Yes Justice Yes Peace!

Arizona State Senator Sylvia Allen (R) says Earth is 6,000 years old.

2009-07-07T01:43:38Z

An American elected official educated by the Bible claiming the earth is 6,000 years old:

I think the Babylonians started using animals as ceramic glue around 6,000 years ago. She wants the uranium in Arizona so she can get the money from it. Money and the Bible are good.

Life is not fair.

2009-06-24T06:05:35Z

But Life is fairer than I warrant, and my comrades more gracious than I deserve.

I feel fortunate.

Surgery successful.

2009-06-22T20:30:28Z

A brief post to say my surgery was a success. I'm out of the hospital after seven days. They really did a great job. I still feel like I got stabbed in the gut, but that's to be expected. Okay, back to opiate induced sleep. I feel stronger after each rest. I have a wonderful nurse. Every leaf looks greener and I'm happy to be alive and around.

All solidarity with the protesters in Iran.

Check out this 18 minute TED talk on the past present and future of surgery. It shows the robot they used in my surgery:

"Catherine Mohr: Surgery, Past, Present, and Robotic Future."

chop chop chop

2009-06-15T16:31:59Z

Sigmoid colectomy is today. They'll also be fixing some other stuff, a fistula through my bladder, etc. Its all a series of tubes, donchaknow. We're going to beat this thing or die trying.

I'll try to post when I get out the hospital in a week or so. Maybe I'll have access to the interwebs from the hospital.

There has been no bedside conversion thus far. ;-)

I'll save ya some white meat...

The case of PFC, Stephen Dale Green

2009-06-11T07:11:17Z

One case I cannot seem to get out of my head. It eclipses other, perhaps more important, thoughts.

Its the case of Pfc Steven Dale Green.

In March 2006, after an afternoon of card playing and drinking, Green and three other soldiers went to the home of 14-year-old Abeer Qassim al-Janabi near Mahmoudiya, about 20 miles south of Baghdad. Green shot and killed the teen's mother, father and sister, then became the third soldier to rape her before shooting her in the face. Her body was set ablaze.

On May 21, 2009, a Kentucky jury sentenced former 101st Airborne Division Pfc. Steven Dale Green to life in prison. Many wanted the death penalty. Stephen has an honorable discharge from the us army.

This is Stephen's statement. One that I doubt any us army recruiter will show to their hopefuls:

GREEN: What I am about to say is completely my own. No one told me what to say. No one wrote this for me. Not my lawyers, not the government, not anybody ...
I am truly sorry for what I did in Iraq and I am sorry for the pain my actions, and the actions of my co-defendants, have caused you and your family. I imagine it is a pain that I cannot fully comprehend or appreciate. I helped to destroy a family and end the lives of four of my fellow human beings, and I wish that I could take it back, but I cannot. And, as inadequate as this apology is, it is all I can give you ...
Before I was in the Army, I never thought I would kill anyone, and even after I was in the Army, but before I went to Iraq, I never thought I would intentionally kill a civilian. When I was in Iraq, something happened to me that I can only explain by saying that I lost my mind. At some point while I was in Iraq, I stopped seeing Iraqi's as good and bad, as men, women, and children. I started seeing them all as one, and evil, and less than human. When that happened, any natural, learned, or religious morality, that normally would have stopped this, was gone.
But I see now that I was wrong ...
Most of all I am sorry for the deceased, but aside from them, I am the most sorry for the boys whose family are gone. I know what we did left a hole in their lives, and scars on their minds, and that there is no making up for that. I only hope for them that they can somehow, and I don't know how, move forward, and have a good future despite the nightmare in their past that I helped create. They have my apologies and my prayers, as meaningless as they must seem ...
... But in the end, whether in one year or fifty, I will die, and when I die I will be in God's hands. In the Kingdom of God where there will be justice, and whatever I deserve, I will get. On the day of judgment, God will repay everyone according to his works, and affliction and distress will come upon every human being who does evil. I know that I have done evil, and I fear that the wrath of the Lord will come upon me on that day. But, I hope that you and your family at least can find some comfort in God's justice.
I see now that war is intrinsically evil, because killing is intrinsically evil. And, I am sorry I ever had anything to do with either.
And, I cannot say this enough times, whether or not you can ever forgive me, and I don't see how you could, I am and will always be sorry for what I did.

I think of this everytime I hear the television tell me we liberated Iraq.

This is the young girl he raped and murdered, Abeer Qassim al-Janabi.

Slippery slope!

2009-06-06T16:00:16Z

"In The Name of God" - David Rovics

2009-06-04T22:51:00Z

David Rovics leaked a rough cut of a song he's writing about the assassination of Dr. Tiller:

Download: "In The Name of God" MP3

In the Name of God

I woke up this morning
And I turned on the news
It was a Sunday morning
They were sitting in the pews
The doctor's wife was in the choir
She was about to sing
She saw it all in front of her
And she heard that awful ring

In the name of God he held his pistol
Pointed at the doctor's head
In the name of God he pulled the trigger
Now the doctor's lying dead

Dr. Tiller had a family
Three daughters and a son
Two girls were both doctors
Who were proud of what he'd done
They knew someone had to do something
Before they left this world behind
If it wasn't them then who would serve
The cause of womankind

In the name of God...

This is not Afghanistan
It's the Heartland USA
Where a girl has to wonder
If she'll get acid in her face
Where they bomb the women's clinics
Because the preacher told them to
Where the man there on the TV
Tells them that's what they should do

In the name of God...

anti-choice terrorists strike again

2009-06-01T16:11:22Z

An Operation Rescue terrorist murdered a doctor this weekend. We've had 36 years of terrorism against a womans right to choose and this has led us to another doctor laying dead. Moderate Christians have reason to fear, as this slaying was done at a church likely as a message to moderates that they're also considered the enemy. We are expected to die quietly, but we shall not.

jblaque offers the excellent suggestion that now is the time to donate some money to pro-choice groups such as NARAL or Medical Students for Choice.

Operation Rescue's website has been off the web since the incident. They hosted a web page calling the slain doctor a murderer and stating he must be stopped. Hopefully the FBI shut it down due to it being evidence in a domestic terrorism incident.

If this had been a black muslim shooting a doctor, oh man. These zealots get off easy cause they're white and worship the popular flavor of deity.

Randall Terry, founder of Operation Rescue, has issued a statement:

"George Tiller was a mass-murderer. We grieve for him that he did not have time to properly prepare his soul to face God. I am more concerned that the Obama Administration will use Tiller's killing to intimidate pro-lifers into surrendering our most effective rhetoric and actions. Abortion is still murder. And we still must call abortion by its proper name; murder. Those men and women who slaughter the unborn are murderers according to the Law of God. We must continue to expose them in our communities and peacefully protest them at their offices and homes, and yes, even their churches."

Mr. Terry is available for comment at 904-687-9804.

‘Out of the Closet’ — Black Atheists

2009-05-30T15:16:07Z

"‘Out of the Closet’ — Black Atheists"

May 28, 2009

BY SIKIVU HUTCHINSON

In some black communities it’s akin to donning a white sheet and a Confederate flag. In others, it’s ostensibly tolerated yet whispered about, branded culturally incorrect and bad form, if not outright sacrilege.

For black atheists like myself, proclaiming one’s non-belief amidst genial wishes to “have a blessed day” is never easy in the seemingly innocuous context of casual chit chat between black folk.

Yet, according to The New York Times, a small but growing segment of the American population, galvanized by the hyper-evangelical climate of the Republican Pleistocene, have begun organizing nationwide and becoming more vocal about their atheism.

Although African Americans are not visible in the “movement,” [*]some are easing away from religion. For black atheists, actively breaking with religious tradition is an even graver rejection than that of white intellectuals electrified by the “pew-storming” rhetoric of atheist gurus such as Christopher Hitchens or Richard Dawkins [**]. This is partly due to the fact that the history of African American civil and human rights resistance is heavily steeped in Judeo-Christian religious dogma.

Despite the White Anglo Saxon Protestant religious justification for slavery and domestic terrorism, African Americans converted to Christianity and utilized it as a source of succor, community and spiritual redemption.

No matter one’s actual deeds, life path or personal mores, to be unquestioningly religious in some quarters is to be inoculated from criticism. Noting this historical irony in his blog “The Black Atheist,” Wrath James White states, “In these (black) communities you find more tolerance towards gangbangers, drug addicts, and prostitutes, who pray to God for forgiveness than for honest productive citizens who deny the existence of God. This, for me, is one of the most embarrassing elements of Black culture, our zealous embrace of the God of our kidnappers, murderers, slave masters and oppressors.”

While there have been critical appraisals of African American adoption of Christianity within the context of European conquest and racial slavery, few propose atheism as a corrective. Indeed, atheism would seem to fly in the face of a cultural ethos that frames earthly pain and suffering as a crucible for achieving rewards in the afterlife.

In the midst of extreme brutality, religious faith can either be seen as a means to mental health, or, as Karl Marx put it more bluntly, an opiate.

In this sense, contemporary black religiosity is the legacy of a culturally specific survival strategy. Many black community-based organizations still look to the black church as a coalition partner and resource. Disturbingly, the church is often uncritically perceived as the “backbone” of the black community.

However, as the debate over California’s Proposition 8 demonstrated, the notion that there is a monolithic “marching in lockstep” black community is terminally outdated.

On issues of gender and sexual orientation, the overwhelming opposition of many prominent black churches to granting civil rights to partnered African American gays and lesbians is morally indefensible.

When it comes to attitudes about traditional gender roles, gender-based assumptions about black female religiosity are double-edged. While black male non-believers are given more leeway to be heretics, black women who openly profess atheist views are deemed especially traitorous, having eschewed their family role as purveyors of culture and religious tradition.

Images of black women faithfully shuttling their children to church and socializing them into Christianity are a prominent part of mainstream black culture. If being black and being Christian are synonymous, then being black, female and religious (whatever the denomination) is practically compulsory. Black women with children who don’t fall in line, who raise their children as atheists, may find their race credentials revoked.

On the national level, the contradictions between American secularism and religion have produced a schizoid tension in the U.S., whereby religious fundamentalism and intolerance for secular thought have become the norm. When it’s practiced in the non-Western world, Americans routinely brand this kind of propaganda as backward and extremist.

Yet, in this, the most swaggeringly liberal humanist of all nations, “coming out” as an atheist in a culture that parades religious dogma as a substitute for true morality may be the final frontier.

Sikivu Hutchinson is the editor of blackfemlens.org and a commentator for KPFK 90.7 FM.

My comments:

* - Neil Degrasse Tyson isn't visible? He should be...

** - I would add Sam Harris, PZ Myers, and Daniel Dennit to that list.

Fuck you, California Supreme Court.

2009-05-26T17:52:28Z

California has embarrassed itself again, continuing to prove itself to be a backward, repressive, and regressive state. All that money we just denied our ailing economy....what bigoted short sighted stupidity. I'm ashamed to call California my home state. Homophobnia is more like it.

Rachael Maddow: "Indefinite detention? Shame on you... President Obama"

2009-05-22T18:43:39Z

Obama wants to abort rule of law and detain people without trial indefinitely. I'm impressed with Rachel's reporting.

Dan Savage - Scene of the Crime

2009-05-13T07:17:11Z

(Download WMA audio file) - 18:06

Dan Savage reads his humorous, touching, and thoughtful essay on losing his mother and the Catholic Church, from This American Life #379 - "Return to the scene of the Crime"

health update...

2009-05-08T18:26:45Z

I get a sigmoid colectomy surgery sometime in the next few weeks. (and if I act now, they will throw in a set steak knives.)

I had another diverticular perforation burst, this time into my bladder and it created a fistula connecting my colon and urethra. This is my 2nd diverticulitis incident, so there isn't another option according to the judge.

I just met two of the surgeons today. There are three, one general, one urology specialist, one colon specialist. (I want House!!!) The latest fistula is near this nerve bundle used by my penis. So, there is some concern about that, ahem! They don't want to severe those nerves, else, uh...no more happy happy joy joy feelings in the `ole baby factory. That's the only tricky twist on what is an otherwise a major, but fairly common surgery.

I'm pushing for the laproscopic surgery method, but the traditional method of 15" inch incision may be needed due to the bladder fistula complication. The cool part of it in that case, is the two nipple-belly button-scar smile that I'll be sporting. They are unsure of a colostomy bag.

I feel horrible about the timing. Cheryl has put infinite amount of time, money, stress, sweat, working to pull our wedding together and this simply isn't helping. She didn't mention it herself, but its pissing me off. Not happy about that, but there is little I can do. I owe her big time. She's been very supportive and that's a real blessing.

I'm going to concentrate on getting better as fast as possible or die trying! (Humor)

Be yourself...life will be wonderful

2009-05-06T07:28:20Z

Snark on the H1N1 virus...

2009-05-06T07:18:23Z

Correlation between use of torture and going to church.

2009-05-05T19:49:47Z

The faithful are more likely to support torture:

So, being church goers, are they more accustomed to torture? Is it that they worship a torture icon (cross)? Was the poll flawed? Is it because they believe in hell? Is it because they are more likely to follow the leader without question? What's up with this data?

6 ways mushrooms can save the world

2009-04-29T21:14:38Z

Mycologist Paul Stamets lists 6 ways the mycelium fungus can help save the universe: cleaning polluted soil, making insecticides, treating smallpox and even flu, and even sequestering C02.

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/paul_stamets_on_6_ways_mushrooms_can_save_the_world.html

A reasonable approach to engaging with such an old life form is to form an alliance with the mushroom for our mutual benefit and survival.

"Jesus and the Laughing Deity" - Jim Page

2009-04-28T22:28:18Z

Jesus and the Laughing Deity

Spoken Video:

Song Version: ( download MP3 )

Well, it was in the great Cathedral when nobody was around
Just Jesus on the crossbeams, wishing he could get down
When a stranger came in riding on a dusty old horse
And the stranger he was laughing, respectfully of course

"Why so glum?" the stranger said, "it's such a beautiful view"
"Jesus," said Jesus, "don't you know who you're talking too?"
"And who are you to interrupt my sacred misery?"
"Oh, I thought you knew" the stranger said, "I am the laughing deity"

"The laughing deity", said Jesus, "Well, I have my doubts,
`cides, I don't know what there is to laugh about,
I've been beaten up and spat on and riddled through with spears
And I've been hanging from this damn thing for 2,000 years"

"Well, that's a shame", said the deity, "somebody ought to take you down,
You don't look so good. I know a doctor downtown
You could get gangrene, this place is full of rats
Aint no way to treat a savior, leave him hanging like that
Leave him hanging like that....

"Jesus", said Jesus, as he cried a bloody tear,
"People say they love me, but they keep me up here.
They think that if I'm miserable, they wont have to feel so bad.
If I could get out of this place, I'd swear I'd go to Trinidad."

"Well, don't you have a famous father who could lay this place to waste?"
"Yeah, I do" said Jesus, "but this is his idea in the first place
Don't ask me to explain it, it would take too long
Families like mine, you have to learn to get along."

Now the deity distracted and his mouth began to smile
And he realized he hadn't had a good laugh in quite a while
"Now there aint no sense in laughing all alone", says he
"Come on Jesus, Laugh with me, Come on, Laugh with me"

"Jesus", says Jesus, "You must be out of your mind,
I may be many things to many people, but I aint the laughing kind"
"You better learn to be", the Deity replied
"Can't get much worse, you're already crucified"

"Yeah, but what about these nails?
I mean, they've got me hanging up here like a trophy"
"Well, those things are only as strong as you allow them to be.
Sackcloth and nails, hardwood crossbeams and glue,
start laughing loud enough, aint no telling what they might do"

"Alright", says Jesus with a furrow in his brow
"I used to laugh a long time ago, but I kind of forgot how"
"That's alright,", said the deity, "you'll get it back,
You just need a little something to help lubricate the laugh track"

"Did you ever hear the one about the Humans?", he said as he got right up to his ear
and he whispered in a punch line that we will never hear
And Jesus, well, his composure, it started to erode
And he broke out with a laugh like the world would explode
Like the world would explode.

And his laughter ricocheted like a fucilated thunder
And the great cathedral shuddered from the miracle and wonder
And after a while, when he finally settled down
Well, Jesus and the deity, they were both standing on the ground

"Jesus", said Jesus. "How did I get down?
My hands don't hurt. My side is healed. And I'm walking around
It's like I just woke up and shook myself and watched myself appear
I've haven't felt this good in 2,000 years"

"Accept it", said the deity, "suspend your disbelief,
You don't always have to be so serious, life is way too brief,
It's a second chance my friend, it’s a brand new you
No one will even recognize you. You can do what you want to do"

"Yeah, but what about my followers, when they come here looking for me?"
"Well that's alright, there still that other you", said the laughing deity
And sure enough there he was so high up in the dust
Abandoned and forlorn, just like he always was

"Jesus", said Jesus. "Let's get out of here"
They both got on that dusty old horse and away they disappeared
They could have ridden off into the sunset, but they went the other way
Into where the sun rises, because it's better that way
Yeah, it's better that way. :-)

Now there are many morals to be had in story and in song
Be careful not to misinterpret, or you might just get them wrong
Some worlds are full of demons and some are filled with light.
It don't matter what you're looking at if you can't see it right

So, if you need some explanations in these great vast mysteries
Well, there are many ways to follow in many different directories
Some will leave you hanging and some will give you a better view
The choice is there before you, and I'll leave it up to you
Yeah, I'll leave it up to you.

"Why We Believe in Gods", Dr. Andy Thomson

2009-04-26T01:24:44Z

A funny and informative lecture on the latest cognitive neuroscience on religious (and all) belief.

Andy Thomson gives his talk titled 'Why We Believe in Gods' at the American Atheist 2009 convention in Atlanta, Georgia.

See also, Richard Dawkins speech.

The wheels of justice grind slow and fine...

2009-04-23T00:46:54Z

...and rarely, transgender humans are even afforded justice.

"A Colorado man was convicted of first-degree murder and a bias-motivated crime and sentenced to life in prison for killing a transgender teen he met on an online social networking site."

[...]

Andrade admitted killing Zapata, but his defense argued that he acted in the heat of passion after discovering that Zapata was biologically male. The defense asked for a lesser verdict, such as second-degree murder or manslaughter.

Throughout the trial, prosecutors referred to Zapata as "she," while the defense referred to the transgender teen as "he."

"When [Andrade] met him, he met him as 'Angie,' " defense attorney Annette Kundelius argued on Wednesday. "When he found out it wasn't 'Angie,' that it was 'Justin,' he lost control."

But the jury rejected the argument, deciding in favor of prosecutors, who argued that Andrade knew Zapata was biologically male and that knowledge motivated the crime.

"This was an ambush attack," said Chief Deputy District Attorney Robb Miller. "This was an all-out blitz."

Zapata was "born in a boy's body but living as a female," added Miller. "Ultimately, she was murdered because of it."

Thanks for the headsup, kynn.

Seems such a hollow and bittersweet victory, but it is one, nonetheless.

"Clozed Zone" by Yoni Goodman

2009-04-21T18:04:36Z

Via the director of animation for the Academy Award-nominated film, "Waltz with Bashir":

Gisha - Legal Center for Freedom of Movement calls on the State of Israel to fully open Gaza's crossings and to allow the real victims of the closure - 1.5 million human beings - the freedom of movement necessary to realize their dreams and aspirations.

For more information visit: http://www.closedzone.com/

Storm

2009-04-09T17:40:06Z

I can just hear Sam Harris now discussing how atheists damage themselves by shunning the transcendental experience that humans so obviously are prone to experience and to which we are drawn. And Sam would have a point. Nonetheless, its a fucking awesome poem.

Portugal's Drug Decriminalization Policy Shows Positive Results

2009-04-08T15:40:06Z

More over at Scientific American

"5 Years After: Portugal's Drug Decriminalization Policy Shows Positive Results
Street drug–related deaths from overdoses drop and the rate of HIV cases crashes"

In the face of a growing number of deaths and cases of HIV linked to drug abuse, the Portuguese government in 2001 tried a new tack to get a handle on the problem—it decriminalized the use and possession of heroin, cocaine, marijuana, LSD and other illicit street drugs. The theory: focusing on treatment and prevention instead of jailing users would decrease the number of deaths and infections.

Five years later, the number of deaths from street drug overdoses dropped from around 400 to 290 annually, and the number of new HIV cases caused by using dirty needles to inject heroin, cocaine and other illegal substances plummeted from nearly 1,400 in 2000 to about 400 in 2006, according to a report released recently by the Cato Institute, a Washington, D.C, libertarian think tank.

"Now instead of being put into prison, addicts are going to treatment centers and they're learning how to control their drug usage or getting off drugs entirely," report author Glenn Greenwald, a former New York State constitutional litigator, said during a press briefing at Cato last week.

Under the Portuguese plan, penalties for people caught dealing and trafficking drugs are unchanged; dealers are still jailed and subjected to fines depending on the crime. But people caught using or possessing small amounts—defined as the amount needed for 10 days of personal use—are brought before what's known as a "Dissuasion Commission," an administrative body created by the 2001 law.

Via DoseNation

"This is How the War Came Home" - Jim Page

2009-03-31T20:41:16Z

A song by Jim Page about his experiences at the 2008 RNC in St. Paul, Minnesota.

"Head Full of Pictures" by Jim Page

2009-03-31T20:18:17Z

Courtesy of the http://www.iraqichildrencampaign.org/