That’s always the case. It seems a potential scandal is roiling the UK right now, with the revelation that Prince Andrew may have been led into unseemly behavior. Or, rather than “led”, ran eagerly into it. Tsk.
Buckingham Palace has resisted growing pressure to explain Prince Andrew’s association with convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, whom the royal is believed to have met on numerous occasions, including on his private jet, yacht and in stays at his New York and Florida mansions.
Since I bashed that absurd article on evolution on Salon, it’s only fair that I mention that they’ve also published a good one: The destruction of creationism: How the search for the beginning of time sparked a scientific revolution. It’s by Martin J.S. Rudwick, and I adore Rudwick’s books — he writes about 19th century geology, and how the scientists of the day struggled with the evidence to develop our modern understanding of geologic time. Gripping stuff, if you’re a nerd.
This article is all about old-time theologians grappling with the idea of a pre-Adamite history of the Earth, which is the beginning of what will eventually kill creationism as scientifically viable. Once you start asking questions of the book, and you start looking at other sources to, say, merely clarify ambiguities, you’re doomed — you’re going to have to start considering new evidence, and pretty soon the splendorously isolated purity of your source text is corrupted.
Mike Huckabee is considering a presidential run in 2016. While your brain is reeling at that possibility, here’s a Huckabee-Nugent duet on Cat Scratch Fever.
Oh my God,the police chief said.
How the hell did this happen?
Let’s see if we can figure it out.
The Chief of Police of Peachtree City, Georgia, William McCollom, was sleeping with his gun in bed. He went to move it, he said, and it just went off, shooting his wife. He immediately called 911.
Heck, as long as we’re talking about what could have been and dead politicians, here’s Paul Wellstone:
I remember those days, when we were all fired up and inspired by Mario Cuomo’s 1984 speech, and we all thought he ought to run for president. Here’s that speech:
The Atlantic has a rather depressing article on The Tragedy of the American Military. Here’s the kernel of the story: the knee-jerk idolatry of the military by the American public is leading to a decline in its effectiveness and to wasteful expenditure of human lives.
If I were writing such a history now, I would call it Chickenhawk Nation, based on the derisive term for those eager to go to war, as long as someone else is going. It would be the story of a country willing to do anything for its military except take it seriously. As a result, what happens to all institutions that escape serious external scrutiny and engagement has happened to our military. Outsiders treat it both too reverently and too cavalierly, as if regarding its members as heroes makes up for committing them to unending, unwinnable missions and denying them anything like the political mindshare we give to other major public undertakings, from medical care to public education to environmental rules. The tone and level of public debate on those issues is hardly encouraging. But for democracies, messy debates are less damaging in the long run than letting important functions run on autopilot, as our military essentially does now. A chickenhawk nation is more likely to keep going to war, and to keep losing, than one that wrestles with long-term questions of effectiveness.
Finally, someone does the right thing.
The European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights has filed a criminal complaint against U.S. torture program architects and members of the Bush Administration. The organization has accused CIA director George Tenet and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld of war crimes and they’ve called for a German prosecutor to conduct an immediate investigation.
Well, it did, but now it looks like North Korea's internet might be getting DDOSed. Interesting timing, given recent hacking by North Korea.
As promised, the Morris Sun Tribune published my letter about the Morris chimes. I want ’em gone.
