Back in November, Dinesh D’Souza asked, “Are Atheists the New Gays?“ Dawkins has also suggested that atheists, like gays, should come out of the closet. Well, what if they don’t want to? I don’t know if Dawkins would support “outing” atheists. Can an atheist “rights” group be far behind? Hate crimes laws to protect atheists? Affirmative […]
Money, Pink Floyd, Dark Side of the Moon Money, KMFDM, Money Money (That’s What I Want), The Beatles, With the Beatles Opportunities (Let’s Make Lots of Money), Pet Shop Boys, Discography Things I Do for Money, The Northern Pikes, Big Blue Sky Love, Sex & Money, Gravity Kills, Superstarved You Never Give Me Your Money, The Beatles, Abbey Road Where’s the Money?, […]
In case you haven’t read Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials, or seen the movie The Golden Compass, or even seen the trailer, a quick recap: In the world where Lyra, the protagonist, lives, everyone has a dæmon, a sort of external soul, which takes the form of an animal. Children’s dæmons can change shape at will […]
The AP reports: A study by two nonprofit journalism organizations found that President Bush and top administration officials issued hundreds of false statements about the national security threat from Iraq in the two years following the 2001 terrorist attacks. The study concluded that the statements “were part of an orchestrated campaign that effectively galvanized public opinion and, […]
The LA Times reports Friday’s violence occurred as hundreds of thousands of worshipers across Iraq took part in Ashura rites commemorating the death of Imam Hussein, a grandson of Muhammad who was killed by the army of the Caliph Yazid on the plains of Karbala. Hussein’s death in 680 made permanent the schism between Shiites and […]
The Mt. Blanco Fossil Museum, a young-earth creationist outfit, is selling a mastodon skull to raise money. As mentioned above, Mt. Blanco is a young-earth creationist organization: We believe that evolution is an old-fashioned theory not substantiated by facts, and that what the Bible says is more scientifically accurate. Our museum shows that there was a worldwide […]
Apparently, having my name in CPAN is a sign that I know everything about Perl, SOAP, XML, and security. Unless someone can come up with a legitimate reason to send 5000 authentication requests to a web server (including an explanation of why that’s not a brain-damaged way to solve the problem at hand), I’m going to […]
From today’s news: In an interview broadcast Friday, Bush said there could well be a long-term U.S. presence in Iraq, but it would be on the invitation of the Iraqi government. Now, where have I heard that before? Oh, right. I think it was August 20, 1968: Although on the night of the invasion, the Czechoslovak Presidium declared […]
Things I Miss About LPs Big cover art. You could spend hours looking at the details in the cover of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, or feel overwhelmed by the lips on The Cure’s Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me. They really have to be seen at 12″×12″ for full effect. Double albums. If 12″×12″ cover […]
First, here’s an opinion piece by Patrick Smith at the NYT’s “Jet Lagged” weblog, pointing out a lot of the problems with airport security procedures. At every concourse checkpoint you’ll see a bin or barrel brimming with contraband containers taken from passengers for having exceeded the volume limit. Now, the assumption has to be that the […]
