownback... beefed up his anti-contraception resume by co-sponsoring a bill to de-fund the nation's largest contraception provider, Planned Parenthood, by excluding it from Title X family planning for the poor.

Sen. John McCain's campaign officials boast he has "consistently voted against taxpayer-funded contraception. And Mr. McCain reports that his adviser on sexual-health matters is Sen. Tom Coburn, Republican of Oklahoma, who leads campaigns claiming condoms are unsafe and opposing emergency contraception.

According to Mr. Tancredo, a Colorado Republican, emergency contraception "cheapens human life and simply uses a woman's body to dispose of the child instead of a doctor."

You won't find these candidates speaking to mainstream voters and media about their stands against contraception though. They speak in code. Theirs is a pretty unpopular view and would alienate women voters. American citizens deserve to know for a fact if presidential candidates would move towards banning birth control.

We've Been Lucky As Hell... So Far.

I thought this article was rather interesting, Rare dead star found near Earth, so I asked Father Tyme to write about it for the blog since a lot of us are interested in the cosmos but didn't major in it in college. So he kindly obliged. From Father Tyme:

One of the really cool things about this universe is the number of ways we’ve escaped death, destruction, annihilation and just general bad times. Call it luck, fate, Divine intervention or whatever but it all boils down to the same thing; we’ve been lucky as hell – so far.

Astronomers discovered a new, rather unique neutron star. What makes this one different is that it emits virtually no visible light but massive amounts of X-Rays. (Makes them hard to find.) More interesting is its proximity to earth and position in the sky. Most neutron stars are scattered around the galactic plane like flying around the earth’s equator. This one is a bit of a maverick. It’s way up in our northern sky. Very unusual. How it got there is a mystery. It’s possible it had its orbit disturbed by something else or it’s just a fluke that we never noticed before. Regardless, it’s moving pretty quickly.

Here’s a link to one of the stories. The news picks up on these and parrots the original with virtually no explanation, just information.

You have to look hard to find any data on the star. Here’s some but it may be a little intense.

“We report discovery of Calvera, a compact object at high Galactic latitude. We initially identified Calvera as a ROSAT All-Sky Survey Bright Source Catalog X-ray source, 1RXS J141256.0+792204, statistically likely to possess a high X-ray to optical flux ratio. Further observations using Swift, Gemini-North, and the Chandra X-ray Observatory refined the source position and confirmed the absence of any optical counterpart to an X-ray to optical flux ratio of FX(0.1-2.4 keV)/FV > 5100 (3 sigma). Interpretation of Calvera as a typical X-ray-dim isolated neutron star would place it at z~6.7 kpc above the Galactic disk -- in the Galactic halo -- implying that it either has an extreme space velocity (vz > 6700 km s-1) or has failed to cool according to theoretical predictions. Interpretations as a persistent anomalous X-ray pulsar, or a ``compact central object'' present conflicts with these classes' typical properties. We conclude the properties of Calvera are most consistent with those of a nearby (150 to 560 pc) radio pulsar, similar to the radio millisecond pulsars of 47 Tuc, with further observations required to confirm this classification. If it is a millisecond pulsar, it would be among the X-ray brightest millisecond pulsars, and only the third northern hemisphere millisecond pulsar at such close distance, making it an interesting target for X-ray study, a radio pulsar timing array, and LIGO.

From the Astrophysical Journal (or so I’m told). Sort of a mouth full!

There were previously seven of these special neutron stars discovered and for a long time, they were it, top of the heap, A-number one! The guys that used to spend time looking at the night sky in person and who now do it from the comfort of their office while flunkies freeze their prominences off actually have a sort of sense of humor. Since there were seven discovered of this unique type they were dubbed “The Magnificent Seven” (groan!)
Well ‘along comes Jones’ number 8. What to do? Let’s call it Calvera; the bad guy from the movie.

The problem with this guy is that he emits a lot more bad stuff but at least he’s far enough away to not cause a problem (about 250 to 1000 light years - or at least a couple of city blocks). If he were closer, say 100 light years, we’d all get free dental X-Rays, removed warts and probably mutations that could account for the Republicans. But we’re still lucky. He’s far enough away.

He’ll make for interesting study over the years. Maybe he’ll help us understand why stars have these nervous breakdowns and undergo catastrophic collapse. Then they continue their inward spiral toward becoming a black hole.

We have a lot of theories but the Xtian god hasn’t blessed us with the ability to go see these things first hand and it does seem as though HE’s doing everything to keep us from scientific discoveries; hence his creation of George Bush! My guess is we couldn’t handle the truth and HE never mentioned these in his novel.

Sooner or later our luck is going to run out. An asteroid that just finds us, a comet (or its brother) from outside the Oort Cloud comes back after 65 million years looking for stray dinosaurs, our sun gets a bug up its butt and fries us with a super radiating prominence, or the Martians really do hate us. (Well maybe they just hate the brown people so we’ll be fine!)
My best bet is on that dastardly group known as humans to extinguish life here on 4 billion or 6 thousand year old Terra.

Oh and the Night Boys just discovered a big, and I mean super big area of nothing! This nothing could be the absolute leftovers from a massive black hole that started out something like Calvera, and totally consumed an entire galaxy and swept the area clean of everything including dust, atoms and even dark matter and energy. The prognosis is still speculative but I’m betting it’s probably still hungry.

By Father Tyme

Ben Stein's Bull Shit/Propaganda Crusade

Ben Stein has a new documentary coming out soon.

It's called EXPELLED: No Intelligence Allowed.

Ben says:

"it is a controversial, soon-to-be-released documentary that chronicles my confrontation with the widespread suppression and entrenched discrimination that is spreading in our institutions, laboratories and most importantly, in our classrooms, and that is doing irreparable harm to some of the world’s top scientists, educators, and thinkers."

"Human beings are supposed to live in a state of freedom"

"Freedom is God-given."

"A huge part of this freedom is freedom of inquiry."

"Freedom of inquiry is basic to human advancement. There would be no modern medicine, no antibiotics, no brain surgery, no Internet, no air conditioning, no modern travel, no highways, no knowledge of the human body without freedom of inquiry."

"This includes the ability to inquire whether a higher power, a being greater than man, is involved with how the universe operates."

(oh please Ben)

"This has always been basic to science. ALWAYS."

(STOP ben....)

"Some of the greatest scientists of all time, including Galileo, Newton, Einstein, operated under the hypothesis that their work was to understand the principles and phenomena as designed by a creator."

(Ben - PLEASE stop it)

"Operating under that hypothesis, they discovered the most important laws of motion, gravity, thermodynamics, relativity, and even economics."

"Now, I am sorry to say, freedom of inquiry in science is being suppressed."


( OH JUST SHOOT ME NOW!)

read on - it gets even crazier

My first reaction is that this has to be some kind of joke he is pulling. I have to check into this. I saw another comment that mentioned this also: "There's nothing on the site that fully convinces me this is NOT some gigantic practical joke being pulled on all of us by Mr. Stein. I can see this as a grand social experiment"

EXACTLY I thought! good - the world has not gone completely mad!

So, he sets up this blog about his new "documentary" and has almost 500 comments. Looks like it's open and not moderated. Let's check. HEY look at that! By comment #11 Ben is made to look very foolish. Here are 2 comments from the blog:

"Actually, Einstein did not believe in a personal God and would abhor this sort of political strongarming of religion into the classroom. Take note:

"The idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I am unable to take seriously. [Albert Einstein, letter to Hoffman and Dukas, 1946]

"I believe in Spinoza’s God who reveals Himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with fates and actions of human beings. [Albert Einstein, in a letter to Rabbi Herbert Goldstein]

(more good quotes in link)

-------------

Sorry Ben, but you’re completely and utterly wrong. The recent legal case in Dover, for example, did NOT deny the teaching of creationism in the schools. It said that there was no evidence for intelligent design and that ID does not meet the criteria to be considered science and therefore should not be taught in school SCIENCE classes.

The judge ruled (correctly) that the only arguments that the ID folks were able to put forth were either “Straw man” fallacies where they misquoted what evolution was in order to shoot it down, or they were “false dichotomy” fallacies. i.e. “If Science can’t explain this (or more likely if the ID proponent’s knowledge of science is not sufficient to explain it) then the alternative must be ‘God did it’”. That’s a false dichotomy. It’s not science.

The judge in the case specifically left open the possibility of ID being taught in a class on religion as a cultural influence or in a class which surveys various religious beliefs. Also, the judge was not a liberal activist judge but a conservative judge appointed by GW Bush himself.

Sorry, but your facts and premise are completely wrong.

---------------

I started to read more about the film and found my way over to PZ Myer's blog (Pharyngula).

OMG - it's really real.

It is an actual film and PZ is in it.
Read how he was tricked into an interview for what he thought was a film project by Rampant Films called "Crossroads: The Intersection of Science and Religion."

He looked up Rampant Films, found this crossroads project, and thought O.K.!

THEN, this new ID creationist movie, Expelled, comes out with a press release with this claim:

"Unlike some other documentary films, Expelled doesn't just talk to people representing one side of the story. The film confronts scientists such as Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, influential biologist and atheist blogger PZ Myers and Eugenie Scott, head of the National Center for Science Education. The creators of Expelled crossed the globe over a two-year period, interviewing scores of scientists, doctors, philosophers and public leaders. The result is a startling revelation that freedom of thought and freedom of inquiry have been expelled from publicly-funded high schools, universities and research institutions."


PZ learned that Expelled uses the same graphic that Rampant Films used for Crossroads.

Per PZ: "The case is closed -- Ben Stein's propaganda film for ID is the one I was interviewed for."

Oh poor PZ: "I've been trying to recollect what horrible thing I said in that interview with that film crew … what juicy, ghastly, evil comment I might have made that will be plucked out and impaled on a stick and waved to the audience to inflame them.I think I know what's going to be featured in Expelled"


Crossposted at BigBrassBlog

Not the Friday Sex Post - "Bromance" Is In The Air

I'm not considering this the actual Friday Sex Post, as it doesn't contain the story about the dwarf at the Edinburgh Festival who accidentally superglued a vacuum cleaner hose to his genitals last week.

But it does strike me as kind of silly.

A Grand Bromance

Umm, "Oops?"

With friends like this, who needs enemies?

God's Warriors

Did anyone watch the 3 Part Documentary- God's Warriors by Christiane Amanpour on CNN this week? There are videos from the series online if you have a good internet connection.
Here are links to segments of the series at YouTube.

Each episode: Jewish Warriors, Muslim Warriors and Christian Warriors confirmed what I always thought- If there is a God, he is fucking with his creatures and I hope he's enjoying it, the sadist.

Don't flame me, but I like Muslim women after seeing that episode. Otherwise I didn't like anything about Jewish, Christian and Muslim radicals. I still maintain that they are nut jobs and they are being led astray by greedy leaders who don't believe iota of the rubbish they preach. Mind you, Ms Amanpour did not suggest that was so in the documentary, but when you take it as a whole, it's quite obvious.

Was Mother Theresa Not Really A Saint?

Mother Theresa spent her life helping the poor because she was a good person... in fact she was extraordinary. Her diaries have been revealed and it turns out that she was even more extraordinary- she spent over 40 years in a crisis of faith. She doubted God.

From the Telegraph

Mother Teresa, who worked for years among the poor of Calcutta, wrote in 1958: "My smile is a great cloak that hides a multitude of pains."

Because she was "forever smiling", people thought "my faith, my hope and my love are overflowing and that my intimacy with God and union with his will fill my heart. If only they knew . . ."

She also wrote:

"The damned of Hell suffer eternal punishment because they experiment with the loss of God.

"In my own soul, I feel the terrible pain of this loss. I feel that God does not want me, that God is not God and that he does not really exist."

Her writings will be published next month as Il Segreto di Madre Teresa (Mother Teresa's Secret). Many "christianistas" will probably revel in this "damning" information because they hate her for not focusing on the "real" christian issues: abortion and homosexuals- even though almost every page of the new testament deals with taking care of the poor. (If anyone finds negative press about this revelation, do send it to me.)

I look forward to reading her diaries because they will reveal the window to the soul of a selfless person, regardless of whether she thought God existed or not. She was a typically tormented human being. How refreshing. Blind faith is getting on my nerves.

The Persistence of Memory

I was having lunch on Wednesday when some complete ass of a coworker put on Fox "News." And there was Dear Leader strutting onto a stage in front of the Veterans of Foreign Wars (who really should know better than to applaud this waste of space and natural resources). After acknowledging the plaudits of the crowd as only a good little Sovereign might do, with a gracious wave of a lily-white paw and that oh-so-condescending faux Texas drawl of his, he began to speak.

I spent the next 20 minutes aghast, my lunch nearly forgotten (it wasn't that memorable anyway).

First, Emperor Empty Suit talked about all the wonderful things he's doing for our veterans (like privatizing the VA hospitals, which precipitated the Walter Reed scandal) and how he's increased health benefits (while at the same time threatening to veto a 3.5% pay increase for active-duty on the grounds that the extra 0.5% is "unnecessary"). The assembled veterans, many of whom seemed to be sliding into dementia, lapped it up like kittens at a creamery exposition.

Then he wandered off into the history books to find just the right analogy to fit the War in Iraq into.

And I almost started choking on my dessert.

An NPR correspondent later that day cited a Shiite proverb that "an analogy is written by the Devil," but in this case it was written by either one of the best gag writers in the business or by El Presidente himself.

He cited World War Two in the Pacific (concentrating on Asian conflicts), as if Iraq had ever attacked us and had the capability to destroy us through its expanding global hegemony. He wanted to point out that there were naysayers regarding the democratization of Japan.

There are ALWAYS naysayers, President Dingbat; dissent is part of the democratic process, a fact that may have escaped your myopia. MacArthur made a deal with the Devil by allowing the Showa Emperor to skate, and to this day many of the authors and perpetrators of Japanese atrocities in that war are honored at the Yasukuni Shrine, a major bone of contention for the rest of Japan's neighbors.

He cited Korea, as if we were fighting an attempt by the Kurdish North to take over the Arab Center and South. That IS the analogy, wasn't it?

Again, holding the line against Communism at South Korea required us to fight only a holding action, especially after Old Asia Hand MacArthur pooh-poohed the idea that China would come to Kim Il-sung's rescue. The ideological struggle of the time was against an expanding wave of Communism fomented by and emanating from two first-rate powers, China and the USSR - and NOT against an ideology that appeals only to alienated and disaffected minorities in impoverished countries (like, say, Iraq now that we've invaded and occupied it).

And he cited Vietnam.

His take on Vietnam was so wrong on so many levels I was very surprised that booing wasn't heard , but then I remembered that the Codpiece only speaks to carefully screened audiences that sign loyalty oaths - oh, and check back to my earlier comment about the vets suffering from dementia. In Vietnam we were fighting Vietnamese - not "insurgents" from Laos, the Phillippines or Japan. The "killing fields" he cited were in Cambodia, and were the result of Pol Pot, whose rise to power was facilitated by our actions in that country.

Also, while there was a level of political violence in Vietnam after the North conquered the South, the dreaded "Domino Theory" never materialized. You DO recall the Domino Theory, Mr. President?

The major problem with El Jefe's oration before the VFW was not that it was transparently flawed, it was that too many people watching it have memories. I grew up during Vietnam, and remember Walter Cronkite on the CBS News talking about the casualties of that war. One of my cousins served there, and wasn't quite right afterward. He's better now, but it took years.

Bush (or his handlers, puppeteers and Cheney) apprently thought that he could rewrite history simply by wishing it so.

It doesn't work that way, Mister "I'll hide out in the National Guard like Dan Quayle."

And it doesn't work that way either, Mister "Five draft deferments."

You can change history books (or burn them, simply by having the Christian al Qaeda declare them "evil" and organize burnings).

But you can't alter or erase people's memories.

Oh, and a good analogy for Iraq, Bushie Baby?

How about Britain's occupation of Iraq in the 1920s? Or don't your books go back that far?

Christian Response Team: Oh Brother

I thought it was nothing to be worried about but according to this story at Talk2Action, it is real. Clergy Response Teams are real and endorsed by the WH should something like Martial Law ever become reality. While most clergy are sincere in helping their country in time of a disaster, there are groups with ulterior motives.

The particular group in question is Christ in Action, which uses quotes from St Paul rather than Jesus to justify its motives to work side by side with the government, thinking that god actually blesses even the most corrupt government. The leadership of Christ in Action is confirmed on the WH website when discussing non-governmental organizations who will act when a disaster hits America:

Dr. Denny Nissley, the Director of Christ in Action, is organizing a Coalition of Faith-Based First Responders from around the Nation to be prepared for the next major disaster. This Coalition will perform disaster relief training for volunteers and will maintain a current roster of thousands of volunteers who can be quickly called upon to provide support during the next major disaster.

The terrifying part is that Dr Nissley is an extremist, partisan, right wing character with a radical agenda. But you already figured that out.

From the story at Talk2Action:

Through its endorsement of Nissley's "Christ In Action" coalition, the federal government would seem to be deputizing a partisan religious faction shaped and led by man who some would characterize as being out on, or close to, the political fringe. The plan could, in essence, subject traumatized, post-disaster populations, perhaps confined by martial law to their homes, to semiofficial proselytizing efforts by partisan Christian fundamentalists embedded within, or working closely with, national guard or US military forces.

I don't think that radical christianistas would be able to pacify me during a time of national crisis. I am glad that they weren't hanging around in NY after 9/11 when it became quite apparent that it was religion and foreign policy that started this whole mess.

There are some good posts by Jersey Cynic on the front page of the blog right now with very interesting discussions in the comments. The christianistas are a threat to democracy in this country whether anyone likes it or not.

Praise The Lord and (don't) Pass The Ammunition!!! - "NOT SO FAST CHRISTIAN SOLDIERS"

Remember last week week we talked about The Pentagon Sending Messengers of Apocalypse to Convert Soldiers in Iraq? Well -- the OSU (Operation Straight Up) aka "the messengers" have abandoned plans to send packages to U.S. troops in Iraq with the controversial Christian video game, “Left Behind: Eternal Force,” along with Christian books, Pentagon officials say.

The group, Operation Straight Up, does not plan to send “any care packages to troops in Iraq,” said a Pentagon public affairs officer who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Read the rest here at ArmyTimes

All the links to OSU have been removed from the first story we talked about.

THERE IS A GODDESS!!

I am seriously considering a visit to my (former) church, and I would urge anyone else who wants to do something about these so called faithful followers, to do the same. "Out of respect" for their beliefs - my (former) church friends that is, I would like to hear what they think about what is going on at the "Pentecostal-gon.” I'll pretend I still go to church when I talk to them. I'm still on the mailing list for my "envelopes" - (no one will ever know - and I'll go to confession on the way out, you know, just in case)

WAY TO GO ARMY TIMES! - Nice coverage of what is happening:

The watchdog group Military Religious Freedom Foundation first revealed OSU’s plans to send care packages to Iraq. Foundation founder and President Mikey Weinstein said the link between the Pentagon and OSU is the worst example the group has seen in the four-year fight to ensure religious freedom for service members.

“OSU is a giant [improvised explosive device] that is blowing up the constitutional wall separating church and state,” said Weinstein, a 1977 graduate of the Air Force Academy who spent 10 years as an Air Force JAG officer, then later spent more than three years as legal counsel in the Reagan administration.

Weinstein also has harsh criticism for the Pentagon, which he called “the Pentecostal-gon.” His book, “With God On Our Side,” published in 2006, details his charges of religious intolerance in the U.S. armed forces. More than 5,000 service members have contacted his organization because “they say they are being preyed upon by groups using the military chain of command,” he said.

About 96 percent of those who said they were pressured are Christians themselves, he said. “But these groups are preying on non-evangelical Christians. They believe they have the only right faith, that everybody else is false.

“We couldn’t care less what someone’s religious faith is,” Weinstein said. “But you cannot use your position of authority to force [your religion] onto military subordinates,” he said. “To send a para-church organization into a war zone undercuts the Chaplain Corps.”

Lawyer and minister Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, said: “This is just the thing to convince Islamic militants that America is on a religious crusade to convert Muslims to Christianity. This officially connects DoD to make it look like the U.S. government is on a crusade. There appears to be a very deep connection between this allegedly private group promoting evangelical Christianity and the military itself. It doesn’t matter what the religion is. The government is supposed to be neutral. It is supposed to be hands-off on that.”


Here's another story about what is going on that appeared in the LATimes


Crossposted at
BigBrassBlog

Something to do for democracy

Robert Greenwald's new short video shows how Fox News is beating the war drums much as it did leading up to the Iraq war. Fox intimidated other networks to do the same for the Iraq war. Visit FoxAttacks.com to see this amazing propaganda.

Fox warns: You don't want another 9/11!
Fox News has the answer: Bomb Iran!

Tell the other news networks to not blindly follow Fox's lead this time around and to report fairly and accurately. There's a letter there.

Free speech doesn't include supposed news organizations spewing deliberate lies.

What really got me in the video was Joe LIEberman saying, "Al Qaida in Iran... these people are out to kill us."

Give me a freaking break. It is no wonder that I cannot have a rational discussion with Fox Noise viewers. I know some viewers. They make me want to rip my hair out.

Why are we spending billions in Iraq?

So get this:

"The U.S. ambassador to Baghdad said on Tuesday Iraq had made "extremely disappointing" progress towards reconciling its warring sects, while President George W. Bush said there was "a certain level of frustration with the leadership in general."

Responding to a question about U.S. criticism, Maliki said: "The Iraqi government was elected by the Iraqi people and nobody (has the right to) put timetables ... on it," referring to conditions set by Washington for his government to achieve political reconciliation among Iraqi groups."

It has been suggested to me that the Iraqi's are deliberately stalling because they know the US wants their oil. They want the US to get fed up and pull out. If this is true, I kind of don't blame them.

This is too much for me. I need to go to the beauty parlor.

Clusterf**ck USA

From Arming the Enemy

"A midsummer report by the Government Accountability Office that the Pentagon “cannot fully account for about 110,000 AK-47 rifles, 80,000 pistols, 135,000 items of body armor, and 115,000 helmets” issued to Iraqi forces as of September 2005 did not stir the city’s stifling air."

Tens of thousands of weapons are unaccounted for in Iraq. Who knows who's got them? Planeloads of weapons left over from Bosnia were supposedly sent to Baghdad by the Pentagon, but there is no record that the planes ever made it to Baghdad. All but 3% of weapons that were handed out to Iraqi's are untraceable. In many cases, Iraqi soldiers signed up, got their pay and took their weapons home, never to be seen again. Saddam's stockpiles of weapons were looted- there are 4-6,000 shoulder fired missiles that went missing.

Makes me wonder if the government isn't being totally incompetant on purpose.

No one goes to a fair for steamed broccoli

The NY Times has a story about the Great Indiana State Fair because of the new ban on Trans Fats in the oils used on the food there. Did it create a hardship for the vendors? Did the food taste different? Was it more expensive to produce? Why are the health police at a State Fair? Indeed.

Some vendors cited that they had to change the oil in the fryers more frequently while some said that they had to change the oil less frequently. There was however less crud buildup in the fryers with the change in oil. bravo.

Forgive me for being so naive but I had no idea that such cuisine existed in America as depicted in the photo above(click to make it larger). I hadn't heard of deep fried Snickers (except in Scotland) and deep fried Oreos, Reeses, Ho-Ho's and Milky-way bars. They even have deep fried Pepsi! That's almost as interesting as deep fried ice-cream (which I have tried in a restaurant out of curiosity, although I felt that it was merely gilding the lily).

I suppose that the irony here is what is being fried. Sure the "officials" don't want their citizens to get fat and have heart attacks so they jumped on the 'trans fats ban' made popular in NYC (home of clean living), but it's not like these are Tempura stands where a change in the oil would make a difference in one's propensity towards a fatal coronary. I mean, WTF.

“This is a slice of heaven,” said Ryan Howell, 31, as he cradled his Combo Plate, which, for the record, consists of one battered Snickers bar, two battered Oreos and a battered Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup — all deep-fried in oil that is trans-fat free, thank goodness.

The Health Nazi's have no credibility when they ban the use of trans fats when we're talking about frying foods that are made with trans fats and other artery cloggers or ban outdoor smoking in urban areas. Consistency is the name of the game when trying to affect change in a society. The above example of healthy eating is just laughable.

"Ignore Religion At Our Peil."

This pearl of ineffable wisdom dropped from the mouth of former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, as part of an interview she had for a special report on CNN. In it, she describes the trouble of hammering out a Mideast peace agreement that is acceptable to both sides, and discusses the problem of Jerusalem in the scheme of things.

Which brings me to the quote that titles this post.

Albright rightly points out that fundamentalism started out as a term used to describe American Christians who were extremely conservative and rigid in their religious views. Tolerance had no place in the fundamentalist viewpoint, either in religion (anti-Semitism), race (Jim Crow), politics (isolationism), or science (the Scopes Trial).

So we ignored it.

And look where we are.

I was watching the local news last night and saw footage of happy students at a local 'charter' school, one where the students get in on a 'voucher' program. Not a single African-American or Hispanic to be seen. Segregation forever, huh guys?

Shiite fundamentalism arose in Iran in 1979, and we made fun of it (I still recall "Shiitehead" jokes made over local radio stations), while at the same time our government and the chattering class spun dark scenarios of the end of the world. A film made back then about the prophecies of Nostradamus (narrated by Orson Welles) portrayed one future leader as a cross between a Turkish Sultan and a figure from The Arabian Nights - every Occidental's worst stereotype of an Islamic leader. So, while we were simultaneously denigrating and wetting our pants over this new fundamentalism, we ignored both our own homegrown extremists and Sunni extremists.

Which came back to haunt us at Oklahoma City.

And at the World Trade Center (twice).

So, do I agree with Maddy Albright?

You betcha. We ignore religion at our peril, because in a technological society, in a state governed by secular laws and reason, religion (particularly fundamentalism) is the greatest enemy we face.

No wonder they're trying to stamp out tobacco use:

"While nicotine is highly addictive, researchers have also shown the drug to enhance learning and memory—a property that has launched efforts to develop nicotine-like drugs to treat cognitive deficits in Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases, schizophrenia, and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder."

Mechanism of nicotine's learning effects explored

(Oops! I was gonna editorialize some more but I just hacked a big oyster on my keyboard.)

UPDATE: And then what to my wondering eyes should appear but a post by Laura Knight-Jadczyk on her blog "Postcards from the Edge of Reality...", entitled Let's All Light Up!, wherein she writes: "Nicotine DOUBLES the efficiency of our thinking. Hmmm... I think that makes it pretty clear why the PTB (Powers That Be) wish to stamp out smoking."


"Don't Bogart that joint my friend..."

Sums It All Up

Does faith deserve respect? NO - IT DOES NOT

and after seeing this video I will no longer be keeping my mouth shut "out of respect" to believers. (h/t to j-walkblog)

Pat Condell has a fantastic approach. I like how he doesn't even mention "atheism". You have GOT to watch him tell it like it is! He also has quite a comical website about FAITH HOPE & SANITY and "A few jokes about RELIGION before it kills us all"

NICE JOB!! and just in time, because I have been putting myself through hell reading one of the "discussions" that ABC put up here oh I don't know, back in MARCH I think. It's the way they posed the question that pissed me off:

Atheists are on the offensive. No longer content to keep their disbelief to themselves, they are fighting all the way to the Supreme Court to get religion out of government, and they are writing best-selling books. In an interview with ABC News, Sam Harris, author of "Letter to a Christian Nation," said, "Religion poses one of the more troubling threats to civilization. The world is ablaze with bad ideas and most of these ideas are religious." Needless to say, this kind of talk is lighting a fire under people of faith. Are atheists fanning the flames a little too hard -- or exercising their right to speak their minds?

Most of the discussions are nasty "christians" beating up on atheists. It's NEVER going to end. I don't think this topic will ever get labled "Discussion Closed". People are such assholes when it comes to religion. My father is right "there ARE more assholes in this world than there are asses".

I did come across a beautiful comment somewhere mid-summer and thought it was one of the most well written testaments to atheism that I had ever read:

"An Atheist loves himself and his fellow man instead of a god. An Atheist knows that heaven is something for which we should work now - here on earth - for all men together to enjoy. An Atheist thinks that he can get no help through prayer but that he must find in himself the inner conviction and strength to meet life, to grapple with it, to subdue, and enjoy it. An Atheist thinks that only in a knowledge of himself and a knowledge of his fellow man he can find the understanding that will help to a life of fulfillment. Therefore, he seeks to know himself and his fellow man rather than to know a god. An Atheist knows that a hospital should be built instead of a church. An Atheist knows that a deed must be done instead of a prayer said. An Atheist strives for involvement in life and not escape into death. He wants disease conquered, poverty vanquished, war eliminated. He wants man to understand and love man. He wants an ethic al way of life. He knows that we cannot rely on a god nor channel action into prayer nor hope for an end to troubles in the hereafter. He knows that we are our brother's keeper and keepers of our lives; that we are responsible persons, that the job is here and the time is now."

A quote I live by from Madalyn Murray O'Hair

WOW!! Now wasn't that just simply beautiful? I had never heard of Madalyn Murray O'Hair. I looked her up. Didn't find too much other than "The Most Hated Woman in America" Well, Allrighty!

I moved on to whatever it was I was supposed to be doing that day and forgot all about Madalyn. Later that night I climb into bed, start surfing, and come across this documentary that was just starting on sundance channel. "Godless in America". It's been out for about a year. A lot of you may have already seen it.

FREAKED me out! It was about Madalyn Murray O'Hair
Here's a review:

".....the story of Madalyn Murray O’Hair’s notorious life and mysterious death, alongside an account of the current campaigns and struggles of American Atheists.

At a time where the World’s most powerful leader declares that he is inspired and directed by his Christian God, and begins each day by leading his cabinet in prayer, we propose a film about Atheism in America. As a US General speaks of “a Christian nation fighting a Holy War on Islamic terror,” the Atheist campaign to take God out of America defines a gathering battleground of the new millennium.

Godless in America will follow the ongoing struggles of American Atheists to be heard, and to take their case to politicians in Washington and to people across America. They claim that the despite the clamour of the Christian conservatives, there are 30 million non-believers in America, and they are determined to fight back against what they see as the current power of religious fundamentalism in every area of public life.

Here is a short film about her life, much of which was in the documentary

I'm still shocked about what happened to her. Sad that things will never change. Atheist will always be a swear word - just like liberal. Makes me want to keep my mouth shut after learning her fate. I won't remain silent out of respect for the faithful anymore though. It's getting out of hand. Time to lash back - with words that is.

I will now be studying the Pat Condell method!

“I don’t know that Atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered patriots. This is One Nation under God.”
~George W. Bush

Crossposted at BigBrassBlog

National Outrage Fatigue

I read last week in the WSJ that the US government was spying on its citizens via satellites usually reserved for spying on other countries. Yeah, what else is knew? They can read my Email and listen to my phone conversations. This blog has been monitored. This is all for MY protection you know, so I guess I had better shut the hell up and stop complaining because after all I am still alive and that's what it's all about, at least as far as I, an American tax-paying citizen should be concerned. My elected representatives in DC don't seem to mind. After all, I don't have to worry about being blown up by terrorists (unless of course a whistleblower gets media attention), thanks to my government. Although, between Mother Nature, the US infrastructure and lightning, I could still end up being a statistic but not one my government would go to war for, so it doesn't count.

and you?

A Must See, Powerful Video...

The Terrorists Did Not Take Away Our Freedoms. The Terrorists Did Not Suspend Our Constitutional Rights. The Terrorists are Not Spying on Us. Bush Has Done All That, Not the Terrorists. He Does Their Work for Them. He is Their Tool at Destroying Democracy.

On Dehumanization

Those OTHERS
by Pamela Troy at Democratic Underground

It’s become quite fashionable in certain circles to inveigh against well…you know…them.

I mean those hook-nosed, black-haired, filthy-rich, conniving nonChristians with the funny dietary laws who are conspiring against all that is right in just in our society.

Oh come on, you know…them! The swarthy types who want to take over the world, rape our blonde women, kill our children, and steal our stuff. Those others.

The Moslems.
Read on...

This is a very moving essay. It really got me thinking and wondering if I haven't become prejudiced against what some would call "my own." White, christian, westerners. Perhaps it's just a delayed reaction to the horrific hatred perpetrated by people who look like me towards those who are different. As I get older I am sometimes just brought to tears when I think about what "my people" did to others in the name of god or civility.

There are some very good quotes at the essay.

Hat tip to tali

Guzzlers of Mad Dog 20-20 BEWARE!:

From the Chicago Tribune in an article entitled
"Wine before its time alarms Italy":

GROTTAFERRATA, Italy - "Patrizia Filippi has no degree in meteorology or any idea how to calculate what scientists call extreme weather change. But the 43-year-old grape picker has been working this area's silky, volcanic soil for nearly three decades, and she knows what she sees:

"This is an early harvest unlike anything that Italy, or any generation in her family, has experienced in memory.

"I'm a bit scared," Filippi said, pulling and snipping a thick, juicy bunch of white grapes from the vines of the Castel de Paolis estate. "I've never picked grapes this early in the season. We're used to picking grapes in October. That's when the grape festivals are. Even my father is saying: What the hell has gone wrong with the world?"

If I am unable to drive away the agony of living in a trashcan universe by sniffing the familiar sweet bouquet of Mad Dog, or Night Train, or Thunderbird, what'm I gonna do? PoLT begs the Blondes and readers for advice.

Tit for Tat

(And no, this isn't a belated Friday Sex Post.)

First I wish to apologize for not having posted anything in almost a week. I was suffering from outrage fatigue, so apart from random comments I basically avoided blogging and gardened until I felt better about writing something that wouldn't sound like The Rude Pundit with added psychopathies.

So what caught my eye a few days ago was an item on the NBC Nightly News where the United States Government had threatened to declare that the Islamic Republic of Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps was a "terrorist organization" because it has supported insurgents and other terrorist groups.

Now, with this article on CNN the Iranians have taken the traditional umbrage at our government's line, complete with bellicose language about "punching" us if we take steps against the Guards.

I just had to say something about this.

First, there is some precedent to the idea of outlawing a part of another nation's armed forces, as the victorious Allies did in Nuremburg by outlawing and prosecuting the German High Command and the SS.

But can our own actions be as closely refereed?

Let's see, shall we?

We supported the Shah of Iran's domestic terrorism of his own people (those very same Iranians).

We lent aid and support to the UNITA terrorists in Angola (to the point of Ronald Reagan praising its leader, Jonas Savimbi, as "the Abraham Lincoln of Africa").

We are currently supporting Sunni Arab insurgent groups in Iraq on the promise that they will help us in stamping out al Qaeda cells there, and will not attack either us or the Shiite majority.

We lent aid and training to insurgents in Afghanistan in the 1980s that led to the Soviet pullout, the Afhgan civil war, and the rise of the Taliban government (which gave shelter to al Qaeda).

We supported Manuel Noriega, who made a mint off of running drugs, racketeering and acting as a double agent.

We are currently giving grants to set up shelters and community centers in American cities for organizations that are fronts for street gangs (which, in my view, are exactly what terrorist organizations are).

So, can anyone tell me where we get off saying that another country aids terrorism?

We're bombing the hell out of Afghanistan

But don't pay any attention to that news cause it's not our fault really.

"It was the fault of civilians for living in populated areas, explained Lt. Col. David Accetta at the time, areas that can provide a shelter for Taliban on the run. So homes were "targeted and hit."

I won't be attending the Olympics in Beijing

a cold front blew through here last night and oh my god, I can breathe again. ahhh
...which reminds me of what it must be like to live in the pollution capital of the world- China.

Last year at this time, my doctor was telling me about his recent vacation to China. He reported that he and his companion could barely breathe, let alone actually see anything in the cities due to the thick air pollution. He was completely disgusted with China's disregard for the environment and he is one of those people who really doesn't complain much about such things being that he lives and jogs daily in Manhattan where it can be pretty hard to breathe in the summer. On a boat cruise around Hong Kong, he said that he couldn't see the skyline at all. They merely took a boat ride in what appeared to be a cloud. Beijing was also a disaster he said. Being an American with money, he was able to spend time in the more expensive and air conditioned places until it was time to leave.

Billydoom's sister has been living in Shanghai for the past few years. Shanghai boasts being a fabulous international city but it is also polluted to the point where it's unbearable in the summertime for those unaccustomed to breathing air that you can see and eat. Her husband comes back to the states in the summer just so he can stay alive. The Chinese citizens don't have the luxury of heat in winter or air conditioning in the summer. It's not like manufacturing plants provide heat and a/c to the workers or they have such luxuries at home either.

The clothes you buy from China are made under extreme conditions by people who wear gloves and coats all day while they sew your garments in winter and sweat all over the garments in the summer and god knows what sort of particulates they cough on said garments.

Why anyone thought Beijing would be a good place for the summer Olympics next year, beats me. Anyone who's been there will tell you that just standing there fills your lungs with un-coughable phlegm. How athletes will compete makes you wonder. Canadian athletes have been practicing there in order to do I don't know what for their lung capacity recently and breathing has become an Olympian effort.

The new "middle class" is in love with big cars in China. Forget mini cars. They are buying big cars faster than the government can build roads for them. China worries about providing gas for these cars and in Beijing if most people were to drive cars, the city would turn into a parking lot. As I mentioned above, the city is already a pollution nightmare.

There are three million cars in Beijing now and a thousand more are being registered every day. The government of Beijing in preparation for next year's the 2008 summer Olympics has banned one million cars from Beijing to see if it will have any effect on the air quality. If nothing else it has eased traffic snarls. Air born particulates from other areas in China are not aware of the ban however and continue to blow in.

An air pollution expert at the World Health Organisation (WHO), however, was on Friday quoted as saying people with heart problems should think twice about visiting Beijing as they could face "serious problems" because of the pollution.

Dr. Michal Krzyzanowski said he doubted there would be much improvement in the city's air quality by Games' time and that the car control measures might not have too great an effect.

"Particles have the ability of travelling thousands of kilometres in the air," he told the BBC.

"So it's possible the beneficial effect of cutting the traffic in the city will be compensated by the transport of pollution from other parts of China."

The Chinese spokesman, who is probably used to the pollution, can kind of-sort of see the implications of Beijing's lack of air quality but gives sort of Bush Administration type assurances to the world. So much for that.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel visited Greenland to see the melting glaciers up close and has declared that China and the US must be a part of the world's goal to reduce pollutants since the US and China are the largest emitters of CO2 (the greenhouse gasses that cause global warming). I would agree with that, but she fails to understand just how freaking greedy are the governments of these 2 nations and how freaking oblivious are those who insist on driving huge cars and flying on their vacations. I'm quite surprised that no one has figured out how to make gobs of money by going green.

UPDATE
Arctic Sea Ice Shrinks to Record Low

And I do hope that the people who got rich polluting the air don't come crying to me when their waterfront homes become submerged.

China Plays Catchup With U.S.

"China has ordered its media to report only positive news and has imprisoned a pro-democracy dissident amid a clampdown on dissent ahead of the most important meeting of the communist party in five years."

Article's in the Guardian Unlimited.

On the Giuliani Trail

Former mayor of NYC and presidential contender Rudy Giuliani took a lot of flack for stating that his experience after 9/11 was akin to that of the actual rescue workers who put in 12 hours days at Ground Zero for weeks or months on end. The NY Times reports today that he spent a grand total of 29 hours at Ground Zero from September 16th through December 27th, 2001. Wow.

I find it kind of ironic that Giuliani probably wouldn't win NY if he were to be the GOP nominee. But that's politics.

Lots of 9/11 rescue workers live on Long Island. Try to find some that would support his candidacy. Fat chance.

Furthermore, America's Mayor would appreciate it if people would leave his family out of his presidential campaign. A woman in the audience in Derry, NH brought up the fact that his children do not support his political aspirations.

"If a person is running for president, I would assume their children would be behind them." she said. "If they're not, you've got to wonder."

On health care, Giuliani thinks people should buy their own healthcare just like they buy any other insurance.

Giuliani wants to give families a $15,000 tax deduction to buy insurance privately rather than through employers, and he proposes that any money left from the credit be kept in tax-free health savings accounts.

Of course he is assuming that most people can afford to do that. Maybe his supporters can do that and expect to also invest in the private insurance companies as well.

fa la la la, la la la la

Despite the fact that the former POTUS never served in Congress, it has been suggested by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) that a statue of President Reagan should deck the halls of Congress.

I kind of like him as a cowboy. I know that Bush thinks he is a cowboy, but he only rides a bicycle.

BREAKING

Jenna Bush is engaged.

Who do they think the Pope is? Bush?

He probably doesn't have a say in this but when the previous Pope, John Paul II visited a shrine in Mariazell, Austria in 1983, "4 stately lime trees were ceremoniously planted" near the shrine in his honor.

Next month, when Joey Ratz Pope Benedict XVI visits the same shrine, the commemorative trees will be chopped down to "make room for a 52 1/2-foot-high steel grandstand to accommodate some of the thousands of pilgrims who will flock to the shrine town of Mariazell, 60 miles southwest of Vienna."

The event will last a few hours.

A church spokesman insists that the RCC doesn't sacrifice trees. Mariazell officials say that some more trees may need to be felled to make room for 30,000 pilgrims but also say that the plaza was going to be redecorated anyway.

Not that surprising actually...

Not only will the WH write Gen. Petraeus' report for him, when he and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker brief congress next month, it will now be a private congressional briefing.

"We have met the enemy...."

"Ninety-nine U.S. soldiers killed themselves last year, the highest rate of suicide in the Army in 26 years, a new report says."

Suicide Rate in Army at a 26-Year High

Bush, President - For - Life?

You, Volvo driving, latte drinking, wind surfing, conspiracy theorist liberals, should think twice before accusing anybody of being a "Conspiracy Theorist".

We throw out ideas that may be more absurd than we could ever imagine, but deep down, don't believe that could happen in this country.
Well, anything goes nowadays.

I found this piece of publication at the Democratic Underground, saved by Google Cache, since it was immediately removed, due to the connection of this group to the White House.

Read this scary stuff for yourselves, put out by Family Security Matters.

Women Talk: Modern Science Marvels

Necessity is the mother of invention, isn't it?
Women's breasts have always been a concern for inventors. What's a little world strife when you could be knocked out by a couple of unharnessed knockers?

I loved my maidenform bra. As you can see from the picture, it shapes women so naturally. What on earth could be better looking during the cold war and then the age of the GWOT than a couple of torpedos on a girl's chest?

Bras can be pesky though. Sometimes they pinch. ow. Sometimes the straps dig into your shoulders. ow.
And they are unsightly when you want to wear a strapless gown.

But they are a necessary evil as gravity takes its toll and one needs super strong straps to hold the girls higher than your waist. The important thing is that you can still look great in clothes and catch lusting leers from strange men when you need it the most.

The worst part happens when you meet a guy at a bar and you take him home (or go out to his car) and he wants you to lay down and take your bra off so he can delight in what he thought was a great pair, and you see his little smile turn into a frown when the girls retreat to your armpits.

Sure, you thought of breast augmentation surgery because that will make you feel much better about yourself because "what defines a woman more than her breasts?" Right? But you have a fear of the knife and fake ones feel so, so fake. But then again they stand up at attention even when you're flat on your back. You're almost convinced to go under the knife until the surgeon tells you that eventually even the fake ones begin to sag.

What's a girl to do?

Bravo Israeli researchers!
Behold the "Cup&Up"

Israeli researchers have figured out a way to install your bra inside you!

"What we've done is build a silicon bra, insert it into the body and attach it to the ribs and to the fascia. It's like a normal external bra," he continues, "where a strip lies on the shoulder and attaches around the body. We attach it to the ribs instead of to the shoulder, and to the fascia in the lower part of the body."

Cohen, who served as an Israeli Air Force captain for seven years before entering the business world heard about the MIM concept from its inventor Dr. Eyal Gur, head of microsurgery at Tel Aviv's Ichilov Hospital.

"I call it an internal bra," Gur told ISRAEL21c. "All women are looking for the right bra that will hold their breasts in the position they like or prefer aesthetically. There's an increasing trend towards buying push-up bras to enhance the upward breast pull.

"So I was thinking that with a harness created from materials used in medicine - silicon, threads and very small anchoring screws - we could support breast tissue and avoid further breast sagging."

The procedure is minimally invasive requiring two small openings through which the device is attached to the ribs."

Fabulous. Sign me up.
Men are just so darn sympathetic to the plight of women. At the moment these marvels are being tested on pigs.

Gee, I wonder what it will say?

The WHITE HOUSE WILL WRITE PETRAUS' SEPTEMBER REPORT - Think Progress
President Bush will have it drafted before the General even gets back from Iraq so it can be fair and balanced. And people wonder why I am so cynical.

LA TIMES: Despite Bush’s repeated statements that the report will reflect evaluations by Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, administration officials said it would actually be written by the White House, with inputs from officials throughout the government.

And though Petraeus and Crocker will present their recommendations on Capitol Hill, legislation passed by Congress leaves it to the president to decide how to interpret the report’s data.

Thank God for GodTube.com

Who knew?

Internet fearing Christians who happily limit their world knowledge and understanding of themselves and others have an online sanctuary. GODTUBE. This American sanctimony is approved by God himself. Praise the Lord.

Mark Morford is worked up: Jesus Loves Your Crappy Videos. Forget You Tube

"From the Christian perspective, YouTube is, apparently, far too inclusive, far too tolerant and messy and scary and depraved and unpredictable and wonderfully, blindly all-encompassing -- and baby, if we've learned anything about God and America during this miserable pile of Bush years, it's that the God-fearing of this nation want nothing more than to instill and perpetuate a deep, abiding fear of the Other, to stigmatize, to restrict, to polarize to the point of total spiritual and intellectual paralysis."

Stop the Presses. PROOF

It's another miracle. God wrote his name in a woman's eggplant.
The woman saved this particular slice, called the media, ate the rest of the eggplant and declared the dinner divine.

How does this story coincide with the resignation of Karl Rove?

-------- UPDATE I--------

The Dark Wraith in all his snarkastical wisdom had an equally compelling revelation just yesterday. He got hungry after reading the above post.

Quoth the Dark One: "I decided I was hungry. I went to the refrigerator and grabbed a banana. When I peeled it, I couldn’t believe what I saw. I took a picture to preserve the moment; then I ate the banana.

It’s subtle, and I have no doubt people will dispute what is there, but I think the discerning observer will agree that the message is clear."

I don't have a f**king clue what he's talking about. I don't see anything.

UPDATE II
Sister Nancy Beth Eczema over at Edicts of Nancy has this to add:

"A little known fact that the MSM outfit reporting this story won't tell you is that eggplants are well-regarded accessories to the homosexual lifestyle. What meeting of radical homosexual activists would be complete without smoked Japanese eggplant & goat cheese canapés? Think about it: Have you ever seen a straight person buy an eggplant? I think not. This is clearly Satan's trickery, and countless millions of earnest Christians who read this story will be deceived into eating eggplant under the mistaken impression that it will bring them closer to our Savior, rather than being the path to Moral ruination that it truly is. Had The Lord really wanted to appear to His followers, He would have shown up in some hearty American fare like a side of beef or a 22-piece bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken, not some wussified vegetarian dish. Praise Him!"

Oink

As much as the pundits spent yesterday praising Turdblossom, they failed to mention that he was a terrible predictor. He was completely off the mark regarding last November's elections when the Repubs were swept away by Democrats. He actually destroyed the Republican Party.Any credibility they once had is now by the wayside. If he was Bush's brain, all the brain cells are dead now. And you're no genius if you keep getting in trouble.

Yesterday he said: “I’m realistic enough to understand that the subpoenas are going to keep flying my way. I’m Moby Dick and we’ve got three or four members of Congress who are trying to cast themselves in the part of Captain Ahab — so they’re going to keep coming.”

Sure, he's a dick, but he also looks more and more like a pig with each passing day.

Was she being sarcastic?

“A lot of people like to say, uh, scaremonger about China, right? A lot of politicians, and I know you talk about that issue all the time. I think people should be careful what they wish for on China. Ya know, if China were to revalue it’s currency or China is to start making say, toys that don’t have lead in them or food that isn’t poisonous, their costs of production are going to go up and that means prices at Wal-Mart here in the United States are going to go up too. So, I would say China is our greatest friend right now, they’re keeping prices low and they’re keeping the prices for mortgages low, too.”
CNBC’s Erin Burnett on Hardball.

Dangerous is okay as long as it's cheap and keeps us shopping? She was kidding right?

Meanwhile, Chris Matthews fawned all over Erin Burnett. This isn't fox news and she wasn't sporting cleavage.

MATTHEWS: Could you get a little closer to the camera?
BURNETT: My -- what is it? Is it zooming in strangely?
MATTHEWS: Come on in closer. No, come in -- come in further -- come in closer. Really close.
BURNETT: What are you -- what are you doing?
MATTHEWS: Just kidding! You look great! Anyway, thanks. Erin, it's great to -- look at that look. You're great.
BURNETT: I don't even know. I'm going to have to go look at the tape here. I'm in a strange location.
MATTHEWS: No, you're beautiful. I'm just kidding. I'm just kidding. You're a knockout. Anyway, thank you, Erin Burnett.
BURNETT: All right, Chris. See you later.
MATTHEWS: It's all right getting bad news from you, even, OK? Thanks for coming on Hardball.

Ewwww.

Oh Good Lord

If you are lucky enough to live in Oklahoma, you can spend $37 to show your support for your government's wars and get a GWOT license plate. At first I was a bit miffed at them having the WTC towers on their license plates because the WTC's not even on our freaking plates here in NY and an awful lot of troops from NY are fighting for my big fat ass in Iraq, but then I thought of something that an Iraq vet said to me just last week, "We need the south in the union or we wouldn't have a military and we need a military even if we weren't to engage in illegal wars." Hmm. It was probably a backhanded something or other insult/complement that I was in no position to agree or disagree with because I didn't go to boot camp, let alone war. But after seeing this license plate, I suppose that he probably had a point. It's a recruiting tool.

Karl Rove to Resign

Seriously. That is the headline at Yahoo this morning. He will leave at the end of this month. I should be jumping for joy but I'm not because I had hoped that when he left the white house, that he would be in handcuffs.

He is going to spend more time with his family.
What is that code for?

The Grand Flip-Flopper

"It's a quagmire if you go that far and try to take over Iraq."

"How many additional dead Americans is Saddam worth? Our judgment was, not very many, and I think we got it right. "

That was Dick Cheney in 1994 speaking about not invading Baghdad during the first Gulf War.

Watch the video at YouTube that everyone is talking about.

The Shadow of the Future

This article from the Guardian basically says it all about our troops fighting in Iraq - they are tired, so tired that some are drinking Red Bull to get by. The public affairs officers who are supposed to be telling the correspondent how hunky-dory things are instead ask him to tell the truth when he returns to The World.

Nuts

Stu Bykofsky: To save America, we need another 9/11...

...to remind us of who the enemy is. We are too divided now, he says.
No way!
But a good terra attack would draw us all together again like in the glory days following 9/11/01. Fear is a fabulous tool for bringing people together.
We wouldn't complain about the war in Iraq so much, you know, if we were united in terror.

Cheney could easily order an attack on Iran if we were terrorized. Why they could even bring the draft back and no one would say boo.

This guy is getting air time. oy vay. At Faux News.

Candide Moment

Well, make that a very early morning 'Candide' moment.

Great Perseids

Got a calendar? Circle this date: Sunday, August 12th. Next to the circle write "all night" and "Meteors!" Attach the above to your refrigerator in plain view so you won't miss the 2007 Perseid meteor shower.

"It's going to be a great show," says Bill Cooke of NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office at the Marshall Space Flight Center. "The Moon is new on August 12th--which means no moonlight, dark skies and plenty of meteors." How many? Cooke estimates one or two Perseids per minute at the shower's peak.

The source of the shower is Comet Swift-Tuttle. Although the comet is nowhere near Earth, the comet's tail does intersect Earth's orbit. We glide through it every year in August. Tiny bits of comet dust hit Earth's atmosphere traveling 132,000 mph. At that speed, even a smidgen of dust makes a vivid streak of light--a meteor--when it disintegrates. Because Swift-Tuttle's meteors fly out of the constellation Perseus, they are called "Perseids."

The show begins between 9:00 and 10:00 pm on Sunday, August 12th, when Perseus rises in the northeast.

As the night unfolds, Perseus climbs higher and the meteor rate will increase many-fold. "By 2 am on Monday morning, August 13th, dozens of Perseids may be flitting across the sky every hour." The crescendo comes before dawn when rates could exceed a meteor a minute.

continue reading - there's a bonus -

(Mars will be shining like a bright red star)

Goodness gracious! Great Balls of FIRE!


Crossposted at BigBrassBlog

In today's episode of rewriting history:

ABC NEWS
Giuliani Says He is Equal to 9/11 Recovery Workers

August 10, 2007 12:37 AM

ABC News' Jan Simmonds Reports: In Ohio on Thursday, Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani R-NY handed his critics new ammunition regarding his role surrounding 9/11.

Speaking to reporters in Cincinnati, Giuliani said: "I was at ground zero as often, if not more, than most of the workers. ... I was there working with them. I was exposed to exactly the same things they were exposed to. So in that sense, I'm one of them."

Michael Palladino, head of the Detectives Endowment Association, the union of NYPD detectives, told the Associated Press that the mayor's record can't compare to those who spent 12 months sifting through toxic debris for evidence and human remains.

"As a result of their hard work, many are sick and injured. The mayor, although he did a fine job with 9/11, I don't think he rises to the level of being an equal with those men and women who were involved in the rescue, recovery and cleanup," Palladino said.

The former New York City mayor has already faced a large wave of criticism from first responders and relatives of those killed at the World Trade Center, who have contended that Giuliani was woefully unprepared for 9/11.

Just last month, the International Association of Fire Fighters (IAFF) released a 13 minute video on the internet urging its members to oppose Giuliani’s bid for the presidency, questioning his leadership both before and in the aftermath of the September 2001 terrorist attacks. At the time of the video’s release, the Giuliani campaign denounced what they called a 'clearly partisan' video and cited the IAFF's history of endorsing and supporting Democratic candidates.

Uncle Sam Really Really Really Wants You

JC pointed to an article I was just going to point to about the desperate military looking for cannon fodder. I don't know how they get anything done with the bush administration fighting them every step of the way.

But didn't Bush just admonish Congress for denying the pay raise for our troops in a bill that he was going to veto anyway?

Doesn't the Bush administration oppose GI Bill benefits?

Perhaps avoiding illegal wars might make military service more palatable for more qualified citizens?
Perhaps allowing homosexuals to serve would fill the ranks with highly qualified individuals? How many gay Arabic language experts were let go?
Perhaps if the war mongers got the sticks out of their asses, our military would be staffed with the best this country can offer. But what the hell do I know anyway?
One Iraq veteran from NY I was just chatting with the other day said that if it weren't for poor southern rednecks, we'd have no army. (His sentiment, not mine.)
But wasn't I just reading that street gangs were serving in the military?

Oh yeah, as a mom, I am going to encourage my 21 year old son to join the Army. Not.

Meanwhile, The Department of Homeland Security is developing a new weapon to fight the terrorists (and war critics?): a flashlight that makes a person throw up.

Where is our John Lennon?

Why anyone who is fighting for justice would want to make nice with the media is beyond me. The media is an arm of the very government who sold Americans the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and now Iran. The media ought to be trying to make nice with the bloggers who daily shred their credibility by connecting the dots. Just from what I had read about the Yearly Kos convention from the many bloggers who attended, especially from TeddySanFran at FDL, I felt glad that I didn't attend. I would have just gotten more pissed off. Being nice isn't going to revolutionize anything. Sorry. Rove, Cheney and Bush aren't nice. The media isn't nice. If you're going to be monitored by the FBI and the CIA, you might as well speak truth to power as loud as you can. I don't see passion for the cause today like there was in the early 1970's. Where are the radical intellectuals? Where are the Abbie Hoffmans? the Black Panthers? the John and Yoko's? Sure, they got bad press, but they scared the hell out of the Nixon administration and caused a complacent nation to wake up and take notice. You just can't expect people to embrace peace and love unless you are passionate about it.

I just happened to receive "The US vs John Lennon" from Netflix yesterday and it really got me thinking about the 1970's. The decade came in like a lion and went out like a wuss. Then the fascists came back.

Army to Expand Recruiting Incentives

That's the AP headline, and here's the story:

Need a down-payment for your home? Seed money to start a business? The Army wants to help if you're willing to join up. Despite spending nearly $1 billion last year on recruiting bonuses and ads, Army leaders say an even bolder approach is needed to fill wartime ranks.

Under a new proposal, men and women who enlist could pick from a "buffet" of incentives, including up to $45,000 tax-free that they accrue during their career to help buy a home or build a business. Other options would include money for college and to pay off student loans.

"The numbers of people who meet our enlistment standards is astonishingly low," said Michael Dominguez, principal deputy undersecretary of defense.

Among the changes that have helped attract more recruits:

Increasing to $20,000 the bonus for troops who join by Sept. 30 and leave for boot camp within a month.

Raising the enlistment age to 42.

Allowing recruits to come in with non-offensive tattoos on their hands and neck.

Offering a $2,000 bonus to Army soldiers who refer a new recruit.

Enlisting recruits who don't meet weight standards and must trim down their first year.

Advertising that targets potential recruits' parents.

Increasing the number of recruits with general education diplomas rather than regular high school diplomas.

Creating a more pleasant boot camp environment.

Sending "gung-ho" soldiers fresh from boot camp or war zones back to their hometowns to visit old friends and schoolmates to promote the Army.

Increasing to more than 15 percent the number of Army and Army Reserve troops given waivers for medical and moral reasons or for positive drug and alcohol screen tests.

--------------------------

Hey, I know of 5 strapping young men from Massachusetts, ages 26-37, that they should go after. Oh, never mind. I forgot. They are already doing their patriotic duty, according to their Dad, republican presidental hopeful Mitt Romney
Romney: My Sons Show Patriotism By "Helping Me Get Elected":

"The Five Brothers, as they are known on the Romney campaign website, post sunny dispatches from across the land, where they are traveling in "the famous Mitt Mobile" (it's a Winnebago), to busily preach the gospel of Dad.

No word on which of the Romney kids are vying for torturer slots at all those Gitmos their dad wants to open, but don't worry boys, I'm sure there'll be enough to go around.

America thanks you."



I think we should all storm Mitt's e-mail with this youtube video

Fortunate Son

The Pentagon Sends Messengers of Apocalypse to Convert Soldiers in Iraq

With the Pentagon's blessings and assistance, apocalyptic evangelists are proselytizing US troops in Iraq.

Actor Stephen Baldwin is the youngest member of the famous Baldwin brothers, and one scary looking dude. After reading about his latest "crusade", I'm pretty sure he may be the antichrist.

Baldwin became a right-wing, born-again Christian after the 9/11 attacks, and now is the star of Operation Straight Up (OSU), an evangelical entertainment troupe that actively proselytizes among active-duty members of the US military. As an official arm of the Defense Department's America Supports You program, OSU plans to mail copies of the controversial apocalyptic video game, Left Behind: Eternal Forces to soldiers serving in Iraq. OSU is also scheduled to embark on a "Military Crusade in Iraq" in the near future.

"We feel the forces of heaven have encouraged us to perform multiple crusades that will sweep through this war torn region," OSU declares on its website about its planned trip to Iraq. "We'll hold the only religious crusade of its size in the dangerous land of Iraq."

On the surface, OSU appears as a traditional entertainment troupe that brings cheer to American troops around the globe. Founded by champion kickboxer Jonathan Spinks, OSU performs comedy, acrobatic stunts and strongman displays. Its roster of entertainers includes a former WNBA star, the Flying Wallendas, a ventriloquist, and former boxing champ Evander Holyfield. "We make no bones about the fact that we are speaking directly to the soldiers of the greatest fighting force of in the world," OSU proclaims. "No 'mamsie pamsie' stuff here!"

But behind OSU's anodyne promises of wholesome fun for military families, the organization promotes an apocalyptic brand of evangelical Christianity to active duty US soldiers serving in Muslim-dominated regions of the Middle East. Displayed prominently on the "What We Believe" section of OSU's website is a passage from the Book of Revelations (Revelation 19:20; 20:10-15) that has become the bedrock of the Christian right's End Times theology: "The devil and his angels, the beast and the false prophet, and whosoever is not found written in the Book of Life, shall be consigned to everlasting punishment in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone, which is the second death."

With the endorsement of the Defense Department, OSU is mailing "Freedom Packages" to soldiers serving in Iraq. These are not your grandfather's care packages, however. Besides pairs of white socks and boxes of baby wipes (included at the apparent suggestion of Iran-Contra felon Oliver North, according to OSU) OSU's care packages contain the controversial Left Behind: Eternal Forces video game. The game is inspired by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins' bestselling pulp fiction series about a blood-soaked Battle of Armageddon pitting born-again Christians against anybody who does not adhere to their particular theology. In LaHaye's and Jenkins' books, the non-believers are ultimately condemned to "everlasting punishment" while the evangelicals are "raptured" up to heaven.

Producers of the Left Behind videogame were faced with a storm of controversy, but that has not deterred OSU from encouraging US troops to play virtual rounds of kill or convert after a hard day of house-to-house searches and counterinsurgency warfare against Iraqi insurgents

OSU has cultivated support from the Department of Defense for years. After a private October, 2005 meeting between OSU's Spinks and Defense Department officials, OSU was invited to perform inside the Pentagon. This week, Pentagon employees and active duty service members are expected to enjoy a breakfast with Spinks and Baldwin, followed by an OSU performance in which they will receive "spiritual encouragement via a Biblical message." The events will be held respectively in the Pentagon Executive Dining Room and the Pentagon Auditorium.

If you can stomach it, here is the whole story from AlterNet


I won't link Jonathan Spinks here (another scary looking dude). You can read his message that is linked in the story.

Here's a little snip for those of you who are still reading this post:

"No one needs a boost in morale more than our military troops that are stuck in Iraq away from their families and in harms way. At no greater time is our military acceptant of the principles of God and prayer, than when under extreme danger and concerned about their loved ones at home. No one can give lasting meaning to the heartache these troops are suffering than can Jesus Christ. Only our God can give back the sanity of our brave men and women, that risk coming home with mental issues because of what they have witnessed on the battle fields of Baghdad, Kirkuk, Mosul, and Fallujah. We believe our armed forces need this kind of boost mentally and spiritually, that offers far more than mere entertainment.

Our goal during these events is to give a deeper rest from the battlefield, comforting the hearts of the weary, and delivering an encouraging word from God to press on to victory."



I am sure by now, your jaw has completely dropped. Mine may now be forever locked in the open position.

My dear, dear, DEAR Bob Hope -- you must be rolling over in your grave.


crossposted at BigBrassBlog

It's Not Just In America

Thinking of leaving America as a result of the Bushite Junta's War on Civil Liberties? Well, you may want to stay clear of Australia, under the regime of Bush's other BFF, Prime Minister John Howard:

Law allows coppers to do you over, judge-free

- snip -

On Wednesday the Senate [Australia's Upper House] passed a bill that provides for "delayed notification search warrants". These are warrants to empower the federal police and other agencies to covertly take a look around your home, download the contents of your computer and sniff the bedsheets, and not tell you for up to 18 months after the warrant has been executed, or never, ever, if [Attorney General] Philip Ruddock says so.

- snip -

***

So much for "Advance, Australia Fair." I'll have to check if New Zealand has the same Hell-bent set of hyenas and assholes running the place. Shit, an igloo in Antarctica's starting to look good right about now (cooler, too).

Winning Hearts and MInds

British commanders have asked American Special forces to stop the air strikes over Afghanistan because of the high number of civilian casualties which makes it hard to win over local people according to the commie rag, the NY Times. The US denies such a request was made.

Also in the Times: If you walk up to President George HW Bush and tell him what a loser his son is, you cause him pain. so stop that.

WWJD? He'd kick your sissy ass.

This story by Jonathan Hutson at Talk2Action is most unbelievable: Pentagon Adopts Missionary Position on Homoerotic Art

This is just too much for my delicate sensibilities but I'll give it a go.

The War Department is providing our poor troops in Iraq and Afghanistan with frightening "entertainment." It's called OSU or 'Operation Straight Up' ironically. I'm sure it's straight up baby. They are fighting "enemies of Christ" and proselytizing something Jesus doesn't even know what on military bases. They even have tshirts! Oh the tshirts. Oh my. Oh my. I want one. Get me one. (for research)

Imagine if your husband came home from the war with this shirt in his duffle bag?
"Honey, what happened there? Do you still like women?"


My dad's generation would have kicked the asses of these blasphemers in WWII.

Hey! Do you think that this was the kind of angel that was visiting Lot in Gomorrah that the townsmen wanted to have sex with? Oh my. But where's his neck? Where's his football helmet?

Is this what Jesus had in mind in his Sermon on the Mount? I must have missed something. Maybe he said that the Peacemakers will kick ass and it was mistranslated by the pansy liberals.

And what in heaven's name is going on in this shirt below?


It says "Because J.C lives in me" and "Until every soldier hears the truth: OSU Tour"at the bottom. Oh my. That's blasphemy for sure. There's more at the link. I can not post any more of this filth.

There are 3 hour live entertainment shows (oh god, no) held in auditoriums for the troops. Speakers include the likes of Stephen Baldwin (the retarded looking brother), some former NFL'ers and retired commanders. They are given (gag again) "freedom packets" with the Left Behind video game so that they kick heathen ass in their spare time and convert to a life much like Christ's. Indeed. I wonder if anyone actually reads the Gospels during these meetings? Nah. I wonder if they do a Village People type show?

HELP! I can't stop snarking. The snarky bug bit me. I watched Jesus Camp yesterday and I was going to post my horror at that movie (especially at Ted Haggard's lip gymnastics), but this takes the cake. I am forwarding the article with the pictures to my newspaper. My tax dollars at work. Ewww. I have to barf.

One o' da reasons I hang around dis joint is 'cause da goils is so smart. Just like:

A Blonde woman wants a job, but the foreman won't hire her until she passes a little math test.

Here is your first question, the foreman said. "Without using numbers, represent the number 9."

"Without numbers?" The Blonde says, "Dat is easy." And proceeds to draw three trees.

"What's this?" the boss asks.

"Ave you got no brain? Tree and tree and tree make nine," says the Blonde.

"Fair enough," says the boss. "Here's your second question. Use the same rules, but this time the number is 99."

The Blonde stares into space for a while, then picks up the picture that she has just drawn and makes a smudge on each tree. "Ere you go."

The boss scratches his head and says, "How on earth do you get that to represent 99?"

"Each of da trees is dirty now. So, it's dirty tree, and dirty tree, and dirty tree. Dat is 99."

The boss is getting worried that he's going to actually have to hire this Blonde, so he says, "All right, last question. Same rules again, but represent the number 100."

The Blonde stares into space some more, then she picks up the picture again and makes a little mark at the base of each tree and says, "Ere you go. One hundred."

The boss looks at the attempt. "You must be nuts if you think that represents a hundred!"

The Blonde leans forward and points to the marks at the base of each tree and says, "A little dog come along and crap by each tree. So now you got dirty tree and a turd, dirty tree and a turd, and dirty tree and a turd, which makes one hundred."

"So, when I start?"

At the request of one of my sister bloggers...

(who has not yet figured out all the intricacies of posting photos and images)...I have consented to post the image and text below.
Heaven knows I would hardly think of doing so myself, since it could be construed as being highly disrespectful of the jizumjaws, buttfvckboys, and the rest of that gang of Neanderthalish fvcktards that inhabit Washington D.C.

New Government Seal:
"The federal government today announced that it is changing its emblem from an Eagle to a CONDOM because it more accurately reflects the government's political stance. A condom allows for inflation, halts production, destroys the next generation, protects a bunch of pricks, and gives you a sense of security while you're actually being screwed!"

(How'd I do? S'okay, Joizeygoil?)

When your brain determines your morality

Great article: Cold-blooded Morality?

Is it okay to kill some people in order to save the lives of many?

Your answer to this dilemma may be based on damage to your prefrontal cortex which may make you prone to utilitarian moral judgments.

"Certain aspects of this situation ... seem to call for watchfulness and, if necessary, quick action on the part of the Administration. I believe therefore that it is my duty to bring to your attention the following facts and recommendations."
- Albert Einstein to President Franklin Roosevelt, in a letter about the possibility of developing an atomic bomb, August 2, 1939.

Einstein's letter to Franklin Roosevelt encapsulates key aspects of moral judgment: moral sentiment (Einstein's concern about the destiny of human lives on the verge of the World War II), a moral dilemma (his decision about whether to disclose scientific evidence that would ultimately lead to a deadly atomic weapon), and a utilitarian calculus (his judgment about whether more lives would be spared if America eventually built such a weapon). Whether to write this letter must have been a terrible decision to make.

Half a century later, cognitive neuroscience is developing the ability to explain the brain mechanisms that underlie such moral judgments. A crucial issue that remains poorly understood, however, is the relationship between moral reasoning and emotion. This new study by Koenigs and colleagues ("Damage to the prefrontal cortex increases utilitarian moral judgments." from Nature, April 19, 2007) provides important new evidence on this question. It shows that damage to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPFC), the region of the prefrontal cortex (PFC) located above our eye sockets, increases "utilitarian" choices in moral dilemmas -- judgments, that is, that favor the aggregate welfare over the welfare of fewer individuals. The study stirs already hot debates about how we juggle evidence and emotion to produce moral decisions."

These people are not always emotionally blunted. Continue reading...

The downside of diversity?

A Harvard political scientist finds that diversity hurts civic life. What happens when a liberal scholar unearths an inconvenient truth?

Lots of 'splaining to do.

Indeed.
From the Boston Globe:

IT HAS BECOME increasingly popular to speak of racial and ethnic diversity as a civic strength. From multicultural festivals to pronouncements from political leaders, the message is the same: our differences make us stronger.

But a massive new study, based on detailed interviews of nearly 30,000 people across America, has concluded just the opposite. Harvard political scientist Robert Putnam -- famous for "Bowling Alone," his 2000 book on declining civic engagement -- has found that the greater the diversity in a community, the fewer people vote and the less they volunteer, the less they give to charity and work on community projects. In the most diverse communities, neighbors trust one another about half as much as they do in the most homogenous settings. The study, the largest ever on civic engagement in America, found that virtually all measures of civic health are lower in more diverse settings."The extent of the effect is shocking," says Scott Page, a University of Michigan political scientist.

Robert Putnam was shocked too as he has always been aligned with the progressive, more diversity camp. But his findings were pretty conclusive. Instead of just presenting his findings as a social scientist would do, he began advocating for ways to correct this much to the dismay of those who favor racism.

"Diversity, at least in the short run," Putnam writes, "seems to bring out the turtle in all of us."

Scott Page, author of "The Difference: How the Power of Diversity Creates Better Groups, Firms, Schools, and Societies," would point out that in cities like NY, London, LA and Rio which are famous melting pots and the driving forces behind the world's creativity and innovation, that the different viewpoints and cooperation are what drive up productivity. It's a challenge.

In other words, those in more diverse communities may do more bowling alone, but the creative tensions unleashed by those differences in the workplace may vault those same places to the cutting edge of the economy and of creative culture.

Page calls it the "diversity paradox." He thinks the contrasting positive and negative effects of diversity can coexist in communities, but "there's got to be a limit." If civic engagement falls off too far, he says, it's easy to imagine the positive effects of diversity beginning to wane as well. "That's what's unsettling about his findings," Page says of Putnam's new work.

Personally, I see the creative culture that exists in a diverse community although now that I think of it, the civic minded people in a diverse community usually have some social commonality. Even in my very diverse former parish, the Masses were divided up by culture and language. It was to welcome those immigrants from different countries who seemed to like living in this area, however, perhaps it would have been more beneficial to combine all Catholics in church services and get volunteers to teach English and social customs to new immigrants while infusing a bit of each culture into the regular Sunday Masses. But that's just one little example I thought of while reading the article. Maybe rather than sneering at new immigrants in the supermarket, we ought to kindly point out to them how the 'program' works here in order to speed up the checkout process when the line is out the door. Maybe we ought to go back to teaching civics in the schools.

I know that I am totally liberal when it comes to immigrants and I bend over backwards for them (and maybe more than some people deserve) but that is because of my upbringing. Personally, I can't bear to live in a homogeneous community for very long. It's way too boring. While I adore NH and Maine, after a while everyone begins to look the same. I suppose it is just what you're used to.

What do people think?

Newt's Novena - 'nine nineties in nine'

"Your Friend Newt" has a website called Americansolutions. I am not going to link it here for obvious reasons, but you can get to it by linking to the usatoday blogs right here:

Newt Gingrich and media critic/former TV reporter Marvin Kalb are joining forces today to urge the Democratic and Republican presidential candidates to sign a pledge saying that if they are their parties' nominees they will take part in nine, 90-minute-long debates in the nine weeks leading up to Election Day 2008.

Gingrich is due to issue the call during a speech at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. He's scheduled to start talking at 12:30 p.m. ET."


"We believe the 'nine nineties in nine' will give voters a chance to see the candidates in an unfiltered dialogue -- one that is informative, constructive and intelligent without the opportunities degenerating into political point scoring and sloganeering," Gingrich and Kalb write in a letter they're sending to the candidates.

"We believe it will not only be better for the political dialogue that has become so divisive; it will also be better for the future of the country, because it will foster the creation of needed solutions to meet today’s current challenges."

Gingrich, by the way, still hasn't ruled out the possibility that he might join the Republican presidential field. His American Solutions website has much more about his other ideas.

Gingrich was highly critical of previous presidential debates, calling them a "cross between The Bachelor, American Idol, and Who's Smarter than a Fifth Grader? He said American politics has "replaced the machine boss with consultant bosses" and that "the job of the candidate is to raise the money to hire the consultants to do the focus groups to figure out the 30-second answers to be memorized by the candidates."

"This is stunningly dangerous," Gingrich said. "Your leaders shrink."



--------------------------------

JerseyCynic would like to issue a 'call to all' this morning.

I would like everyone who is reading this to find their Rosary Beads, or like facsimile.
(I'm going to use my favorite candy -- NERDS ROPE)

Now, all together, repeat after me:

"Dear Goddess above, PLEASE make Newt NAUGHT" (yum!)

"Dear Goddess above, PLEASE make Newt go away" (tasty!)

(and while you're at it Dear Goddess above, PLEASE don't crack my crowns while I'm doing this)

-----------------------------

ADDENDUM

A perfect comment from Minstrel Boy that was left in the same post over at BigBrassBlog:

OK, i'm in. i really am baffled by the resurgence of newt. one might think that even the capacity of republicans for cognitive dissonance would be sorely tried by listening to newt lecture them on ethics, government, or anything except maybe serial adultery and wild hypocrisy without heads exploding all over the nation.

he reminds me of a conservative peter the hermit who organized the children's crusade. the pitch was that the holiness of peter and his band of children walking from europe to the holy land would show the saracens and mamelukes the power of christ, they would then capitulate to the will of the one true church.

peter gathered urchins and extra children from the south of france, northern italy, austria and on through the balkans. it was estimated when he reached the bosphorus that he had close to 100,000 waifs following behind him, many of them were barefoot as penitents.

he sold them to the turks as slaves.

in essence that is what newt did to the republicans. he came in on a wave of reform spirit with his "contract with america" but once he arrived in the corridors of power he realized that earmarks, and pork barrel spending were great tools for both rewarding the faithful and, by being held back, could punish the unbelievers. spending ensued on a scale that would have made even FDR blush after his second pitcher of martinis. then, after working himself into a state of rage over a perceived slight by the president regarding the seating plan on a flight he orchestrated the shut down of the federal government over the budget. the people saw through that and blamed the republican congress for the event, and it cost them seats. his next move was to lead the lynch mob after the president over his sexual indiscrections and his subsequent lying about those indiscretions. when it became known that while this was happening newt was bonking his office assistant while still married to his second wife (who he was bonkng while still married to the first wife, but she was in the hospital and not available for jesus approved bonking)

he slinked away, disgraced and defeated. his cause was taken up by hastert and deLay who managed between them to completely shatter every myth of republican fiscal acuity, or any concern for personal liberty, or just about every issue they claim leadership on leaving them with nothing but a reputation and legacy of corruption, incompetence and hypocrisy.

now he's back. ready to lead the children for the greater glory of god.

(note to self: check the futures market on slave children in ankara)

by: Minstrel Boy

crossposted at BigBrassBlog

Time for a moment of peace

Most Americans haven't seen what the atomic bombs did to the people in Nagasaki and Hiroshima 62 years ago this week. In fact, there was a huge cover-up. Our government didn't want us to actually see what really occurred and the effects on the survivors. There were many bomb tests to be done here and abroad... and if people knew the truth, they would object. The US seized Japanese footage, all photographs and evidence of the devastation. A Japanese film crew secretly hid a copy of the footage in a ceiling until the end of US occupation. Finally some footage was declassified.

Extremely graphic pictures and footage is being aired by HBO this week in a documentary by Steven Okasaki titled "White Light/Black Rain." If you don't have HBO, it is worth a look at the website. Perhaps many of those running for president ought to take a look at what bombs which were much less powerful than what we have today did to innocent people.

Sure Americans were dancing in the streets at the end of WWII. But at what cost was this peace? Is this what is in store for Iranians?

Also see Nuclear Age Peace Foundation at wagingpeace.org.

A Thrilling Tale of Survival Against All Odds

And in my very own garden. Imagine that.

I've always said that I have a Black Thumb - whatever I plant seems to die. I'm going to have to amend that statement. Exhibit A: The Plumeria you see in the above picture. This plucky little fellow started out as a cutting about eight inches long that I just stuck in the ground. Over the next few months it was baked by the Florida sun, received little water, got knocked around and even sideswiped by the trimmer.

So I relocated it to another part of the gardens I've set up around my home and started watering it (by this time, it looked like a piece of vegetarian beef jerky). I was told that it was a hopeless case; I just smirked and kept on watering it. Amazingly, it started to sprout leaves.

It's now about 3 feet high and in full bloom, as you can see.

Interesting health news

Caffeine prevents cognitive decline in older women who do not have dementia already. It doesn't do the same for men unfortunately. Sorry guys. 3 cups of coffee/day does the trick. More here.
Speaking of coffee, drinking the caffeinated kind may prevent eyelid twitch and other involuntary muscle contractions.

Speaking of caffeine, those 'energy drinks' have about the same amount of caffeine or less than a cup of coffee. More here.

Kids get smart the old fashioned way. From the LA Times: "For every hour a day that babies 8 to 16 months old were shown such popular series as "Brainy Baby" or "Baby Einstein," they knew six to eight fewer words than other children, the study found." Smarter kids are read to and talked to. How much do you want to bet that GOP parents never read to their kids?

People with ADHD have less dopamine and are more likely to be substance abusers... but not just because they want to get high. Cigarettes, alcohol, marijuana, cocaine and other drugs may increase dopamine activity in their brains and make them function better. More here.

Boy bullies and boys who are victims of bullies are more likely to have mental health disorders as young men. "...boys who habitually bullied were more likely than their peers to be diagnosed with antisocial personality disorder as young men. People with this disorder have a disregard for the law and the rights of other people, and are often aggressive or violent. On the other end of the spectrum, boys who were frequent victims of bullying had an elevated risk of anxiety disorders as young men."

Good news. Moderate exercise such as walking is better for you than intense workouts and the benefits last longer. Details here.

Wow this may explain my poor dad: Stomach meds tied to mental slowing in seniors

Lose weight before you get pregnant. Study links women's obesity, birth defects risk

Summary: Take walks, drink the coffee, don't let anyone push you around, read and talk to kids.

The Duggar Family Welcomes Their 17th Child

Yep, #17

I have no comment. Mark Morford said it best two years ago:


God Does Not Want 16 Kids
Arkansas mom gives birth to a whole freakin' baseball team. How deeply should you cringe?


Who are you to judge? Who are you to say that the more than slightly creepy 39-year-old woman from Arkansas who just gave birth to her 16th child yes that's right 16 kids and try not to cringe in phantom vaginal pain when you say it, who are you to say Michelle Duggar is not more than a little unhinged and sad and lost?

And furthermore, who are you to suggest that her equally troubling husband -- whose name is, of course, Jim Bob and he's hankerin' to be a Republican senator and try not to wince in sociopolitical pain when you say that -- isn't more than a little numb to the real world, and that bringing 16 hungry mewling attention-deprived kids (and she wants more! Yay!) into this exhausted world zips right by "touching" and races right past "disturbing" and lurches its way, heaving and gasping and sweating from the karmic armpits, straight into "Oh my God, what the hell is wrong with you people?"



h/t to j-walkblog

The American War (a song by Simone White)

Liz, I couldn't help but think of this new song - The American War, by Simone White, when I read "Today's Quote" on the blog this morning:

"The West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact, non-Westerners never do."
Samuel P. Huntington

Here's a little background about the song From the-raft:
"an unusually elegant protest song featuring White accompanying herself on guitar, backed by cello, piano, delicate brass and the odd cymbal clash. It has, according to MOJO, “an intimate prettiness concealing within the rosebud the thorns of subtly articulated political protest”.


“The title came from a conversation I had with a Vietnamese guy who was talking about what went on during “the American War”. At first I didn’t know what he meant but when I realised I couldn’t believe I hadn't understood. Of course! The Vietnamese wouldn't call that war the Vietnam War. The US has all these wars with different names but around the world there are the American Wars.” Simone White

Honest Jon's Records has a brief listen you can sample (and a great story about the recording), and there is another longer sampling you can catch at Youtube. It's a pretty cool experimental animation video done by Albert Reyes who did the cover artwork for her new album 'I am The Man'.

I first learned of this song via Sean over at mainstreamisntsobad: "The American War is a protest song that is amazingly cutting for having such seemingly light lyrics"

PLEASE PLEASE play it again Sean!

and since I can't get my hands on the album or the lyrics in the USA yet, these are the lyrics as I hear them:

Do you remember
the American war?
It wasn't that long ago
it was fought on every shore.

Are you trying
to tell me
that you didn't know?
I saw you reading the paper
at the corner store
yes I know......

that's a joke.

Did you ever think you lived inside the belly of the beast?
Are you gaming at something nice to eat
or are you waiting for your very own special treat.....

we like to live on easy street.

Do you remember all the people we bombed.
All the homes that were there that are now gone.
Whoever told you that life was fair.....

People have to die
over there.

Did you ever think this was the greatest country in the world?
With freedom and democracy and SUV's called Liberty
for every boy and girl?

The oyster chokes on it's own pearl.....


We know you can't help where you were born.
It's not that you're foreign
it's what you stand for.
We know it's hard to start a revolt-- the revolution's won.....

but no one claims it.

Do you remember the American war?
We thought it was fun
but it was a bore.
Do you remember the American war

We forgot what we were fighting for.



Crossposted at BigBrassBlog

Bad Cops, Beware!

We've all seen this before. This is Hello Kitty, created by the Sanrio Corporation in 1974 and unleashed upon an unprepared world. It is iconic of all The Cute Things that we must beware of, lest we all come down with diabetes.

Which brings me to what I found on Yahoo News. It seems that the Thai National Police have had it with police officers breaking the law, so in addition to having to pay the fines for littering and such, these macho defenders of the community have to wear Hello Kitty on armbands as a mark of shame.

Not in public, mind you - the top cops aren't THAT cruel.

Dumb global warming deniers: blaming Hillary

Last week, out of the blue, my 60+ year old, Vietnam veteran cum capitalist pig cousin who lives in southern Pa. gave me a call to just say hi. Or so I thought.

It had been a few years since we had spoken and it was mostly my fault but the last time we had been together at a family reunion which happened to be loaded with Jesuits and theologians, I didn't like his pro-bush and pro-war comments. He was also going on and on back then about Hillary and how much money he donated to keep her out of the senate in NY. I told him to mind his own Senate or I would in turn donate money to get rid of Santorum. (He's the one who got arrested for drunk driving on the night before my mother's funeral in my mother's town and we wondered where he was during the funeral. After the funeral, I got a phone call and I spent the afternoon in the parking lot of the county jail waiting for him to be released after I posted $500 bail. Then I had to drive him all over the place to get his car back and call our cop cousin to see if he could do anything... yadda yadda yadda... Hey, thanks for coming. The drinking part was after the funeral. Turns out the cops in my mom's village told me that if my cousin had said he was in town for my mom's funeral that they wouldn't have thrown him in jail.) But I'm just the dumb blonde younger female cousin, so what the hell do I know about anything anyway.


We have a rather capitalist pigs meets liberal theology wing of the family and it makes for interesting and combative reunions especially since they are all practicing alcoholics. I found out during our conversation that the matriarch and patriarch of that side of the family died within hours of each other 2 years ago. Hey, thanks for telling me. No wonder my other cousins never call or write. They must hate me.

So anyway, we exchanged pleasantries and then he asked me about my son and I told him that my son had just graduated from college with degrees in Anthropology and Political Science but he is currently surfing in Hawaii and talking about studying the effects of humans on the environment at the University of Hawaii at Manoa and doing field work in the changing environment... and so on and so on.

The cousin said that the only thing my son could do with that degree was to work for Al Gore. I knew what he was getting at, but I pretended not to get it and I said, "Oh wouldn't that be great?" Cousin thought that my son should have majored in business. I explained that while I got an MBA, I didn't turn into a fascist.

I paraphrase what his response was: "Liz, you and your family ought to get out of that liberal northeastern utopia (yes, he said 'utopia') and see the real America. In 10 years under the presidency of Hillary Clinton, real Americans are going to rise up, with their guns, and overthrow the government. The people in the real America don't care about all that liberal scientific mumbo jumbo and all that socialist crap"

I told him I would definitely go out on a tour of the red states to convert each and every person, reminded him that he lived in a blue state, to which he grumbled and then said I had to go and feed the cat. Good bye.

In this week's Newsweek and I love the cover, we learn more about the well funded hoax to deny climate change. Personally, at this point, I don't give a shit whose fault global warming is. The climate is changing more rapidly than expected and my mom was right (she was the ultimate alarmist, god bless her). Responsible leadership would address what we are to do when the shit hits the fan. At the moment, we are burning a lot less fuel oil because the winters are so nice and toasty in the northeast, but what about the conveyor belt in the melting arctic that feeds the Gulf Stream? It's not going to be a tropical paradise in liberal northeastern America or Europe if the conveyor belt fails. The US News and World Report had an article a few years back about the "myth" of the conveyor belt, but we know that scientists were paid $10,000 each by the fascists to dispute real science. Most people still remember the well funded campaign to denounce that myth. There were lots of articles disputing the "Day After Tomorrow" theory. I saw a show recently about the conveyor belt shutting down within the next few years. Hey, maybe the government does know what is going to happen and that's why they are blowing up the middle east for oil? Nah.

How the hell are we supposed to know what is truth when the government that takes my tax money is paying "scientists" to fuck up their findings? I am thinking of getting out of the stock market and investing in greenhouses for my backyard and grow lights.

The Republican Debates from Iowa

Even if you don't scan the videos, the descriptions were pretty interesting:
Video clips from ABC News.

Brownback-Romney Face Off
Romney Calls Brownback robo-call ad on abortion "desperate" and "negative."

McCain and Romney Defend War
Romney criticizes Obama for foreign policy position.

Tancredo: 'Unhealthy' Health Care
Rep. Tancredo is opposed to a government health care plan for America.

Paul on Iraq: 'Just Come Home'
Rep. Ron Paul calls for troop withdrawal, saying U.S. went into Iraq illegally.

Giuliani on Taxes and Bridge Disaster
Giuliani: "The way to do it is to reduce taxes and raise more money."

McCain Questions Cheney's Power
Sen. John McCain says "There's only one president."

Giuliani's 'Defining' Mistake
Republicans discuss defining moments in their lives and lessons learned.

"It’s a Bloodbath. That’s the only way to describe it."

Mike Whitney's article at Internation Clearing House is entitled "Stock Market Meltdown". Here's some highlights.

"We are now beginning to feel the first tremors from the massive credit expansion which began 6 years ago at the Federal Reserve."
"This week a third Bear Stearns fund shuttered its doors and stopped investors from withdrawing their money."
"Already the big investment banks are taking on water. Merrill Lynch has fallen 22% since the start of the year. Citigroup is down 16% and Lehman Bros Holdings has dropped 22%."
"The dollar is falling, employment and manufacturing are weakening, new car sales are off for the seventh straight month, consumer spending is down to a paltry 1.3%, and oil is hitting new highs every day as it marches inexorably towards a $100 per barrel."
"The public doesn’t know anything about this looming disaster yet. How will people react when they drive up to their local bank and see plywood sheeting covering the windows? This will happen. There will be bank failures."
"The Federal Reserve is a central player in a carefully considered plan to shift the nation’s wealth from one class to another. And they have succeeded. Nearly 4 million American jobs have been sent overseas, the country has increased the national debt by $3 trillion dollars, and foreign investors own $4.5 trillion in US dollar-backed assets. While the Fed has been carrying out its economic strategy; the Bush administration has deployed the military around the world to conduct a global resource war."

Hit the link for more of the gruesome details.

You could just ask anyone.

I don't know why anyone needed to do a study on this.
Bad bosses get promoted, not punished?

"Despite their success in the office, spiteful supervisors can cause serious malaise for their subordinates, the study suggested, citing nightmares, insomnia, depression and exhaustion as symptoms of serving a brutal boss."

When I worked in a bank branch as Assistant Manager, the absolute worst, most incompetent teller, whom I thought should be "let go" because of his lousy attitude, rudeness towards customers, not to mention that he couldn't fucking count and he kept us there past 5 o'clock every day looking for his shortages, was suddenly transfered to the local head office and put in charge of all the branches in my county. He became a tyrant and a major ball buster by changing policies and increasing new account quotas. He took away the incentive- free trips. Instead we were threatened with being fired. The morale plummeted from branch to branch. He became a VP. I transfered to the city to be a bond trader. Same shit only the bosses were coke-heads to boot. Try to reason with that shit.

I can't say that bad bosses are mostly men or mostly women. They come in both sexes. The manager of my branch was the most evil vindictive woman. I was drinking Maalox right out of the bottle thanks to her and I was only 25.

The Midas Touch. Not.

In Iraq: Before we bombed the shit out of Baghdad, they had 16-24 hours of electricity a day. Now they have about 1-2 hours a day. Iraqi Power Grid Nearing Collapse

and

In Afghanistan: "Afghanistan will produce another record poppy harvest this year that cements its status as the world's near-sole supplier of the heroin source, yet a furious debate over how to reverse the trend is stalling proposals to cut the crop, U.S. officials say." WP "Afghanistan Poppy Cultivation Skyrockets"

I hate to bring this bad stuff up, but it just breaks my heart. This is how we liberate people?

Hot fun in the summertime

In only 2 weeks, I have had amazing results. I am literally sweating my ass off doing moderate exercise. My good friend/neighbor and I have been waking up at the crack o'dawn to walk in the park across the street. We're usually out for about one and half hours slogging along, me sweating bullets because it has been so hot lately, with every joint in my body aching with every step I take. We never run out of junk to talk about either. Amazing.

BUT! Yesterday I noticed that I am getting my stomach muscles back ( I had a keg instead of a 6 pack) and my whole body doesn't hurt so much anymore. I have become unaware of my knees. My girlfriend also noticed that her feet don't hurt so much. We were smiling and beaming like teenagers. Today we woke up to a glorious morning where it was actually cool. I forgot what that felt like as the low temp has been around 79º lately which is my favorite high temp of the day. Today however we both had some aches and pains again. We may have pushed it a bit yesterday. Oh well. Thank god for Alleve™.

I just read this story which may be of interest to some.
Fat-burning defect in liver may cause obesity

Summer Reading, Retread Edition

I've gotten very tired of the banal excrement and bad news vomiting out of my television (except for some of the shows on Food Network - they're quite good), so I decided to do my summer reading this month.

The books are ones I've read before, but all the better for that - rereading a good book's like curling up with an old friend.

This is what's on the list for now:

The Iliad by Homer (Fagles translation)
Unfortunately, It Was Paradise by Mahmoud Darwish
Revenge of the Sith by Matt Stover
Napalm and Silly Putty by George Carlin

What's on your bedside table?

If this graphic gets your attention,

then slide on over to the Dark Wraith Forums and catch his latest essay entitled "The President's Optimal Strategy in the Matter of Alberto Gonzales".

Hot Fun In The Summertime -- OOH YEAH!

I "cloud nine" when I want to.......

Oh what a song - one of my top 10 most favorite summer songs of all time!

Here's an awesome video of Sly and the Fam singing it in 1969

and here's another video (with better audio) that I just found when I was searching for my other OTHER favorite summer song - SUMMERTIME by the Zombies. Nice beach sceens set to the music of both songs -- now what are the chances of me finding both on one video?

"Boop-boop-ba-boop-boop" when I want to.......

Any Sly Stone fans out there? Well, HE'S BACK after a 25 year absence and sounding pretty good!

Here he is at the North Sea Jazz Festival in CA a few weeks ago.


He recently granted Vanityfair an interview that you can read here. He's working on some new songs and I CAN'T WAIT to hear what's been going on in his head after all these years!

excerpt --

But when I ask Stone to describe the new songs, he straightens up, rocks forward in his seat, and starts rhyming in an insistent cadence somewhere between a preacher's and a rapper's, the rasp suddenly gone from his otherwise low, throaty speaking voice. "There's one that says, 'Ever get a chance to put your thanks on? / Somebody you know you can bank on? / Even sometimes you might embarrass them by pulling rank on? / Now, whatcha gonna do when you run out of them? … Another holiday, you're drunk and curbing it / You can't face a noun, so you're straight adverbing it / You had an argument at home, and you had to have the last word in it / Now whatcha gonna do when you run out of them?'

There's one that's called 'We're Sick Like That,'" he continues. "It says, 'Give a boy a flag and teach him to salute / Give the same boy a gun and teach him how to shoot / And then one night, the boy in the bushes, he starts to cry / 'Cause nobody ever really taught him how to die.'"


Good Luck Sly!!


"Did I listen to pop music because I was miserable? Or was I miserable because I listened to pop music?"
~John Cusack, High Fidelity

the democrats can bite me too.

Senate passes Bush-backed spy bill

Father Tyme writes (a better commentary on this than I could this early in the morning):

"The chickenshit Democrats voted to continue sucking Bush! Because they didn't want blamed if another "attack" happened in this cunt-ry by them bad guys (Cheney and friends) they passed his Hitlerian Spy Bill.

It says that the real terrorists in America are Americans who oppose Bush.
Tell your piece of Shit Representative in D.C. that if you wanted this kind of ass-kissing subservience, you'd have voted Republican.

And I'm sick and tired of hearing Kos and Atrios and Amato telling us to "be nice" when you write or call the chisckenshit Democrats because it works better to be nice! NOT! The Democrats that think we're being nasty are rationalizing for their own cowardice and capitulation.

At least we KNOW Bush is a prick. Now we know these vermin are just as bad as any Republican.

Let's start calling them (Democrats) what they are; the equivalent of Ronnie's assholes.

To me they are now and forever, Democrats for Bush!
Pricks, Bastards, assholes, dipshits, traitors....just like Republicans.

Looks like Rove got his ONE PARTY NATION, doesn't it? Tell your representative piece of shit that. See how they answer!!!"

But seriously Father Tyme, tell us how you really feel.
But seriously, I concur.
---------------

In other news about the subserviant bush flunkies that should all just go away and rot for all I care, Buzzflash writes:
The House Republicans Intimidate Dems Into Creating a Special Investigative Committee Into Some Idiotic Vote the Republicans Claim Was "Stolen." Meanwhile the Dems are Scared Sh*tless to Impeach Bush or Take Any Real Action Against Him For REAL Illegal Behavior. Bring on the Wimps.

I don't know if this belongs in "Health News" or "Obligatory Friday Sex Post":

In Pharmacology, all drugs have two names, a trade name and generic name. For example, the trade name of Tylenol also has a generic name of Acetaminophen. Aleve is also called Naproxen. Amoxil is also called Amoxicillin and Advil is also called Ibuprofen.
The FDA has been looking for a generic name for Viagra. After careful consideration by a team of government experts, it recently announced that it has settled on the generic name of Mycoxafloppin. Also considered were Mycoxafailin, Mydixadrupin, Mydixarizin, Dixafix, and of course, Ibepokin.
Pfizer Corp. announced today that Viagra will soon be available in liquid form, and will be marketed by Pepsi Cola as a power beverage suitable for use as a mixer. It will now be possible for a man to literally pour himself a stiff one. Obviously we can no longer call this a soft drink, and it gives new meaning to the names of "cocktails", "highballs" and just a good old-fashioned "stiff drink". Pepsi will market the new concoction by the name of: MOUNT & DO.


Thought for the day: There is more money being spent on breast implants and Viagra today than on Alzheimer's research. This means that by 2040, there should be a large elderly population with perky boobs and huge erections and absolutely no recollection of what to do with them.

Hey all you Jestons' fans.....

your flying saucers have arrived!!!!

Check it out (cool video)
Flying Saucers Go Into Production

Hopefully someone will open up a "flying saucer" amusement park for all us little folk. I would LOVE LOVE LOVE to take a test ride!! Oh George -- who would ever have thought!

Can you imagine trying to park one of these outside the grocery store?


h/t to Indigus at Godisnotanasshole

Same shit, different party

I was Miss Atom Bomb 1957. Oh it was an exciting time. Those big explosions were so intimidating to the rest of the world. I didn't have the opportunity to decide who to bomb. But 50 years later a woman may get that patriotic opportunity.

Say hello to Miss Nuke 2007 who won't rule out the use or non-use of nuclear weapons against bin Laden or other terrorists in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Prior Planning Prevents Poor Performance

This article from the New York Times (via the Huffington Post) turned the contents of my stomach into a lake of boiling acid and bad noise.

It tells the tale of our intrepid Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates' journey to the Middle East to talk to our quondam allies about Iraq, but that wasn't what hit my digestion like a stink-bomb. What caused the acid reflux to wake up was these words:

"...we probably all underestimated..."

Who the fuck are you calling "we," little mister?

You got a godsdamned mouse in your pocket?

When the war drums started to sound in 2002, many people started looking beyond the roseate schemes and Pollyannish projections made by the neocons and their enablers in the White House. What they saw was billions of dollars wasted, years of occupation and many dead American soldiers.

Now, as with all of those doubters (who were realists, and paid for their doubts with epithets and outright threats), I would have much preferred a happy ending to this whole mess - one that didn't cost so much in terms of blood, money, and reputation. But because no one in the Administration or the Defense Department was apparently thinking rationally, we are stuck in Iraq.

When you plan for things, you are supposed to take into account what happens if your plan falls apart. The great military philosopher von Clausewitz said it best: "Plans never survive first contact with the enemy." Hope for the best, of course, but always, always plan for the worst.

This "no one could have anticipated ..." bullshit is exactly that; bullshit, designed to absolve us from all blame and instead put the blame on whoever's handy when the Dolchstosslegende starts up in earnest. Those scapegoats will include the Left, the Dems, the American People, the Troops - everyone but the actual people who supposedly thought long and hard about our wonderful parade through Iraq.

Are we a plastic society interested only in material acquisition?

I'm having fun with the many different definitions of PLASTIC:

lacking in depth, individuality, or permanence; superficial, dehumanized, or mass-produced

Easily influenced; impressionable.

Marked by artificiality or superficiality; synthetic: a plastic world of fad, hype, and sensation.

He had a whole pocketful of plastic.
The entire meal was served on plastic.

I think the headline below says it all on oh so many levels --

Scientists issue warning about chemical in plastic

FROM THE SCIENTISTS:

In an unusual effort targeting a single chemical, several dozen scientists on Thursday issued a strongly worded consensus statement warning that an estrogen-like compound in plastic is likely to be causing an array of serious reproductive disorders in people.


FROM THE PLASTIC INDUSTRY:

Representatives of the plastics industry on Thursday lambasted the scientists as alarmist and biased, and said they based their conclusions on inconsistent and uncertain science.

"Considering many of these people have made their views known in the past, is there any surprise? Is there really anything new?" said Steve Hentges of the American Chemistry Council's polycarbonate/BPA group.

Hentges said the scientists who signed the consensus statement were self-selected, leaving out many experts, and that many have conflicts of interest because they have either studied BPA and reported effects or "have already taken a very clear advocacy position.

"They are completely at odds with the findings of every governmental scientific body that has reviewed the same science," he said.

-------------------

I would expect to be seeing some new "tug at your heartstring" commercials from duPont in the near future. Maybe they'll just dig out that oldie but goodie that shows the premature infant lying in the PLASTIC incubator that is keeping her alive. (glass used to work well also). God I miss an ice cold BOTTLE of coke freshly picked out of the cooler.

Well, who knows how this will play out. Regulation? Doubt it.
In the mean time, remind your friends and family:

Don't microwave babies formula in the microwave.
When cooking a frozen food item, ALWAYS remove it from the carton and cook it in a glass dish (it tastes better too!)
I know it's hard to find items in glass containers, but at least try to find glass for the items that take a while to use up -- mayo, peanut butter, salad dressings, or at least put them in glass after they are opened.

Here is an informative list from the Plastic Task Force :
Toxins, Endocrine Disruptors And Carcinogens That Migrate From The Molecules Of Different Plastic Containers To Their Contents


The debate still rages on about Plastics and the Microwave

Don't bother reading it, cause according to our "watchdogs" at the FDA, nothing to worry about - as usual their standard reply:

"The FDA has seen no evidence (that plastic containers or films contain dioxins) and knows of no reason why they would.


"well below the levels"

"But the levels are very low"

and my favorite:

"The FDA will revisit its safety evaluation if new scientific information raises concerns."


crossposted at BigBrassBlog

Infrastructure determined to terrorize US this summer

This time you can't blame it on those tax and spend Democrats.

Court rules against Katrina Victims

From AP writer, Becky Bohrer: "The Court ruled against Hurricane Katrina victims whose homes and businesses were destroyed when flood-waters breached levees in the 2005 storm cannot recover money from their Insurance companies for the damages, a federal appeals court ruled Thursday.

This case could affect tens of thousands of rebuilding residents and business owners in Louisiana. Daniel E. Becnel, who represented 21 plaintiffs in the case, said."

Insurers could have taken a "multibillion dollar hit" if the ruling had gone against the industry, said Dave Rossmiller, an attorney and analyst.

WTF?!?!?!?

Blinded By Propaganda

I check out this site every day, sometimes several times a day. Some days the numbers change almost constantly. As far as I can tell it is accurate. A few days ago I noticed an article crowing that the death toll in Iraq was the lowest in six months, I am sorry I don't remember where I saw it, I think on Salon. Being already in the high seventies I thought it was a pretty crass statement for the government to make. Turns out they spoke too soon which makes it even worse. This is how this administration works to obfuscate reality and confuse the general public. You can bet your first born that there will be no correction to that statement and the only thing that will stick in the minds of most is the idea that things are getting better. They are very good at this misuse of information. It is one of many reasons to get them out of the White House soon.

As an addendum, someone seems to be quite keen on reiterating that the bridge collapse in Minneapolis was NOT caused by terrorism. Maybe it is just me but it never crossed my mind that it could be terrorism. But we know we must live in fear ALL THE TIME.

We get mail

IMSpartacus asked our readers to discuss how he should talk about sex with his 15 year old. He finally got around to writing about it. Things A Dad Should Tell His 15-year old Daughter About Sex

James from Framed has more on cleavagegate. oy.

Jersey Cynic sent me this story about more from the Chinese debacle: Fisher-Price Recalls 967,000 Plastic Preschool Toys Worldwide Because of Lead in Paint

Tali sent me this story about about the dumbass reporter who said that Vick would have been better off if he had "raped a woman" rather than being charged with dogfighting. The reporter has apologized. feh.

Oddjob sent along this link to a well written article by Josh Marshall which points out the striking similarity between the administration's criticism of war criticizers and the Nazi's.

ABC News reports:
"The number of U.S. citizens who moved to Canada last year hit a 30-year high, with a 20 percent increase over the previous year and almost double the number who moved in 2000."

-------------

Kings had always been involving and impoverishing their people in wars, pretending generally, if not always, that the good of the people was the object. This, our [1787] Convention understood to be the most oppressive of all Kingly oppressions; and they resolved to so frame the Constitution that no one man should hold the power of bringing this oppression upon us: Abraham Lincoln - Source: in an 1848 letter to William Herndon


The powerful have invoked God at their side in this war, so that we will accept their power and our weakness as something that has been established by divine plan. But there is no god behind this war other than the god of money, nor any right other than the desire for death and destruction. Today there is a "NO" which shall weaken the powerful and strengthen the weak: the "NO" to war: Subcomandante Marcos - Source: No to war, 2/16/03

Elizabeth Edward's breasts

Nice post at DU.

thanks for heads up Tali

If abortion were illegal...

what should be done to women who have illegal abortions?
Should they go to jail?
Should they be prosecuted?

Read this post at Eclectics Anonymous.
It appears that not all anti-abortion folks have thought about that part.
If someone does believe that abortion is murder of a human being, then someone who commits murder ought to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, no?
Opens up a whole can of worms.