Letter from Julian Assange to US Ambassador

Julian Assange

People are always quick to blame WikiLeaks for any innocent blood spilled as a result of publishing secret documents that include names of informants and double agents and other such compromising information. But as this letter ^{[PDF, 29 KB]} demonstrates – and keep in mind that it’s one of many that have been sent over the months since WikiLeaks attained heightened notoriety – the blame is, as it usually is, squarely on the shoulders of the US Government who refused to provide any assistance despite WikiLeaks practically begging it to.

Julian Assange
Editor in Chief, WikiLeaks

Ambassador Louis B. Susman
US Embassy
24 Grosvenor Square
London, W1A 1AE
United Kingdom

26 November 2010

Dear Ambassador Susman,

I refer to recent public statements by United States Government officials expressing concern about the possible publication by WikiLeaks and other media organisations of information allegedly derived from United States Government records. I understand that the United States Government has recently devoted substantial resources to examination of these records over many months.

Subject to the general objective of ensuring maximum disclosure of information in the public interest, WikiLeaks would be grateful for the United States Government to privately nominate any specific instances (record numbers or names) where it considers the publication of information would put individual persons at significant risk of harm that has not already been addressed.

WikiLeaks will respect the confidentiality of advice provided by the United States Government and is prepared to consider any such submissions made without delay.

Daily Blend: Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX)

• FEATURED: Highlights from WikiLeaks’s “Cablegate” so far. Includes: Chinese government hacked Google, everyone’s worried about Iran, State Department’s spying on everybody, US is secretly bombing Yemen, and more.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• Rep. Joe “Sorry for punishing you after you raped the Gulf of Mexico, BP” Barton (R-TX) [pictured] declares war on President Obama.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• Republican economic logic. Or, why these clowns hold credibility only amongst themselves.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• Interesting: Apple removes anti-gay app “The Manhattan Project” from their online store.
  (via Right Wing Watch)

• Bill O’Reilly is upset at The Simpsons for mocking Fox News’s racist problem. So The Simpsons swipes back. I love this show, and their long history of swipes at Fox.

• Harvard scientists managed to activate a healing enzyme that reversed signs of aging in lab mice.
  (via The Daily Grail)

• It Gets Better. Love, the wonderful people at Pixar.
  (via The Agitator)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Blend: Monday, November 29, 2010

Rep. Peter King (R-NY)

• FEATURED: Wikileaks’s operation Cablegate has begun, releasing over 250,000 secret government communiqués revealing all sorts of corruption, backdoor dealings, and other tidbits making the US government squirm like in purgatory. I’ve got my popcorn.

• Nutjob Rep. Peter King [pictured] (R-NY) thinks that being a website that reveals some uncomfortable information about international wrongdoing merits being labeled a “foreign terrorist organization”.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• Fox Nation can’t stomach the fact that President Obama has a live-in pastry chef! … Who doesn’t actually live at the White House, who first worked under President Bush, and whose job was actually created more than three decades ago, spanning five presidencies.

• Wikileaks founder Julian Assange’s old, archived blog: Interesting Question (IQ.ORG). Interesting, and seems legit.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• The Top Ten Daily Consequences of Having Evolved. Or, blame Darwin for hiccups and backaches.
  (via The Agitator)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Please, either use Internet vernacular correctly or don’t use it

Hint: If this headline doesn’t make you laugh or cringe knowingly, you aren’t fit for the title of Internaut.

Better yet is how the article begins:

If you don't have a child between 7 and 13 years old, you're probably furrowing your brow right now, wondering what the word "pone" could possibly mean.

Yes, you should be. But worry not: Children between 7 and 13 years old would also be scratching their noggins.

That’s because “pwned” is not an onomatopoeia.

And what the hell could “Bibi style” possibly mean?

(via @todayspolitics)

Why not abolishing slavery is (not) on par with not abolishing the government

Best libertarianism symbol I could find

It’s so easy to vilify libertarians these days. After all, everyone needs a favorite punching bag. But the truth is that the majority of libertarians, as far as I have been able to tell over time, are normal people like you and I who tend to be socially liberal and fiscally conservative and possess (what I would call) a healthy distrust of modern government. And that’s all just fine, if not even ideal. But then, every now and then – something that’s frightfully more common in the vast, open playground that is the Web – you come across the obligatory nutjob who does things like say that the reasons for abolishing slavery are the same that should be used in support of overthrowing the government, presumably in favor of some completely unregulated, anarchic society.

And no, that’s not some random example pulled out of my rear. It’s something currently being proposed and debated on Reddit:

Ten Reasons to Not Abolish Slavery

• 1. Some slavery is a necessary evil.^[1]

• 2. Slavery has always existed.^[2]

• 3. New slave owners would just take over.^[1]

• 4. Slaves cannot provide for themselves.^[4]

• 5. Slavery is good for the economy.^[5]

• 6. Freedom is less predictable than slavery.^[6]

• 7. Abolition would cause bloodshed.^[7]

• 8. Freed slaves would run amuck and cause great harm.^[8]

• 9. Abolition is foolish and utopian.^[9]

• 10. It is better to practice a form of limited slavery.^[10]

Daily Blend: Sunday, November 28, 2010

Joe Rehyansky

• For real: American judge Joe Rehyansky, part-time Tennessee magistrate and Vietnam veteran, accused of calling for “corrective rape” to “convert” lesbians in the US Military.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• How to avoid being grilled for spreading a lie, Michele Bachmann-style: Claim you “didn’t say [you] believed it”.

• What if solar got the same subsidies as fossil fuels?
  (via @todayspolitics)

• Breathtaking 80 gigapixel, 360-degree panoramic photograph of London, England. Find the supposed “naughty” bit, get a cookie.
  (via The Agitator)

• Frederika the 91-year-old superhero grandmother!
  (via The Agitator)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Limbaugh’s dumbass, bigoted attack on Obama and Native-Americans

Apparently unable to go a single day without attacking President Obama whilst simultaneously smearing an entire group of people over utter nonsense, Rush Limbaugh raged over the President’s Thanksgiving proclamation, where he dared to mention how the first American settlers wouldn’t have made it without the help from Native-Americans, and actually claimed that the Native Americans are the real bad guys because they killed more people by introducing tobacco to Americans than the settlers did with their diseases that wiped out most of the Native-American population. Yes, again – seriously.

No, I can’t figure out why this crackpot is still on the air, either.

(via @todayspolitics)

Daily Blend: Saturday, November 27, 2010

Cheeky bastards, aren’t they?

• It begins: Homeland Security goes on website-killing spree without any court order, including shutting down a torrent search engine that wasn’t even against the law.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• Looks like Canada is going to be getting Sun TV News (ie. “Fox News North”) after all, despite a supposed defeat a few weeks back.
  (via @ebertchicago)

• Unsurprising: Fox Nation reposts an anti-Obama article from The Onion without mentioning it isn’t, you know, real.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• A Swedish appeals court shortens the prison terms for founders of The Pirate Bay while increasing damages to be paid.

• The Orwell Party. Sounds accurate to me.

• Seems like Bill Watterson (Calvin and Hobbes) may have been on to something, back in 1995.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• Today’s mathematical formula: [parents] + [smart-phones] + [auto-correct gone awry] = [oh, dear].

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Respect and Obey Authority – when deserved

Hemant says he was able to sit through the whole thing. I only made it to about two minutes in before I feared my brain’s health was in serious risk and closed this egregious video. I almost can’t tell if this is supposed to be a parody … but considering how it’s made by something called “Breed Ministries” that classifies itself as Christian pop, I fear they mean every word.

Granted, I take pride in nonconformity (so long as no-one is physically or morally harmed), and I deplore anything that essentially amounts to “respect mah authoritah!” propaganda for feet-licking rule-abiding. Yet, I do recognize the need for at least a modicum of respect for and adherence to authority and laws (as flawed as they may be). But seriously, just watch that video (assuming you haven’t already) and tell me that ought to be taken seriously.

The truth is that while there needs to be some amount of following orders, respect for authority is not something inherent, automatic and universal. It must be earned. The person who claims authority must demonstrate, through their words and actions, that they know what they’re doing and have people’s best interests at heart, before others are willing to place their loyalty in their hands. This, of course, is exactly why respect for politicians, police and the likes has been dwindling away for years: People are becoming increasingly aware how full of crap so many of them are. This is made exceptionally clear in cases where moralists or religionists are placed in charge of educative curricula: If responsible teachers (and cleverer-than-average students) don’t teach others to break the mold and think for themselves, despite what the con-artists and fools tell them, then all is lost.

(via Friendly Atheist)

New rule for science journalism: Just don’t do it

I like this rule. If science journalists could write it on their hands (à la Sarah Palin, only smarter), it’d be appreciated.

Personally, I’d just rephrase the headline into something intelligent and accurate, but this works, too.

As always, hover your mouse over the red button for a final zinger.

(via Pharyngula)

Daily Blend: Friday, November 26, 2010

Pictured: Incitement for suicide

• US Highway Patrol Sgt. Charles Jones, fired after video emerged showing him hanging and kicking his police dog, ordered rehired by a judge with all back pay and legal fees reimbursed.
  (via The Agitator)

• Australian twins who committed suicide at shooting range had books about spiritualism, self-improvement and atheism [pictured] in their luggage. Three guesses which one made the headline.

• A Security Issue at the (TSA) Office.
  (via The Daily Grail)

• What is this I don’t even
  (via The Agitator)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Friday Canine: Not the softest pillow around

[source | full size (1024×768)]

Toothpaste For Dinner on vaccinating your kids

Hint: Drew (the cartoonist) isn’t taking Jenny McCarthy’s side.

‘Vaccinate your kids’ | Toothpaste For Dinner (by Drew)

Admirably put.

(via Friendly Atheist)

Daily Blend: Thursday, November 25, 2010

Killed 4-year-old German shepherd King

• Doggycide: “Friendly” Henderson, NV family German shepherd shot and killed by off-duty cop for reportedly attacking her husband and son, aggression that owners and neighbors assert was mere playfulness.
  (via The Agitator)

• Hate-mongering anti-gay bigots feeling pissy about their recent Southern Poverty Law Center designation as hate groups.

• A short, incomplete list of some of the things innocent people are subjected to in order to “keep America safe”.
  (via The Agitator)

• Kuwait outright bans photography for anything other than journalism.
  (via The Agitator)

• An entire iceberg, above and (90%) below water.

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Blend: Wednesday, November 24, 2010

James O’Keefe

• UN countries vote to allow executions of gay people. Not that it really changes anything – I don’t think countries that do slaughter gays are all that conscientious about human rights or laws to begin with – but that this measure passed is disturbing in itself.
  (via The Agitator)

• Not only has sleazy little douchebag James O’Keefe [pictured] gotten another innocent hero punished with misleading video, but his virus of hackish bullshit is spreading.
  (via The Agitator)

• President Obama issues executive order demanding that hospitals receiving federal funds (such as for Medicare and Medicaid services) must allow gay partners to visit their ailing loves ones, something that hospitals have all-too-often denied in the past.
  (via Dispatches from the Culture Wars)

• Shocker: TSA agents actually don’t like being forced to look at naked people or pat them down all day.
  (via The Agitator)

• Roselle Park, NJ outlaws sleeping in public. Stupid homeless people, ruining it for the rest of us.
  (via The Agitator)

• New York woman cited for not carrying her dogs’ vaccination paperwork on a walk. Stop thinking things can’t get more ridiculous, you know they always can by now.
  (via The Agitator)

• Why do I suddenly think “Doc Ock” …?
  (via The Daily Grail)

• May the Force of typography be with you.
  (via The Daily Grail)

• I hate the modern GOP, but these are actually pretty funny.

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Defenestration: The Movie

If you already knew what “defenestration” meant before looking it up just now, you are officially a geek and I like you. If you didn’t, well, here’s a good way to get acquainted with this obscure yet awesome term: Seven minutes packed with all the window-smashing action you can think of (and lots, lots more).

I wanted to stop watching after the first three minutes, but … I mean, c’mon, seriously. People and cars crashing through windows. You know.

(via The Agitator)

Obama still eclipses leading Republicans in polls

President Barack Obama

It’s no secret that Republicans have been making political gains in the past months, something that neoconservatives have been collectively wagging their zealously ideological hard-ons over ever since the midterms. But while President Obama is suffering from hit after hit in the polls, a recent Politico poll reveals some rather interesting info:

While a new Politico poll ^{[PDF, 275 KB]} shows President Obama trailing a generic Republican opponent for reelection, 40% to 37%, he comes out at least 6 points ahead when matched up with likely Republican contenders Sarah Palin, Mitt Romney, Tim Pawlenty, Mike Huckabee and Haley Barbour.

So, Americans in general would vote for some faceless Republican symbol to overtake Obama, but none of the current chief contenders and icons of the modern Republican Party actually make the cut. Interesting.

(via Dispatches from the Culture Wars)

Daily Blend: Tuesday, November 23, 2010 – Late edition

This is just so perfect [source]

My RSS reader is just about fit to explode (yet again), so I’m dumping the links I’ve accumulated so far, including from last Wednesday (the last time I was online). Apologies for the old news.

• Them again: US House GOP [pictured] kills extension of unemployment benefits for the long-term jobless. But, hey, the electorate must enjoy being screwed over if they keep voting for these soulless hacks.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• US Senate closer to passing Internet Censorship Bill, makes all foreigner Internauts that much more relieved not to be American.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• More, more, more! Or, the FBI’s approach to Internet wiretapping.
  (via The Agitator)

• Del City High School in Oklahoma forces lesbian students to drop out and prevents them from coming back and graduating.

• This week’s House cranked up the in-your-face atheism to record levels in ridiculing a moronic patient who crucifies himself every year as part of a “deal” he made with God to spare his daughter’s life. So, of course, Bill Donohue is apoplectic. WIN.

• Family Research Council’s Tony Perkins’s latest argument against repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”: So many soldiers would leave that the military would have to reinstate the draft.

• City of Chicago letting coyotes loose in the streets to hunt rats. No, seriously. (And really cool.)
  (via @ebertchicago)

• How difficult is it to solve the US’s deficit? In theory, it’s simple and straightforward. In practice – ie. with politics factored in – the US is screwed.
  (via Dispatches from the Culture Wars)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Limbaugh: Net neutrality blocks conservatism on the Internet

And our latest entry in the long line of delusional and dishonest attacks against net neutrality comes from – *drumroll* – Rush Limbaugh, who claims that recent proposals for instating the enforcement of Internet service equality will actually “limit the amount of conservatism that you will be able to find on the Internet”:

My transcript of the relevant bit (from the 0:45 mark):

Net neutrality – of course, it’s not what it claims to be. It’s like so many other liberal things. It doesn’t mean that there’s gonna be neutral (on the Net?). It doesn’t mean there’s not gonna be bias in the Internet. What it’s going to do is limit the amount of conservatism that you will be able to find on the Internet. That’s what it’s purpose – be them blogs, the search engines, or what have you.

Needless to say, this definition for net neutrality applies solely to the weird, warped version of the principle that exists in the fictional universe dreamed up by the neoconservative hivemind. What actual net neutrality is has absolutely nothing to do with permitting or filtering content on the Web based on its nature, but is rather a marketing and business tool that would allow different Internet service providers (ISPs) to allocate greater accessibility to content they want, based on whatever rationale they conjured up. Once again, net neutrality is the exact, polar, diametrical opposite of any form of censorship, instead ensuring that everyone has an equal standing place on the global online podium, regardless of what they have to say.

I’m baaaaack! (until the next hardware failure)

The IT gods require their sacrifice

This seems to be becoming a recurring theme. Every time I finally start to fall back into my groove and get some decent traffic streaming through this blog, real life throws an informatic curveball at me – specifically, an Internet-connectivity-related one. Just over a month ago, I was stuck offline for a week longer than expected due to delays with the installation in our new place. And now, just last Thursday, my computer decided that two sticks of RAM that I had installed over two years ago and that had never posed any sort of problem since were actually of the wrong format and wouldn’t boot up again until I had it fixed. Which, of course, took another bloody week. (Or so it very much felt like.)

At any rate, I’m back now. Again. I’d say “for good”, but the fates have slapped me thoroughly enough every time I’ve said that in the past to teach me to err on the side of caution. So, I’m back – until my motherboard dies. Or the brand new hard drive fails. Or a comet hits. Seriously, nothing surprises me anymore.

Anyway, back to blogging. And revising my ruddy book. And planning a new one. And catching up on all I’ve missed. Now, shoo, I’m busy.

Friday Canine: An overabundance of cuteness

[source | full size (600×543)]

I would hate to be pronounced a Coward and a Scoundrel in Public

But that’s because it would be manifestly and demonstrably unfair, given my great bravery and charitableness. (Contest this and I’ll slap you, then hide around a corner.)

Ooh, how that must’ve stung … back then.

(via The Agitator)

Daily Blend: Thursday, November 18, 2010

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs pez dispensers

• I went in expecting an amusingly bad video attacking skeptics and instead left unimpressed and bored after only two minutes.

• The Rock Stars of Science.

• 16 hardass scientists.
  (via The Daily Grail)

• Oh, dear. Unintentionally naughty Disney pez dispensers! [pictured]
  (via Diaphanitas)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Blend: Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Luz del Mundo (Light of the World) Church

• Those angry, Islamophobic Arizonans are tired of those damn mosques. Even when they’re actually Christian churches [pictured].

• Peter LaBarbera’s newest scare: That gay TSA agents might secretly be enjoying delivering security pat-downs at airports.

• Newly-elected House Republican wingnut Andy Harris, who spent his campaign railing against the healthcare reform bill, wants his government-subsidized healthcare to kick in faster.
  (via Right Wing Watch)

• Right-wingers’ ridiculous Islamophobic freak-out over the Veterans Day-themed Google logo.
  (via The Agitator)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Michael Savage’s hilarious fit of rage against Media Matters

Just in case you need a reminder of how low broadcast standards have sunk (at least for the US), take a listen at radio hate-monger Michael Savage’s latest rant against his enemies on the Left, notably watchdog group Media Matters for America for dutifully sharing around all the crazy shit he spouts for a living.

I wonder how many shades of red his face went through during those hysterical three minutes. He certainly must’ve reached mauve.

Normally, I’d include a little transcription of the juicy bits, but frankly, this doesn’t even require one, much less merit one. Just imagine some angry impotent lunatic taking to the mike and frantically rifling through a word-salad bowl filled with all the typical far-right threats and smears from Nazis to George Soros, and you get the gist of it.

Daily Blend: Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Far side of the moon

• New Haven, Connecticut man arrested, charged and convicted for filming on-duty cops – mere weeks after both the mayor and police chief affirmed that doing so is perfectly legal.

• New Castle, NY councilman Michael Wolfensohn calls cops on two 13-year-old boys selling cupcakes without a permit.

• Richard Dawkins reads some of his hate-mail (11m30s in) in his adorable British accent. Oh, and there are some questions before that.

• As easy as it may be to feel schadenfreude at hearing that Westboro Baptist Church kooks had their car tires slashed and were refused any help, I mirror PZ Myers’s reaction: We ought to be better than that. I take no pleasure in hearing of property damage, only in learning that cranks sink into ignominy.

• Rush Limbaugh’s latest sure-to-be “media tweak”: Bashing a female journalist for writing a pro-Obama article as a “stupid babe” – except that Sasha Abramsky of Salon is a man.

• A few conclusions about what the voters want from the government. In other words: People are fucking stupid.

• The dark side of the Moon [pictured] was molded by the Earth’s gravity.
  (via The Daily Grail)

• Spectacular night-time shots of Earth taken from the International Space Station.
  (via The Daily Grail)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Blend: Monday, November 15, 2010

• 16 of the Dumbest Things Americans Believe -- And the Right-Wing Lies Behind Them

• Free speech win: South Carolina Supreme Court strikes down speech code prohibiting any “remarks and actions as would humiliate, insult, or scare any person”. Remember: No-one has the right not to be offended.

• Ex-President Bush proclaims how waterboarding detainees allowed security to thwart terror attacks in Britain. British officials beg to differ.

• For sufferers of scopophobia, now might not be the best time to look it up on Wikipedia.
  (via The Agitator)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

‘This Hour Has 22 Minutes’ does “It Gets Better” (for ex-gays)

I’m not big on comedy shows, but this is one skit that had me laughing by the end. The Canadian sketch show This Hour Has 22 Minutes does a hilarious skit on the “It Gets Better” Project where a couple of “ex-gays” describe how life does get better for those who reject homosexuality and embrace traditional (Christian) marriage – only to realize they’ve totally missed the point.

(Sidenote: YouTubers really need to allow comments for their ruddy videos.)

(via Dispatches from the Culture Wars)

Cable TV reaches new low with “child psychics”

Just when you think cable programming can’t get any worse, here comes A&E with a show that guarantees, not merely pointlessness, but outrage. Get a look at their latest show, the ever-nauseatingly titled Psychic Kids: Children of the Paranormal, where kids who are deluded into thinking they have magic powers are then grouped up with a professional charlatan who then acts as though they were “coaching” kids in using their psychic powers.

(Oddly enough, the two highest-rated YouTube comments as I write this are one decrying this crap and another one praising it. Mixed signals.)

PZ Myers has some more info on the nature of this garbage and what you can do to try and stop it. This sort of crap is easily worse than all of those ghost hunting shows that fester on Discovery and History channels put together – at least they don’t act as a thin cloak for deliberate child brainwashing.

(via Pharyngula)

German news report on Miami’s inhumane sex offender laws

You know that something about your country’s laws has to be smelling rather rancid when even news channels across the ocean devote their time to covering their disastrous effects. Here’s a German news report (with subtitles), dating from June 2009, covering the inhumane living conditions endured by sex offenders in Miami, FL, many of whom are forced to live under bridges in order to stay at least 700 meters away from any public area where children gather regularly, as per the city’s policy.

Incidents like this are far, far more common than what supporters of these draconian and egregiously pointless laws would have you believe. Especially when anywhere from half to a vast majority of these “criminals” are actually nothing of the sort by any moral standard, having been caught engaging in fully consensual sexual relations with minors who were only a couple of years younger than they were at the time, or who were only caught pissing in public and are now ranked alongside child molesters and serial rapists in the sex offender registry, and treated accordingly, both by law enforcement and the reactionary public.

(via @todayspolitics)

Daily Blend: Saturday, November 13, 2010

Alvin Greene [source]

• Torture at Abu Ghraib = sickening. Torture at Guantanamo Bay = patriotic. My decoder ring is no match for this.

• Alvin Greene [pictured] for President? Seriously, someone show him to a TV set or something.

• Ray Comfort seems a bit peeved at whoever PZ Meyers is. PZ responds.

• And my hope for humanity just keeps waning.

• Yep, some scientists apparently thought it was time to huddle down and study how cats drink water without getting their chins wet.

• Cracked sez women are just as shallow and vain as men. … Well, some women. … In generally different ways. … Don’t hit me.
  (via The Daily Grail)

• A Jim Crow museum?
  (via The Agitator)

• Insta-nerdgasm: Detailed blueprints for the Millennium Falcon. Han Solo lied – those hidden smuggler compartments ARE in there!
  (via The Daily Grail)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Blend: Friday, November 12, 2010

Asia Bibi

• This is religious persecution: Christian mother-of-five Asia Bibi [pictured] sentenced to death in Pakistan for blasphemy (that she reportedly never committed).
  (via The Agitator)

• San Francisco resident proposes a ballot measure to ban circumcision on people under 18. I do hope this passes, though source article reactions aren’t very promising.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• Amazon.com apparently used to sell a Kindle book titled The Pedophile’s Guide to Love and Pleasure: A Child-lover's Code of Conduct. Long-time readers of the blog will already know my thoughts regarding the sexual attraction to children (and the critical and vast difference between that and child molestation), so I refuse to issue judgment on this book (in condemnation or otherwise) until I know more about it.
  (via Uzza)

• The insanity virus: Could schizophrenia be caused by a virus? The evidence seems rather interesting.
  (via @ebertchicago)

• Updated LDS handbook softens language on gay Mormons. It’s a start, I guess.
  (via @religionnews)

• Wait … forgive me for being clueless (again), but wasn’t corporal punishment by teachers supposed to be illegal? Seriously, charge those assholes with assault and/or battery already.

• Bill Donohue really needs to learn to recognize a freaking joke.

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Friday Canine: I shoulda brought my camouflage …

[source | full size (782×507)]

How to score on the football field in 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 easy steps

I’m no sports fan, but this is just awesome.

I have no idea if that isn’t against the rules or something, but it seems to have worked. Great for them.

(via Uzza's Notes)

Jehovah’s Witnesses accuse atheists of being too preachy

It’s not exactly a secret that some of the more religious people, particularly fundies, tend to possess all the self-awareness of a toad. So it’s entirely unsurprising, albeit endlessly amusing, that we would see something like this from the likes of the Jehovah’s Witnesses monthly magazine Awake! (itself a companion publication to The Watchtower), where this month’s issue ^[PDF] contains a story on the problems of those gnarly atheists that begins, incredibly enough, with this:

[source]

Yes, someone apparently wrote that. Presumably with a totally straight face.

I wonder if they even have any mirrors in their homes. This sort of complete blindness to the irony and hypocrisy is just pathological. Then again, so may be the mind-rot that incurs it.

(via Friendly Atheist)

Daily Blend: Thursday, November 11, 2010

The Dark Knight poster in art deco

• Sources familiar with the Pentagon study on the effects of repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” assert that the results show that up to or exceeding 70% of soldiers would have little or no problem with openly gay servicepeople serving at their side.
  (via @BreakingNews)

• I’m sorry; I may be a fierce supporter for equality and all things LGBT rights, but any report that uses such a tiny sampling to declare that there is “zero percent” abuse in lesbian households is just statistical garbage.
  (via @ebertchicago)

• Have you ever had a coffee with Bernie?

• Movie posters in art deco [pictured].
  (via The Agitator)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Republicans, the sick, and the economy

There are endless ways to rephrase the same message. Here’s another one:

[unknown source]

Yep, sounds like the same logic to me.

(via @todayspolitics)

Illustrated Iraq War casualties

Each pixel represents one single fatality: US soldiers in blue, Iraqi troops in green, enemies in grey and Iraqi civilians in orange.

‘function’ (by melkaone) | Flickr

But, hey, as long as they’re fighting against terrorism … right?

(via @todayspolitics)

Bonus Links: Cartoons, oral sex and impossible CAPTCHAs

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) [source]

I ran out of tag space in the previous post, so here’re some more links for ya.

• Iron Knee at Political Irony says he’s just gained a whole lot of respect for Rand Paul [pictured] because Paul actually proposed cutting military funding to help balance the budget. Sorry, but that hardly makes up for him being a bit of a nut in general.

• The future of banking and economics in the US? Considering all we’ve seen so far … not bloody unlikely.

• Cee Lo Green’s hit song ‘Fuck You’ just got even better on The Colbert Report.

• “Somebody is going to eat my pussy or I’m going to cut your fucking throat.” Oh, Christ, kill me quickly.
  (via The Agitator)

• Is this CAPTCHA supposed to be possible?
  (via The Agitator)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Blend: Wednesday, November 10, 2010 – Late edition

Dr. LeRoy Carhart (upon hearing of Dr. George Tiller’s murder)

Pardon the lateness; scheduled work on the neighborhood cables kept me offline for most of the day. Oh, and I was busy getting my first credit card. (Amazon.com, here I come!)

• So was pre-President Obama “anti-American” or was he a “very reasonable fellow”, Rep. Bachmann (R-MN)?

• Nebraska doctor LeRoy Carhart [pictured], colleague of murdered Dr. George Tiller, opens new late-term abortion clinics in the Iowa and the Washington, DC area.

• Tucker Carlson: Sending snarly emails to an ideological opponent’s employers under the opponent’s name doesn’t discredit one as a journalist.

• The UN’s anti-blasphemy resolution is a violation of free speech and should be opposed, says … Bill Donohue.

• Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC): “You can’t be a fiscal conservative and not be a social conservative”. Oh, really?

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Daily Blend: Tuesday, November 09, 2010

Andrew Shirvell [source]

• See ya: Michigan Assistant Attorney General Andrew Shirvell [pictured] finally sacked for his ridiculous anti-gay crusade against a U-M student president.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• Aaaand the War on Christmas is ON, baby!

• Which is shocking: That the Pentagon wants permission to attack computer networks around the world “to protect American interests”, or that Obama administration lawyers are actually objecting?
  (via The Daily Grail)

• Climate scientists plan wide-scale media counterattack against ankle-biting denialists. Good. We need more belligerence on the side of reason.

• Federal judge temporarily blocks Oklahoma’s idiotic and pointless new ban on Sharia law in courts, citing a violation of the Establishment Clause.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• Michelle Malkin accuses Democrats of “incivility and hate”. In a screed foreshadowingly titled “Take Your Olive Branch and Shove It, Democrats”. Just wipe those shards of exploded irony meter out of your eyeballs, now.
  (via Dispatches from the Culture Wars)

• Are actual, 3D holographs just around the bend? Arizona scientists say they’re nearly there.
  (via The Daily Grail)

• Scientists now able to turn ordinary skin cells into new blood, providing new ray of hope for sufferers of leukemia, anemia, and so on.
  (via The Daily Grail)

• Groundbreaking research finds primitive human ancestors behaved more, well, primitively.
  (via The Daily Grail)

I Voted Republican (and all I lost was …)

The pedant in me can’t help but point out the missing end to “My Unemployment” … but otherwise, just try to argue with that message. Go on.

[source]

Nothing quite like a vote for insanity, is there?

(via @todayspolitics)

Agnostic prophecies: They are probably more accurate

I dunno; still missing a few qualifiers.

Cartoon: ‘Agnostic Prophecy’ | Non Sequitur (by Wiley Miller) | GoComics.com

(via Pharyngula)

Gorgeous nighttime shot of the Nile delta from the space

Some pics have a curious knack for making you swoon in your chair. Here’s one of ’em:

[source | full size (1440×960)]

As the more geographically enlightened may be able to tell, that’s the Nile delta in Egypt, as seen by the International Space Station. More info, and a very lovely description on what that river signifies, over at Phil Plait’s Bad Astronomy.

(via Bad Astronomy)