the Jaded Skeptic, Odd Jack

On Spirit Day

2011-10-20T14:49:00.001-05:00

Today is considered to be Spirit Day.

This is about offering support to the LGBT community. In particular, it is about supporting the youth in the community. It is for those that are unable, or scared, to come out and be open about who they are. It is about the bullying so many LGBT persons face in their lives.

As was sadly seen recently, one young man did one of the series of It Gets Better videos, meant to bolster and support these young people. He then proceeded to get bullied and was driven to suicide. It was a tragic event. And it was a clear example of just how cruel society can be to a minor and misunderstood group.

So today, and everyday on, think better. Watch out for, and support those that are bullied for just being different, help them out and let them know they do not need to feel alone. And where some purple to show solidarity with them today. But think and act better from her on out.

'
Addendum:
Forgot to place a link to some nice words from actor Zachary Quinto on these issues.

Immunization Myths

2011-10-09T01:02:00.000-05:00

Mamamia.com has a nice list of the myths that still often pervade thinking on vaccination. Please give it a read to be better informed on the issues, and misunderstandings.

MYTHS (and these are MYTHS)

Myth 1: Vaccines cause autism.
Myth 2: Vaccines contain mercury.
Myth 3: Vaccines contain toxic ingredients.
Myth 4: Vaccines have never been tested.
Myth 5: Vaccines don’t work because children who are vaccinated can still get the disease.
Myth 6: Improved living standards, not vaccination have reduced disease.
Myth 7: Infectious diseases are not serious; children are meant to get them.
Myth 8: Vaccines cause or spread the diseases they are supposed to prevent.
Myth 9: My child’s immune system will be overwhelmed.

Occupy Wall Street, the continuing

2011-10-09T00:31:00.000-05:00

Before I go on to another topic I thought it was best to return to Wall Street.

Occupy Wall Street has continued, despite some confusion in the media. There has been some rather sad and smug (Really? Does Erin Burnett have to mouth the Streets thinking, try being a journalist? You are not trying out for The Tonight Show, and Jeanne Moos job at CNN is currently filled by Jeanne Moos. Thankfully there was some internal counter.) hostility in the media. They've had blows from the police. And they've got the regular outright contempt from the conservative mouthpieces.

I am jaded, but I can hope it has a way to hold on there, or ensure it stays bigger than a bit of real estate and echoing voices. It has like-minded events popping up around the country. We will see.

Salon has done some good work on the protest for those coming in late, or looking to better understand.

The Origins of Occupy Wall Street Explained
Occupy Wall Street: A Historical Perspective

Also to hear from people resonating with the protest, and the concerns and anger at the top tier in the country look through, We are the 99 Percent.

This was a nice graphic put up to explain the concern and problems of banking: (There really are no options being left in the system) (Wait until you see how uniform the news media is...)

And Jeff Sharlet put up some nice pics from the current NYC events.

GOP - At Work...for somebody.

2011-10-08T20:33:00.000-05:00

So what are Republicans doing for us all?

In Florida, they are trying to put smaller folk to work, hurtling briefly through the air. Yup. Republicans want to restore the Floridian sport of dwarf tossing. It is apparently a matter of freedom, to be able to take someone smaller than you and throw them as far as possible...for AMERICA! The fact that the Republican governor is backing this speaks to how sad his reign has been.

In New Jersey, the governor, and almost national primary loser, is continuing his brilliant work of costing his state millions while benefiting none. Really, it is quite amazing Christie has done it again and again. From right after taking office up to right now. This time it is a needed rail tunnel to NY. But know it won't happen AND NJ has to pay. After getting over $270 million from the federal government, he decided the project was to expensive. The government decided it wanted the money back then (The villains!). Christie balked, he doesn't return money he grabs, even when it isn't his own. But know he has agreed to return $95 million. So he welshed on a debt to the American people, and also has cost NJ nearly $100 million. And the state of NJ is left with only an antiquate rail tunnel to service its transport to and from NY.

In Tennessee we see the continuing effects of a national effort by Republicans to deny the vote to...well, everyone if they could just be given office by fiat. Among Republicans it seems to have become accepted that they can not win in the long run. Hispanics are a threat. African Americans are a threat. The poor are a threat. Even the military, it seems, can be a threat to their electoral destiny. So they have moved to remove them (the voters) from their path. In the past we have seen the electronic voting booths deployed to effect. Misinformation is a go to way to get people to the wrong polls on the wrong day. But the current method is reworking how you get a ballot to vote on. New restrictions are being given, more and more id's are needed, or a specific one. And, as you can imagine, they aren't rushing to inform voters. So now, and as we go into the more serious election year many voters are going to be in for a cruel surprise. Or people can stand up in their states and say no to this. Stand up for people like the 96 year old voter who is no longer an acceptable without hunting down an old marriage certificate from decades past, for a husband long since buried. The truth is voting fraud is rare. The crime against the electoral system comes in the mass of legit voters kept from engaging in their rights. Maybe 5 million Democratic voters will be lost.

In the Senate the leader of the Republicans is too busy to work out an acceptable jobs bill. Why? They are playing PR games. He was trying to push an old version of the jobs bill. Through this Democrats would have to vote down the presidents bill, which would make the papers. Then the proper bill would pass through, but the half truth talking point would be born, the senate Democrats oppose Obama's job's bill. Not true. But wha tis the truth to Republicans these days when you've got optics.

In the House Boehner is tripling the tax dollars being spent to preserver the Defense of Marriage Act, and keep gays from marrying. Meanwhile he and Cantor fret about paying to help disaster victims.

In the creepy end of the Internet Beck continues to descend into his role of Col. Kurtz. Sure he sounds like a weirdo. Sure he shoots out purely maddening conspiracies. But to add to that Beck is doing a kid's show, to teach the real history of American...just stew on that.

In my TV we learned that proudly right wing singers are fully able to spout right wing pap. Hank Williams Jr. showed that while he does look like a country parody, he is one. Though when I look at him he looks a good like that someone is reenacting Weekend at Bernies with him. But enough with a guy that would compare Boehner with Netanyahu. They are both screwing things up for their people in their own ways.

In the womb Republicans continue to push on to control and dictate use. One way they have worked to control reproduction rights is in defining life. The effort is to at a minimum define life as starting at conception. Then they will demand that anything that risks or harms joined egg and sperm can be declared a crime. Then end result is that much of birth control will be criminal, as well as abortions. You see some birth control acts to prevent implantation of the fertilized egg. And most everyone accepts this birth control, but this conservative effort will kill the pill. And the far right that started this know that is the result, they want birth control to be more limited and hard to use. Because? They want to control what you do in the bedroom.

Republicans at work, to toss dwarves, keep gays single, and control American wombs.

Occupy Wall Street - 3 Weeks in

2011-10-02T17:29:00.001-05:00

So we enter week 3 of Occupy Wall Street. Has it been 3 weeks? Partly it almost feels like it passes fast, from the comfort of home. But also the lack of coverage from the start makes me feel vague about just when this began. I do remember a comment or two at the start. A post here and there. But it was mostly a blip.

And that has been a problem (Just don't tell many of the protest supporters that.), communication out about what was going on. I heard about Occupy Wall Street and had no idea what it was. Some people planned to go an protest the big wigs...aaaaaand? There are people doing protest all the time, is this a bigger one, what makes it stand out? Is it 5 people on a week long silent vigil? Is it 100 chanting? Is it 1000's...doing something?

You watch protest get setup all the time and you can become inured. And of course those passionate and engaged in this protest hate that jaded quality, but what am I gonna do? I am not alone in this plenty of old hands in the progressive movement have tried to help and suggest ways to improve the work on the street. And that has been banefully opposed for a long time. Suggest contacting media with a formal explanation, is hissed at. And that causes some sighing on the part of people like me. It reminds me of a bit of work of Patton Oswalt where the hypothetical hippie wants to protest and want to be so standoffish, and subtle, that the protest is invisible. Not taking advantage of the media to get eyes on you is risky. Most of the time it means you can quietly fade away in the background, or go on years being more or less white noise.

Luckily that has changed. In not so good ways, as some cops have attacked protesters, which just helps the media get its rocks off. So the media is on board, until they get bored again. Then yesterday on the Brooklyn Bridge, the police did some mass arrest. This should get the protesters some later in the news show coverage, but still not stories that will open most news shows.

While the Occupy Wall Street concept is spreading some, sprouting up around the country, can it last? Can it start gather up some more local interest? Haven't seen it yet. But it may come. Some more seasoned help may be good.

On Daily Kos they have now the first of the official statements from the protests. It's a statement voted on by people at the event to reflect the myriad of issues those present want to correct. Look it over.

TPM has a look at Week 3 of the Occupy Wall Streets, and considers where it is now.

But it is interesting to see the number of people online still pissed off when told that is unclear what the protest is aiming for. Sorry, the accomplishable goals still need to get lain out. Media needs to get pushed into being engaged. How aware is the country right now of it? How aware is most of NYC?

Addendum 1:

Wanted to mention a good point made on twitter by @allisonkilkenny.

Think when observers claim #OccupyWallStreet is unfocused, what they mean is the problems are "too big."

A good point. The issues we face are huge. And they are hard to express. So general anger can be good. But we have to be sure it does get positively focused at some point. Hopefully soon.

Addendum 2:
Also wanted to consider a good point made by Driftglass via the last The Professional Left podcast. In it he noted the Million Women March from 2006. I remember it well. It had big political, social, and entertainment names down on the Smithsonian lawns speaking out. There were huge numbers. But there was no real coverage outside of CSPAN.

The idea that Driftglass posits is that this is due to being unfocused, interested in all the issues that women face in the United States.

Seems like an interesting point, that I hope Occupy Wallstreet keeps in mind. But I do also wonder, did The Million Man March has a better focus? It got a lot of coverage, I think...All points to consider.

Doctor Who, coming to series end.

2011-10-01T14:21:00.000-05:00

Well it is another Saturday. That means BBC is running another new episode of Doctor Who. And it turns out this is the series finale (of Series 6 of the new version of Doctor Who...it doesn't really matter). Doesn't feel like we've come to the end already, this half of the season went by so quick.

It speaks well for the series. The 13 episodes we get for a series seems to be never enough. But the brief taste of scifi fun keeps up from getting too complacent. But the latest run is ending, a race from the Western US and the death of the titular character, has taken us across time, through labor, through Hitler's window, and on back to London. Tonight should take us back to the United States, and back to the beginning of the current series.

I look forward to it. Right now the episode has finished showing in England, but in the U.S. we have to wait until tonight. I had hoped to start doing some analysis of the series before the second half started up last month...but...eh. And I wanted to jump in as the episodes passed...but...well, it is occurring to me that rushing in is not the best plan. We have until next fall (except for a Christmas special this year) before we get new episodes.

So why rush into this. Better to do some post-series analysis of Doctor Who than give a rushed glib post. So that is the plan. For now I want to forward the idea of the Doctor being a fairy tale figure...later.

I may be late in returning, but Tucker is late in leaving already. One of us is being fashionable.

2011-09-29T18:55:00.000-05:00

what..What! ...oh sh...say!

So...how about that...

...the hell! Tucker Carlson's The Daily Caller is still around. (I'll do you the favor of not linking.)

If you are not aware, and if so, apologies, but Tucker has a rather poor website he likes to imagine is a useful news source.It isn't.

Take a recent story they ran detailing a rapid expansion of employment at the EPA. Whether a massive influx of 230,000 jobs for the country. the real problem is the story was B.S. There was outrage at the growth of government, and the spending of over $20 billion. And, like with Drudge, news sources leaped at using the tall tale.

The Washington Post's Greg Sergeant has written about how wrong the site has been, and how hard it has worked to justify it's work. First the numbers were used by the EPA as a cautionary tale, a size that the EPA would not want to grow to. But The Daily Caller tried to blow this off. They claim that the EPA, and government wants to grow, expand, and just bulge out. The EPA really does want to balloon, everyone knows it, but The Daily Caller is the only one willing to say it. So the claim is right. What a load of codswallop. It reminds me of the News of the World in England trying to smugly claim that their phone hacks were just journalism. No. NOTW was in the wrong. And The Daily Caller is just plain wrong. The story was done wrong, the claims have been disproven, and everyone with a clue sees where the The Daily Caller is setting. How long will it take Tucker and his little rascals to fess up.

At this point, even the conservative National Review has criticized The Daily Caller for it's poor work.

But it is on par with what we expect from Tucker Carlson.

Republicans: Beyond Thunderdome

2011-06-26T12:43:00.000-05:00

Hey! I haven't blogged in a bit and BLAH BLAH BLAH...

What the hell is it with the Republicans?

Yeah. really what is there deal. The nation needs to seriously discuss and debate our debt, our revenue, and our costs. Everyone knows that. But for some reason they feel the need to try and force the discussion to really omit talk on the debt, and talk on our revenue. It seems they want to try and tackle cost alone, and pretend that will fix it all.

Here is how this works. We have Debt (D), Revenue to the Government (R), and Costs the Government Pays (C). And they each need to address C and R, to lead to changes in D. Either debt can be payed off, or more debt needs to be taken on.

R + C = Change in D

Ideally, the result should be a shrinking debt. Ideally. But it doesn't often work that way. And we should work towards this. Trouble is, the time to bring this fight for debt cutting, and surpluses, like under Clinton, should come in stronger economic periods. Doing it now in a weaker economic period does not benefit us. It spreads suffering, deepens troubles, and creates long term strife and issues. The impulse is to cut into C, but that must be done thoughtfully, not as demanded by a given ideology.

R must also be carefully taken on. In this weaker economic period to heap on further trouble to those in distress makes little sense. Now those with deeper pockets can be turned to. How much? That is the debate. For Republicans it is a negative value. For Democrats it is up in the air. But I suggest at a minimum, you go look at the current tax rate in the country, and then look at what it was under Ronald Reagan. Look at the far far higher rates in the days of Reaganomics.

So consider today's Republicans. They have decided that the debt ceiling makes a wonderful campaign talking point. And through it they get to cry over the idea of the rich paying anymore taxes, or elderly people, or the poor, receive aid.

It is a sad sight. They treat the nation's financial state as a chance for theatrics. Eric Cantor last week met with the president to discuss the debt ceiling, but it was all so late in the week he could have a stages walk out in "righteous" indignation. For he and the rest of the Republican leaders this is all a chance to pose and pout. They talk of demanding that they are given a chance to build a plan with the president to so as to secure the future stability and growth of our economy. Everything should be on the table...except changing the debt ceiling, or raising revenue. So for them it is all slashing costs. Slash Medicare. Slash Medicaid. Slash social security. Slash, slash, slash. They are making quite a show of it. Any Republican that votes to increase the debt ceiling will be driven from offices, says one Republican leader.

This is a loud and clear declaration from the conservatives. No tax increase. No debt ceiling boost. And if they turn to allow them, they are on the record as hypocrites. If those that have promised to destroy those that vote for a ceiling raising don't act they will be hypocrites. So they are committed.

Either the nation will do what they want. Or they will break the nation. That has more and more proven to be the silent code and oath of the Republican faithful.

I don't like zealots.

And if it had happen...?

2011-05-23T17:15:00.000-05:00

After the Rapture vid.

Truth in media

2011-05-23T16:49:00.000-05:00

Pawlenty Presidental Campaign (2011-2011)

Dead on Day 1.

You can't buy publicity like this.

Why would you try?

Further into the sadness of Saturday's rapture cancellation.

2011-05-23T16:25:00.000-05:00

In the wake of the aborted takeoff of all the pious, righteous, and true...more of the tragedy that befell some.

This is not about people who blew their cash, or sold homes. That is bad, and lamented. Like the person who dumps their car off somewhere because "they know" they have the lucky numbers that will be winning the lottery that night. But economic boondoggles can be come back from.

No. This is about the near death of children. A women seeing that the rapture and tribulation were nigh, slit her daughters throat, then her own. Then drove to a friend's home to die. Luckily this person had the sense to call for help, which kept them alive.

This is horrible. What this women did was sick and demented. But she was driven and taught to believe that they were both in trouble, and horrors were coming. That is one important trick to many religious groups, promise horror, torture, and unending pain, unless you walk a very narrow line that the group defines. This woman, presumably believed that it was coming. If she did not end her daughter's life, she would have, literally, hell on earth.

And that is messed up. Messed up for her to do. And messed up that in global society we have this tripe sold and coddled by government, media, and the rest of us (to some varying extent). We try to laugh, but it can't be forgotten that things like the Rapture are a cottage industry. They are big bucks because many people take it on faith that events will soon come to pass. Remember how Christianity starts, with the promise of the end of days just around the corner (from 30-something C.E.). People have been drawn into a belief the end is nigh, time and again, before that time and ever since. Sometimes these people are driven or pushed to dark ends.

Now we may learn that she has various psychological issues, medication she needed to be on, etc. But many churches teach that their is a Rapture. That is you are not on their god's right side...you are screwed.

So we need to be aware of this. Joke. Laugh. But keep an eye out in your family, and among your coworkers. Reach out as any compassionate rational person should.

Welcome to my world...world.

2011-05-23T16:04:00.000-05:00

Now is when I turn and give some sympathy to those that awaited the rapture yesterday.

Yes. To embrace the idea that some supernatural event was coming is silly. And because a person who spends too much time in their preferred supernatural storybook, and then crafts a mathematical formula around it to countdown to all "good" people being teleported to a magical land...yeah, really?

So everyone had a good laugh. I did.

But what the rest of us? Yes, including myself in this.

There are plenty of joke worthy ideas, causes, beliefs.

Bible/Torah/Koran codes - Take a given translation trace around words and letters, or just pick them at a chosen interval...and you know the future...No. But it is embraced.
2012 - Mayan Comeuppancepaloza. So apparently the Mayans created a super special calendar that charts the major events of the future leading right up to the end of the world. Or not. It points to major events, when you squint at it. Doesn't really point at the end in 2012 even. And the calendar end can also be, and is by Mayans today, as the end of an era. Not the world. But people are selling it to you. And you may, or someone you know, is lapping it up.
I-Ching - Works about the same as above...or Nostradamus.
Anti-vaccination - People are being sold on how vaccination will kill or poison a baby or child. Or how it won't work so they don't pursue shots or updates to protection. And as a result old illnesses are coming back.
Science denial - In the USA we have to struggle to get comprehensive science to be taught. Evolution is often an anathema. Alien and foreign, barred from conversation. Science is what it is. The results follow where nature leads. But we seem to fear and loathe nature's arrogance with it. We too often see science as a servant to ideology. Evolution is bad, why? GM foods are bad, why? Irradiation is bad, why? A biblical view of history and science is sound, why?

Like I wrote before. Take some time after these ridiculous events like this Saturday. Look at how contorted these people were driven to become. Look at how they believed, and how they have been hurt.

Then look at your own beliefs and ideas, and think thoughtfully.

Been off for a bit.

2011-05-22T01:04:00.001-05:00

I haven't been doing much in the way of blogging for awhile. Well as you may have heard the world'd coming to an end, and stuff.

Winds, rains, and storms...and stuff. Plus the nice holy man, and all of his people, his groups, and his billboards say so.

So it's all kinda depressing.

End of the world. And I haven't even finished my laundry, or vacuumed.

.
.
.

Damn. Apparently the world already ended earlier. Knew I shouldn't have taken that nap. I always miss out on these sorts of things.

Yeah. Not so much for the logic.

End of the world...come on.

But, of course, most nobody was paying serious attention to this. To this one. But not always.

First consider this lot with the billboards. They are not some small unfunded church. This group is all over the country. They have some reasonably deep pockets (they have the money to put up more signs than atheist groups do, and more forbearance from locals than atheists get). So this is more than that Terry Jones lot. Remember that these folks were more . And these folks thought the world was ending. They aren't alone in that.

For example:

Jehovah's Witnesses
1914 - That's the key date when everything changes and Jesus comes into his own. Now a century has passed.

Seventh-Day Adventist
1844 - The day that Jesus returns to Earth (the end). Of course once that didn't happen it became a "spiritual" event. You know, like how God answers prayers in indirect ways, how prayers and saints help medicine after the fact, etc.

General Christians
How did it all begin? With a a promise from Jesus that those he met would see him again in their lifetimes. Meaning, the end was coming damn soon. And...two thousand years later...eh. Of course, we then got the Wondering Jew, an immortal at the crucifixion who walks the Earth as an immortal. So the words of Jesus still stand as he's alive. How freaking weak.

And of course we have had tons of "crazy cults" (cause the main ones are the respectable sort).

Shermer on it.

Brett Erlick on the Rapture

That is the point though people always come up with an end event and obsess. Sometimes a small group buys punch and sneakers and heads off. Sometimes a religious movement embraces it. Or a religious movement is birthed from the dates given.

The thing to remember is whether you ignore this one, or laugh at it, when one comes that you feel like just buying into...Step back. Look around. Think. Research. Don't be Homer Simpson.

Blogging on Theocractic Impulses

2011-04-24T21:22:00.000-05:00

Turned into a busy weekend, but I wanted to get some time for theocracy.

Obviously, not here to praise it, but hoping to see it buried.

Still, in talking about it, for too many the view is that it is something to do with the Middle East. Yet it has been a struggle to resist this here in the United States.

Since the those earliest colonist there has often been a drive to cement religious law and religious doctrine, and enforce it on all within reach. It is part of the reason the colony of Rhode Island came into existence. Official religions were abound in the colonies. Attitudes in the start were focused on building and enforcing religious communities, and those not following the path, had to be righted, or outed. And it was hard work to shift these attitudes, but there were good leaders and speakers who helped make progress. They could only go so far. It fell on future generations to be active in continuing the work. And slowly progress has continued. But here we are now, with legislatures in a panic to try and ban fanciful religious threats, while trying to place in granite other religious tenets in the law books and in front of the courthouses.

Still in some parts of the US, blue laws persist. These laws prevent businesses and customers from coming together for some commerce on the sabbath. In Texas hostility towards the nonreligious is clear, with atheist being barred from office (and in 6 other states). And there and in other states acting as a homosexual is sanctioned harshly. And this extends to attitudes towards women (from reproductive freedom to right buy sexual aids).

All down to religious, theocratic, dictates.

As sad it is to see in legislature, some courts, and some officials, it is terrifying to see in one's armed forces. Evangelicals are seen to have a good deal of power in the military. Higher ups have been seen to bring pressure on recruits to conform, even religiously. It is wholly unacceptable and a distinct threat to the security to this country.

The struggle with theocracy, sadly, must continue. There is so much yet to be addressed. And the issues fall in all branches of government, and even the armed forces. But change is coming slowly. There are those willing and able to speak out. More are being made aware. It still falls on all of us to try and make more aware, more concerned, and more active against the threat of theocracy.

Are you active?

Here are some groups at work in this area:

Blogging against Theocracy

2011-04-22T18:54:00.000-05:00

Almost let the distractions all around allow me to forget this is the time to blog about the concerns with theocracy....i.e. blogging against theocracy.

Welcome to Blog Against Theocracy 2011

...

It is not a blogswarm against religion. Bloggers who believe in religion, and those who don't, are equally welcome here. What we share is a common commitment to the First Amendment to the Constitution and its guarantee of church-state separation.

...

This year, we are using the hashtag #AgainstTheocracy on twitter to link and promote our posts.

...

Now I just have to think of something to focus attention on. It will continue on through Sunday.

Get involved.

Spring - April 15th, 2011

2011-04-15T22:51:00.000-05:00

A look at a fine Spring day in the Midwest United States. Shots from the sunny side.

And after opening the car window and taking a shot that happens to be into the wind.

And I thought the rain the day before was cold.

Don't know what it says.

2011-04-13T22:51:00.000-05:00

It seems odd, on Twitter, that I seem to draw in more followers when I am off of it and to busy to tweet or retweet.

Don't know what that says about me...

Let's just call it being so interesting that my absence draws people in all the more...yeah...

Loving my Horror Hosts

2011-04-12T01:32:00.000-05:00

Yeah, I do love my horror host, and their shows. I have been happy to get into finding, watching, and supporting some of the hosts active these days. You should look there are many, and they are all over the country, on many different mediums.

To get a look at some a quick way to go is via, Horror Host Graveyard, which list current happenings this different shows and hosts. Also different events going on, and how to access some shows. Plus it uses plenty of YouTube vids of the shows that are out there.

And one DVD that is out, looking at the history of these shows in American Scary. Had to grab it up after I learned about it and saw some parts of it on YouTube. Here are some bits.

A Trailer

First 10 Minutes

Clip from behind the scenes with Neil Gaiman and Malena Teves.

Superheroes are for girls

2011-04-12T01:25:00.000-05:00

And in that same vein. A new site on Tumblr, there to remind us all that, despite what society, execs, and some writers and fans claim, women AND girls want and do read comics...and love those superheroes.

SUPERHEROES ARE FOR GIRLS, TOO

Awwww. Live the dream.

Little girls do kick butt, and join the Dark Side

2011-04-12T01:22:00.000-05:00

How can you not be impressed, and charmed.

Little kid goes to Mouse Country, meets Darth Vader and jumps at the chance to join the Dark Side and get the power she's been craving. You go after it!

Live the dream.

Ending the world prematurely.

2011-04-09T20:11:00.001-05:00

Mental Floss gives us a list of the many declaration of end times.

Yup. There have been plenty of them. And in many cases they were taken damn seriously. People have given up property, all their worldly goods, even cut themselves off from loved ones. And others have died for their beliefs in this regard. So it is always worth being aware of the sheer number of times the final calls were announced for this world.

The Quick 10: The End is Near! Wait, No, It’s Not.

...
1. 1284. When the Pope decrees something, people tend to listen. And they did, in 1213, when Pope Innocent III wrote that “the end of this beast is approaching, whose number, according to the Revelation of Saint John, will end in 666 years, of which already nearly 600 have passed.”
...
6. 1910, with the appearance of Halley’s Comet. French astronomer Camille Flammarion predicted that a seven-tailed comet was coming to Earth, and gas from the comet’s tail would “impregnate” the Earth’s atmosphere, setting it and all of its inhabitants ablaze in a fiery explosion.
...
9. September 11, 12 or 13, 1988. Edgar Whisenant, a former NASA engineer, was so sure about his calculated date that he wrote a book called 88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will be in 1988 and boldly stated, “Only if the Bible is in error am I wrong.” When he was, in fact, wrong, he published The final shout: Rapture Report 1989, followed by the less-certain 23 reasons why a pre-tribulation rapture looks like it will occur on Rosh-Hashanah 1993 and And now the earth’s destruction by fire, nuclear bomb fire.
...

And as a reminder we are all still here.

Addendum: Forgot link at top.

Superhero Movie Physics

2011-04-09T18:11:00.000-05:00

Cocktail Party Physics has a fun look at science in Hollywood. Worth a read through.

But this video from the U of M in the Twin Cities shows Prof. Kakalios, and his work in superhero physics. Including some of his attempts to help Hollywood.

I would suggest checking out his great book on superhero physics, if you haven't already.

Shutting down like it's 1995.

2011-04-08T17:54:00.000-05:00

Talking Points Memo has a look back to the government shutdown of 1995.

Look back, and remember the good old days.

So many familiar faces.

The right kind of movie poster.

2011-04-05T11:31:00.000-05:00

In the variations of posters produced to promote The King's Speech was one I found quite nice. It is one I am sure even Hitchens could like, though I know he has been critical of the history in the film.

Can't ALL movies do posters that note how shit gods are?

Awww.

2011-04-02T01:30:00.001-05:00

Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.

Well, you will have to click and open it to see the animation I am afraid.

More Moyers?

2011-04-02T01:27:00.000-05:00

There is talk of the possibility of Bill Moyers returning to PBS with a show he is currently working on.

Could it be? Is it possible?

Maybe he has something more to share and discuss with America?

Wait and see.

Personally, I wish Moyers would be asked to head up the FCC, or some similar agency. He would be great at cleaning up the mess in any of them.

April Fools Day

2011-04-01T11:59:00.000-05:00

APRIL FOOLS....

...and why it can be a pain in the ass.

Best explanation of the Rebecca Black haters.

2011-04-01T10:24:00.000-05:00

Charlie Brooker, a wonderful humorist and scathing media critic, has, what I think is the best look at the story of Rebecca Black.

To understand, this 13 year old's parents paid to make a video that would allow their daughter take a stab at music making. They picked an annoying pop song to use called Fridays. But it's a pop song. Make a list of all the pop songs in existence, pick one at random, odds are it will annoy you. That is the cost of you not being one of those dastardly tweens (god, I've used that word).

So parents lavished an expensive gift on there daughter I don't care. (Now there are shows like My Super Sweet 16 were teens get lavish gifts and act like asses. Not even that here.) In fact I was oblivious to all of this until a feminist twitter entity made note of all the shit she was getting, in comparison to the attention that people like Charlie Sheen get. Thought it was a good point. So I looked at the video, thought it was a little annoying, but I am an old grumpy fart (Hello! Jaded!). So after watching all I could think, why should I or anyone care? Well apparently a lot of sad online users did. Enough to mock a kid, ridicule her and try an tear down any positive self-image she had. Pathetic.

But before going on, it should be noted that this is quite sadly not a unheard of tale. No. Girls and women are constantly sought out online to be ridiculed, have their sexuality, body, etc ridiculed for...just having an opinion they dare share (Let alone women who build and run sites.). It can be sick and vicious. And sometimes people go to the point of stalking women online, finding other id's and sites they work or visit, and attack them there. It even gets to the point of physical threats, sometimes finding out information on where they live.

I was just going to just point to this scathingly funny clip, but it is important of remind people how nasty, continual, and pernicious these activities are. And people need to be aware and acting to right things.

From the British series 10 O'Clock Live:

Eating Brains at Work

2011-04-01T01:03:00.000-05:00

Here is a video that takes John Coulton's great song to another level.

And if you do like Coulton's music, you can easily find more in iTunes, among other spots. It is all geeky fun.

Oh, god. Trump won't shut up.

2011-03-30T00:59:00.000-05:00

Yeah. He won't shut up. And worse in not shutting up he keeps going back to this Birther beat he seems to love so much. I noted this much last time.

So after his debacle with the short-form yesterday, he has released the longer form for us. Yeah...still don't care. This is a non-issue. And only allows the crazies to come out and jump about.

I do love that the certificate issue bothers Trump so. When his businesses go belly up, he seems to barely care, before going on to the next. But on this, he's got a feeling. Based on his style and taste, I think we would all rather past on his gut and his instincts.

What can make this all the more annoying, and worse, make it a problem? Have the media jump in to join in. Now ABC is just asking questions. They are stupid questions, but...really this where you are now ABC? How sad.

Bring out your severely sick! Now, send them away!

2011-03-30T00:42:00.000-05:00

Interesting story off the BBC website.

It is yet another story of miracle cures being sold. In Africa we can find many of these. But in this case it comes out of the hands of a retired evangelical preacher. What's for sale? An herb and water treatment that fixes what ails ya. He is so popular that people are lined up outside in the 1000's. At these umbers they are overwhelming him.

And they are coming in all sorts of states. Coming from home, from hospitals, and even some dragged out of hospital beds, they end up in this massive line (over 15 miles) to receive a cure made mostly of false hope.

This isn't the sale of a fake hair growth formula. This isn't a miracle diet. No, this is a promise to cure whatever it takes to get you in. And the result has been death. Death while waiting for some. Death for some after getting help for some others.

Now there is no indication that it is a poisonous brew. But like so many others selling snake oil and miracles, many come away with what they feel is their only hope. So many choose to abandon all other support that was still available. Like people who go to faith healers, and then rely on these results. Or, people who go to psychic surgeons, and assured afterward that there cancer has been yanked out. So they aren't being sold a poison. No, they are being sold on abandoning medical treatments which is the only real chance that they have.

So the preacher man wants a break now. :Stop coming, people", he decries. He needs time to work the MILES of people standing under the hot Tanzanian sun, mile after mile of people.

Yes, promise a miracle, and then expect people who are afraid of death, that they deem looming, to not come. Sure. When you promise a cure all, nothing will stop people from seeking you out. That is the magic of advertising. Convince folks they will die without your aid, and they are hooked. Ad men, religions, and quacks all know this well.

Interesting as well, the nation in question, Tanzania, has already banned old school healers, magic users. But selling a water concoction that is unproven...go ahead, and promise the moon when peddling it. Nice, Tanzania, nice. What exactly makes him different from tribal witchdoctors? Is it not coaching things in magic? Or is it being a former man of the clothe? Are you letting him do this...out of faith? Or out of him having the right faith?

Bring out your birth certificates! Bring out your birth certificates!

2011-03-28T21:09:00.000-05:00

We all know the Birthers. Nutters.

Now would be hairy man, would be king of NYC, and would be would be wit (if not for the absence of wit), Donald Trump wants to be president of a country. Or he at least dreams of playing at it and wasting a bunch of someone else's cash. He's used to this (see his business career). He has hinted at times, now he is serious, sitting on talk show couches and even wintering in Iowa.

Part of his current plan is to attack the current president at the point of his legitimacy. His place of birth. So Trumpy wants to do magic, and play at being a Birther.

And like some others he is going the passive aggressive route. Just asking questions. Asking them in his normal pompous, know nothing manner.

Trump has long galled me, in truth. He walks and talks like an idiot. But he keeps getting money from people, and keeps making it (to some extent).

It's like the character of Boston Rob in the show Survivor. From what little I see of him, I have no idea what people keep listening and following. It defies reason.

But people like Trump get the following. He struts around in wealth, and people drool. He struts around on a truly silly reality show and people go, "Ooooooo."

So knowing this Trump has stepped part way into a run for the Republican nomination. And his plan, be the biggest Birther candidate running. Not that he is of course. He's just asking questions. And what does the president have to hide anyway? What's to hide? About his birth? Nothing. But playing his normal dull role Trump throws out already answered questions as if they remain unresolved. Granted his audience is one oblivious to this. They just want to have Obama "given the business." And he is apt to do this. He is a master of empty rhetoric. He is king of posturing. He comes out trumps in this arena.

And so Trump makes his silly attacks. He even has threatened the governor of Hawaii. Trump suggests that trying to show Obama is a Hawaiian by birth means

To try to show up, in his usual empty manor, the president Trump released his own birth certificate. But as AMERICAblog notes, it is the short-form certificate. This is the version of Obama's certificate out for people to see, and attacked for not being the long-form. Now Trump is in the same place as the president. Not that this will occur to the Birthers. Trump is rich, white, and conservative.

By the way, if you want to see a Birther rant, here's the Certificate of Live Birth.

Sylvia Browne, even reaching for the wallets in the sickbed.

2011-03-27T21:46:00.001-05:00

Among others SkepChick notes that famed medium Sylvia Browne has had a heart attack. They do joke a bit, but most do, seeing as Browne has gone a long way to prey on the bereaved, and to use tragedy to enhance her fame. So I can understand, but I just don't like to mock people in the hospital, even when as loathsome as Browne is. I am sorry she is in the hospital, but I think she's a truly terrible person.

It is odd, I am a generally pessimistic growly grump. But I just don't think it does me or anyone else good to pick on people who fall ill, or pass. Sure you shouldn't shirk being honest on wrongs and faults. But dancing on a grave, or hospital bed...we should be better than that.

Thankfully, as people like Sylvia often do, she and her lot raced to remind us of just how low a lot they are.

As noted by ShepChick:

And her organization has found the perfect opportunity to squeeze some more pennies out of the people who don’t realize that she’s a sociopath who regularly lies to the parents of missing children and the loved ones of the deceased. Their begging newsletter...

Yes, in the wake of her illness, her group (a group she founded) raced to pressure fans and followers to bleed cash for them. They say they rely on her for money, and now need others to jump in a help. Why? She is okay and heading home? So it is really about fleecing extra cash...cause. So she had a heart attack, and everyone saw a way to cash in.

Mediums, psychics, and televangelists. It is so hard to see any real difference.

An interesting look back at scientific and political history

2011-03-27T19:56:00.001-05:00

The Superconducting Super Collider. In the 80's and early 90's it was a big deal. Slowly constructed in Texas there was a lot of excited talk about how it would further our scientific understanding...but issues in construction, budgeting, and in political interest led it to never see completion. Much of this work was later carried on via the CERN's Large Hadron Collider.

This is an interesting blog post that takes me back in time to the days of SSC. Some participants at a physics conference took a trek to the site, photographing and remembering back to another era in US scientific efforts.

Of course, of note in the story is that when funding was cut here, it went to the International Space Station.

Defending your journalist, until you don't

2011-03-25T04:12:00.000-05:00

Back to far more serious matters. Journalistic support.

Do I mean defending constitutional rights, defending integrity, defending their physical safety? Oh, no.

We are talking about the HuffPo (Huffington Post).

See, it and Huffington herself, have a long friendly history with one Andrew Breitbart. You may remember him from any of many dishonest attempts to smear, discredit, and destroy the careers of liberals. You may also remember his erstwhile occasional lackey James O'Keefe. Huffington and Breitbart are actual friends, and in the early days of her HP site, he wrote on it.

Well, the years have passed, she has expanded her online empire, and he has expanded the scope of his douchiness.

The prominence that has been announced and bestowed on Breitbart has annoyed many who see HuffPo as a liberal leaning news source. (He was being linked and written up on the sites front page, meaning people would easily know and access his work and ideas.) To some, his die hard conservative thoughts getting promotion was galling. To many others the fact he is a dishonest shill getting this prime space and press was the issue. It was a reward to someone commonly seen as a RW villain.

But Huffington and her staff have a right to hire, use, and promote who or whatever they want. And we have a right to bitch and moan over it. We have a right to protest it. And we have a right to not give her and her site views. It is up to you.

But that is not where this story comes to rest. Oh, no. Breitbart then chose to be Andrew Breitbart. A choice few sane people would make. At this juncture, having been given cover and support, and a nod from Huffington, that she was his defender, he now chose to rip into a favorite punching bag of the lowest common denominator of RW punditry, Mr. Van Jones. (Van Jones was in the Obama admin, before being driven out by mischaracterizations, and smears, which continue to this day. See Andrew Breitbart.)

That is when Huffington let loose and allowed the proverbial shit to hit the fan. With the nasty, as is the norm from Breitbart, comments shared with the world, mocking and deriding Van Jones, Huffington Post announced that Ariana's good friend was off the front page. He was welcome to stay, but he would be in the back with the rest of the work a day bloggers, slaving away for HuffPo.

Everything he says about everyone else, no biggie. The injury to the president, the dishonesty in his work...eh. Slag off her DEARER friend....you're out of here.

That's nice.

Now if you go to the science and medical sections of HuffPo, you will find compromised work, with the likes of AntiVaxers and Chopra peddling bull to the masses. I do expect a lot more from the political end. There are fine people who work there, like Howard Fineman. But to let Breitbart get that kind of elevation is both sad and wrong. And then to yank him back only after he hurts you're friend...? ...Fuck that speaks so poorly of you.

It is akin to NPR and Juan Williams. Based on every statement, claim he made on FOX News, and how he went on seemingly as a rep of NPR, the brass at NPR had a right to dump him. Waiting until after William’s comments on Muslims were made just helped make NPR look petty.

Ariana now looks petty. HuffPo looks petty. And this follows on looking more like a joke with the endorsement given to Breitbart.

Badly done HuffPo.

The hell? I left a blog in here?

2011-03-25T03:25:00.000-05:00

Well there has been a break since my last...oh, hell...I got distracted...then busy...

,,,Anywho...

What was I talking about before...doesn't really matter, so let's just get a post in, hmm?

Kind of have to like this photo op for the president.

He is getting ready for a meet and greet. But to me it says, when you're the president of the whole damn country, and have to go, you are the front of the line.

Cue rim shot. Wacka wacka.

The unintentional humor of religion and bureaucracy.

2010-07-16T15:24:00.000-05:00

This is a funny picture.

In 1973 the Catholic Church, the Youth Movement had a simple little logo. It is just so 70's.

Oddly, in looking at it now, it could easily be thought to be NSFW. The change of perspective and perception.

More Mitchell and Webb coming

2010-07-13T14:46:00.000-05:00

New series of there show is coming. The promo just makes you want it all now.

Another review and snark.

2010-07-08T13:33:00.000-05:00

Another fun review source is from That Guy With The Glasses, and particularly, the Nostalgia Critic. He's a little weird and plenty goofy, but wit and snark are always a joy to behold.

A look at part 1 of the the reviewing of Hook.

Bond...Snark Bond

2010-07-08T13:19:00.001-05:00

The Agony Booth does some good reviews, picking apart movies and TV with humor and snark. And some are some nice lengthy articles that are a hoot.

They have also started some video reviews. This one from Mr. Meno, looking at 007 in The Man with the Golden Gun. Not the finest outing from Her Majesties best.

Glenn Beck: Fleecing the god fearing, the armed forces supporters, and the rest of the country.

2010-07-05T02:45:00.000-05:00

Crooks and Liars:

...

Well, he's really stepping in it this time. He's asking his fans to make donations to a military charity to fund a rally in Washington D.C. - the only problem is that the rally is nothing more than a release party for his new book and well...I'll let GottaLaff tell the rest of the story, keying off this audio report from Bill Press:

[audio at link] ...

Classy, classy Glenn.

...

Yes, you heard right. Beck doesn’t even have a permit for The Big Rally yet. They’ve applied, but they’re still in negotiations. Yet, they’re selling merchandise as if it’s a done deal. He’s selling stuff for an event that may never take place.

It’s also not being held at the Lincoln Memorial, but at the reflecting pool, across the street. Glenn Beck is lying about the location of the rally.

And finally, he’s exploiting a charity by soliciting contributions to the Special Operations Warrior Foundation. But see, the fine print says all contributions will first be applied to the rally, the one with Sarah Palin. All contributions in excess of the costs will go to the troops.

Let’s recap:
–He’s desecrating the memory of Martin Luther King and Abraham Lincoln;
–He’s lying to the (gullible) American people who still choose to give him an ounce of credibility, and
–He’s using a charity set up to raise money for members of the military, and then stealing the money he raises to pay for his little get together. Read on...

...

If only he could stay classy and go back to mocking children and women who lose there children. Remember the good old days he was just happy to openly fear and have contempt for minorities.

Happy Time with a puppy

2010-07-01T18:17:00.000-05:00

Here is a bit of joy, in watching a pup meet and challenge itself. "Who is that!"

Conservative Charm Offensive

2010-06-30T13:50:00.000-05:00

Republicans and those other conservatives they continue to woo are quite a lovely group, except for all of their positions and statements...and so much else.

There is the great hope Sharron Angle and her great ideas. She has finally done an interview (vid at link) where she has walked back some of her claims, and tried to justify others, including the kinda sorta dismantling social security. It is great to see her face challenges to her claims.

Boehner wants to join Sharon Angle in going after Social Security, the nation's social safety net. Still with the myth that system is broken and doomed...and in the way of war. Love Boehner's frankness. It is great to see how full of it a loathsome Reps are at heart.

And the Senate continues to choose the needs of the rich over the survival of those that are poor or in straits, between jobs. What champions. George Will loves this position, holding that unemployment support is not stimulative. Those poor people will never work if they aren't starving on the street...guess we know how will picks his manor staff. Will continues to amaze with his clear detachment from reality. But it is the conservative axiom, to help the poor is to weaken the workforce. Now, of course, when their is an oil spill and conservative jobs go bye bye, they really love that socialist support mechanism...cause...

Conservatives are so much those of the people...just richer and safer and able to ride out their ideologies impact. Lucky them.

Dog doing his thing

2010-06-22T16:44:00.000-05:00

Here is a cute video of a dog blind since a pup, and suffering other ailments, out playing fetch in the backyard. Lacks a sense, but living life and happy.

Finding the Gold Monkey

2010-06-22T01:52:00.001-05:00

Don't know if it makes me sad, a nerd, or just old...but I am giddy that the Tales of the Gold Monkey series is available now on DVD.

It was a short lived, but fun action show, with a bit of comedy from the late 80's. It starred Stephen Collins. Along with his adventurer pilot were spies, barmen, mechanics, tricksters, and all sorts you expect in a fun pulp tale.

Personally I loved the show, as it gave some of the period fun much like what was available through Indiana Jones, and other pulp adventure stories.

This show takes place in that fun magical near nonexistent time of the 20's, where major war was seen as a memory, and adventure, mystery, and the future were exciting.

I do really like this particular period. It is, as said a magical time. The big memories (world wars) of the age are around it, a decade out from WWI, which colors most every character in stories, but is far enough in the past that most have moved on and have built lives again, had kids, lived their dreams, etc., but it is part of the background forever. And another war is looming. Scary Germans. Aggressive Japanese. Officious Italians. And so on. And the tales that is told is smack dab in the center, the world oblivious of what is to come.

For stories like Gold Monkey, it is a story of the South Pacific, drawing on a variety of Pulp (with natives, traders, explorers, etc.), and the history of expanding Japanese power, and the colonial interest. Another shows I love that's like this is Tailspin. It also took this time and made it playful use of the related tropes. I loved the island home and its defenses (large guns guarding high mountain walls with a narrow pass for planes to get through), Baloo and his plane, and definitely that version of Shere Khan (an enjoyable Charles Foster Kane/Lex Luthor with big claws). It is a fun show to take a chance to catch when you can.

Then other tales that used the period are Anastasia (animated), which used a fantasy evil wizard with a lost princess and a mystic and wondrous Europe that never really was. I really liked the film. It had good animation, and I enjoyed the songs. Also it gave us a 1920's fairy tale. We need people to play with fantasy in history in this fun way more often.

As well, there is the Universal Horror series, like Dracula, Wolf Man, Frankenstein, etc. On into the war years these also made use of this long gone idea of a foggy Europe that was fool of werewolves, not Nazis. But it is an impossible time, kinda Victorian and kinda modern (for the day). It marks are ideas of the sorts of movies til this day.

Crimson Skies offered a alternate America of the time, with a disrupted nation, with sky pirates, zeppelins everywhere, and independent and fun states and site.

It is a fun period to enjoy. So I am glad to have this series out for me to enjoy again after all these years.

New season of Warehouse 13, YIPEE!

2010-06-18T12:51:00.000-05:00

I am eagerly anticapting the new seasons of scifi fun with new Eureka, and Warehouse 13. Both of which will be crossing over into each others series this summer. Both are starting up in the coming weeks.

Here is a fun bit dealing with one of the artifacts held in the warehouse.

Rush standard class act and Beck's self love society

2010-06-17T01:44:00.000-05:00

These two are charmers.

Following on the Beck example Limbaugh decided he needed to ridicule Obama's one daughter. I am startting to wonder if there other daughter is starting to feel slighted by the far right. Here for more or listen to the ass below.

Then Beck haw been on a role in a number of ways, but to see him declare himself great is a marvel. He is a great man, as he writes fiction, he is great as he is a truth speaker, or as his god talks through him to others.

But to see him declare that he is a new Martin Luther King Jr? Come on. He will be apart of the reclaiming of the Civil Rights Movement.

Really. He will reclaim it? Much like his country...when was the movement taken? While conservatives barred blacks and others from drugstore counters, while they were barring them from schools, or while they were setting dogs on blacks and others striving for civil rights? That is just lame on his part.

He compares himself to King, to Parks, and to Ghandi. And it makes me laugh. Because I could imagine him being around them in there day, and bringing them on his show. On the show he would yell at them for what they did and spoke out for. He would also be sure to challenge them as potential communist. Then, of course, he would be sure to challenge them on whether they were terrorist, or going to be trying to kill or harm people like him. Really cringe worthy media. NO doubt. But he has his little dream. Like the one were Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Paine would be his equals and respect and revere him...and not at all pants him, mock him, and denounce him as a troubled man.

So watch for 8-28 when he reclaims civil rights...for white people? I don't know...

Bad texting advise from Mitchell and Webb

2010-06-15T16:42:00.000-05:00

Another vid from Mitchell and Webb, and BBC Comedy.

Jason Bateman - Prom Date

2010-06-15T16:39:00.001-05:00

Bateman gets to team up with his old TV bro Will Arnett for an odd little short promoting Orbit gum.

It is odd, quirky, and a real laugh.

Orbit Dirty Shorts gives us - The Prom Date

We do need more Arrested Development. Or, at least, to bring the cast back together with the writers of the show to do some good comedy.

Being a wonder, Wonder Woman

2010-06-15T16:27:00.000-05:00

The top tier of women heroes, and in the top tier of the DC Comic heroes, she doesn't always get the respect she deserves from the fan base. More focus is put on her outfit, her looks, and how she sometimes gets seen as a dominatrix type. Not fair for a character with so much potential.

Here you can find a good list of collected stories of Wonder Woman to get into the character and her continuing story.

DC Women Kicking Ass

And some cool shoots of the warrior and inspiration for plenty of young girls.

She is cool, when written well. A vast pool of potential.

More Mitchell and Webb

2010-06-15T16:15:00.000-05:00

Some more from the Comedy pages of BBC.

Pit Ponies - The excitement never ends.

Knobshead Morning Visited - The tricks of the temperature knob and showerhead.

Scientology is not pro-Choice.

2010-06-15T01:16:00.000-05:00

There is no choice, only the rules. And the team players will enforce those rules, no matter what you think.

The troubling story of what happens to Sea Org members that become pregnant.

Vid from story.

Reading Orphan Annie?

2010-06-15T01:13:00.000-05:00

Have you been reading Little Orphan Annie? Probably not as it has been cancelled from the last of the papers it was carried in. Bye to that era.

Here is what was going on.

Yeah. Held by a Genocidal ex-soldier and lost. Remind you of the red dressed kid with the dog?

Read more.

Good luck Annie. You will need it.

Conservatives and Feminism

2010-06-15T01:07:00.000-05:00

There has been a new push for the idea of this being The Year of the Woman. Cue the fanfare. And it is a little odd as it is not as if women don't win primaries, and then multiple ones. Though this time the newbies are Reps, and that may be why. They are good at getting media to run in their preset rings. This is a push by Reps to push up minority members for government to try and seem more big tent, though we have not seen yet if this is more change or ploy. So we will see, and as we do the media is thrilled to have a new event for the moment to chat up.

This has also been a time that Palin continues to try and put herself up for a role as feminist extraordinare. She doesn't really get what feminism is or feminist are eager to work for. She definitely has no record to prove her claim, other than the one from birth stating she is female.

Is that enough. Femocracy looks at this in a series of post that just started. Look at the feminists and the conservatives.

...

And I've watched as Sarah Palin was first declared the final nail in the coffin of "liberal" feminism, only to pull a 180 and become the reviver of a "new kind" of feminism, as dubbed by the media. After the victories of Nikki Haley, Carly Fiorina, Meg Whitman and Sharron Angle, I've watched as women candidates winning became the culmination of feminism's efforts, yet was a "huge blow " to feminism since the outcome helped Republican women. And I've held off writing about it, mainly because the majority of commentators did what the media practically exists to do now, which is to vacillate wildly between extremes with little measured commentary or careful analysis. (I may be biased, but I think the only thoughtful commentary I've read is on websites with a feminist bent, or op-eds by actual feminists, who really focus on these issues and are better positioned to be experts on this sort of thing.) Since this is important to so many women, to the whole country really, I thought it wiser to take a step back, watch it unfold and think about it more deeply. That is, until I read Ross Douthat's column today and decided maybe it's time to formulate my own perspective.

...

Conservative Bad Sportsmanship Olympics

2010-06-12T22:13:00.000-05:00

The World Cup is here. Time for some football, or soccer. The varying nationals from across the world are vying to be the winner of the cup. And over the passed so many cups, USA has been in the running, not in the long run, but their is hope.

So with America taking on the world for glory, honor, and bragging rights...you'd think conservatives would be racing to join in. But if you have seen the reaction to the Olympics...their team spirit is meager at best. Hell their Christmas spirit only persists so as to force it on to others.

So the World Cup...not eager? Worse, they are going after it like it has oil it wants.

From Media Matters their is a collection of the attacks, one more loopy then the last.

Beck looks at the World Cup like Obama. Nobody wants it! Go away! We don't like you! Yeesh! Could Beck be more pissy? The answer is yes, but this is lame. How dare soccer exist! How dare they compete! How dare any American would be involved! But those 3 sentences do fit the opinion of some many of us about Beck.

Liddy (the thief, liar, and advocate of murdering federal agents) calls the game primitive and unAmerican. Meaning lying, thieving, and threatening people's lives is true Americana. And the guest on his show called soccer a game of the violent and unruly. How much cheaper can you get in trying to imply the lesser humanity of those outside your own borders? This is a lovely look at the face behind the dull mask of conservationism.

And the temp Limbaugh went further down the road of conservative minds declaring soccer the game of the poor. Really. First, huh? American football or baseball, the sport of kings? Hockey, the game of the urban elite?Yeah, many kids who love and play soccer around the world are poor. So? My dad was a poor kid cobbling together a ball to play with, and that makes the game bad? The multitude taking sticks to stand in as the edges of goals are lame? Are the kids finding a stick to act as a bat proof of the lameness of baseball. Or is that part of its greatness?

This is just what conservatives are up to these days. You can't just disagree. You have to hate your opponent. You can't just hate your opponent. You have to hate and fear everyone not you in the world. And you can't just hate the person you have to hate the sport that there young kid plays and anything and anyone tied to it. There is little that is not sick or messed up with modern conservatism. It is hard to understand how they let themselves get here, or how they can go back to sanity,

BP Fat Cats

2010-06-12T20:22:00.000-05:00

Respectful Insolence points to this cute and funny vid:

Those fat cats.

The Cantina just got weirder

2010-06-12T20:06:00.000-05:00

Adidas ad using Star Wars.

Hate when the kids come during Spring Break.

That pious reaction to gays

2010-06-11T23:47:00.001-05:00

It is odd to see how the more ethical and moral see homosexuality.

Andrew Sullivan:

Here's a charming editorial in the official paper of the Archdiocese of Boston arguing in defense of barring the children of same-sex married couples from Catholic schools. One of the uglier passages:

The third reason is that it seemed a real danger that the boy being raised by the same-sex couple would bring to school something obscene or pornographic, or refer to such things in conversation, as they go along with the same-sex lifestyle, which--as not being related to procreation-- is inherently eroticized and pornographic. He might expose other children to such things, as he might easily have encountered them in his household.

Really? One wonders whether the author has ever spent any time with a married same-sex couple with children. Well, one doesn't wonder. But here's the real kicker:

It was inevitable that either the teacher, or some parent, would deal with the two men in such a way as implicitly to teach my son, or other children in the class, that there is nothing wrong with same-sex relationships. But this is scandal: that is, leading a “little one” astray in some serious matter by the example you set.

Yes, this is what "leading a 'little one' astray" conjures up in the mind of a theocon in the archdiocese once run by pedophile protector - and curia member - Bernard Law. More reaction here.

Abusive priest aren't a problem. The presence of a child aware of how complicated sexuality, love, or family is...a horror. Lovely.

Then we have our representatives. One congressional chairman, and a Dem, is disturbed about informing kids about gays. He pondered, "what will mommy and daddy have to say"? When kids have question...they might need answers...and then then parents will need to teach and share their values and understanding...again...

THE HORROR!!!!

And the idea of sex ed in school where it would be handled and inform kids in a calm and honest manner, that is a HORROR!!! as well. I can't help but see these people as plain scared of there kids being informed about how other social structures work, or how their own bodies operate. EEK!

Maybe it is time for them to just say that they are scared of change, differences, and things they do not understand. Maybe then those with some more compassion can help them out.

David Mitchell and Authenticity

2010-06-11T22:14:00.000-05:00

David Mitchell's Soapbox allows him to spend a few minutes wittily discussing things that confuse and vex him, while give us all a laugh.

This week he is troubled by the quest to be authentic.

A Hypatia tale

2010-06-08T20:47:00.000-05:00

I do want to see this film, Agora, a nice tale about the historical figure, Hypatia.

Mitchell and Webb hijinks

2010-06-08T19:45:00.000-05:00

Here are some humorous vids done by Mitchell and Webb for the BBC.

Almeratron - Less than Meets the Eye

Flightless Bird - Evolution might have been a bad idea.

Whitening America

2010-06-08T19:40:00.000-05:00

Roger Ebert wrote a very nice piece considering the new controversy in New Mexico, where a school mural is under attack for having racial diversity. The attitude of many local residence to the mural and the diversity in town and in school is a sad reminder of how we are truly not in a post racial world. You see a push is going to whiten the mural and remove all that unnecessary ethnicity.

Ebert gives us some good thoughts to read through and reflect on.

How would I feel if I were a brown student at Miller Valley Elementary School in Prescott, Arizona? A mural was created to depict some of the actual students in the school.

Let's say I was one of the lucky ones. The mural took shape, and as my face became recognizable, I took some kidding from my classmates and a smile from a pretty girl I liked.

My parents even came over one day to have a look and take some photos to e-mail to the family. The mural was shown on TV, and everybody could see that it was me.

Then a City Councilman named Steve Blair went on his local radio talk show and made some comments about the mural. I didn't hear him, but I can guess what he said. ...

Sacrifice the Weatherman!

2010-06-08T14:54:00.000-05:00

Armstrong and Miller sketch on the plight of weathermen and the public voice at the BBC.

Text now on sacrificing the weatherman.

Blocking moves

2010-06-08T14:49:00.000-05:00

Juan Cole takes note of another attempt to circumvent the Israeli blockade of Gaza.

This time from a Jewish group in Germany.

What I found interesting is how Israel seems to be actively working to prevent Jewish immigration to places like Germany. It seems strange to try and force everyone of the Jewish heritage that wants to immigrate to feel obliged to go exclusively to Israel. Currently the Jewish population of Germany is burgeoning, which seems to trouble officials in Israel.

Seems like a strange attitude.

Astroprank

2010-06-03T08:46:00.000-05:00

Great prank at Carleton College in Minnesota.

Turn the observatory into R2D2.

Holmesian Skeptism

2010-06-02T02:03:00.000-05:00

Among the enjoyable aspects of the latest variation of Holmes is the maintaining of his skeptical and logical view. As he faces the fear of many that demonic forces are at work, he looks beyond it all to the truth. It is nice to see, as it is in the case of the Baskervilles and of the Sussex Vampire.

Another one I didn't know before now is within the 1944 film, The Scarlet Claw, with Bail Rathbone. He faces an assumed phantom out to ripe the throats of his victims.

Best is how Holmes enters the story. In Quebec, he is meeting an Occult Society. He is talked down to by the groups leader. He is seen as a skeptic. He is closed minded. He won't see the facts. Sound familiar. Holmes takes it all with humor and calm repose. He tries to make clear that he wants to just see facts, as without them there is no reason to believe the idea of the supernatural. And when he is given "proof", that a bell is known to have wrong in a given village, then the next day sheep were found murdered, he is unimpressed. In fact he deduces the events that would follow the tolling bells, heck as a lover of scary stories many of us could. He excepts that the bell did ring. He accepts the sheep were slaughtered. But how that proves the supernatural? Well? That action only confirms the true believers contentions about him.

It shows me why I have loved the character, and like this outing all the more. As Rathbone's Holmes does say, "It is elementary, my dear Watson." A skeptical Holmes is a great Holmes. We need more!

Oz is gonna blacklist you

2010-06-01T15:20:00.000-05:00

AMERICAblog notes the changes to access that are coming to Australia.

The government's $128.8 million Cyber Safety policy includes forcing internet service providers to block access to a secret blacklist of website pages...

A new policy to enact a listing that all providers must use. A secret list? Why secret? So people won't complain, or know the focus?

...

Web pages will be nominated for blacklisting by Australian internet users who come across illegal or ''unacceptable'' websites.

...

Great so people will nominate. Almost Athenian. So a site that gets a complaint is all it takes to be wiped from the Aussie net? Wow. How is this considered good?

Sinkhole or Superweapon?

2010-06-01T15:11:00.000-05:00

WOW!

It looks like a doctored image, but it is not.

Guatemala City, rain, and sink hole.

And not being able to see the bottom just plays with your head.

So the Silurians striking, the Mole Men in revolt, Mole Man seeking the FF, Darkseid enacting a plan?

Just the environment doing its thing. But always a bit creepy to imagine opening before you or under you.

How she learned to love not being respected.

2010-06-01T02:49:00.000-05:00

Hathor Legacy took note of a pretty sad case of a woman who ran afoul of traditional marriage.

See she thought she was "feminist" about her relationship, which she seems to mean she actually expected to be respected, and treated with equality.

...

A female graduate asked to speak about what her time at SCSL meant to her, said she had felt that she was “pretty much all right” when she came to SCSL and came to get closer to god and learn about faith. “But,” she said, “I used to be kind of a feminist about relationships, because when I was a child, I saw women being weak in relationships and I decided I didn’t want to be like that, and then when I went to the marriage class, I learned how marriage works best when the man is the head and women are submissive and that’s not being weak.”

...

What a great thing marriage classes are. You learn so much, like how to not look your husband in the eyes, and walk behind them. It's just better that way...apparently. I guess some guys will stop hitting you if you do. Not really a good argument.

But it reminds me of so much from conservative thinking. Women should be at home. Women need to focus on kids. No gay families. No birth control. No ability to choose and control what happens with ones (ladies only) body. It is a strange patter, by which I mean troubling. Some in society need to change, for conservatives. And those people (in order of needed change) are women, minorities, men who don't want to "restore" society, Just charming.

It's all just charming.

Newt Gingrich: The Crap Historian and His Friends

2010-06-01T02:36:00.000-05:00

Not a historian of crap, I can respect them. But Newt Gingrich, who claims to be a man of knowledge and thought, has proven himself just that a crap historian. I won't comment on his alternate history fiction, as I have never read it. But in dealing with politics he seems to deal with yet another alternate reality. He should leave it in the fiction isle.

But he does not, he peddles it at podiums, on TV, and in the papers. He is so quickly to throw out comparisons to Nazis. Beck does to, but he is an acknowledged twit. Gingrich likes to play as the better man of conservatism.

Gingrich: “The Secular Socialist Machine Represents As Great A Threat To America As Nazi Germany”

Wallace: You also write this on the screen: “The secular socialist machine represents as great a threat to America as Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union once did.” Mr. Speaker, respectfully, isn’t that wildly over the top?

Gingrich: No, not if by America you mean….Just listen to President Obama’s language. He gets to decide who earns how much. He gets to decide when it’s too much.

This is all just crap. Obama decides how much you or I make? Bull. Maybe he's worried about the bonuses of those poor BP execs. Maybe he is scared for the owner of the Massey mines, and his estate. Maybe he is worried about having to pay his own taxes. Pathetic playing up of fears.

And secular socialist? The two chimes of our modern conservatives. Evil secularist, not good Christians. Socialist, not true Capitalist Conservatives. Oh, those banes on us all.

Really, Newt? This is what you peddle. What a sad weasel he is.

PZ Myers has some good thoughts on this lot. Read the quote he has from Sinclair Lewis. It is amazing how apt it is in comparison to today.

...

The book can be summarized in this misattributed quote (Lewis didn't actually say it, but it is a perfect description of our situation):

When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.

Look at America today, and we're seeing this phenomenon in progress: think tanks, ideologues, and religious fanatics are insistent that we are a Christian nation — when we are most afraid of external threats, what do they do? Entangle the country deeper in the web of the sacred. ...

A wrapped in the flag, with a cross over the shoulder? That is Newt, that is Beck, that is O'Reilly, that is Hannity, and so many others. They cry out for their Christianity, their Christian nation, and their Christian god.
They do harp on and demand special respect for it all...for the sake of all Americans. And when the other is acknowledged, or when faith is not heralded is just the right manner, it is a true state offenses. Ridiculous. And also not new.

Also I like that Myers notes the history that goes along with this religious fervor. Like with the National Day of Prayer, God on money, etc. It is of interest to me as so often I see the pious seek to talk about the various presidential proclamations or Congressional declarations requesting prayers goings back through the centuries. And it is true, these request have been made. But the National Day of Prayers, and other pushes to acknowledge Christianity have come from the likes of the Cold War terror and paranoia, not the wishes of the Founding Fathers, despite some wishes that it were otherwise. These choices made in government during the middle of the 20th century were wrong, made in error and out of fear. Lines were crossed. And for some pious it is a fear they hold as they lay down for the night...the lines may be recrossed...and the country may truly be a secular one, that won't put there interest over that of the whole.

Quack Toon

2010-06-01T02:05:00.000-05:00

A funny little comic strip look at the UK Anti-Vax Quack Andrew Wakefield.

The Facts In The Case Of Dr. Andrew Wakefield

Untraditions

2010-06-01T02:01:00.000-05:00

From Cracked.com a list:

6 Supposedly Ancient Traditions (That Totally Aren't)

Thanksgiving, The Pledge, Bushido, etc.

Trouble on the waters: Flotilla edition

2010-06-01T01:48:00.000-05:00

Troubling business on the3 way to Gaza. A series of ships were heading to Gaza with the stated claim of giving relief support to an embargoed people. Israel responded poorly to this, and sent forces to stop them. Dropping troops on a ship fighting broke out leave around 19 of those on the ship dead.

Some coverage:

Badass Israel

There is a move to portrait Israeli forces as victims, attacked as they boarded the ship. But the trouble is that the boarded a private ship, in international waters, in violation of no laws. And they boarded armed intent on taking over the ship. They started in the wrong, and proceeded to escalate.

Videos Of The Raid

Video has been released to show how those aboard acted. And they were definitely violent in reaction to the Israelis. But the Israelis were highly trained, highly disciplined, highly armed, and highly resourced opponents. They had all the advantages. They could sink the ships, knock out there propulsion, tow them off, give political pressure, etc. But they flew out, threatened and dropped down into a throng of angry and resentful folks. They sought a fight, or to scare.

Israel Meets Its Own Fist

The trouble is that Israel wanted to show its strength and resolve. And they have. But it has been in a way that has created disgust and anger in many places around the world. Turkey has now turned upset, as the originator of the ship, and some of its nationals injured. And there is news Americans were aboard and at least one was injured. And the UN will be meeting on this.

It will be curious to see how Israel changes its reaction and stance, and how its allies and enemies as well.

Horror Host fun

2010-05-29T03:10:00.000-05:00

Came across some fun had by Neil Gaiman and Malena Teves during filming host segments for a Monster Movie marathon. Funny stuff with Teves.

It was to use with documentary over the Horror Host. And as I have said before I love a fun horror film, and really love a good horror host. It is just a pain that I cannot see them on TV around here. But there is some access on the net. But looking at the doc, American Scary, I will have to get it and enjoy.

And I now found I can watch old Elvira's on YouTube. Cool. Hope to find more old classics, and new ghouls.

Dog finds friend

2010-05-29T01:52:00.000-05:00

Cute vid of a dog in desperate need of aid. The very end of the video shows what the dog took away from the event.

Aww.

Bechdeling your movies

2010-05-27T19:50:00.000-05:00

A fun and useful primer on the Bechdel Test from Feminist Frequency.

The test is always interesting, as it provokes some people. The point is that is NOT to show a good movie, a pro-Women flick, or a fun scene. The point is, does the script take any consideration of women as anything else than a romantic cog, a being focused on a male lead, or a sexual being. Not that being in a romance is bad, or being sexual. But what interest was there in the females of the story?

As can be pointed out. There are films where guys get a short shrift to, with no focus on any additional dimensions to their character. Very true. The problem is, is that this is an EXCEPTION. With women it far too often is shown to be the RULE. So all movies have to pass the test? NO. Of course not. It isn't a judgement as such. It is just an indicator. One that should make one ask, is there something wrong with how things are done? Can scriptwriters take this issue to heart and accommodate change? Can producers pull their heads out of their asses?

Because women do not get enough respect in Entertainment it seems.

Even in the comic movie world it is a pain. After the Wonder Woman Direct to DVD movie came out, it was decided to just dump ALL the female hero movies on the way into production. Why? Is it because it bombed in the stores? No. It was because it didn't make its money as fast as teh Batman, Superman, and Justice League DVD's. It made the money just not as fast. So all the other plans were scrapped. How often is this sort of excuse trotted out by the execs to push back against female leads in motion pictures? Too often.

Take the test during your next matinee visit.

What you pay for.

2010-05-27T18:48:00.000-05:00

Here is a good quick look at some of the prices we pay day to day that we should be thinking about.

Top 5 Retail Markups

No surprise, people pay a lot to get organic, drink bottled water, and get coffee on the go at places like Starbucks.

Here's what I do, get a bottle that had water, if I must, or sody pop, and reuse to carry around tap water, and reuse, and reuse, and reuse... Thing is I love the standard pop bottle design. They are less awkward, hold the liquid at bay, sit in a car, and come with the price of a drink, compared to awkward ones in the dining items area of a store.

Riffing on Metroid

2010-05-27T18:43:00.000-05:00

Here is a fun little editted together piece from the newer version of the game Metroid. It was melded with a collection of riffs from Mike Nelson, Bill Corbett, and Kevin Murphy. It is an excellent editing job and damn funny.

Telecom attack on Net Neutrality

2010-05-12T02:59:00.000-05:00

An interesting look from ThinkProgress to the plans of the telecoms to react to moves to defend access to the internet.

Unsurprising, it involves getting you scared.

Did you know we are going down the road of China to control your access to knowledge? (The corps will save you though. They're great like that.)

Did you know the Man is out to get you? (The corps don't like the Man. They want to fight the Man. Put this suit on, put this tie on, and join the fight against the Man.)

More Star Wars Fun

2010-05-12T02:52:00.002-05:00

Eddie Izzard - The Death Star Canteen

Trouble with Facebook

2010-05-12T02:48:00.000-05:00

I have been tempted at times to try Facebook. But I am not sure how useful it would be for me. And more there are too many stories of security issues. Then there are the issues with how Facebook uses your personal information, or how it changes privacy controls without warning.

Good look at the issue.

New Ice Ages

2010-05-12T02:20:00.000-05:00

Here is a good page discussing the myth that scientist a few decades back believed that we were heading towards a new ice age threat. This plays into attacks on Climate Change, particularly from those that like to go and tar scientist.

But apparently the media loved the story far more than any group of scientist. No support agreement from the institutes, who saw the C02 threat pointing to increased warming then.

But it is such a great libertarian punching bag.

Becking it up

2010-05-12T02:15:00.000-05:00

It is worthwhile to keep in mind the crap Glenn Beck spouts.

Beware the schools, get the kids out! Yeah. The schools are lying and poisoning kids minds. It is full of lies Glenn knows. Also the only place people are racing to get to for immigration, or to sneak into is America...really, I heard it from Glenn Beck.

Then there is the secret report that Sec Sebilius was hiding, not really. But Glenn knows the truth.

And then net neutrality. Did you know it is all a secret liberal plot to take over the internet and control your free speech? Glenn Beck does.

And remember Glenn himself says he takes none of it seriously. But people are affected and believe his rants.

NonChristian Nation

2010-05-12T02:05:00.000-05:00

I enjoyed Phil Plaitt's look at the fact...

We are not a Christian nation

It is a thoughtful and good look at the silliness of the claims that we are. And I always enjoy the inevitable complaints in his comments when he talk about things other than astronomy. Apparently he should know better. He does, and that is why the good doctor speaks his mind.

Election Night Fun

2010-05-06T19:21:00.002-05:00

From Blackadder the Third - Election Night for the Adder Party.

Star Wars fun

2010-05-06T03:06:00.002-05:00

Here is the original Star Wars trilogy...in two minutes...in LEGO.

Ta da.

Burn Notice Promos

2010-05-06T03:04:00.000-05:00

They have some fun promos for the USA Network, blending Burn Notice, Psych, White Collar, etc.

First Look.

National Day of Reason 2010

2010-05-06T02:58:00.000-05:00

Happy National Day of Reason...or howdie NDR...

National Day of Reason

Reason it out.

Net Neutrality news

2010-05-06T02:55:00.000-05:00

Will we be regulating broadband lines?

And I love the threat from telecoms that they will fight in court and cut investment in infrastructure. If they won't maintain and do their duty...maybe they should have their prizes returned to the government to run, or to pass out to those willing to actually do the job.

A thought.

When being Jewish isn't Christian enough.

2010-05-05T02:33:00.000-05:00

FOX likes to play the great defender of Christianity (except when they need to be the Judeo-Christian defender). It does lead the defense in matters like "the War on Christmas". They have found another reason to howl about the White House and President Obama. They are not acknowledged Christianity again. Remember, they have plenty of excuses, from meeting atheist to not enough vigor over a prayer day. But this...

Media Matters:

...

But if you click through the image, you discover a report about how the White House has not included the phrase "in the year of our Lord" in a proclamation... declaring May as Jewish American Heritage Month.

...

So in honoring a cultural heritage of Jews in the US, Obama and the White House didn't pause to proclaim the glory of the Christian god. That is gall. But it is also all FOX.

When it comes to attacking Obama, there are no holds barred, and no apologizes.

Year of our Lord. Tradition for religious sake. And Christianity, a continuing majority, and ever the victim.

Why are people listening to Brownie?

2010-05-05T02:16:00.001-05:00

Michael Brown, was over his head as the head of FEMA. When Katrina hit things were bad.

But he, like so many Cheney and Rove lackies, want to pop up now and do there part going after Pres. Obama.

And Brownie is just full of it.

He claims that Obama wanted the oil to get out and cause damage to fulfill his secret ends to end off shore drilling. It's all a plot. A ploy. A load of crap from him and others like Limbaugh.

Even other Reps want to keep there distance. And let others do the damage...

What is fun though is to listen to his little tirade. If you listen when he hits his stride in attacks the president he starts talking about how many days since the event that Obama did this and that. But what he says is the number of days since the storm, and then he corrects and continues.

The storm? Hello Freud.

Beautiful. We all know what his real beef is.

Better was Gibbs yesterday, just rhetorically spanking a FOX reporter for how the channel is handling claims like this. Oh yeah.

Thankfully, he does seem to be a joke.

Great Whiner

2010-05-05T02:07:00.000-05:00

It is almost funny to watch Beck now. He is loosing financial support, viewers, and now he is just whining about how people don't take him serious and give him the attention he deserves.

Crooks and Liars:

Waaaahmbulance, stat! Glenn Beck whines that 'the press' doesn't take his conspiracy theories seriously

Interesting and fun video series

2010-05-05T01:45:00.002-05:00

This is a fun 6 episode series online. God, Inc.

Episode 1

Reminder about Minnesota GOP

2010-05-05T01:44:00.000-05:00

Next Republican vying to be governor of Minnesota...is an interesting type.

Not the good interesting.

The Minnesota Republican Party's official candidate to succeed Gov. Tim Pawlenty, who is looking ahead to a 2012 run for President, is a staunch conservative well to Pawlenty's right who has a long history of "Tentherism," the attempts by the far right-wing to invoke the Tenth Amendment and nullify federal laws on various liberal initiatives. He has even proposed a state constitutional amendment that would allow federal laws to operate in Minnesota only if they were consented to by super-majorities of the state legislature.

...

Who needs Federal law? And who needs this twit in Minnesota?

Miranda...sounds foreign

2010-05-05T01:38:00.000-05:00

In the wake of the scare in Time's Square, Reps had a choice. Help calm people, help bring the antagonist to justice, help answer the why's and wherefores, or just plain not help.

Guess where the Reps went.

So what were their first concerns afterwards? Was the blighter mirandized? This is a step taken by rule with those taken in for arrest. A must, by law. But was he mirandized? Like McVeigh once was. Like Dahlmer once was. Like Capone once was. Like some many villains have and will be (hopefully, less conservatives have there way).

But that was the panicked question from Rep. Peter King, and then Sen. John McCain. And so the game continues on.

As before, does it matter that we get useful information? No. That we have caught the near do well? Hell no.

It is a matter of not using any and all means to get info, squeeze it all out. Let us not think about what that means. Heavens no. We do it for England...Or America...Or whatever. Stiff upper lips, carry on.

Then Lieberman leaped in and wants new law. He wants to strip some of citizenship for their connections, it is unclear if the perceived connection will be enough.

So consider the issues. Do we allow, at the very least, US citizens there rights under the law? When the crime if very severe? Are we a nation of laws or not? You can't piss around. One or the other.

And as to stripping peoples citizenship, and rights... So you take a person, you suspect them of a crime. Then you strip away rights, citizenship, etc. Then after all of this, you look into whether they are actually guilty or not, or if there is any possibility. Then after judging the innocent get their rights back.

Is that how we want to work. Where is the line? Who can and cannot be a citizen now? Or in the future?

The changing tunes of Reps in need

2010-05-05T01:15:00.000-05:00

In the wake of oil seeping through the gulf towards their realms, some Republicans see the light suddenly. Hallelujah.

Through oil-fouled water, big government looks better and better

Sen. Vitter - Doesn't want BP to have to take on a cruel burden...Hello Feds.
Gov. Jindahl - Wants the Feds to start to plan for how they will those in need...him.
Same with Sen. Shelby, Sen. Sessions, Sen. LeMieux, and Rep. Miller - Feds will act.

Heck some have even called for BP to pay plenty out. What happen to tort reform, not bleeding the poor corps?

The times they are a'changing...until tomorrow.

A Look in the Glenn Beck closet

2010-05-05T01:02:00.000-05:00

Here is a "fun" slide show looking at the work of a fellow that Beck thinks quite highly of. It is one W. Cleon Skousen, who is a pretty twisted fellow. Not to mention is view of history.

Take a look at the slideshow.

Right-wing historian W. Cleon Skousen has seen a posthumous rise in popularity thanks to Fox News host Glenn Beck, who has praised Skousen's book The 5000 Year Leap and said that the 9 principles and 12 values of his 912 Project were inspired by Skousen's "28 principles of freedom." As MoJo's Stephanie Mencimer reports, demand for the constitutional seminars offered by Skousen's National Center for Constitutional Studies has more than tripled since the Tea Party movement took off. A new edition of The 5000 Year Leap (with a foreward by Beck) is flying off the shelves.

So what does Skousen's version of American history look like, exactly? A reading of Skousen's 1986 textbook, The Making of America, and its corresponding workbook, reveal a revisionist—and racially charged—narrative that's pretty different from the one most Americans study in school.

Obama and Net Neutrality

2010-05-05T00:57:00.001-05:00

Here are some updates on the state of Net Neutrality, the work and guarantee on internet access.

Bad News on Net Neutrality
The courts aren't friendly to the prospect and have opposed the FEC. Meaning the telecoms would keep control of who has access.

Obama Administration to break promise and cave to telecoms, leave the Internet unprotected?
It is not clear if Obama will continue to fight on this.

In early April, a federal court stripped the FCC of its power to regulate the Internet. Now it seems the Obama administration is considering doing nothing in response, giving power over our Internet to the greedy phone and cable companies.

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ADDENDUM:

Another story - Obama FCC Expected to Abandon Net Neutrality, Universal Internet

Enterprise in low orbit

2010-04-29T22:03:00.000-05:00

Here is a fun video found on MyOuterSpace.com. The Enterprise flies!

Religion, Marriage, and Sex

2010-04-29T21:57:00.000-05:00

PZ Myers looks at a quote and a common religious argument about marital duties.

Apparently you have to have sex, if you are married. You just do. It's a chore and job you are obliged to engage in. I can't help, but wonder if the guy feels the same way when he's not in the mood. Or is it completely different.

It is all charming. First, I can guess he fails to engage his partner to woo them, to entice them, to build interest in him. Sad. And if someone doesn't want to do it and says no...What then? I would like to hear about that.

Ironically there are often uses of this logic brought into law. It is strange.