Obama is vexing me

Perhaps Barack Obama really wants to make sure I won’t vote for him. At least, that’s how I’m interpreting his attempts to couple environmentalism and religion.

Meeting the threat of global climate change will take hard work and faith, Obama said.

“Not a blind faith, not a faith of mere words, not a faith that ignores science, but an active searching faith,” said Obama, a member of the United Church of Christ. “It’s a faith that does not look at the hardship and pain and suffering in the world and use it all as an excuse for inaction or cynicism, but one that accepts the fact that although we are not going to solve every problem here on earth, we can make a difference.”

I don’t even know what the hell he means. Meeting the threat of global climate change will take hard work, but faith? What does faith contribute to it? And then the rest is just noise. You don’t need a searching faith, since there’s nothing to search, and no criterion for deciding when you’ve found something — just make it all up. Tossing in irrelevant nonsense about using faith in an endeavor that requires real-world solutions is just an annoyance, and makes me suspect he’s going to waste a lot of effort if he gets into office. We do not need faith-based science.

Then there’s another issue: linking himself with evangelical Christianity means he’s automatically going to be allying himself with anti-gay bigotry. He has since rejected the position, but face it — he’s going to be hauling a lot of baggage along with him on this issue.

Here’s the only stance I’d like to see from any of the candidates: they can say they’re devout, that they believe in god and all that stuff, but that it’s a personal issue that they keep in the home and in their church, and off the campaign trail, and in particular, out of their political office. Can we please get at least one candidate stating that they are running for a secular political office and all that matters is their natural, material qualifications and plans? I can’t vote for a candidate who’s running on the platform that ghosts are on his side.

D.B. Cooper: the Morris connection?

I knew of D.B. Cooper, the famous mystery man who jumped out of a plane with a few hundred thousand dollars ransom money, and was never seen again — I grew up in the Pacific Northwest in the 1970s, so of course I was familiar with the story. Now here’s a weird little twist: there’s a new suspect in the crime, and he’s the brother of a fellow here in Morris, Minnesota.

Not me, I didn’t do it. I was only 14 when D.B. Cooper made his jump.

(Hat tip to Jeffrey Shallit)

Is this a good way to go?

At least it’s an interesting and unusual way to expire: a man in India was killed by a horde of wild monkeys. Not many people get to have that written in their obituary.

Reading further, I see that some places in India have a real problem with monkeys overrunning them, but I was surprised at this one solution they’re trying:

One approach has been to train bands of larger, more ferocious langur monkeys to go after the smaller groups of Rhesus macaques.

Uh, right. The little guys have just killed someone, so the obvious answer is to bring in bigger, meaner monkeys. Maybe the fate of death by monkey isn’t going to be so unusual after all.

(via Cronaca)

Doesn’t he realize? It’s all about nothing.

Prepare to have your opinion of Jerry Seinfeld diminished. He’s a scientologist, for the dumbest of reasons.

“They have a lot of very good technology. That’s what really appealed to me about it. It’s not faith-based. It’s all technology. And I’m obsessed with technology.”

Scientology and technology? You’ve got to be kidding. The “e-meter” they use is a cheap galvanometer, and their explanation for how it works is biophysical nonsense. If that’s his idea of technology to obsess over, he’s going to really be dazzled when someone shows him a transistor radio.

The dimness of D’Souza

It’s Monday. You’re tired after your weekend, you aren’t too enthused about getting back to work, and it’s just so dispiriting to have to get back into the grind. What do you need with your coffee? An unsurprising tale of a very stupid person, so that your boss and your coworkers will look like shining beacons of reason by comparision, and you’ll realize your job isn’t so bad after all. You need to hear about Dinesh D’Souza, because you’ll realize that even in the state of sluggish stupor on a Monday morning, you are a thousand times wiser and more perceptive than that crank.

You will especially enjoy the irony of D’Souza declaring that atheists aren’t very bright.

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Right-wing hypocrisy on parade

Richard Mellon Scaife, that horrible little man with an immense fortune who has been propping up institutes loudly supporting right-wing family values, creationism, and gutter-scraping attacks on Democrats, is getting a divorce. Not just any divorce — a train wreck of a divorce, prompted by Scaife’s gallivanting about with a prostitute, and with scads of amusingly petty behavior. And the money involved is impressive.

Unfathomable but true, when Scaife (rhymes with safe) married his second wife, Margaret "Ritchie" Scaife, in 1991, he neglected to wall off a fortune that Forbes recently valued at $1.3 billion. This, to understate matters, is likely going to cost him, big time. As part of a temporary settlement, 60-year-old Ritchie Scaife is currently cashing an alimony check that at first glance will look like a typo: $725,000 a month. Or about $24,000 a day, seven days a week. As Richard Scaife’s exasperated lawyers put it in a filing, "The temporary order produces an amount so large that just the income from it, invested at 5 percent, is greater each year than the salary of the President of the United States."

Take him for everything he’s got, lady, and then throw the money away on diamond dog collars, a team of tanned, buff pool boys, and whatever silly overpriced frippery tickles your over-privileged patrician fancy. It’s got to be better than using it to fund the Heritage Foundation.

Isn’t it so typical, though, that a rich old bluenose who thinks he knows best how other people should live their lives doesn’t even try to meet his own standards, and is flaming out spectacularly in such a tawdry scandal?

If it’s got math, it must be true

Earlier, I mentioned this Templeton Foundation ad that showed some people claiming the universe has a purpose, and others validating the silly question by saying maybe it has a purpose. I noted at the time that no one seemed very interested in saying what that particular purpose might be, or more importantly, how they knew what it was, but now someone has provided the answer.

Tristero has used the power of mathematics to find the answer to life, the universe, and everything, all in one simple, easy-to-remember formula that also proves the Christians are right about everything. It’s a little scary, actually — I may have to go in hiding to escape the plague of boils or locusts or frogs or whatever it is that Jehovah will be sending down on me soon.