Headline of the Day: Sins come in threes

(IrishCentral)

(via The Daily Grail)

Daily Blend: 03/26/13

Gov. Jack Dalrymple (R-ND)

Applying for an internship/apprenticeship/something at a ranch tomorrow! Wish me luck. (Or a broken leg. However it goes these days.)

North Dakota Gov. Dalrymple (R) ^[pictured] signs law banning abortion at six weeks, presumably planning emergency fund for inevitable court loss. Wonder if he’ll also enact the even worse “personhood” law.
(via @BreakingNews)

Berlin-based company confirms their “atheist”-branded packages take significantly longer to reach their destinations, when they don’t go missing altogether. Looks like the US Postal Service has some explaining to do.

Oh, look, it’s another boilerplate, evidence-free diatribe about how “[m]ilitant atheism has become a religion”. (Hemant Mehta tears it apart, as does PZ Myers.)
(via @religionnews)

Vox Day: Egalitarians are “inferior beings” (because some of them sometimes make crude jokes on the Internet).

And finally, here’s the trippiest damn water spiral you’ll’ve ever did seen (more info here):

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

Daily Blend: 03/20/13

Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX)

Happy tenth anniversary to the clusterfuck in Iraq and the spoon-fed lies that got the US populace to go along with it.

Another underage victim blamed for being raped by football players. Some people are just fucking sick.

Why is it that so many of those in charge of laws pertaining to computers and the Internet are absolute morons about computers and the Internet? (Though, to be fair, Rep. Gohmert (R-TX) ^[pictured] is usually wrong about everything.)

Another day, another blatantly dishonest global-warming-denying article from a renowned crank in a Daily Mail-associated tabloid.

I’m really embarrassed by fellow progressives’ penchant for nanny statism at times. Is it really that hard to commit to the ideal of personal freedom even if it means allowing people to make unhealthy choices?

Faithlessness is healthy and growing in Canada.

More of that Christian Love^TM, this time in Nova Scotia, Canada.

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

Daily Blend: Monday, March 11, 2013

Duane Gish

Win for liberty: New York Supreme Court blocks New York City’s ban on large sugary drinks, which was to enter effect tomorrow.
(via @BuzzFeedAndrew)

Condescending asshole tries so desperately hard to make the case that the skeptical movement is actually a religion-in-disguise for condescending assholes. It was less annoyingly tedious to sit through Al Stefanelli’s “atheist cult” tirade.
(via The Daily Grail)

There’s a special irony to seeing Vox Day, who’s spent the last several months smearing John Scalzi as “McRapey” over his own bizarre misunderstanding, accuse Scalzi of exhibiting “juvenile behavior”.

Duane Gish ^[pictured], shameless Creationist liar famous for the popularizing the “Gish Gallop” style of “debating”, has died at 92.

And finally, just the thing to top off a Monday:
(via @EmergencyPuppy)

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

Sen. Rand Paul’s filibuster and Democrat partisan hypocrisy

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY)

Something pretty amazing (and disheartening) happened yesterday, for the two of you who may not yet have heard: Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), a certifiable regressive kook in almost every regard, took the Senate into a 12-hour filibuster – spent actually talking about policy rather than, say, reading from a phone book or some such – to stall the confirmation of John Brennan, President Obama’s chosen appointee for Director of the CIA, over concerns about the Obama administration’s use of drones.

Basically, you know something somewhere has gone egregiously wrong when a handful of stopped clocks led by a Tea Party darling are the ones who are completely and unambiguously right about something, while those who make themselves out as champions of justice and civil liberties opt for partisan pettiness, instead:

Senate Republicans took the floor on Wednesday, launching an historic filibuster in an attempt to extract an answer from the White House to a simple question: Does the administration believe it has the legal authority to kill an American citizen on American soil with a drone strike?

It's a question that seems fairly nonpartisan on its face, but a second one occurred to those watching the C-SPAN broadcast late into the morning: Where are all the Democrats?

Republicans, from Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) to filibuster-leader Rand Paul (Ky.), spoke for more than 12 hours. But only one Democrat, Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, spoke in support of Paul during that time. Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Oregon) tweeted support, but otherwise progressives who might have assumed to have been supportive were absent, leaving members of the GOP as the sole defenders of civil liberties. The White House was equally silent.

A resounding silence … as opposed to immediately offering the only reasonable (and eminently obvious) answer: “No, the US Government does not have the right to order and carry out the extrajudicial and explicitly unconstitutional murder of its own citizens on its own soil (or anywhere else, for that matter).” But then, anyone paying attention has long since abandoned any hope that the President would seriously follow up on his erstwhile promises to reform the various executive travesties begun under President Bush & co, particularly given how he’s only expanded on them while in office.

Donohue is squicked by BDSM “perverts”

As I seem to be saying a little too regularly for comfort: My apologies again for the downtime in blogging, which is (as always) attributable to a lack of motivation and some mild sleep deprivation. And so – also as always – here’s a quick little something to chew on: Catholic League chief pearl-clutcher Bill Donohue has the vapors over this New York Times piece on the rising popularity of BDSM practices:

NYT has a great story on perverts today in the Style section. Electricity, fire, knives, ropes, chains--all are used for sex. Not kidding!!!

— Catholic League (@CatholicLeague) February 28, 2013

“ZOMG, a number of consenting adults do things on their own time and dime behind closed doors that sound really weird and disturbing to a crusty old prude like me, the freaks!!!”

Of course, that’s not even mentioning the impressive amounts of irony on display here, considering this squawk of puritanical protest comes from a man who devotes himself to the passionate defense of a flamboyantly creepy cult and whose best-known export is the continual defense of almost any clergyman caught committing child sexual abuse and the officials who do their best to cover it all up. Forget glass houses; they can see this guy’s glass palace from space.

Daily Blend: Sunday, February 10, 2013

Chris Hayes

Strong monologue by MSNBC’s Chris Hayes ^[pictured] about depressingly rampant liberal/progressive hypocrisy over the Obama administration’s escalated drone war.
(via @ggreenwald)

The easy solution to anti-gay bullying in schools: Just tell kids that they can pray the gay away!

FBI continues to heroically foil its own fake terrorist plots.

Bigot-tank Family Research Council rehashes the exact same arguments against allowing gays in the Boy Scouts that it used against repealing “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”. Because their predictions were so obviously correct the last time. (And the time before that, and …)

And finally, #INeedMasculismBecause it’s a comedic draw between watching MRAs try to explain their bigotry while the rest of the world laughs at them.

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

Daily Blend: Wednesday, February 06, 2013

Pres. Barack Obama

A Tale of Two Obamas: BuzzFeed’s Andrew Kaczynski presents a trenchant exposé on the President’s ^[pictured] then-and-now stance on civil liberties and government powers.

10-year-old Alexandria, VA boy arrested and charged with “brandishing a weapon” for showing his orange-tipped toy gun to other kids on a school bus.
(via @radleybalko)

Maybe the reason some police departments hate being recorded (including by their own surveillance tools) is because it exposes their corruption.
(via @normative; RT: @radleybalko)

And finally, latest Republican attempt to force God into classrooms includes text from a noted pro-choice atheist.
(via Rob F)

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

Fox News outraged when liberals use Nazi analogies (like Fox News)

You may remember how Jon Stewart took the leaping mickey out of Fox News two years ago when Megyn Kelly actually tried to pretend that the channel never compares its ideological opponents to Nazis & co. Well, it seems the sad clowns posing as journalists there are confused again, as CBS’s Bob Schieffer made a loose (but still inappropriate) analogy between the Third Reich and the gun lobby and they’re now busy denying they ever use such rhetoric at all and trying to climb up on their high horse:

Transcript: (click the [+/-] to open/close →)

[−]

TITLE: Fox News Can't Decide If It's OK To Call Someone Hitler (January 2013)

KIRSTEN POWERS: Speaking of Nazis, a lot of people – these gun rights people think that Obama’s like the next Hitler and they need to have their guns to protect themselves from this tyranny.

MARINE CPL. JOSHUA BOSTON: It’s something we’ve seen happen time and time again in history, with Stalin, happened in Cambodia, and then, of course, the Third Reich. No-one saw that coming until it was too late.

MAN #1: In Nazi Germany, they had a propaganda magazine called Der Stürmer. They had an article that they titled “The Jew Next Door”. The Journal News, their article was titled “The Gun Owner Next Door”.

SEAN HANNITY: You mean that happens? Governments actually become tyrannical, historically?

FOX ANCHOR #1: Of course, we’ve seen this: Germany, Italy, Japan. Yes, we’ve seen it.

MAN #1: These are scary times.

LARS LARSON: Everybody in America who owns one of the guns on the list will be required to go in and give up fingerprints, mug shot, and be entered into a database. It’s be “your papers, please” like Nazi Germany.

STEVE KAUFMAN: I mean, you go back to the 1930s with Hitler, he did the same thing.

HANNITY: Isn’t that what a lot – you don’t talk a lot about – what were the intentions of our founders and framers? We have Stalin, we have Hitler, we have countries, tyrannical, they talk a lot about that, and so people say, if you mention that in this day and age, that’s extreme.

HANNITY: The mainstream media is doing their part to smear gun owners as they are now likening NRA members to Nazi.

HANNITY: Our friend, Bob Schieffer – and by the way, I don’t mind that Bob has an opinion, but he can’t on the one end be a journalist and – it just gets complicated, but he’s now comparing the gun lobby to defeating the Nazis.

CBS’S BOB SCHIEFFER: Surely, passing civil rights legislation, as Lyndon Johnson was able to do, and before that, surely defeating the Nazis, was a much more formidable task than taking on the gun lobby.

RUSH LIMBAUGH: In other words, taking on the NRA is the equivalent of taking on Adolf Hitler.

BRENT BOZELL: And there, in the same sentence as ‘Nazis’. This should be insulting.

ERIC BOLLING: What is the liberal media doing instead of “fair and balanced” reporting? Guys like Bob Schieffer are running around comparing the NRA to Osama bin Laden and Adolf Hitler.

MSNBC’S MARTIN BASHIR: If anyone deserves to be equated with Hitler on the issue of firearms, then it’s not the President, it’s the NRA.

LIMBAUGH: Now, is there room for that in our discourse? Why is that not an example of just over-the-top defamation?

HANNITY: By the way, conservatives use the word ‘Hitler’, and there’s a total liberal, Left meltdown like Alka-Seltzer in water. Left does it, it’s fine.

FOX ANCHOR #2: Think of if conservatives used that language to describe liberals on the same policy, then there would be collective outrage on the front page of the papers and demands for people to resign and apologize.

JIM PINKERTON: He’s given himself a little bit of wiggle room, Bob Schieffer, just a little bit of wiggle room. “Oh, I didn’t exactly compare the NRA to the Nazis; I sort of threw ’em in the same pot and let the people on^[sic] the audience sort it out.”

FOX GUEST #1: There’s clearly an inference that the NRA is the equivalent of the Nazis, and I do think it raised questions about whether or not he was just a little bit too opinionated.

PINKERTON: George Orwell, back in 1946, in the famous essay, said, “The word ‘fascism’ should only be used for people who – Hitler, Mussolini, so on, and not just thrown around all the time.” That was 1946. Seventy years later, we’re still doing it as much as ever.

FOX ANCHOR #2: We should take Hitler and Nazis off the table and our – if they really wanna have a dialogue, as Robert Redford said, then let’s just stop – can we just, like, take [?] off the table.

FOX ANCHOR #3: Why bring that into the comparison? I mean, it was clearly –

FOX GUEST #2: Well, first of all, never bring up Nazis. Like, that’s the big mistake. Never.

Fox isn’t angry at liberals for using such rhetoric because it’s wrong, but because they’re worried about patent infringement.

(via Dispatches from the Culture Wars)

Daily Blend: Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Pres. Barack Obama

The blogging vibe has forsaken me today, so here’s a quick link dump for y’all.

President Obama ^[pictured] enacts whistleblower protection law – then adds signing statement that he’ll ignore any protections that prevent him from targeting whistleblowers. You can’t make this shit up.

Creeping Creationism in Colorado.

Meanwhile, the ugly and pseudo-historical Creationist branch of racism contaminates Texas schools.

Oh, look, it’s a new report about the Catholic Church covering up clerical child abuse for Bill Donohue to splutter in denial about.
(via Friendly Atheist)

Today’s argument against banning assault rifles^*: There aren’t that many people being slaughtered by them, and besides, we already tried it once and it really didn’t work, so fuck it, amirite?
(via The Agitator)

Proof that there is an Intelligent Designer, and that it’s totally wasted.
(via @radleybalko)

And finally, random adorable photo time:
(via @EmergencyPuppy)

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

* Because the linguistic pedant in me refuses to use the term “assault weapons”.

Daily Blend: Sunday, January 20, 2013

Phil Plait

Phil Plait ^[pictured] explains the many problems with education vouchers: They’re basically thinly veiled attempts at inflicting anti-science garbage upon impressionable young minds.

Isn’t it interesting how those who try to tarnish scientists’ credibility always end up destroying their own instead?
(via @BadAstronomer)

Difference between Islamist extremists and anti-feminist cranks: The former throw acid in women’s faces, while the latter just joke about it. (To his quasi-credit, Conlon later apologized.)
(via Pharyngula)

And finally, here’s why the Oxford comma isn’t all bad:
(via @normative; RT: @radleybalko)

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

Daily Blend: Monday, January 07, 2013

James Dobson

Most Transparent Administration In History^TM allowed to continue hiding every single detail about its drone war.

Dishonest like a Breitbart acolyte arguing against gun control.

Looks like the design & technology community also has its issues with subconscious bigotry … and knee-jerk twits who perpetuate it.
(via @pzmyers)

Focus on the Family founder James Dobson ^[pictured] laments: “Nearly everything I have stood for these past 35 years went down to defeat.” Coincidentally, my causes are only getting better!

Research indicates crime rates may be directly influenced by … leaded gasoline? First I’ve heard of this; while certain hazards increase risks of congenital defects, can they really have such a clear effect on complex adult behaviors decades later?

And finally, this is even more tragic than what’s happened to the History Channel:

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

Donohue on World AIDS Day: “Promiscuity kills”

Our favorite Catholic League blowhard, Bill Donohue, has a message for World AIDS Day tomorrow:

Dec 1 is World AIDS Day. Pray for those who still refuse to use common sense and practice restraint. Promiscuity kills.

— Catholic League (@CatholicLeague) November 30, 2012

Of course, it’s not like Donohue’s fetishized Catholic Church has had anything to do with the continuing AIDS plague in the Third World, is it? Nope, it’s poor people’s fault because they just can’t stop rutting.

Obama passes stronger whistleblower protections, or something

It seems that President Obama has reversed his opinion that cracking down on whistleblowers is a brag-worthy accomplishment and has now signed a new law ostensibly to protect federal employees who reveal government wrongdoing:

Capping a 13-year effort by supporters of whistle-blower rights, the new law closes loopholes created by court rulings, which removed protections for federal whistle-blowers. One loophole specified that whistle-blowers were only protected when they were the first to report misconduct.

[…]

The whistle-blower law makes it easier to punish supervisors who try to retaliate against the government workers.

[…]

The new legislation, however, would go beyond restoring protections, to expand whistle-blower rights and clarify certain protections. For example, whistle-blowers could challenge the consequences of government policy decisions.

Specific protections would be given to certain employees, including government scientists who challenge censorship. Workers at the Transportation Security Administration, who provide airport security, would be covered under the law for the first time.

The law also would clarify that whistleblowers have the right to communicate with Congress.

To stop illegal retaliation, the law would make it easier to discipline those responsible, by modifying the burden of proof required when taking action against those trying to punish whistle-blowers. Also, the Office of Special Counsel, which was established to protect federal employees, would no longer be liable for attorney fees of government managers if the office does not prevail in a disciplinary action.

This is all very commendable, albeit rather belated. Now, if only the White House had any intention of actually applying these protections to those who reveal information that makes the President’s office look bad.

It’s also a fitting coincidence that these development occurs right as Bradley Manning’s ridiculous show trial-slash-court-martial begins.

(via @radleybalko, @ggreenwald & @ggreenwald)

Bill O’Reilly hates media operations that promote ideology

Your deliciously self-unaware screenshot of the day:

Daily Blend: Monday, November 19, 2012

Lisa Biron

Another Bible-loving Christianist “traditional values” advocate ^[pictured] busted for child porn & molestation.
(via Right Wing Watch)

Former Michigan assistant A.G. Andrew Shirvell demanding unemployment benefits after being fired for illegally using government computers to stalk and harass a gay university student.
(via Dispatches from the Culture Wars)

100,000 Stars: Take a spectacular virtual tour of the Milky Way galaxy.

And finally, give a stingray an X-ray and you apparently get an alien:
(via Pharyngula)

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

Daily Blend: Friday, November 02, 2012

Eric Bodenweiser

Meet today’s “family values” Republican hypocrite ^[pictured] caught diddling other women male prostitutes children.
(via Joe. My. God.)

I’m quite happy with Microsoft’s decision to banhammer anyone caught being a sexist shitheel in Halo 4 on Xbox Live. Those who can’t play well with others shouldn’t play with them at all.
(via @BadAstronomer)

Glenn Beck in 2011: Political summer camps for kids are similar to “Hitler Youth”. Glenn Beck today: Sponsors new “Patriot Camps” to brainwash kids with wingnut-approved version of U.S. history.
(via Dispatches from the Culture Wars)

And finally, Sweden continues to provide an optimistic glimpse of the future.
(via The Agitator)

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

Limbaugh angry at “fat” “fool” Gov. Christie for acting grown-up

Rush Limbaugh

Rush Limbaugh isn’t happy with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) putting electoral politics aside and working with President Obama like a mature adult – and even thanking him for doing a good job – in the wake of Hurricane Sandy’s devastation:

Heed the warning. Except what Governor Christie says. He’s fat and a fool. Don’t listen to Governor Christie. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about. He makes fun of me all the time.

That screeching rumble you just heard wasn’t an earthquake, but rather, the sound of everyone alive exploding with laughter at the thought of Rush freakin’ Limbaugh unironically accusing anyone else of being overweight (entirely irrelevant as that is), stupid, or mean-spirited, given his lifelong work of perfecting his incarnation of the Ugly American. They simply don’t make irony meters strong enough to survive whenever the man opens his facial manhole.

On another level, it’s considerably entertaining to witness all the squeals of dismay from the far-Right at the sight of their erstwhile beloved politician actually pulling his sleeves up and putting the well-being of his disaster-stricken citizenry first. It’s anyone’s guess whether they’re jealous of Gov. Christie for acting in a principled manner, or whether it’s the very idea of being principled that’s alien to them.

(via Dispatches from the Culture Wars)

A pro-choicer explains why she left the “pro-life” movement

I’m not usually into such “coming out” stories, but Libby Anne of Love, Joy, Feminism has penned a fascinating and truly enlightening account explaining how her belief in the sanctity of life and her desire to prevent abortions – along with an open mind – actually drove her away from her previously cherished “pro-life” movement and turned her into a pro-birth-control, pro-choice activist. It’s a moderately lengthy read, but a damned good one. Hell, even I learned a few things, which always makes me happy.

Here’s just a taste:

The reality is that so-called pro-life movement is not about saving babies. It’s about punishing women for having sex. That’s why they oppose birth control. That’s why they want to ban abortion even though doing so will simply drive women to have dangerous back alley abortions. That’s why they want to penalize women who take public assistance and then dare to have sex, leaving an exemption for those who become pregnant from rape. It’s not about babies. If it were about babies, they would be making access to birth control widespread and free and creating a comprehensive social safety net so that no woman finds herself with a pregnancy she can’t afford. They would be raising money for research on why half of all zygotes fail to implant and working to prevent miscarriages. It’s not about babies. It’s about controlling women. It’s about making sure they have consequences for having unapproved sex.

Ironically, only yesterday I argued that this conclusion about most “pro-lifers” being driven by veiled sex-shaming was an overreach, and that anti-choicers simply lack the openness towards new ideas and information to recognize the contradictions inherent to their positions on abortion and birth control. The more obvious answer now is some sort of combination of the two, though I suppose I can’t ever know what really goes on in their minds. Frankly, the idea of punishing women for having sex by restricting their medical and economic well-being is so incongruous to me that I can’t even wrap my mind around it.

Then again, maybe it’s a good thing I’m unable to empathize with thinking that sloppy. I’m just happy that Libby Anne saw the better of it, and hopeful that her exposé will help others come around as well.

(via Friendly Atheist)

Daily Blend: Friday, October 19, 2012

Jenny McCarthy

Guess who’s been caught committing actual voter fraud yet again? Virginia Republicans.

Days after adopting a new policy to support transgender students, Illinois’s East Aurora School Board caves in to Christianist bullies and rescinds it. Now that’s how you tell vulnerable kids their rights aren’t worth standing up for.

Today in Bizarro World: Antivaccination pseudo-celebrity Jenny McCarthy ^[pictured] lands deal for a Chicago Sun-Times column on “being a good parent”.

Godlessness is on the rise in Ireland, too.

That’s gotta hurt as Romney loses the Salt Lake Tribune.

Which is possibly due to things like this: “Mitt has always been a pro-life person; he governed, when he ran, as a pro-choice […]”

Classy quote of the day about Wisconsin Senate hopeful Tammy Baldwin (D): “The last thing [Wisconsinites] need is Barney Frank in a dress.”
(via Joe. My. God.)

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