21 to Drink

Seems that one of the main drivers of the law to make 21 the legal drinking age is now saying that it has not worked.

Since that time, however, Chafet has apparently had a change of heart. The Los Angeles Times reports that in an editorial that has yet to be published, Chafet describes his effort to raise the drinking age as the "single most regrettable decision" of his career. "To be sure, drunk driving fatalities are lower now than they were in 1982," Chafet notes. "But they are lower in all age groups. And they have declined just as much in Canada, where the age is 18 or 19, as they have in the United States."

This is one of those laws that I have never understood. How could anyone think that having a law like this was going to stop young adults from drinking? It just drives them underground so they are doing it out of sight. Maybe I'm crazy, but it seems to me that laws should reflect reality (to an extent) and be enforceable. If not, then I think we need to examine whether it should be a law or not.

Of course, none of this even gets into the dubious notion of restricting an adult's rights before they have even done anything wrong.

xkcd

If you haven't checked out this webcomic about "romance, sarcasm, math, and language," you are missing out.

I'm St. Vincent Healthcare

The hospital I work at just announced the expansion of our Walk-In Clinic and Emergency Department. This is very exciting news for the hospital, of course, and something we very much needed. Anyway, there was a press conference with the usual pomp and circumstance. The media was there and if you look carefully at the next couple of videos, you'll see some creepy looking dork in a green shirt. I hope that guy doesn't work at St. V's because I sure wouldn't want to get healthcare at a place that would employ a guy like that.





I hate to disappoint anyone, but I'm not doing autographs. Sorry.

The Crushed Ego Gets the Last Laugh

I was orienting a student to the hospital on Monday. She is going to shadow a dietitian for a week to see if this is "What She Wants to Do With Her Life." I have to cover basic safety stuff such as what to do in case of fire, disaster, and so on. There is a quiz. One of the questions is "Who do you report to if you get injured?" She was not sure on this one, so I told her that it was me. This puzzled her until I explained that this was after she was patched up because we would have to do some paperwork for an event like that. We got that cleared up and went over a few more things. Then she smacked me down.

As she's leaving my office, she says with a smile, "Hopefully I don't get hurt so I don't have to come see you again."

What?

Where in the hell did that come from? I hadn't been rude. I hadn't come on to her. I had been nothing but friendly and polite. And this is what I get? After a brief, stunned moment I said, "I don't know how to take that."

She smiled again and said, "In the best possible way."

I guess there's a "best" way to take "I don't want to see your ugly mug ever again, freak!" I mumbled something like "have a good day" and she went on her way.

She should have knocked on wood when she said that, though. A couple of hours later, I got a phone call. She - the girl who prayed for no harm to come to her so we would never cross paths again - had...wait for it...passed out in the ICU, fallen on her face, and bloodied her nose. No kidding. How bad am I that this made me laugh uproariously? So, notepad and pen in hand, I fairly danced my way to where she was because I had to get the info on the matter to file a report. Oh, yes, I reveled in her embarrassment when she saw me. "So, you had a little accident, hm? Why don't you tell me about it."

Ha! I said. Karma's a bitch, isn't it? That'll teach ya. Anything else you want to say now? No? Are you sure? Yeah, that's what I thought? Maybe you'll think twice next time before you say something stupid, hm?

Of course none of that was said aloud. And it's a slight exaggeration of what was going through my head. It was damn funny, though. The ending. Not the beginning.

I hope you learned your lesson reading this.

Obama Sees the Light

I completely understand the President's change of heart, though I came to realize this many years ago.


Obama Drastically Scales Back Goals For America After Visiting Denny's

A New Fan of A Song of Ice and Fire

James Poniewozik over at Time has become a big fan of George R.R. Martin's epic fantasy series, A Song of Ice and Fire. He picked it up after hearing that HBO has a series pilot in the works. If you have not read this series, you owe it to yourself to check it out. It's heroic fantasy, but it's oh, so gritty. I wouldn't recommend getting too attached to any character as they are all fair game for the Reaper. Still, I highly recommend this series to anyone who likes rousing good characters and a gripping story. Now, if only book five would come out...

Birthers and One More Reason I Could Never Be a Politician

This video has been making the rounds lately.



Watching this amazes me on a certain level. I mean, I'm a pessimistic guy but I try (really!) to give people the benefit of the doubt. Then I see something like this and I think, "Yeah, humanity has barely more gray matter than an amoeba." What seals it is not the lady with her crazy rant. One or two loons in a crowd is to be expected. It's the mob applauding and cheering what she's saying.

This is just one reason I could never be a politician. I could not calmly stand there and be respectful toward this woman. No, I would be saying something like, "Look, lady, the fact of the matter is that you're crazy. And retarded. There's just no dancing around the issue. I hope you are not voting for me because I would consider myself a failure were I to secure votes from people as stupid as you."

Clearly, Mr. Castle is uncomfortable here. I feel for him. Up to a point. Republicans have not done near enough to quash this ridiculous rumor and so now have to sleep in the bed they've made. Of course, the media has been just as complicit. Witness Lou Dobbs raising the specter of "Obama Might Not Be an American" when the story was debunked on his own show three days previous.

Our Resplendent World

Check out this series of stunningly beautiful landscapes. This one is my favorite.

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Tyler has words of wisdom for us all.

We'll Save You But Its Gonna Cost You

Is it just me or does this seem a little strange?

A Massachusetts teenager who spent three nights alone on Mount Washington in April after he sprained an ankle and veered off marked trails has been fined more than $25,000 for the cost of his rescue.
...
Acerno said he believes Mason's fine is the largest ever sought under a 9-year-old New Hampshire law that allows lost hikers and climbers to be charged for rescue costs. Mason's rescue was particularly expensive because the helicopters the state typically used were unavailable, and a helicopter from Maine had to be brought in, Acerno said.

Now, granted the kid screwed up, but how can he be charged for something he didn't ask for? I'm willing to bet he didn't call up the state and say, "Hey, you know I'm lost. Any chance you give me a lift? Just hone in on my cell signal. Oh, by the way, the terrain's a bit rough. I recommend sending out a chopper." If you take your car to a mechanic and say, "Change the oil," and you come back to find out he also replaced your carburetor and now wants to charge you for it. You didn't ask for it!

One could argue that the kid should have turned down the rescue if he didn't want to pay for it. Can't you see the headline on that? "Lost Teen Turns Down Rescue Because of Cost" But that is just ludicrous.

Of course this stuff is expensive, but there has to be a better way to pay for it than to "fine" the person who was rescued. Private donations? Taxes on people using parks? I don't know what the solution is, but I know this one is not right. In more ways than one.

The Power of Money

Feel like getting riled up today? Read this post by Glenn Greenwald about the shady deals financial companies are making with the government.

This stuff is sickening and just points to the corrupting influence of vast wealth. I'm not against anyone getting rich, but I am against the people who do have more money than they know what to do with being able to use it to manipulate government to make laws and policies more favorable toward them at the expense of the not-so-rich person. That is wrong. Some have argued that the limits on campaign contributions is a First Amendment issue. Perhaps it is, but the problem is that money inflates a wealthy individual's clout to the point where they can drown out thousands of voices of the less wealthy.

Now I don't have any easy answers for this problem. But it is a problem and it needs to be dealt with. Sadly, even though this has a direct impact on the lives of Americans, I don't think there is enough anger, will, knowledge, or caring about the problem to get something done.

Weekly Music Video

The Postal Service - "Nothing Better"

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Pet Peeves

You know what bugs me? Stores with narrow, cramped aisles that are difficult for wheelchairs to navigate. When I take my mother shopping, I typically push her around in a wheelchair. It is more than a little annoying trying to squeeze between displays only to knock things down or to have to go around a few aisles because we just can't get through. I know space is often at a premium and that the number of people in wheelchairs is a very small percentage of the average store's customer base, but still. How about some consideration for people in wheelchairs. Is that too much to ask?

Weekly Music Video

This is from one of my favorite film scores of all time. After hearing this, I started checking out other stuff from this band and I fell in love.

Tangerine Dream - "Loved by the Sun" from the movie Legend



On an interesting note, the lyrics in this song were written and sung by Jon Anderson, lead singer of Yes. Tangerine Dream was not aware that this was going to happen.

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It's Good to Be a Geek

You might get invited to conferences put on by the Department of Homeland Security to discuss future possibilities.

Whack Jobs

The GOP is going to have a hard time regaining power if it continues to embrace the crazies.

WHEREAS, we believe our economic woes are consequences of our greater national moral crisis; and

WHEREAS, this nation has become a world leader in promoting abortion, pornography, same sex marriage, sex trafficking, divorce, illegitimate births, child abuse, and many other forms of debauchery; and

WHEREAS, alarmed that the Government of the United States of America is forsaking the rich Christian heritage upon which this nation was built; and

WHEREAS, grieved that the Office of the president of these United States has refused to uphold the long held tradition of past presidents in giving recognition to our National Day of Prayer; and

WHEREAS, deeply disturbed that the Office of the president of these United States disregards the biblical admonitions to live clean and pure lives by proclaiming an entire month to an immoral behavior;

Isn't it supposed to be Democrats that make things easy for the other party?

The View from Space

A space-eye view of a volcanic eruption.



Awesome.

h/t: Sullivan

Dude! Obama is Totally a Terrorist!

I'm glad that conspiracy theories never die. They are so entertaining.

I do hope that the author of the linked piece never reads Foucault's Pendulum, though. It might drive him over the edge.

Catering to the Wannabe-Adulterer Crowd

I had never heard of this site - AshleyMadison.com - until I read about it on Time. It is a website for married persons who want to cheat on their spouse. Yes, you read that right.

Two-timing politicians, take note: Cheating has never been easier. AshleyMadison.com, a personals site designed to facilitate extra-marital affairs, now boasts slick iPhone and Blackberry versions that help married horndogs find like-minded cheaters within minutes. The new tools are aimed at tech-savvy adulterers wary of leaving tracks on work or home computers. Because the apps are loaded up from phones' browsers, they leave no electronic trail that suspicious spouses can trace.

What can you even say to something like this? The article quotes people who use the site as complaining about lack of intimacy or compliments. Well, then why aren't we setting up a website to help couples deal with these issues? Because that's a lot harder, that's why. Our society is engineered to take the easy way out every damn time, not realizing that the easy way out is typically a short-term answer. The hard way will require more effort up front, but will pay off in the long term. That's not the way we our brains work, though. We are wired for the hear and now, the quick payoff. That doesn't mean we should give up; it means we just have to work a little harder.

My favorite quote in the piece, however, was this telling bit.

And for that, Biderman offers no apologies. "Humans aren't meant to be monogamous," he says. So would this free-thinking CEO mind if his own wife used his site? "I would be devastated," he says.

Right. "Hey, if other people want to do it? No big deal. My wife? Oh, my God, what?!"

The "humans aren't meant to be monogamous" line gets thrown out a lot and I don't get it. Well, I mean I do. Some people don't want to be monogamous and they are looking for a justification. There are lots of things humans have an inclination to do that we don't condone. How many times have you felt like physically throttling someone who made you mad? This is a feeling people regularly have; it is a deeply rooted feeling natural to humans. Does this mean we allow people to use violence willy-nilly to solve their problems? Not that I know of.

The whole point of civilization is to overcome our primal urges, to rise above ourselves and be better than our base egos. The excuse of "that's just how we're made" is ridiculous and anyone who uses it should be punched in the face.

What?

Weekly Music Video

R.I.P. Michael Joseph Jackson, August 25, 1958 - June 25, 2009

"Smooth Criminal"


"Beat It"


"Thriller"

Michael Jackson - Thriller sélectionné dans Musique et Clips

"Billie Jean"

Michael Jackson - New Music - More Music Videos

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NPR and the T-Word

Glenn Greenwald, a new addition to my blogroll, has been one of the best voices online in regards to the torture issue. Here he is, slamming NPR hard for its decision to not call "torture" torture.

Here’s the nub of the matter – the crux of journalistic decay in America. Who cares if NPR is "seen" as siding with the White House or its critics? How it is perceived -- and who it angers -- should have nothing to do with how it reports. Its reporting should be guided by the truth, by verifiable facts, and by the objective meaning of words [notably, NPR's excuse -- "the Right will get angry at us if we call it 'torture'" -- is identical to The Washington Post's excuse for why they stopped calling Dan Froomkin a reporter (it angers the Right); it's amazing how much The Liberal Media makes editorial decisions based on a desire to please the Right].

Also, note that Shepard explicitly admits that, with its language choice, NPR has opted to be "seen siding with the White House and the language that some U.S. officials, particularly in the Bush administration, prefer." That, too, is an odd choice for a supposedly Liberal Media outlet. And note her snide and revealing assumption -- conventional wisdom among the establishment media -- that the only people who want these tactics to be called "torture" are those "who are particularly and visibly still angry at the previous administration" (or, as David Ignatius put it, "liberal score-settlers"). It doesn’t seem to occur to her that something other than base vindictiveness – such as a desire to maintain the universal taboo against torture, or allegiance to accuracy in language – might motivate those who want NPR to call torture "torture," rather than prettify it with banality-of-evil euphemisms invented by the very people who perpetrated it.

This is one of the things that has really baffled me over the past few years. Why are media outlets so afraid of what the message machine on the Right says? I think one of the reasons people so dislike the mainstream news media is that they always seem to be pandering. They don't want to lose access to politicians, so they don't want to ask tough questions. They don't want to make people on the Right mad, so they change what they write.

It's the media's job to investigate and report facts. That might make people mad. That's all right, though, 'cause it means the media is doing its job. The inability to call a spade a spade is positively Orwellian.

Blogs to Check Out

I just updated my blogroll on the right. Some of them I passionately disagree with, but I always find them worthwhile to read. Check 'em out.

Thoughts on Blogging and a Milestone

I noticed that I recently surpassed 1000 posts here on this ol' blog. It's hard to believe that it's that high. I launched this ship on May 4, 2007. Over two years ago. That's almost harder to fathom than 1000+ posts. Being a writer at heart, I have to say that I have really enjoyed the journey so far and look forward to continuing it for the foreseeable future. Blogging has given me an outlet for my thoughts, helped me explore my thinking, learn more about myself, and learn more about the world.

One thing I've learned is that blogging is hard. Well, perhaps less hard than time consuming at least for me. If I'm writing anything more than a sentence with a link, I want to feel at least a modicum of familiarity with the topic. Typically that means a lot of reading, not just stuff online, but books and magazines and journals. It means spending time thinking about things and not just spouting off an off-the-cuff emotional response. Not that I've always achieved this, of course, but it is what I aim for.

Which is part of the reason my posting has been so light lately. For a number of reasons, my personal life has been quite hectic and I have not been able to devote the time to my blog that I would like. If anyone wants to pay me to blog, however, so I could quit my regular job, I would not say 'no.' Anyway, I'm going to try to be more disciplined and post more regularly. I know I've said that before, so I'm not going to make any promises. If you are at all interested in anything I have to say around here, please leave comments on my posts and thanks for hanging with me on my adventure to boldly go...somewhere.

The Captain's Utility Belt

Now that I have one more thing on my belt, I started thinking about all of the stuff I regularly carry on my belt or in my pocket.

• Cell phone


• Pager


• Gerber multi-tool


• Insulin pump


• Pocket knife

And when I'm at work, add:

• Flashlight


• Two-way radio

Oh, and I always have my wallet and keys on me. Not quite Batman level, yet, but I'm getting there.

Becoming a Cyborg

Well, I had my insulin pump put on this morning. So far it's seems to be working all right, but it's definitely going to take some getting used to. I'm still very conscious of its presence and I keep worrying that I'm going to pull the tubing out or accidentally push the wrong button. Changing clothes after work was interesting. I could have suspended it for two minutes while I did so, but I decided to leave it on to see how that was. I set the pump down on my dresser, but then had to be careful not to accidentally step too far back. Maybe next time, I'll just disconnect it. We'll see.

Tonight should be interesting as I'll have to learn how to get comfortable sleeping with the thing. Tomorrow, I get to disconnect it for my shower and reconnect it afterward. In fact, since this thing is my new constant companion, I'll have to learn how to do everything with it. Damn thing will be closer than my shadow.

Still, I'm sure that I will eventually come to really love it.

Type 1 Diabetes and Life Expectancy

It's probably because I have type 1 diabetes myself, but the fact that Sonia Sotomayor having it has been raised as a concern irks me. By all accounts she manages her condition quite well. Even if she has a life seven to ten years shorter than average, she is only 54 and should put in a lot of decent years on the bench. This is not even close to being a valid reason to question her ability to serve on the Supreme Court. Of course, other attacks on her have been much worse.

Weekly Music Video

This goofy song always makes me smile.

Todd Rundgren - "Bang on the Drum All Day"

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Comic Book Economics

Admit it. You've been sitting around thinking to yourself, "I wish their was some serious discussion about the economics of comic book worlds." Well, your wish has come true. Ecocomics has you covered. Highlights include:

Tragically, most mutants use their powers to either save the world or terrorize it. At least this is the popular depiction in Marvel Comics. Imagine what Magneto could do if he worked in construction. For one thing, all of those New York City public works project would have their completion dates moved up from 2018 to roughly five minutes from now. But instead, he spends his time sinking Russian submarines and making asteroid bases to live in. For the love of God, the man has the power to build himself a high-tech home in space. He could repair the Hubbell telescope with no trouble whatsoever.

And:

Regardless, someone in the Canadian government was still there to provide funding for Weapon X, whatever its intended purpose may have been. And I'm sure they had to receive progress reports such as: "We created a supersoldier with a healing ability and an indestructible skeleton. And he was really cool. But then he killed all of the scientists and the guards... and he's living in the woods now. So... we need more money."

And:

Norman Osborn started as a weapons and chemical designer. But like all wealthy industrialists do in the comic book world, he decided profit margins weren't enough. And as such he began riding around on a bat-shaped glider in a green and purple outfit and started throwing pumpkin bombs. It truly boggles my mind when i consider the amount of research and development that must have gone into the creation of pumpkin-shaped explosives. Some poor R&D guy had to sit in front of his computer screen, working on plastic explosive casings while dealing with Norman standing over his shoulder and shouting, "No, it needs to be MORE ORANGE!"

It simply boggles the mind that an industrialist who had made millions designing lucrative compounds, weapons, and technology would then perform an engineering about-face and decide that the best means of long distance transportation would be a halloween-themed glider that uses foot-grips to secure the rider. That's right, Norman Osborn expects a commando to be secured to a glider flying 800 miles an hour by the same technology that keeps boots connected to skis. Not to mention the fact that Norman Osborn decides that he is the best person to use this new technology. A company of hundreds spends millions of dollars to create a new series of weapons only to have the company CEO steal it all and fly around new york wearing a Halloween costume. In this economic downturn, it seems truly tragic for a company to nearly go bankrupt because their fourth-quarter profits were spent "trying to kill Spider-Man."

Check it out and be enlightened.

Obama Vetoes Mutant Registration Act

Good news for muties everywhere.

Weekly Music Video

'Cause the concert is coming in just a couple of weeks.

Styx - "Mr. Roboto"

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Michael Steele is Not Very Bright

Really, is he the best person to head the Republican Party. His latest brilliant idea is to cast gay marriage as a fiscal burden on society.

Republicans can reach a broader base by recasting gay marriage as an issue that could dent pocketbooks as small businesses spend more on health care and other benefits, GOP Chairman Michael Steele said Saturday.

Steele said that was just an example of how the party can retool its message to appeal to young voters and minorities without sacrificing core conservative principles. Steele said he used the argument weeks ago while chatting on a flight with a college student who described herself as fiscally conservative but socially liberal on issues like gay marriage.

What a dumbass. How does even sound plausible to anyone? I support gay marriage, but for those that don't, there are certainly much better arguments to make than this one. Are there any intelligent Republicans left?

Torture Suspect Dead

The man who "confessed" to a link between al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein while being tortured is now dead. Impeccable timing and how convenient.

All the Small Things

I made a woman cry at work.

Last Thursday, one of the employees at the Guest Services desk told me that a woman was there looking for her checkbook. I told her to send the woman back and I would see what I could do. She was a small woman, older with dark, slightly frazzled hair. The look on her face and the tone of her voice told a story of despair. She told me that she had been a patient at the hospital the previous weekend. She had collapsed and was found by a neighbor and rushed in to the hospital. Whatever was wrong (she didn't say), she was better and went home on Monday.

Unfortunately, she now could not find her checkbook. It had been in her purse, or so she thought, but she was unconscious when she came in and was not sure if it had been brought in with her or lost someplace else. Armed with a description of the checkbook and her name, I went to the Public Safety office to check through the lost and found as well as the patient valuables taken in. Sure enough, a Public Safety Officer had collected it, but the nursing staff apparently did not notify the department when she was discharged so that it could be returned to her.

I took the checkbook back across the street to the woman and turned it over to her. And she promptly burst into tears. She called me an angel, kissed my hand, and told me that I didn't know how much this meant to her. She was right, of course. She told me that she had thought she would have to cancel a whole string of checks and credit cards and get new photo ID. I had saved her this nightmare and she was ever so grateful. She insisted on doing something for me and nothing I said could convince her that it was unnecessary.

Yesterday, she brought me a plate of chocolate chip cookies. They were quite tasty, I must say. Anyway, all of this is to say that the smallest gestures we make toward our fellow humans are often the most important. You don't have to cure cancer or give someone $1 million to make a difference in someone's life. This didn't even take five minutes of my time and it's part of my job, but clearly it meant a lot to this woman. I challenge you to keep in mind the seemingly insignificant acts you can do for someone else. They may not be so small to the person you help.

"That's what the heck I said!"

Kids crack me up. Last night, as I was getting ready to leave to pick up dinner, I had this conversation with my five-year-old niece.

Holding a pair of pink sunglasses, she said, "I want to go with you 'cause I've got my hot sunnies."

"Hot sunnies?" I asked.

"That's what the heck I said!"

I could only laugh after that. What could I say? I'm going to have to remember that line, though.

Weekly Music Video

I love the dark, moody, slightly creepy ambiance of this song.

Toadies - "Possum Kingdom"

The Toadies - Possum Kingdom
by UniversalMusicGroup

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I certainly think my mother is amazing. Happy Mother's Day, Mom! Thank you for always being there for me. I couldn't have made it without you.

Off to the Movies

Going to see the new Star Trek film tonight with my daughters and a friend. I can't wait.

My Friend

Patrick Roy Kramer, May 6, 1977-October 22, 2006

All Things Will Die - Lord Alfred Tennyson

Clearly the blue river chimes in its flowing
Under my eye;
Warmly and broadly the south winds are blowing
Over the sky.
One after another the white clouds are fleeting;
Every heart this May morning in joyance is beating
Full merrily;
Yet all things must die.
The stream will cease to flow;
The wind will cease to blow;
The clouds will cease to fleet;
The heart will cease to beat;
For all things must die.
All things must die.
Spring will come never more.
O, vanity!
Death waits at the door.
See! our friends are all forsaking
The wine and the merrymaking.
We are call’d–we must go.
Laid low, very low,
In the dark we must lie.
The merry glees are still;
The voice of the bird
Shall no more be heard,
Nor the wind on the hill.
O, misery!
Hark! death is calling
While I speak to ye,
The jaw is falling,
The red cheek paling,
The strong limbs failing;
Ice with the warm blood mixing;
The eyeballs fixing.
Nine times goes the passing bell:
Ye merry souls, farewell.
The old earth
Had a birth,
As all men know,
Long ago.
And the old earth must die.
So let the warm winds range,
And the blue wave beat the shore;
For even and morn
Ye will never see
Thro’ eternity.
All things were born.
Ye will come never more,
For all things must die.

Kids and Divorce

As is so often the case, The Onion mixes in a healthy amount of truth with the funny.

Bipartisanship at Its Finest

So, when Obama offered to make concessions on curbing medical malpractice rewards as part of overhauling health care, what did the Republicans offer to give?

Nothing, it turned out. Republicans were unprepared to make any concessions, if they had any to make.

Just more proof that the current crop of Republicans are not serious about governing, only about grandstanding. Like it or not, our system of government is typically about working with people of differing views and compromising with them. Unfortunately for the Republicans, Democrats hold the White House as well as a majority in both branches of Congress. They are in a position of not needing to compromise as much as the GOP. If the Democrats wanted to, they could ram quite a bit through. So, it seems as if it is in the best interest of the party for Republicans to take an olive branch when it's offered instead of throwing it away.

Reconciling Science and Religion

I'm always glad to read stories like this. Francis Collins is an evangelical Christian and a scientist. He worked on the Human Genome Project and now he's working on a new project to bridge the gap between Christian fundamentalism and science.

Collins, 59, who with his mustache and shock of gray hair looks like former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton's cheerful twin, seems genuinely pained by the idea that science could be viewed as a threat to religion, or religion to science. And so he decided to gather a group of theologians and scientists to create the BioLogos Foundation in order to foster dialogue between the two sides. The name — combining bios (Greek for "life") and logos ("the word") — is also what Collins calls his blended theory of evolution and creation, an approach he hopes can replace intelligent design, which he derides as "not a scientific proposal" and "not good theology either."

Through the Washington-based foundation, Collins says he and his colleagues hope to support scholarship that "takes seriously the claims of both faith and science." Its online component, biologos.org, is designed to be a resource for skeptics and nonbelievers who are interested in religious arguments for God's existence. But the primary audience for BioLogos is Collins' own Evangelical community.

I think this is fantastic. The person in the best position to change minds is someone on the inside, a member of the community. Being an Evangelical, Collins knows the language, knows the thought processes of the group and is in a much better position to show them that faith does not have to be in conflict with science. The two enrich each other or at least should. It's the extremes on both sides (Richard Dawkins, James Dobson, I'm looking at you two) that escalate this "battle" and make it difficult for the two to come together.

I guess I'm saying that I vote for more sanity and respect from people on both sides of the issue.

Conservatives and Humor

Via HuffPo, it seems that conservatives have difficulty detecting satire.

This study investigated biased message processing of political satire in The Colbert Report and the influence of political ideology on perceptions of Stephen Colbert. Results indicate that political ideology influences biased processing of ambiguous political messages and source in late-night comedy. Using data from an experiment (N = 332), we found that individual-level political ideology significantly predicted perceptions of Colbert's political ideology. Additionally, there was no significant difference between the groups in thinking Colbert was funny, but conservatives were more likely to report that Colbert only pretends to be joking and genuinely meant what he said while liberals were more likely to report that Colbert used satire and was not serious when offering political statements. Conservatism also significantly predicted perceptions that Colbert disliked liberalism. Finally, a post hoc analysis revealed that perceptions of Colbert's political opinions fully mediated the relationship between political ideology and individual-level opinion.

It would be easy to just laugh at those dumb conservatives, but I'm genuinely curious as to why this is so. Why do conservatives have a harder time realizing that Colbert is a parody? By the same token, if there was a similar show with a conservative ideological bent, would liberals be able to identify it as satire?

Weekly Music Video

This is a great hard rock precursor to heavy metal.

The Sweet - "Ballroom Blitz"

No Moon Base?

NASA is saying that they might abandon their plans for a moon base in favor of other manned missions.

NASA will probably not build an outpost on the moon as originally planned, the agency's acting administrator, Chris Scolese, told lawmakers on Wednesday. His comments also hinted that the agency is open to putting more emphasis on human missions to destinations like Mars or a near-Earth asteroid.

NASA has been working towards returning astronauts to the moon by 2020 and building a permanent base there. But some space analysts and advocacy groups like the Planetary Society have urged the agency to cancel plans for a permanent moon base, carry out shorter moon missions instead, and focus on getting astronauts to Mars.

As big a proponent as I am of space exploration, I am glad that NASA is dropping the idea of a moon base. It sounds cool, but it's actually not very helpful in exploring space. It's really too far from Earth to serve as a convenient launching point for further missions. What we need are a space elevator to more cheaply and easily move materials into space, a large space station in orbit around our planet that can be spun for artificial gravity, and a plant for manufacturing craft outside of Earth's gravity. Granted, none of these are going to happen in the near term; but NASA or a private contractor should be working on these. Space exploration will increase dramatically once we have these in place.

Weekly Secret

PostSecret

Grandma Dope

I am going to suggest this career to my mother. She could use a way to supplement her income and 10 Gs a week isn't bad at all.

Ideas and Sense

An article at The Atlantic takes the NYT to task for just tossing out theories without any, you know, facts behind them. It was interesting if not altogether unsurprising in this day and age. What I loved about the piece, though, was this cartoon.

I'd never seen this before, but I love it. I printed it out and hung it up at work. I may have to have a copy with me at all of the meetings I have to go to. Instead of voicing dissent for every bad idea, I can just hold this up every time one comes up.

Kim Kardashian is a Role Model

In the "You Can't Make This Shit Up" category, Sean Hannity calls Kim Kardashian a role model for young girls. Shhh....hear that? Yeah, that's just the crickets chirping. I guess for all of the girls out there that want to be famous for being famous, "accidentally" release a sex tape, or pose for Playboy; then, yeah, she's a great role model. Of course, Hannity also equates liberals with terrorists, has no problems with torture, and brings anti-Semites on his show to smear Obama.

And to think this guy has an audience. That the bar is so low for success should give every American hope.

No More CAPTCHAs!

Chris Wilson makes the case.

If only someone had listened to computer scientist Moni Naor in 1996, proving that you're human on the Internet would have been so much more interesting. Naor was among the first to propose that simple tests only humans can solve would prevent malicious bots from infiltrating the Web. In an unpublished manuscript, Naor proposed nine possible tests, including gender recognition in images, fill-in-the-blank sentences, and a "deciding nudity" quiz in which you're asked to identify which person isn't wearing any clothes.

Alas, rather than getting to play "find the naked person" every time we sign up for a webmail account, we're now stuck with those reviled squiggly letter tests known as CAPTCHAs. Let's give credit where credit's due: These tests have been incredibly effective in combating spam. But even CAPTCHA pioneer Luis von Ahn, who received a MacArthur genius grant on account of his squiggly-letter work, admitted to me that they won't be a solution forever. For all their success, these tests are a crude way to weed out the bots among us. And they have proliferated to so many sites that the task of proving your humanity on the Internet is beginning to feel like an imposition.

I hope it's soon. Those things are damn annoying.

Beware the Gay Storm!

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
The Colbert Coalition's Anti-Gay Marriage Ad
colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Gay Marriage Commercial

Republicans and Science

They just don't seem to get along.

A Bullied Kid Commits Suicide

An eleven-year-old in Georgia has committed suicide because he couldn't handle any more bullying. I have written before about kids and bullying and this subject is one close to my heart. Parents and students need to do more to stop this. It can't just be written off as "kids will be kids." No! In this case the boy's mother complained to the school about it several times and nothing was done. This is unacceptable. Parents and schools need to work with children about the importance of not bullying and if (when, I should say) it does happen, the hammer needs to come down. Hard. Nothing good comes from bullying. It doesn't make the kid being bullied tougher. It's not the bully just letting out some harmless aggression. It is a vicious assault against someone whether physical violence takes place or not. The scars of bullying last for a lifetime.

And sometimes that life ends too early because of the bullying. That's not acceptable.

Weekly Music Video

The 80s were great on so many levels. This is a great tune to get you pumped up.

Quiet Riot - "Cum on Feel the Noize"

Weekly Secret

PostSecret

Isn't compassion wonderful?

Do Not Go Gently Into That Good Night

This is not cute or funny or endearing. It's just creepy. In order to "boost [her] confidence," a mom has spent nearly $18,000 on plastic surgery in order to...look just like her 20-something daughter. She even dresses like her.

I know that the inability to accept the aging process is as old as humanity itself. The expressions of that fear still amaze me from time to time, however. What is this woman going to think or do when she's older and no amount of plastic surgery can make her look younger? Why is it often harder to love and accept ourselves than it is others?

A Brief Moment of Joy Before the End

If this doesn't choke you up just a little, you may be a Vulcan.

Shep Smith on Torture

I've been wanting to post on the recent torture debate because I am passionate about the subject. Until then, though, enjoy this fine piece of television (from Fox no less).



This is America indeed.

Memorizing Pi

As a geek of many stripes, including math, I have always been fascinated with pi, the irrational number that is the ratio of a circle's diameter to its radius. Some years ago I decided to start memorizing pi. It contains an infinite number of digits so I could never commit its entirety to memory, but I was curious to see how far I could go. I only made it to about 50 before I got distracted and got away from it. I've always wanted to start again, however, and now I have the perfect excuse.

My oldest daughter is turning into quite the little math whiz. She recently took the NWEA test and scored in the 98th percentile in math for her grade. Hearing that brought a tear to my eye. Anyway, she told me today that she would like to start memorizing pi, too. Yeah, another tear there. Okay, seeing my daughters blossom into beautiful, young geeks is a wonderful thing. Sniff. I'm gettin' all choked up here. Okay, pull it together...

So, we are going to memorize five digits a day. In 200 days, that should give us 1000. Why would you do this? you ask. Because it's there. And, maybe it's just me, but I think it's going to be a blast.

John Boehner Demonstrates Why Republicans Are Unpopular

The rank ignorance here is just appalling. Who's saying carbon dioxide is a carcinogen? No one! Well, no one except desperate Republicans still unable to figure out they lost in 2006 and 2008. This is a party that continues to look backward and to cling to the past. Until they come to grips with reality and decide to take an honest look at themselves and where they want to go, they will continue to lose. And deservedly so. It would be better for everyone if we had at least two viable political parties, but the current iteration of the GOP just does not measure up. How long will it take them to regroup?

Dr. Google

In a shocking turn of events, people are harnessing the great power of teh intarwebs for medical diagnoses.

To say he is literally everybody's first-call doctor exaggerates the matter only a little. A 2008 Microsoft study found that one of every 50 total Web queries was health-­related, and one-quarter of the million people in the study had embarked on at least one health-related search over the course of the study.

This reminds me of a coworker at my current job. I walked into the office one day last year. He's staring at the computer and he asks me, "Shane, if I had an aneurysm, would I know it?"

I just busted out laughing, not realizing at first if he was serious. "What?"

"I'm trying to read about aneurysms on the internet to see if that's what I have. So, would I know if I did?"

Still laughing. "Well, yeah, in the sense that you'd be dead."

"Really?"

"Yeah, really. Why?"

"Well, I have this sharp pain in the back of my head and it's hurting pretty bad. I was trying to figure out what it could be."

"Well, Dr. Noble can safely tell you that it's not an aneurysm."

"Oh, okay."

This is a regular occurrence with him, although the oh-my-God-I-think-I-have-an-aneurysm story is the best.

Weekly Music Video

A coworker loaned me this album, Neon Bible, by a group I had not heard of and it has since become one of my favorites. In fact, if it was a physical copy, it would probably be worn out by now. Here's one song, but you really should check out the whole album.

Arcade Fire - "Intervention"

The Captain's Chair

Oh, yes, I want one.

Hovering Over Your Children

This is an impulse I struggle with as I'm sure any parent does. Lenore Skenazy, the woman who became (in)famous for letting her 9-year-old ride the New York City subway on his own, has a book out now about how to step back and give your children freedom without killing yourself with worry. I think most of us do tend to hover over our children too much and this can have a profound impact on them for their entire lives. With my daughters I really try to give them as much freedom as I can within certain boundaries. I am not always perfect about it, of course, but I do make an effort. I want them to learn how to handle things on their own, how to succeed and fail, and how to keep going when they do either. My hope is that this will make them stronger adults, more confident in their own abilities.

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Get Off My Lawn!

I can't wait until I am a grouchy old man. I want to sit on my front porch, grizzled and world weary, shaking my fist at the whipper snappers that stray across my lawn or drive by too quickly. I could also write bitter screeds against denim like George Will.

Long ago, when James Dean and Marlon Brando wore it, denim was, Akst says, "a symbol of youthful defiance." Today, Silicon Valley billionaires are rebels without causes beyond poses, wearing jeans when introducing new products. Akst's summa contra denim is grand as far as it goes, but it only scratches the surface of this blight on Americans' surfaces. Denim is the infantile uniform of a nation in which entertainment frequently features childlike adults ("Seinfeld," "Two and a Half Men") and cartoons for adults ("King of the Hill"). Seventy-five percent of American "gamers" -- people who play video games -- are older than 18 and nevertheless are allowed to vote. In their undifferentiated dress, children and their childish parents become undifferentiated audiences for juvenilized movies (the six -- so far -- "Batman" adventures and "Indiana Jones and the Credit-Default Swaps," coming soon to a cineplex near you). Denim is the clerical vestment for the priesthood of all believers in democracy's catechism of leveling -- thou shalt not dress better than society's most slovenly. To do so would be to commit the sin of lookism -- of believing that appearance matters. That heresy leads to denying the universal appropriateness of everything, and then to the elitist assertion that there is good and bad taste.

You know, I read something like this, shake my head, read it again, and think, "Really?" All of the things in our country that he could make valid complaints about and he goes off on people who wear jeans (not to mention people who play video games or enjoy action/adventure movies). How does someone like this get a column? How does someone write this and then other people read it, nod sagely, and say, "By gum, that George fella's right! If only people didn't wear jeans, then we wouldn't have hunger, poverty, disease, or death! Let's have a Jeans Party and throw all of the denim we can find into the sea! Death to Denim!"

I can see the angry mobs now, torches and pitchforks in hand, chasing down the rogues who refuse to give up their favorite denim attire. "Give me denim or give me death!" they cry. The mob, George Will, at the head chants "Death!" in unison while Will charges forth and skewers the poor bastard. Then, with a sharp tug, he pulls his pitchfork out of the corpse. Neatly adjusting his bow tie, he smoothes out his smartly pressed pants, and begins scanning his surroundings, looking for his next denim-clad target.

This sort of rant has been going on since the dawn of time. I'm sure that back in the mythical Cave Days, some dumb bastard ranted about "Kids these days and their damn wheels!" or "The sun isn't good enough for you, eh? You have to make your own little fire? Well, when I was a strapping young lad..." Blah. Blah. Blah. For all of you in older generations who just can't stand what the next generations are doing, well, tough. You had your time. The only constant is change whether you like it or not.

And, really, if this is the only thing you can get worked up over, either the world has become a utopia or you just aren't thinking clearly.

Of Insulin Pumps and Protein in My Urine

I had my three-month checkup last week with my doc. He gave me a referral to an endocrinologist so I can explore the option of getting an insulin pump. On one hand, it would be nice in that I would go from poking myself four or five times a day to once every three or four days for insulin. As much as I enjoy being a pincushion, a break would be nice. Pump users also typically have better control of their blood sugar with fewer ups and downs. On the other hand, I'm not sure I want a machine permanently attached to me, reminding me of my condition, especially if it's going to start looking for Sarah Connor.

I also had labs. My A1C was good, although it has creeped up a bit. What was a concern was my urine analysis. Protein showed up in my urine meaning my kidneys are not functioning properly. My doctor has prescribed lisinopril which is supposed to help. That puts me at six drugs I now take on a regular basis. At least this one is a pill, though. I suppose I should be grateful that their are drugs to help me manage all of my health issues, but right now I just feel...tired of it all.

Weekly Music Video

Here is an artist that I got into through my parents. Shockingly, they have good taste on occasion (kidding, Mom). He's got an incredible voice and happens to be one hell of a songwriter, too.

Gene Pitney - "24 Hours from Tulsa" and "Angelica"

Time Travelling Attire

I want this t-shirt.

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Curing the Desire to Steal

William Saletan writes about a new study indicating that a drug used to treat drug addiction seems to curb the desire to steal.

It sounds like an April Fools' joke. But it isn't. In an interview with Reuters, the study's lead author explains that naltrexone "gets rid of that rush and desire" to steal.

Naltrexone is better known as a drug for alcohol or drug addiction. Many of us, while accepting these addictions as diseases, continue to regard theft as a matter of personal responsibility. Should we rethink that distinction? If the same drug relieves both conditions, should we take kleptomania more seriously as an illness?

Modern medicine continues to find biological evidence behind all sorts of acts, good and bad. It's exciting, but also a little scary. How long is it before we have pills to change any sort of behavior? It sounds great if you have a pill that stops a person from wanting to molest children, but what if you have a pill that say, makes kids not want to take risks? I mean, you don't want your kids climbing tall trees or riding a bike down a steep hill sans helmet, right? Of course it sounds absurd now to talk about extremes, but one of the problems with modern science is that new advances are coming faster than we have time to think them through to see how best to properly assimilate them into our society. Actually, probably an even bigger issue is that so many people seem disinclined to discuss these issues up front and would rather wait until after it presents a concrete issue to step back and say, "You know, we should think about this for a second."

Everyone's Autobiography

Bryan Appleyard writes the autobiography of every human ever in two words: unintended consequences.

Quote of the Day

"[A]s a secular person who thinks there’s a lot of wisdom in traditional Christian ethical thought it always strikes me as very odd that modern-day manifestations of Christian political activism in the United States so often take the form of advocacy for violence, cruelty, and revenge." - Matthew Yglesias

The Wheel of Time...Just...Keeps...Turning

A little over a week ago, in what I was sure was an early April Fools' Day joke, it was announced that the final book in The Wheel of Time saga would be split into three books. The first book of the final three will be released this November.

I know I'm not the only one who finished the last book, Knife of Dreams, and thought, "How the hell can he finish this in one book?" Even though Jordan had said he would not wrap up all plot threads, there was still so much left hanging that only one more book seemed a Herculean task. And, sure enough, we're not getting one more book; we're getting three.

Honestly, I'm not sure how to feel about this. The Wheel of Time series is one of my favorites. I've been reading it since The Great Hunt came out in paperback in...1991. Wow. I've been reading these books for eighteen years. Each time a new one came out, I would reread the entire series. These books have really shaped my conception and love for the fantasy genre.

Still, I'd by lying if I said I wasn't feeling a little burned out on them. The last four books of the series (eleven main books and one prequel) were a bit of a drag. Jordan got caught up in numerous side plots that really felt tangential to the main story and typically not nearly as interesting. I understood where he was going in trying to craft an epic plot in which impending Armageddon triggers all sorts of other events. But, he meandered too much and took too much time with these. If he had been able to tighten up these side stories into a tighter arc, it might not been so bad. As it stands, though, it's hard not to occasionally think, "I really don't care about this" while reading the last couple of books.

That makes the thought of three more books somewhat depressing. I really, really want to see how it all ends. Jordan has said in multiple interviews that he has had the very end in mind since the beginning and I imagine it is going to be awe-inspiring. If Brandon Sanderson, the author tasked with finishing the series since Jordan's passing, can keep these last books tightly paced and moving quickly then I am sure I will enjoy them with the same enthusiasm I had for the first several books in the series. If not, they will end up ranking as a great literary disappointment because the promise shown in the first few books was and is outstanding.

Mom Wants Son's Sperm

That sounds like a story from a soap opera when I write it like that. Reality stranger than fiction and all that...

A mother has had a judge rule that she has the right to her dead son's sperm.

A judge has granted a mother's request to have someone harvest sperm from her dead son's body, so she can have the option of carrying out his wish to have children.
Nikolas Colton Evans, 21, died Sunday at a Brackenridge hospital after being punched and falling outside an Austin bar March 27.
His mother, Marissa Evans, told the Austin American-Statesman newspaper that he wanted to have three sons someday and had even picked out their names: Hunter, Tod and Van.
"I want him to live on. I want to keep a piece of him," she told the newspaper.

That last quote is the key here. This mother is not doing this to fulfill her son's wish. She is doing it for herself. I can't imagine what this woman is going through. Losing a child has got to be about the most horrific thing imaginable especially in some senseless way like this. However, that does not make it right for her to take his sperm to make some babies.

There are many ways to keep her son's memory alive. This is not a good way.

Star Wars is Making Your Child a Violent Monster

Emily Brazelon is worried about the effect Star Wars is having on her young children.

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away—circa 2006, at our old house in D.C.—my husband and I let our little boys watch Star Wars. Eli was almost 6 and had just broken his leg. We were housebound, antsy, and despairing. In a moment of weakness, we turned on Star Wars. We figured, like most indulgences, that the movie would thrill and then pass.

Wrong. Our younger son, Simon, who was not quite 3, couldn't sleep that night or for many nights over the months that followed. He was obsessed. He talked about the movie to any relative, friend, or baby sitter who would listen and plenty of shopkeepers who wouldn't. He relived the trash-compactor scene. He worried over Obi-Wan Kenobi's Jedi sternness and Darth Vader's glittering malevolence. He sniffed out plot twists in the rest of the endless six-movie saga (who knows how) and tried desperately to work out why Darth Vader could be Anakin Skywalker and Luke's father—and could also cut off Luke's hand. Here's a little girl sweetly summarizing the Star Wars plot. Simon wasn't sweet. He was feverish. He was short-circuiting. Thanks to our two hours of stupid indulgence, Paul and I concluded, his neurons were melting.

She even mentions a psychologist she had interviewed for an unrelated matter who told her this was a definite faux pas.

During Episode 1, in the throes of Simon's initial fixation, I happened to be interviewing child psychologist Edward Zigler. In the middle of a conversation on an entirely unrelated topic, I veered off into my family's Star Wars woes. I was confessing to Dr. Zigler, but in that rueful way that's really a bid for absolution. Instead, on the other end of the line, I heard only silence. And then he said quietly that indeed I had erred and that Simon probably shouldn't watch any more movies with violence or even suspense, for, well, years. Here's a 2007 study from Seattle Children's Hospital that links violent screen images to aggressive behavior in boys (not girls) ages 2 through 5.

While I am a big proponent of parents carefully screening what their children watch, I think Bazelon is overreacting here. Her youngest son wasn't quite three when he watched the first Star Wars. That's probably a little young, but watching Star Wars one time isn't going to irreparably harm a child. I was watching Star Wars that young and look how I turned out. *crickets chirping* Okay, maybe not the best example. Still, she needn't be so concerned about her two sons getting excited about a movie and wanting to be Jedi even if they are making their own lightsabers and thwacking each other. Boys have lots of energy. Let them play make-believe; it's good for them. She can talk to them about the movie and help them understand what they saw.

I think that's a better option than banning Star Wars for three years.

Tax Reform

More proof that we need to overhaul our tax code.

Foreigners [sic] nationals who don't live in the U.S. but like to place wagers here can really win big. Any money they win on horse or dog races in the United States is exempt from U.S. taxes. That means they don't have to cough up the 30 percent withholding tax that unlucky Americans must pay. This provision was also included in the 2004 jobs act, at the behest of Kentucky Sens. Jim Bunning and Mitch McConnell to help ease the suffering of bet-taking race courses. This break on legal gambling doesn't have anything to do with taxes you are supposed to pay on illegal activity. That's right. Anyone who receives bribes, deals drugs, takes kickbacks or steals property is expressly required to pay taxes on that income, reminds Luscome. Of course, they can write off their attorney's fees as a business expense.

Internet Privacy

I stress this to my daughters all of the time. If you put it on the internet, it's not private.

Bill O'Reilly the Racist

I don't know how anyone can take Bill O'Reilly seriously when he says stuff like this.

They want to break down the white, Christian, male power structure, which you're a part, and so am I, and they want to bring in millions of foreign nationals to basically break down the structure that we have.

Well, anyone that's not part of the "white, Christian, male power structure" anyway. I wonder if you have to sign up to be a part of that group or if you are automatically inducted. I fit the three criteria, but I've never received any sort of newsletter or anything. Maybe there was dues I was supposed to pay...

Weekly Music Video

"Don't tell me you guys have never got the Led out."

Led Zeppelin - "All My Love"

Banning Cigarettes

Scott Haig, a physician and columnist for Time, doesn't want to regulate tobacco. He wants to ban cigarettes all together.

Which begs the question: Why regulate it at all? Why put cigarettes under the jurisdiction of the agency charged with making sure our food and drugs are safe, when cigarettes are, as we all know by now, unsafe by definition. Used as intended, they are bound to make you sick. Rather than equate them with food and drugs, if lawmakers were serious about the health costs of smoking, they would take the logical next step and just make the damn things illegal.

This is a great idea. In fact, why stop there? Let's make a list of other bad things we should completely outlaw.

• Alcohol - I think we tried this before, but apparently we didn't have the guts to stick with it. We're not as weak now, so no more liquor!


• Cars - About 42,000 people die every year in the U.S. due to auto accidents. Banning cars would eliminate that little problem, wouldn't it?


• Lightning - How horrible is it that lightning occasionally strikes people, killing them, or starts a fire which kills people and destroys property? That's just not right. I say outlaw lightning.


• Unhealthy foods - There's way too much junk food out there and people clearly do not have the willpower to resist it. If we take it away, we don't have to worry about weak will anymore.


• Mean Words - Know what happens when you say mean things to people over and over? They snap and kill a bunch of people. What a pain. If we make it against the law for people to say mean things to each other, this wouldn't ever happen. Problem solved.


• Sex - This is just messy. It leads to pregnancy which either leads to abortion (which causes a lot of stress to many people) or children. And what do those children do? Grow up and become middle managers, dictators, mass murderers, bullies, pimps, people who put the toilet paper on the roll incorrectly (if they do at all) and other unsavory types. Get rid of sex and you don't have to worry about this little problem anymore.

I'm sure I'll think of more things later, so I'll be sure to update my list.

Ahem. Back to the Land of the Non-Sarcastic (sarcasm is most certainly not going on the list of things to ban) for a moment, this is a ludicrous notion. Yes, it would be a better world if no one smoked. No one doubts that. But, we can't save people from themselves. Prohibition failed spectacularly for a reason. No one likes being told what they can and cannot do. We need to have programs and policies in place to discourage smoking and to help people who do and want to quit do so; but we cannot be everyone's overbearing parent, telling them what they can and cannot do at all times.

It's the same reason I am against seatbelt laws, helmet laws, and other measures designed to protect someone's safety. Why can an adult not make the decision on their own whether or not to take safety precautions? People have argued, as Haig does in his article, that it puts a burden on the rest of society because the healthcare costs associated with accidents or smoking complications are enormous. But, isn't that an argument for healthcare reform and not being everyone's nanny?

Adults are adults and we need to let them make their own choices for good or for ill. After all, how does anyone learn anything if they are never allowed to fail?

If you can think of anything else we should ban, though, let me know.

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Colin Powell: Coward

I was really disappointed watching Colin Powell on Rachel Maddow.

I understand that Powell is trying to protect his image here, but it's disappointing nonetheless. I really want to respect Powell. I think he has more integrity than anyone else from Bush's cabinet. But his refusal to come clean on torture makes it difficult for me to maintain a high opinion of him. What the Bush administration orchestrated is one of the greatest moral blights on America in our history. For Colin Powell to not stand up and accept some responsibility, to not come clean, is cowardice pure and simple. And if he doesn't want to fess up, then he shouldn't be doing interviews at all. He should just stay home and shut up and think about what went on and why he didn't do more to stop it.

Economy Got You Down? Get a Vasectomy

Vasectomies are up in our troubled times.

"My staff came to me and said, what's happening?" said Jones, the chairman of the Department of Regional Urology of Glickman Urological and Kidney Institute at the Cleveland Clinic. "Why are we suddenly having an explosion in guys asking for vasectomies?"

They looked at their statistics and realized the uptick started around November as the economic crisis deepened. October went down in the history books as one of Wall Street's worst months.

Since then, the Cleveland Clinic has seen a 50 percent increase in vasectomies, an outpatient surgery that is the cheapest form of permanent birth control. Vasectomies are less invasive and cheaper than tubal ligation, which involves blocking, tieing or cutting a woman's fallopian tubes to prevent pregnancy.

There's a joke in here somewhere, but I can't quite get a grip on it.

Weekly Music Video

This is a great song about longing and despair from a prog metal band that usually writes songs about mythology.

Symphony X - "Candlelight Fantasia"

Those Damn Dressed Up Dogs

A guy I know, Abram Hagstrom, wrote an article for our local paper recently about needing to focus less on ourselves and more on helping others.

We are controlled by fear - the self-perpetuating fear that comes from believing the lies of individualism and consumerism. Being so controlled, we have each exchanged loving our neighbors for honoring ourselves.

This exchange has failed to yield any real value because it violates a deep truth that we have long kept hidden.

This truth is what Jesus alluded to when he said, "Love your neighbor as yourself."

He wants us to grasp that, as members of one body, namely, the human race, our neighbors' relation to us is such that when we actively love them, we are loving ourselves. Likewise, when we mistreat (or disregard) them, we end up doing the same to ourselves.

You see, while the worldly economy of competition is win-lose, Jesus' economy of community is win-win. He wants us to adopt a lifestyle that resounds with the reality "I am you."

The main thrust of Hagstom's article is a good one and a point I have tried to make manifest in my life and to instill in my daughters. That's why I was disappointed that Hagstrom diluted his point by beginning his article mocking people who dress their dogs up.

We are controlled by fear - the self-perpetuating fear that comes from believing the lies of individualism and consumerism. Being so controlled, we have each exchanged loving our neighbors for honoring ourselves.

This exchange has failed to yield any real value because it violates a deep truth that we have long kept hidden.

This truth is what Jesus alluded to when he said, "Love your neighbor as yourself."

He wants us to grasp that, as members of one body, namely, the human race, our neighbors' relation to us is such that when we actively love them, we are loving ourselves. Likewise, when we mistreat (or disregard) them, we end up doing the same to ourselves.

You see, while the worldly economy of competition is win-lose, Jesus' economy of community is win-win. He wants us to adopt a lifestyle that resounds with the reality "I am you."

Both beasts sported thick, elegant, turtleneck sweaters - the kind that Paris Hilton would wear if she were a dog.

In contrast, today in Thailand a 12-year-old girl will be rented to and raped by 12 different men. Today in Zimbabwe, a family will die from cholera because its members could no longer keep from drinking the only water available.

Today, in India, Samir will toil as a third-generation slave to repay his grandfather's $10 debt.

Today in America, you will have a choice.

Please understand me. I have no interest in taking shots at people who love their pets.

Dapper dogs are just one of many signs of our time. The question we need to ask is: What is the ethos of a world where hundreds of thousands of innocent adults and children are systematically enslaved, starved, raped and murdered while others primp their pets (or play pro sports, race jet boats, buy second homes, etc.)?

He tries to step back from this with his line, "I have no interest in taking shots at people who love their pets," but it ends coming off more as, "I'm not racist, but..." Hagstrom knows nothing about the people who owned those dogs. Perhaps their pets are their one hobby. Perhaps they donate large amounts of time and money to charity. Perhaps they don't, but the point is that Hagstrom has no clue and it is unfair to use someone to make a point when he knows nothing about them.

The attacks against people who "play pro sports" and "race jet boats" are strange, as well. So everyone who participates in these activities is a selfish prick who only thinks of themselves and never lifts a finger to help others? Really?

This attitude is, I believe, one of the reasons Christianity can turn off people. Instead of coming across with a humble attitude, Hagstrom, like so many other Christians, has a holier-than-thou attitude. I have my own strongly held personal beliefs, but if I didn't people like this would certainly not turn me into a believer.

If Christians want to spread their faith they would do well to keep in mind the words of Mohandas Gandhi: "It is unwise to be too sure of one's own wisdom. It is healthy to be reminded that the strongest might weaken and the wisest might err."

UPDATE: I suppose I should make it clear that I do know Abram and I do not think he is arrogant. I just think that's how his article comes off.

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