Saturday, October 31, 2015

Intelligent Vampires

Intelligent design:

  • Joe finds a computer and sees that the computer is irreducibly complex.

  • Joe claims that because the computer contains irreducible complexity, it can be inferred that it was designed by intelligent vampires.

  • Dan retorts "but wait. How do you know that intelligent vampires will create designs that are irreducibly complex?"

What Does Science Say About Vampires?

As the weather cools and Halloween approaches, creaks in the stairs and scary stories become more believable -- but not to physics professor Costas Efthimiou.


The laws of physics and math debunk popular myths about ghosts and vampires, according to a paper published by Efthimiou and Sohang Gandhi last year.

Using Isaac Newton's Laws of Motion, Efthimiou demonstrates that ghosts would not be able to walk and pass through walls. Basic math disproves the legend of humans turning into vampires after they are bitten, Efthimiou explains, because the entire human population in 1600 would have been wiped out in less than three years.

Friday, October 30, 2015

Can Ideas Have Consequences?

This past weekend, more than 1,500 people attended the National Conference on Christian Apologetics in Charlotte, NC. The theme was "Ideas Have Consequences." Among the speakers was Discovery Institute Fellow Paul Nelson, who gave three separate presentations to highly engaged and enthusiastic attendees. His first session was a premier screening of Living Waters: Intelligent Design in the Oceans of the Earth, in partnership with Illustra Media. This beautifully filmed and wonderfully narrated documentary shows marvelous examples of design in dolphins, turtles, salmon, and whales.

The crowd of over a hundred at the screening thoroughly enjoyed the film. In the Q&A session afterward, Dr. Nelson received many positive comments and excellent queries about current evolutionary explanations for the origin of Cetaceans, how to promote Illustra films, and what people can do to encourage discussions on the evidence for design in nature and the shortcomings of materialist philosophy.
There is more. I read it all and I don't understand any of it. I don't understand how ideas can have consequences, unless you are using the definition "a conclusion derived through logic". I think that actions based on ideas can have consequences.

The only thing that makes sense of this nonsense is that it is produced by The Discovery Institute. How dare they use the URL evolutionnews.org.

Christian Apologetics really are the worst. Their writings are total word salad. They make Sarah Palin look good. I dare you to read Dave Armstrong.

Duping theologians:
In 2012, atheist philosopher Maarten Boudry committed a Sokal-style hoax against a theology conference[12] by submitting an intentionally absurd abstract, under an anagrammatic pseudonym,[13] that was promptly accepted.[14] Conference abstracts are not subject to peer-review, so getting this sort of material under the radar isn't as difficult as it might seem - and should a conference be desperate for the numbers, they might just accept any old rubbish to fill the slots. Yet, even a casual read-through of Boudry's abstract shows it to be clearly a load of nonsense. The opening sentences form a semi-coherent screed about Darwinian evolution:
In the Darwinian perspective, order is not immanent in reality, but it is a self-affirming aspect of reality in so far as it is experienced by situated subjects. However, it is not so much reality that is self-affirming, but the creative order structuring reality which manifests itself to us.
Boudry even managed to shoehorn Dawkins' name into the abstract, too, suggesting that we should "reframe our sense of locatedness of existence within a the space of radical contingency of spiritual destiny"[sic] — which is, somehow, contrary to Dawkins' own assertions. The lesson to draw from this? sometimes, "expertise" really means "using big words," and it doesn't take much to impress people who are eager to have their own views reinforced no matter what. As Jerry Coyne noted:
I defy you to understand what he’s saying, but of course it appeals to those who, steeped in Sophisticated Theology™, love a lot of big words that say nothing but somehow seem to criticize materialism while affirming the divine. It doesn’t hurt if you diss Dawkins a couple of times, either.

Jerry Coyne On Atheists, Antitheists, And Humanists

Self-abasing atheist at the Guardian calls atheism is a “leap of faith”:
Failure to accept gods is no more a leap of faith than is doubting the existence of the Loch Ness Monster, Bigfoot, or Santa Claus. It’s not “faith” when you refuse to accept a proposition for which there’s no evidence.

In general I agree with Oluo’s thesis that atheism usually jibes with a liberal outlook. Many conservative political views derive at bottom from religion. And there’s a lot of evidence that religion is often an outgrowth of social injustice: the heart of a heartless world. Ergo, if you’re an antitheist and want to work towards the abolition of faith, one way to do that is to improve the lives of the impoverished and dispossessed.

But not all atheists are antitheists, and not all of them accept the connection between social well-being and nonbelief. Atheism is simply the refusal to accept supernatural deities, and there are plenty of conservative atheists. The view that this life is all we have, and that we should help our fellow creatures, is not atheism but humanism.

Thursday, October 29, 2015

Quote Of Note - Gail Collins

"Every seasoned politician is good at answering a difficult question with the answer to something entirely different." - Gail Collins

Monday, October 26, 2015

Quote Of Note - Jeffrey Tayler

"Religion is, after all, implicitly arrogant. It assumes it knows the truth, that its followers are saved and that the rest of us are deluded and even damned. Are we really going to sit by as faith movements demand “tolerance” for such views, and try to make us to submit to their wills? Whether religion offers solace to some isn’t the issue. The submission and control it seeks to impose is. Toss out the Supreme Being and we’re left with one set of humans striving to dominate another, and justifying themselves with ideology based on nothing but myth." - Jeffrey Tayler

Friday, October 23, 2015

History Can Be Interesting

I like to invest in common stocks from time to time. For some reason I started to think about well known companies that have been around for a long time, but have transformed themselves into something different from what they started out as. In particular I was curious about Wells Fargo and Western Union. So I checked them out on Wikipedia and learned some things I did not know.

The Fargo in Wells Fargo was William G. Fargo, not Fargo, North Dakota. Henry Wells and William G. Fargo founded Wells Fargo in 1852. William G. Fargo was mayor of Buffalo, NY from 1862 to 1863 and again from 1864 to 1865. Wells and Fargo previously had founded American Express.

In 1850, American Express was started as an express mail business in Buffalo, New York. American Express is another one of those companies that has been around for a long time, but has transformed itself into something other than what it started as.

Western Union was founded in 1851 in Rochester, NY by Ezra Cornell. Cornell was a co-founder of Cornell University.

Three companies, three years: 1850, 1851 and 1852, plus three people provided us with changing industries that remain to this day.

Wednesday, October 21, 2015

Extremist Views

Why Sam Harris and Noam Chomsky are Both Right:

Bringing the discussion full circle, Harris is correct in asserting that beliefs influence actions. In particular, apocalyptic beliefs can be used to excuse virtually any act of violence and treachery on the grounds that the present moment is one of cosmic significance and urgency. But beliefs don’t exist in a vacuum. The material conditions in which people find themselves can have a profound influence on the sort of worldview they adopt. And this is where Chomsky is correct. The West has an absolutely sordid history of aggressive, self-interested, and morally questionable meddling in the affairs of Middle Eastern countries. The debacle known as the Iraq War created a situation of widespread desperation that's seduced a whole generation of religiously-inclined people to latch onto extremist views they otherwise wouldn't have accepted. In turn, these views then modified their behavioral patterns in ideologically specific ways.

Money Money Money

Tim Egan has been working since he was 14. He’s now 56 and has spent most of his career as a restaurant manager. He has virtually nothing saved for retirement and, until last month, never had a 401(k) account.

Little wonder: Only two of the 20 restaurants where Egan has worked in the past four decades had retirement-savings plans.

“The restaurant business is what I’m good at, but few owners, especially of small places, offer retirement benefits, no matter how much money you help them earn,” says Egan, who worked his way up from dishwasher to waiter to bartender before rising to manager 20 years ago.

Egan’s story isn’t unusual among the legions of Americans who work part time, switch jobs frequently or earn their livings at small companies, which generated two-thirds of all new jobs last year. Even as people live longer and must save more for old age than prior generations, most can not depend on any help from employers. Almost half of U.S. workers didn’t have a company-sponsored retirement plan in 2013, compared with 39 percent in 1999, according to an analysis of Census Bureau data by the Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis at the New School for Social Research in New York.
Where in America are people the most ready for retirement, financially? Looks like it's the east coast.

Delaware ranks as the most prepared state for retirement, according to data by Personal Capital, an app-focused financial advisor. Personal Capital users in Delaware have the highest average amount of savings to date, at $286,277.
Millennials have grown up with technology playing a leading role in their lives and as a result are quick to embrace the latest and greatest device, app or social network. But that comfort with technology puts them at particular risk for identity theft at a time when the criminals are getting increasingly greedy.

Consider this: According to the Javelin Strategy 2015 Identity Fraud report, thieves stole $16 billion from 12.7 million U.S. consumers in 2014. That amounts to a new identity fraud victim every 2 seconds, according to Javelin.

And, Americans age 20-29 make up 15% of identity theft complaints, according to a 2012 study by the Federal Trade Commission.

Stupid Motorist Law

POLL: Would You Support a Flood-Related 'Stupid Motorist Law' in Your State?:
Thanks to a piece of legislation nicknamed the "stupid motorist law," drivers who either disobey traffic barricades or who attempt to drive through a roadway covered in high water are liable to pay for any resulting expenses from a rescue.

The law was enacted in 1995 and serves as more of a reminder of what not to do in a flood situation.

Other states have adopted similar laws as well, hoping to prevent motorists from making a fatal mistake.
I'd support a 'stupid gun owner law' as well.

How Many More Times? - 028

8 year old girl dies after gun falls to the floor while her mother braids her hair

By the way, this was officially ruled as an accident.

How Many More Times? - 027

Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Rand Paul Is Full Of It

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., joined South Carolina radio host Vince Coakley yesterday to discuss the first Democratic presidential debate, where he said the candidates were “all trying to outdo each other in their disdain for the economic system of capitalism that made us great.”

The Republican presidential candidate linked Sen. Bernie Sanders, a self-proclaimed democratic socialist in the mold of Northern European countries, to the murderous communist regimes of Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot, saying that “most of the times when socialism has been tried” there “has been mass genocide of people or any of those who object to it.”
The "economic system of capitalism" has given us the 1%. Bernie Sanders is simply saying that the remaining 99% deserve a little bit of America's "greatness" as well.

Many countries have existed with varying degrees of democratic socialism: Scandinavian countries, France, Germany, Poland, Canada, Bolivia, Greece, etc. Are these countries rampant with mass genocide?

Many people have associated themselves with democratic socialism: Helen Keller, Nelson Mandela, Eugene V. Debs, Russel Brand, Bertrand Russell, John Dewey, Erich Fromm, Howard Zinn, George Orwell, Martin Luther King Jr., Barbara Ehrenreich, Christopher Hitchens, etc. Are these people mass murderers?

Bernie Sanders first started representing the people of Vermont in 1981, first as the mayor of Burlington. How much mass genocide has occurred in Vermont since then?

The good news is that neither Sanders nor European social democratic parties favor the creation of a Soviet-style economy or a Soviet-style political system. There are plenty of other models of socialist society, some of which have worked in practice, and many of which have never been tried.

In particular, the Nordic social democracies that Sanders praises are demonstrably economic success stories. One could fairly argue that these societies have successfully ended, or at least drastically curtailed, the worst excesses of capitalism. In 2012, the relative poverty rate — the share of the population living on less than half the median income — was only 9 percent in Sweden and 5.4 percent in Denmark. In the US, by contrast, it was 17.9 percent. Infant mortality in Finland is roughly half that in the US, largely because poor Finns get better health care than poor Americans.
Implying that Bernie Sanders wants mass genocide makes Rand Paul a very bad man.

Monday, October 19, 2015

Fight Or Flight

Police: Man wields brick; pastor wields gun:
A Detroit church service turned tragic Sunday when a man with a brick went after the pastor, but likely didn’t anticipate what would follow: the pastor pulled out a semiautomatic pistol and fatally shot the man, police said.
Jesus loves you. Peace be with you.

I Usually Prefer KISS

An innovative, government-sponsored program aimed at funding energy-saving home improvements has drawn praise from powerful supporters, including President Obama. But complaints from a growing number of homeowners, lenders and realtors in California suggest the financing is making homes more difficult to sell and disrupting the mortgage market.

More than 50,000 California households have signed up for Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) financing since state legislators passed a law in 2008 allowing residents to borrow money for such things as solar panels and energy-efficient windows. The financing method, authorized by cities and counties, and funded  by venture capital-backed startups like Renovate America Inc, Renew Financial LLC and Ygrene Energy Fund Inc, is then paid off through special assessments on property tax bills.

Because the improvements stay with the home, and subsequent owners will reap the benefits of them, the assessments are intended to remain with the property in the event of a sale.

But some homeowners trying to sell their houses have found potential buyers scared off by the higher tax assessments. And now realtors in the state are organizing against PACE, saying it makes getting new mortgages much tougher and can leave sellers stuck in their homes.
It seems to me that if these homeowners had paid for their renovations out of pocket they wouldn't have the problems they are having. I Usually Prefer KISS. Not the band, the acronym which translates to "Keep it simple stupid".

Internet Insecurity

In late 2014, cyber intruders linked to Russia were able to break into the State Department's email system, infecting it so thoroughly that it had to be cut off from the Internet in March while experts worked to eliminate the infestation.
Senior State Department officials disagree. They say the Russian hack was the result of a "well-crafted intelligence operation" designed to look normal to the employee who clicked on the attachment, and it was unrelated to other cybersecurity deficiencies.

No technology can completely thwart the most sophisticated of such hacks, but one official familiar with State's cyber deficiencies argues that the department's sloppy security means officials can't be sure other breaches haven't gone undetected.
Do we rely on the internet too much?

The most secure database is one that is not connected to the internet. I wonder if there are any? I wonder if there should be more?

There are ways of inputting and outputting data to a database without the internet. Should we go back to some of the "old" ways of doing things? I don't know. I do know that hackers would have a harder time of hacking these systems.

Sometimes I think that I would happily give up speed for safety, but I live in a world where 4 to 5 seconds is an eternity.

Since customers will eventually no longer pay with a swipe of a card, the “process can take as long as 4, 5 seconds so it’s really slowing the transaction down,” said Chris Britt, the co-founder and CEO of Chime, a mobile bank account and rewards app. Britt maintains the slowdown will turnoff millennials from using cards as a form of payment altogether.

“We actually think that this is going to result in changing the way people pay and probably shift it even faster to mobile payments,” he said.

Sunday, October 18, 2015

Quote Of Note - Hillary Clinton

"We have to look at the fact that we lose 90 people a day from gun violence. This has gone on too long, and it’s time the entire country stood up against the NRA." -  Hillary Clinton

Dumbass Quote Of Note - Grover Norquist

"When they start to say that people with guns are the problem, that they don’t trust people with guns, and that people with guns are somehow connected to mass murders, that’s what turns voters off." - Grover Norquist

Saturday, October 17, 2015

These People Should Call Moose And Squirrel

What Scares Americans: Going Broke, Terrorism and Sometimes Zombies:

The survey also revealed that some Americans fear the supernatural, with 9.7 percent of people have a strong fear of ghosts and 8.5 percent dreading zombies.
What scares me is people who believe in the supernatural.

Friday, October 16, 2015

Bern Bern Bern

This may sound like radical, left-wing talk within the elite circles where most of the Washington political and media class travel, but it sounds like common sense to vast numbers of people across the country. Americans of all regions, political affiliations, ages, and races recognize that what Sanders says is true. And they find it refreshing that finally there is a politician who says it with the kind of conviction and track record that makes it believable, not just a campaign posture.

Speaking plainly and saying things that vast numbers of the American people agree with is what makes Bernie Sanders a much more creditable candidate than the mainstream media has recognized. It’s why Sanders is drawing such enormous crowds on the campaign trail. It’s why his poll numbers are close to or better than Clinton’s in key primary states and nationwide. It’s why he is raising as much money as Clinton is, despite forgoing donations from the millionaires and billionaires who dominate every other candidate’s fundraising efforts.

The Big Fool Said To Push On

Barbara Lee has always had the clearest vision when it comes to the US role in Afghanistan—and the rest of the world.

The California congresswoman cast the sole vote in the US Congress against the Authorization for Use of Military Force resolution in the wake of the September 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. As a veteran congressional aide and legislator who has a long history of highly engaged and thoughtful involvement with global issues, Lee did not oppose responding in appropriate and necessary ways to genuine threats to the United States. But she feared the open-ended authorization would become a blank check for endless war in the targeted country of Afghanistan and elsewhere.

Lee was right. On October 7, 14 years after the launch of the Afghanistan War, she noted that it has become “our nation’s longest war” and said that “sadly, there seems to be no end in sight. Despite a war-weary public, calls continue to keep more U.S. troops in Afghanistan for many more years.”
Waist Deep In The Big Muddy Lyrics


It was back in nineteen forty-two,
I was a member of a good platoon.
We were on maneuvers in-a Loozianna,
One night by the light of the moon.
The captain told us to ford a river,
That's how it all begun.
We were -- knee deep in the Big Muddy,
But the big fool said to push on.

The Sergeant said, "Sir, are you sure,
This is the best way back to the base?"
"Sergeant, go on! I forded this river
'Bout a mile above this place.
It'll be a little soggy but just keep slogging.
We'll soon be on dry ground."
We were -- waist deep in the Big Muddy
And the big fool said to push on.

The Sergeant said, "Sir, with all this equipment
No man will be able to swim."
"Sergeant, don't be a Nervous Nellie,"
The Captain said to him.
"All we need is a little determination;
Men, follow me, I'll lead on."
We were -- neck deep in the Big Muddy
And the big fool said to push on.

All at once, the moon clouded over,
We heard a gurgling cry.
A few seconds later, the captain's helmet
Was all that floated by.
The Sergeant said, "Turn around men!
I'm in charge from now on."
And we just made it out of the Big Muddy
With the captain dead and gone.

We stripped and dived and found his body
Stuck in the old quicksand.
I guess he didn't know that the water was deeper
Than the place he'd once before been.
Another stream had joined the Big Muddy
'Bout a half mile from where we'd gone.
We were lucky to escape from the Big Muddy
When the big fool said to push on.

Well, I'm not going to point any moral;
I'll leave that for yourself
Maybe you're still walking, you're still talking
You'd like to keep your health.
But every time I read the papers
That old feeling comes on;
We're -- waist deep in the Big Muddy
And the big fool says to push on.

Waist deep in the Big Muddy
And the big fool says to push on.
Waist deep in the Big Muddy
And the big fool says to push on.
Waist deep! Neck deep! Soon even a
Tall man'll be over his head, we're
Waist deep in the Big Muddy!
And the big fool says to push on!

source: http://www.lyricsondemand.com/p/peteseegerlyrics/waistdeepinthebigmuddylyrics.html

FUBAR Morality

The Fog of Intelligence:

You get the point. Whatever the efforts of that expansive corps of intelligence analysts (and the vast intelligence edifice behind it), when anything happens in the Greater Middle East, you can essentially assume that the official American reaction, military and political, will be “surprise” and that policymakers will be left “scrambling” in a quagmire of ignorance to rescue American policy from the unexpected. In other words, somehow, with what passes for the best, or at least most extensive and expensive intelligence operation on the planet, with all those satellites and drones and surveillance sweeps and sources, with crowds of analysts, hordes of private contractors, and tens of billions of dollars, with, in short, “intelligence” galore, American officials in the area of their wars are evidently going to continue to find themselves eternally caught “off guard.”
The Republicans think that war is moral and that war deserves as many tax dollars as we can throw at it. Even when it is not working. Even when it lasts FOURTEEN YEARS.

The Republicans think that womens health issues are immoral and deserve zero tax dollars.

FUBAR morality.

The Wonder And Glory Of Religion

Palestinians have torched a Jewish holy site in the West Bank city of Nablus, amid soaring tensions with Israel.

Rioters set fire to a tomb revered as that of the biblical figure Joseph. The site, where Jews go to pray, was badly damaged.
Another example of two religions of peace in action.

This I Know, For The Bible Tells Me So

The King James Bible was the work of 47 translators working in teams, or “companies”, working in London, Oxford and Cambridge. They had been charged by King James I to produce an authorised version of the bible that would support the Church of England over Puritan influence in earlier texts.
It's the word of God, he won't mind if we mess around with it to suit our own agenda.

Thursday, October 15, 2015

I Guess Jesus Died On Top Of A Water Tower

Residents of a Kentucky city are pushing back against an atheist group that is attempting to have a cross removed from a water tower with the help of like-minded Christians from across the nation.

A Pro-Cross Rally is scheduled for this upcoming Saturday in Wilmore, Ky., a small city with a population of 6,000. Hundreds of white crosses this week have appeared on residents’ front lawns throughout the city to show support after the Freedom From Religion Foundation demanded that the city remove the cross and a picture of the water tower from the city’s website. The group claims that the cross “unabashedly creates the perception of government endorsement of Christianity” and “has an exclusionary effect, making non-Christian and non-believing residents of Wilmore political outsiders.”

The cross has been located for over four decades on top of a water tower on Asbury University, a Christian school. The city owns the water tower, but the university pays the electric bill for the cross.
Boy, this is a weird one. Forty years! Just when you think you've seen it all, along comes another cross, and it's electric. Isn't this one kind of sacrilegious? Or is a cross on top of a water tower dignified?

What the hell would Jesus think?

Spirituality

Can atheists find spirituality without God?

Depends on what you mean by spirituality. If it means belief in anything supernatural, the answer is no.

 Merriam-Webster says:

the quality or state of being concerned with religion or religious matters : the quality or state of being spiritual
Why ask the question anyway. The implication is that atheists are missing out on something. No, we are not.

Take away the supernatural, and you are still left with everything else. In fact, it's kind of hard to take away the supernatural, because it's not there.

We're Number Two

China has passed the United States in the number of billionaires, driven by the rise of fortunes in technology and manufacturing, according to a survey released Thursday.

Despite a cooling economy, the number of Chinese billionaires rose by 242 this year to 596, according to The Hurun Report, which follows China's wealthy. It said that surpassed the 537 the company found in the United States.

Dumbass Quote Of Note - Rev. Greg Locke

"Let me tell you something, when they are in sixth grade they get a half a page of watered down Christianity that has about as much Bible as a thimble, if you will, and now there’s 28 pages they have to learn about Islam, and Mohammad, and how it all came about, and about the holy Koran, and the Five Pillars of Islam, and how they pray, and when they pray, and where they pray, and how they pray, and why they pray, and about pilgrimages and all this and then they say that Allah is the only God." - Rev. Greg Locke

Faux News, Faux Fair, Faux Balanced, Faux Guest

Fox News Regular Indicted Over Allegedly Concocting Bogus CIA Past:

A frequent guest on Fox News claimed he worked 27 years for the CIA but in fact never worked for the agency, according to a federal indictment announced Thursday.

Wayne Shelby Simmons was arrested following his indictment by a federal grand jury for fraud, accused of lying about his employment at agency, the U.S. Attorney's Office of Eastern Virginia announced. Simmons was often a guest on Fox News and touted as a national security analyst. He is being charged with major fraud against the United States, wire fraud, and making false statements to the government, the U.S. Attorney's Office press release said.

Quote Of Note - John W. Loftus

"The number one political problem we have today is that people with special interests representing big money have hijacked American democracy." - John W. Loftus

Questions Questions Questions

If the United States government can print money to stabilize the economy why can't it print money to stabilize public education?

If the United States government can print money to stabilize the economy why can't it print money to stabilize social security?

If the United States government can print money to stabilize the economy why can't it print money to stabilize the infrastructure?

Sex Sex Sex

Anti-Abortion Advocates Spill The Beans:

I don’t think they’re supposed to say this out loud to other people (boldface mine):
Dr. Monica Miller of Citizens for a Pro-Life Society, one of the main organizers of this weekend’s protest rallies at Planned Parenthood clinics, said on Tuesday that even if Planned Parenthood were to stop performing abortions, she would still want to strip it of federal funding because it promotes a “corrupt view of human sexuality” including “sex for recreation, sex for mere pleasure.”

“Planned Parenthood from the top to the bottom is a corrupt organization,” Miller told Ave Maria Radio’s Teresa Tomeo, “corrupt in its view of the sanctity of human life and corrupt in its view of human sexuality. And I say even if Planned Parenthood didn’t perform one single abortion, just the mere fact that its sexual ethic is corrupted means right there, should be the reason right there, that they should not receive any federal money. The kind of sexual ethic that Planned Parenthood promotes is sex for recreation, sex for mere pleasure.
She says this as if it were a bad thing (SLUTS!!). It puts the lie to the notion that this is simply about preserving the life of the fetus.

Wednesday, October 14, 2015

Talk Talk Talk

Clinton made $3.15 million in 2013 alone from speaking to firms like Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank and UBS, according to the list her campaign released of her speaking fees.

"Her closeness with big banks on Wall Street is sincere, it's heart-felt, long-established and well known," former Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley has said on the campaign trail.

While Clinton has given paid speeches to many groups, Wall Street banks and investment houses made up a third of her speech income.

She even made more money speaking to UBS and Goldman Sachs than her husband Bill did. Goldman Sachs in New York paid Bill $200,000 for a speech in June 2013 and Hillary $225,000 for a speech in October of that year.
I wonder why the headline wasn't Wall Street has made Hillary Clinton a multi-millionaire?

I can't believe that anyone's speech is worth so much money. I think that Wall Street is paying for something else.

Why can't poor people run the country for a change. There are probably plenty of adjunct professors that have plenty of good ideas.

Tuesday, October 13, 2015

Quote Of Note - Homer Simpson

"I'm not a bad guy, I work hard, and I love my kids. So why should I spend half my Sunday hearing about how I'm going to hell?" - Homer Simpson

The Wankiest Generation

Quote Of Note - Samuel Huntington

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

Stop War Now

Vested in War:

A few weeks ago as summer waned, and another crisis dawned, the Pope like a new product launched in September, donned his vestments of holiness and as if like the don of all such dons presided over a multi-faith ceremony at the monument for the World Trade Center in New York and earlier in Washington DC spoke to the Americans by speaking to the Congress. But never once during his speeches directed to the Americans did he use the word war or say ‘Stop war now.' He spoke of peace, spoke of conflict, spoke of poverty, of excess of wealth, spoke of charity, spoke about the climate, but not once the word war.  He never uttered the word war in the context of today's wars.  Oh right, I stand corrected he mentioned the Great War as in World War in quoting a sentence by a previous Pope. That's it. And please keep in mind that those wars aren't referred to as the Great Conflict One and the Great Conflict Two. They are called wars. That means something. That means something terrible. Words matter. They mean things. The world's most weapon wealthy and weapon powerful and weapon producing nation is at War. It is not at a conflict. It is at War. Conflict suggests, that those involved may be involved in resolving conflict, conflicted—they could be peacemakers. They are not. They are warmongers, warriors and they are involved in making War. They are vested, financial, economically, industrially, psychologically, emotionally, politically, religiously in war. They are vested in war.

Is it so impractical, too unreasonable and idealistic to ask that the word War be used for War? More unreasonable than believing in God? More unreasonable than believing in the Pope's agency?  Believing in God, we have no problem with—believing that he speaks for God—no problem—having him address a secular institution such as the Congress-----no problem---but expecting him to say: stop war—that's a problem? Stop war? For him to use the word ‘War'. Because you see there are declarations and resolutions to go to war. Not conflict. There are colleges for War. And there are weapons for war. These are not labeled as colleges, weapons and soldiers for conflict. To expect the Pope to say the word War and ask him to say Stop War might be like expecting the Pope and other religious headmen to accept women as equal to men. Absurd.

Monday, October 12, 2015

Would Jesus Practice Vandalism?

The Adopt-A-Highway sign heralding a stretch of road occasionally cleaned by a California atheist group has been defaced for a second time in the last three weeks.

The most recent act of vandalism to the sign sponsored by Atheists United San Luis Obispo occurred last week. An unknown perpetrator sawed the sign off its posts and painted over the first letter and the last letters of “Atheists.”

Thus, after the vandalism, the all-caps word “ATHEISTS” was transformed to “THEIST.”

Members of heathen group say they refuse to be intimidated by someone causing damage to their highway sign on the southbound side of Highway 101 near Atascadero, Calif.

“Despite this act of vandalism, AU SLO remains dedicated to making it acceptable to be a non-believer in this county,” group president Steven Arkowitz said is a press release sent to The Daily Caller.
These vandals are simply proving what many atheists already know, that morals and ethics are not exclusive to the religious.

Atheists can do good. I won't comment on the vandals.

I'm not sure why this is on The Daily Caller. Also, it's weird that they have a "poll" question at the bottom: "Does The Highway Sign Deserve To Get Vandalized?"

I think that The Daily Caller thinks that the sign is alive.

An Interesting Interview With Charles Koch

Watch the interview with Charles Koch:



Or read the interview with Charles Koch:

Charles Koch is a billionaire many times over -- and a much-discussed figure in the world of business and political funding. This morning he's making a rare television appearance answering questions from our Anthony Mason.
The Koch brothers have started a propaganda campaign and are trying to prove that they are not Satan incarnate. Fine, if that's what they want to do. As a person Charles Koch may have some decency within him. Mostly, I don't really care. What bothers me about the Koch brothers is not the Koch brothers. It is what they are allowed to do. Because of various legislation about campaign financing the Kochs are more equal than the rest of us. Most Americans don't have billions of dollars to throw around trying to influence politicians. It is interesting that Charles Koch doesn't understand this. I wish I had the power to zap him into the body, mind, and life of a poor, inter-city American, and them have him watch this interview and see what he thinks.

Money and democracy make a very bad combination. One person, one vote is a foreign concept to Charles Koch and he is in denial about this, or he is simply lying.

Something I Did Not Know About Ben Carson

Did you know that Dr. Ben Carson led a team of seventy surgeons who were the first to successfully separate conjoined twins?

In 1987, Ben Carson made medical history by being the first surgeon to successfully separate conjoined twins (the Binder twins) conjoined at the back of the head (craniopagus twins). Operations to separate twins joined in this way had always failed, resulting in the death of one or both of the infants. Carson agreed to undertake the operation. The 70-member surgical team, led by Carson, worked for 22 hours. At the end, the twins were successfully separated and can now survive independently.

As Carson said in an interview:
I was talking to a friend of mine, who was a cardiothoracic surgeon, who was the chief of the division, and I said, "You guys operate on the heart in babies, how do you keep them from exsanguinating" and he says, "Well, we put them in hypothermic arrest." I said, "Is there any reason that -- if we were doing a set of Siamese twins that were joined at the head -- that we couldn't put them into hypothermic arrest, at the appropriate time, when we're likely to lose a lot of blood?" and he said, "No." I said, "Wow, this is great." Then I said, "Why am I putting my time into this? I'm not going to see any Siamese twins." So I kind of forgot about it, and lo and behold, two months later, along came these doctors from Germany, presenting this case of Siamese twins. And, I was asked for my opinion, and I then began to explain the techniques that should be used, and how we would incorporate hypothermic arrest, and everybody said "Wow! That sounds like it might work." And, my colleagues and I, a few of us went over to Germany. We looked at the twins. We actually put in scalp expanders, and five months later we brought them over and did the operation, and lo and behold, it worked.[13]

There Is A Pattern Here

Aerosmith's frontman Steven Tyler has sent presidential hopeful Donald Trump a cease-and-desist letter requesting for him to stop using the band's song "Dream On" during his campaign.

Tyler, a registered Republican, is not opposed to the hotel tycoon politically as he attended the second GOP debate back in August as Trump's guest. However, the rockstar has threatened legal action if Trump continues using Aerosmith's song.

" 'Trump for president' does not have our client's permission to use 'Dream On' or any of our client's other music in connection with the campaign because it gives the false impression that he is connected with or endorses Mr. Trump's presidential bid," the cease-and-desist letter reads.

"If Trump for president does not comply with our demands, our client will be forced to pursue any and all legal or equitable remedies which our client may have against you."

This is the third time Trump has been asked to stop playing songs on his campaign trail after using Neil Young's "Rockin' in the Free World" and REM's "It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)."
This "stop playing my song" theme seems to only involve Republicans and not Democrats. I wonder why that is.

Sunday, October 11, 2015

Still More About Richard Nixon

Hard as it may be to believe after all this time, there is still more to the story of President Richard Nixon and Watergate. And hard as it may also be to believe, it is one of the men who was closest to Nixon, Alexander Butterfield, who's letting the secrets out.
A president who on a Christmas Eve tour of the old Executive Office Building next to the White House made a discovery that sparked a witch hunt: "Some of the staff people -- bureaucrats, the civil servants -- had pictures of John F. Kennedy on their desks or on the wall," said Woodward. "Nixon said, 'We have to get rid of that infestation,' as if it was some sort of disease that somebody would have a picture of JFK in their office."

Butterfield was told by Nixon to get pictures of other presidents taken down from the walls. "He made that express order," he said.

In particular, White House Chief of Staff Bob Haldeman told Butterfield, "The President would like you ... to find out who the woman is ... who has the two Kennedy pictures," adding, "He asks about it once a week -- at least." Butterfield reported back that the CIA, Secret Service and FBI -- even the House Committee on Un-American Activities -- all found the woman, a civil servant named Edna Rosenberg, was a "completely loyal American."

"What's surprising as you go through all of this is the amount of energy that was devoted to these kinds of maneuvers," said Woodward. "This was a subversion of what the job of the presidency is."
Nixon was a strange and petty man.

I wonder what we don't know about the presidents who have succeeded him.

Planned Parenthood And The Will Of The People

Some congressional Republicans remain determined to cut off federal funding for Planned Parenthood, but a nationwide USA TODAY/Suffolk University Poll finds Americans back government support for the group by more than 2-1.

Two-thirds of those surveyed, 65%, say funding should continue for the group, which provides contraception, cancer screening and other health services to women; 29% say it should be cut off.

"Basically, we're defunding women's health care," protests Erika Raney, 32, a business consultant from Los Angeles who was among those surveyed. "It furthers the issue that women still don't have equal rights in the U.S."

Passions run high on both sides of the issue. Ronald Joseph, 78, a retiree from Elmira, N.Y., objects to the abortion services Planned Parenthood provides, although the $500 million it receives in federal funding isn't used for that purpose. "They're butchers," he said in a follow-up interview. "They might as well put sawdust on the floor."
I didn't realize that sawdust was necessary to provide contraception, cancer screening and other health services to women.

I do not understand the Republican Party. Why do they pander to the minority of the American people? I thought we were a democracy.

It seems to me that one of the things this poll says is that most Americans think that the services Planned Parenthood provides are legal and moral. Why are the Republicans saying otherwise?

Friday, October 9, 2015

How Many More Times? - 026

Shooting at Texas Southern University Kills One

Stop giving the NRA money!

Bern Notice

Populism:

The political doctrine that supports the rights and powers of the common people in their struggle with the privileged elite.
 Populist Candidate Scorecard: Sanders Leads:
Sanders lead is built on his forceful commitment to major structural reforms – on breaking up the big banks, Medicare for All, enhancing Social Security benefits, taking on climate change, curbing big money in politics, cutting military spending and opposing costly interventions abroad.
Among Democrats, progressives are driving the debate. Every candidate knows they must inspire the activist base of the party – and the Obama coalition – not only to win the nomination but to be victorious in the general election. This is the time to keep the pressure on about what that will take. More and more Americans understand that the rules are rigged against them. Now it is time to demand that candidates champion the alternative.

Quote Of Note - Madalyn Murray O'Hair

"An Atheist knows that a hospital should be built instead of a church. An Atheist knows that a deed must be done instead of a prayer said. An Atheist strives for involvement in life and not escape into death. He wants disease conquered, poverty vanquished, war eliminated." - Madalyn Murray O'Hair

David Silverman Is Fighting God

God won't fight back, but plenty of religious people will.

Fighting God is the atheist manifesto it sets out to be, making one of the most compelling cases for not only using the word atheist openly and proudly but also because he makes the strongest case I have yet to read for why firebrand, in-your-face atheism is not only vital but absolutely necessary to further atheist acceptance in the world.

Atheists have attacked Silverman and American Atheists for its tactics in setting up billboards proclaiming that “You Know It’s a Myth” or filing lawsuits against the US Government for putting an iron crossbeam decorated to look like a Christian cross in the 9/11 Memorial Museum.

Yet Silverman uses data to explain why this kind of activism is working and how it is changing the face of atheism in the public’s eye forever. While humanist groups and those who take a more interfaith approach have an important role in our community, Silverman believes no real change could come unless groups like American Atheists knock down a few walls first.

He cites the Boston Marathon bombing and how the Harvard Humanist group was blocked from attending the interfaith service that was attended by President Obama after asking politely to be included, but making almost no noise when told no. The polite method didn’t work, but in many other cases of exclusion, American Atheists, Silverman and other loud and outspoken atheist activists have made a lot of noise and forced those who shut us out to address us.
David Silverman is the current president of American Atheists, which was founded by Madalyn Murray O'Hair.

Religion Kills

One survivor of last month's crush and stampede at the hajj in Saudi Arabia recalled seeing so many bodies that he couldn't tell how many there were.

The Associated Press sought to answer that question, arriving at a death toll of at least 1,453. That made the Sept. 24 disaster the deadliest accident ever at the annual pilgrimage. And hundreds remain missing.

The AP count is 684 higher than Saudi Arabia's official tally of 769 killed and 934 injured in the Sept. 24 disaster in Mina, a few miles from the holy city of Mecca.
Saudi officials, who could not be immediately reached for comment Friday, previously have said their tally remains accurate, although an investigation into the causes of the tragedy is ongoing. Authorities have not updated their casualty toll since Sept. 26.

The previous deadliest-ever incident happened in 1990, when a stampede killed 1,426 people.
The Hajj is an annual pilgrimage to Mecca. Muslims are supposed to do this at least once in their lifetimes.

If having God on your side means being trampled to death, I'm glad I'm an atheist.

Would Jesus Wear A Pope Francis Thong?

Three words that don't seem right together are "Pope Francis thong."

Do a search for things like:

  1. Pope Francis thong
  2. Pope Underwear & Panties
  3. Pope Francis sports bra
Weird, weird, and weird.

Quote Of Note - Barry Diller

"Donald Trump, all he is is about conflict, and all that he is is negative conflict. He's a self-promoting huckster who found a vein. A vein of meanness and nastiness." - Barry Diller

Playing With Slaves?

Dark-skinned Playmobil pirate-ship doll wearing ‘slave collar’ ignites outrage:
A Playmobil pirate ship set has sparked a firestorm over a figurine that resembles an African American slave wearing a neck shackle.

Ida Lockett of Sacramento, Calif., said her 5-year-old son received the toy as a birthday present, and when she was helping him assemble it, she noticed the instructions — telling her to put a play shackle around the figure’s neck.

“This right here was found on his neck,” she told CBS Sacramento about the piece.

“You cannot have this specific accessory and call it anything else. The fact that you can Google it, look it up, say what it is — it’s a slave collar.”
Why let your kid play with pirates in the first place? After all they were, and are, murderous, plundering thieves. Some role model. Captain Mosey would be OK, however.

How Many More Times? - 025

Thursday, October 8, 2015

Fake Quote Of Note - God

"Look, I’m too busy to stop all the gun violence in America, try some new laws." - God

Those Damn Facts And Rigorous Standards

The overwhelming majority of scientists agree: Vaccinations do not cause autism. Study after study has shown this, and even the original research used to peddle this myth was eventually retracted due to falsified data. But this hasn’t stopped many anti-vaccination groups from still trying to create data that says otherwise, often by commissioning studies that they hope will support their ideologies.

But for one group at least, this method of funding scientific studies to prove their point seems to have backfired. A six-year study looking into the effect that vaccinations have on the neurological development and social behavior of rhesus macaque infants, funded in part by the anti-vaccination and autism advocacy group SafeMinds, concluded that there was no evidence at all for such a link.

That didn’t stop the group from claiming the results didn’t change things. In a statement, they say that they had “concerns about changes in the study design protocol and analysis that may have led to these contradictory results.” The contradiction they are referring to is the fact that they were previously given preliminary results from a smaller trial, which purported to back up their position, before the study was expanded to include more subjects and underwent more rigorous standards that eventually found zero evidence.
"The results didn’t change things." A nice example of Confirmation Bias.

Oh, the irony of funding a study that proves you wrong.

I’d Really rather you didn't act like a sanctimonious holier-than-thou ass...

Moments before a city council meeting, Keller scrapped plans for an atheist to deliver its invocation.

The mayor offered a prayer instead.

Zachary Moore, representing Keller Humanists, was set to speak.

“The things I like to invoke are our shared values. I like to invoke the democratic process,” he said.

Moore has given the invocation at Keller city council meetings three times in the last year. It comes with a condition, though.

Moore’s invocations are always followed by a prayer given by Pastor John Salvesen of the Bear Creek Bible Church.

“I was fine with that too for a while, but it occurred to me that what happened was also a form of discrimination,” said Moore.

Last week, the Freedom From Religion Foundation, which advocates for separation of church and state, sent the council a letter.

“If the Council insists on continuing to host prayers at public meetings, it cannot discriminate against any person wishing to give a prayer. The nonreligious and members of minority religions must be permitted to deliver invocations on an equal basis. This not only means permitting them to be in the invocation rotation, it also means not making a special show of diluting their message with a subsequent Christian prayer,” reads the letter.

Pastor Salvesen, who oversees the invocation, sees one problem, though. Moore, he claims, isn’t praying, since he has no one to pray to.
This is so wrong.

There are many different versions of the Our Pasta prayer:
Our Pasta,
Who "Arghh" in colander,
Draining be thy noodles.
Thy serving come,
Thy food be yum,
In restaurants, as it is in kitchens.
Give us this day our daily sauce,
And forgive our messes,
As we forgive those who mess against us.
And lead us not into hunger,
But deliver us some pizza,
For thine is the spaghetti, and the meatballs, and the sauce
For ever and ever.

R'Amen
Religious people aren't praying to anyone either, anyone real that is.

Why Did He Wait So Long?

The founder of the global News Corp. media empire, Rupert Murdoch, is suggesting that President Barack Obama isn't a "real black president."
Has all of the racist hate levelled at Obama for all these years been totally unnecessary?

Does This Mean Anything?

But amid this flawed, headache-inducing verbiage, there is a pattern. So says Grammarly, a private, San Francisco-based company behind what’s billed as “the world’s leading automated proofreader.” The company analyzed comments on 19 presidential candidates’ Facebook pages and found that: 1) supporters of Republican candidates make more mistakes than supporters of Democrats; 2) supporters of Republican candidates use fewer unique words than supporters of Democrats; and 3) Donald Trump supporters made the most mistakes of them all.
In the grand scheme of things this probably means nothing, so I decided to post it.

Wednesday, October 7, 2015

An Example Of A Responsible Gun Owner

Police confirmed on Wednesday that a concealed pistol license (CPL) holder was not being threatened by a fleeing shoplifter when she decided to fire multiple shots at him in a Home Depot parking lot.

“It’s my worst nightmare as a CPL instructor,” said Doreen Hankins, owner of Detroit Arms, which holds CPL classes. “You have to know the entire situation before you pull that handgun out. And I don’t see that a shoplifter at Home Depot fills any of those criteria.”

The shooting happened in the store’s parking lot at around 2 p.m. Tuesday, when Home Depot’s store security was chasing a shoplifter who jumped into a waiting dark SUV driven by another suspect, said Lt. Jill McDonnell, an Auburn Hills police spokeswoman.

But when the SUV began to pull away, the CPL holder, a 48-year-old woman from Clarkston, suddenly began firing shots at the fleeing vehicle. The vehicle escaped, though one of the bullets may have flattened a back tire, McDonnell said. Police are still seeking to identify the suspects.
To use a concealed weapon in Michigan, a CPL holder needs to think that there is an imminent danger of death, great bodily harm or sexual assault, or think there is a similar danger to someone else, said Rick Ector, a firearms trainer who runs Legally Armed Detroit. He added that a gun is “truly a tool of last resort.”

“In that situation personally, there’s no way I would be shooting my gun,” said another instructor, Dawn Martin, with the Kalamazoo-based Viper Security Enforcement Inc.

CPL holders who misuse their guns could face a wide range of charges — among them felony firearm, reckless use of a firearm and felonious assault.
The only problem that I see is that their weren't other armed people opening fire. Someone should have shot at this woman, and then someone should have shot at that person, and then someone should have shot at that person, and then someone should have shot at that person, ad infinitum. Isn't that what Wayne LaPierre preaches?

I look forward to my next trip to Home Depot.

Stop giving the NRA money!

Quote Of Note - A.C. Grayling

"Religious apologists complain bitterly that atheists and secularists are aggressive and hostile in their criticism of them. I always say: look, when you guys were in charge, you didn’t argue with us, you just burnt us at the stake. Now what we’re doing is, we’re presenting you with some arguments and some challenging questions, and you complain." - A.C. Grayling

Dumbass Quote Of Note - Marco Rubio

"I just think you’ve created an industry now — a situation where very much, you’ve created an incentive for people not just to look forward to having more abortions, but being able to sell that fetal tissue — these centers — for purposes of making a profit off it, as you’ve seen in some of these Planned Parenthood affiliates." - Marco Rubio

I Was Not Surprised

  1. Americans have more disposable income thanks in part to lower gas prices.
  2. ...sales of electronic cigarettes are rising, according to the Centers for Disease Control.
Were you surprised?

How Many More Times? - 024

11 year old shoots and kills brother with a "weapon he picked up off a picnic table."

Guns Don't Kill People, Anti-Christian Opinions Do

In the specific case of the Oregon shootings, the far left wants to exploit the crime in an effort to push an anti-gun agenda, but they won't want to talk about the shooter's beliefs and motives. Mostly, that's because they agree with his anti-Christian attitude.

No, I'm not saying they want to kill Christians.  I am, however, suggesting that the same kind of anti-Christian bigotry the killer allegedly espoused has become a rallying cry for the disaffected, anti-establishment, radical left. In short, the base of the Democrat party despises Christianity, its values, and its practice.

So they'll downplay this killer's agenda, and they'll blame the weapon to advance their own.

They have no interest in a "national discussion" about this monster's anti-Christian opinions because, by and large, they share them.
Yes, let's get right on this. We all know that guns were only used once in all of the mass-shootings that have ever occurred in the United States. We all know that anti-Christian opinions are the mass murderer's weapon of choice. We definitely need an anti-Christian opinion ban.

Tuesday, October 6, 2015

WingNutDaily Weirdness

It is true because we say so. God exists because we say so. Obama is a Muslim because we say so.

"Cahn has never made any such prediction or prophecy concerning dates or time periods," because we say so.

And people believe.

If the world makes it through the end of the Mayan calendar this year, a pattern of recent economic disasters based on the Hebrew calendar portends what some suspect we will be the biggest U.S. financial calamity yet Sept. 13, 2015.

The No. 1 bestselling Christian book in America, “The Harbinger” by Jonathan Cahn, points out that America’s two greatest financial shakings, occurred on successive Hebrew Shemitah years following the 9/11 Islamist terror attacks on the U.S., the key to the series of limited judgments the author sees as a result of America’s turning away from God just as ancient Israel did before the dispersion.

While Cahn prefers not to speculate on what, if anything, might befall America on Sept. 13, 2015, it will be the next Shemitah year – which occurs on Elul 29 every seven years on the Hebrew calendar. It is a time when debts are to be forgiven and the land, in the agricultural communities of ancient Israel were to be given a rest.

Sept. 17, 2001, was the beginning of the economic calamity associated with 9/11 and the lowering of interest rates by the Fed resulting in the collapse of the stock market Sept. 17, 2001 – Elul 29 on the Hebrew calendar. Likewise, Sept. 29, 2008, marked the next big crash. Sept. 29, 2008, also fell on Elul 29.
After predicting for the entire last year that The Shemitah on Sunday, September 13, would usher in some cataclysmic event in America — possibly an economic crash, inclement weather, war or terrorist attacks — messianic rabbi Jonathan Cahn appeared on “The 700 Club” today to save face (and sell more books) after September 13 came and went without anything out of the ordinary happening.

When host Pat Robertson asked him if anything noteworthy happened on the 13th, Cahn first tried to avoid the question but eventually told the televangelist that “you can’t put God in a box or He’ll get out of it,” saying that God doesn’t work in exact dates.

Of course, Cahn himself declared that this potential disaster would occur on an “exact date … in accordance with the ancient mystery” of the Shemitah, a day when the land is left fallow and debts are forgiven. “The coming Shemitah will end September 2015. Its final climatic day, Elul 29, the Day of Remission, will fall on Sunday, September 13,” he wrote in “The Mystery of the Shemitah.”

WorldNetDaily repeatedly reported on Cahn’s September 13 prophecy, with messages like “Mark This Date For Potential Disaster,” “Get Ready: Biblical Shemitah’ Begins This Week,” and “Countdown To Disaster.” WND is even making a movie about Cahn’s prophetic message.
Time to shoot the messenger:

Did Jonathan Cahn ever predict a cataclysmic event would take place on Sept. 13?

Did the bestselling author of “The Harbinger” and “The Mystery of the Shemitah” ever predict one would happen in September 2015?

No.

But just as a new movie about Cahn’s life, “The Harbinger Man,” is about to be released, a blogger from the Norman Lear-founded People for the American Way, a George Soros-funded organization, accused him of doing just that.

“Of course, Cahn declared that this potential disaster would occur on an exact date,” writes Brian Tashman.

Cahn has never made any such prediction or prophecy concerning dates or time periods but rather wrote about historic patterns of the seven-year cycle in his book “The Mystery of the Shemitah.”
WTF?

Are these people absolutely insane?

Yes.

Or as John Cole might say:

Are these people batshit bugfuck crazy?

Yes.

Dumbass Quote Of Note - Jim Bakker

"Today, God said, ‘I want you to wear all black.’ Even my shoes are black. My underwear is black. My socks are black." - Jim Bakker

Rep. Drew Springer

A furor involving a small-town Texas police department and national secular organization has reached the state attorney general’s office, and may well wind up in court after that.

At issue: does slapping “In God We Trust” stickers on police patrol cars violate the U.S. constitution?

After fielding a complaint from a citizen of Childress, a Panhandle town of about 6,000, the Freedom From Religion Foundation sent the town’s police department a letter last month asking it to stop using the motto.
Monday, the two state legislators representing Childress — state Sen. Charles Perry, R-Lubbock, and state Rep. Drew Springer, R-Muenster — asked Attorney General Ken Paxton to weigh in on the question.
There’s nothing wrong or unconstitutional about officers finding solace in the words of the motto, and it should comfort nonbelievers to encounter law enforcement officers that subscribe to a belief system, Springer said.

“If I was a nonbeliever,” Springer said, “I would still have good feelings if someone was acting in a religious way from that standpoint.”

Drew Springer seems to have many misfiring synapses. Either that or he is simply a terrible person. A Christian telling an atheist what he would think if he was an atheist is totally irrelevant and nonsensical. It's like a man telling a woman that he knows what childbirth is like. It's like me saying I know what it is like to be Chinese. I've never been to China and I don't know the language. I know nothing about what it would be like to be Chinese. Drew Springer knows nothing about atheism and does not know what it is like to be an atheist. He is a ridiculous man.

I do not want the police to advertise their belief in the supernatural. It disturbs me. It does not give me good feelings. It is not comforting.

In the future will the police stop patrolling and simply hold prayer meetings and try to wish all of the bad guys to simply vanish into thin air?

Quote Of Note - Steve Allen

"There are hundreds of millions who believe the Messiah has come. If he did, then it is unfortunately the case that his heroic sacrifice and death have had no effect whatsoever on the very problem his coming might have been expected to address, for history demonstrates, beyond question, that we Christians have been just as dangerous, singly and en masse, as non-Christians." - Steve Allen

Monday, October 5, 2015

Mass Shootings

As a people we are bound and determined to talk about these shootings as long as we agree that the problem of easy access to guns won’t be part of the conversation. And there is a contingent of folks ready to extinguish the last spark of humanity left in their souls in order to run interference for the NRA — who, it just so happens, officially run interference for the gun makers who think Americans need more powerful weapons of war in their households.
Stop giving the NRA money!

Dumbass Quote Of Note - John Piper

"It is the world that has stolen what belongs to believers. Sex belongs to Christians. Because sex belongs to God." - John Piper

I'm confused. Does sex belong to Christians, or does sex belong to God? I want to see proof of ownership, like a title or deed or something.

How Many More Times? - Special Edition

Mass Shootings Grab Headlines, but Others Go Under Radar:

The numbers jump off the page: Nine dead on an Oregon college campus, 12 in a theater in Aurora, Colorado. Thirteen soldiers and civilians at Fort Hood, Texas; 32 people at Virginia Tech; 13 at a community center in Binghamton, New York. Twenty-six dead — 20 of them young children — at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut.

Mass killings like the one Thursday at the Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon, scraped nerves raw, commanded headlines and prompted an anguished President Barack Obama to take to the airwaves — again — to condemn gun violence.

Here's another number: 8,124. That's the total of homicides by gun in 2014, according to the FBI's Crime in the United States report. That works out to an average of 156 a week, more than 22 people shot to death every day across the country.

I Don't Think Jeb Is The Smart One

I don't think there is a smart one.

Jeb Camp Weighing More Prominent Role For George W. Bush In S.C.:

Hillary Rodham Clinton Wants To Do Something About Stuff Happening

Days after a deadly shooting in Oregon, Hillary Rodham Clinton unveiled new gun control measures Monday aimed at strengthening background checks on gun buyers and eliminating legal immunity for sellers.

During a daylong campaign swing through New Hampshire, Clinton proposed a repeal of legislation that shields gun manufacturers, distributors and dealers from most liability suits, even in the case of mass shootings like the one that killed nine people at a community college on Thursday.

Clinton has made strengthening gun laws a centerpiece of her presidential campaign, vowing she would use her executive power as president to expand background checks for sellers at gun shows and online and back legislation banning domestic abusers from purchasing guns.
"I will try every way I can to get those guns out of the hands of people who shouldn't have them," she told voters gathered for a pancake breakfast town hall meeting in Hollis, New Hampshire. "We need to prevent these kinds of terrible crimes that are happening."
Somehow, this seems more presidential than the Alfred E. Neuman type response of Jeb Bush and Donald Trump.

We need to stop all of these killings! A good start would be to kill the NRA.

Sunday, October 4, 2015

Quote Of Note - Charles P. Pierce

"I think Kim Davis, and her most recent husband, and her dingy legal team are lucky the Church doesn't have dungeons any more." - Charles P. Pierce

Stuff Happens, No Matter What You Do, You’re Gonna Have Problems

Americans citizens are dying. Jeb Bush and Donald Trump don't care, 'cause shit happens and the bad guys are too smart.

President Obama and Democrats quickly condemned comments made Friday by Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush, who said that there isn't always a useful government solution to mass shootings and other crises because "stuff happens."

Speaking at an event in Greenville, S.C., Bush's comment came in the midst of expansive answers about the Second Amendment and how people respond to school shootings.

"We're in a difficult time in our country and I don't think that more government is necessarily the answer to this," he said. "I think we need to reconnect ourselves with everybody else. It's just, it's very sad to see. But I resist the notion -- and I did, I had this, this challenge as governor, because we have, look, stuff happens, there's always a crisis and the impulse is always to do something and it's not necessarily the right thing to do."
Two days after a gunman killed nine people at an Oregon community college and then shot himself dead, the Republican presidential frontrunner, Donald Trump, seemed to accept the inevitability of mass shootings in the US.

In a rare sit-down interview, for broadcast on NBC’s Meet the Press on Sunday, Trump told Chuck Todd: “I have to say, no matter what you do, you’re gonna have problems.

“Because you have sick people. They happen to be intelligent. And, you know, they can be sick as hell and they’re geniuses in a certain way. They are going to be able to break the system.”

The New York real-estate billionaire, who boasts of possessing a concealed carry permit, said he did not see the need for increased firearms regulations.

At a rally in suburban Nashville on Saturday, he mentioned his New York state handgun carry permit and added that anyone who attacked him would be “shocked”, because he would emulate Charles Bronson in the vigilante film Death Wish.

“I’m a very, very big second amendment person,” Trump said in Tennessee. “This is about self-defense, plain and simple.”

Trump reminisced about the Bronson-starring 1974 film and got people in the crowd to shout out the title in unison. In the movie, an affluent, liberal architect embarks on a vigilante mission after his wife is killed and his daughter raped.

“Today you can’t make that movie because it’s not politically correct,” Trump said.

Speaking to NBC, Trump said those US jurisdictions with “the strongest, the most stringent laws [on gun control] are in almost every case the worst places. It doesn’t seem to work.”
Actually, gun control does work. It doesn't work in the United States because there essentially isn't any.  Gun control works in the United Kingdom, Canada, and various Nordic countries. It also works in China, Japan, Korea and other countries. Why can't we at least give it a try in the United States? Nothing is sacred, not even the Second Amendment. We need to do something!

Quick, look over there, that Mexican wants to kill you and rape your daughter!

Trump claims to know how to protect us from imaginary threats, but not real ones.

Do you remember the "Dean Scream"? It was a very stupid and trivial reason to say that someone was not presidential. What will it take to say that Jeb Bush and Donald Trump are not presidential?

My only other reaction to these two is a string of obscenities. I' ll spare you.