jigsaw dust

Mega-church pastor Rick Warren started off last night’s debate with the statement:

We believe in the separation of church and state, but we do not believe in the separation of faith and politics because everyone has a world view.

This is like stating I believe in the separation of McDonald’s and my stomach, but I do not believe in separating the Golden Arches from my mouth because everyone has to eat. Seriously, do you think that John Adams or Thomas Jefferson would have submitted themselves to such pandering? Both of these candidates are becoming increasingly guilty of a ‘whatever it takes’ mentality.

This ‘faux-debate’ was set up as an obvious attempt to increase McCain’s following in the evangelical camp. I’m frankly shocked that Obama’s handlers would consider allowing their man to participate in such a one-sided show. Even though McCain clearly ‘won’ this debate, some people were shocked that his answer to every question somehow worked its way back to his military service and the time he spent in a concentration camp as a POW.

Imagine this: McCain gets elected and has to meet with Asian diplomats. As soon as he walks into the room and sees a group of Asian gentlemen, he has a flashback to the rice paddies and dives behind a podium, screaming something about ‘killing those goddamn gooks and raping their women and children’. I’m sure those actions would help to improve our failing stature on the world stage. Seriously, McCain’s experience is more likely to qualify him for being institutionalized for PTSD than it does serving as leader of the free world.

As for Obama, he floundered with every question, unable to state his true beliefs because they aren’t the evangelical party line. This is a failure on two fronts. One, the evangelicals are not going to be happy unless you acknowledge that a newly fertilized egg has the same rights as a newborn baby. Second, you’re not going to win the American public when you are simply trying to get everyone to think your on ‘their’ side, regardless of what side that is. Take a stance, say what you believe, and follow through. Grow a backbone.

Regardless, I’m starting to think that anyone that wants to be President of the United States is probably not qualified to wear those shoes. It’s sad but true, the nature of the beast.

It seems that the organization ARC is protesting the new movie Tropic Thunder because it uses the term ‘retard’ more than it should. Pretty ironic, considering that ARC originally stood for ‘Association of Retarded Children’. It seems that retardation is still not a good excuse for ignorance and stupidity.

If you have been watching the Olympics, you are probably familiar with the fact that there is much controversy over whether or not the Chinese female gymnasts are the ages they are claiming to be. Regardless of the answer to the question, it has brought up a greater issue. Is female gymnastics an exploitative sport that should possibly be banned or at least heavily regulated?

You may think I’m overreacting, but here’s the facts. According to the University of Utah, ‘in 1999, nearly 22,500 children ages 5 to 14 were treated in hospital emergency rooms for gymnastics-related injuries. Among girls’ sports, gymnastics has one of the highest injury rates, increasing with the level of competition’. The study also found that nearly 60 percent of elite Olympic hopefuls have some form of eating disorder. Gymnastics requires young women to contort their bodies and perform physically straining feats before their bodies are ready for such trauma. Top competitors as young as ten years old are often training six to eight hours a day and applauded for performing in events while injured (see Mary Lou Retton and Kerri Strug). Often, the girls’ bodies are pushed so hard that they don’t have periods and are physically diminutive compared to same aged peers.

Why doesn’t this behavior fall under child abuse? I imagine if you started training a young girl in weightlifting at age six, competing seriously by the time she was ten (fake tanning, putting on skimpy outfits, posing in competitions), people would take issue. Why is the story different for gymnastics? The girls seem happy, sure, but it’s all they’ve known. What do you think?

Allowed:

1. High-fives
2. Back pats (above the waist, I hope)
3. Hand shaking

Not allowed:

1. Tickling
2. Kissing
3. Wrestling
4. Bear hugs
5. Lap sitting
6. Piggy-back rides

I’m glad someone cleared this up. I mean, really. Without guidelines like this, who knows what priests would get away with? The Archdiocese of Cincinnati has issued a detailed list to let it’s parishioners know what it allows its priests to do in regards to children.

My question is this: Have we so much ‘respect’ for religious freedom and particularly the Catholic church that no one is willing to step up and bring these people to justice? Not only have thousands of priests molested young children, the American public has done little to nothing to prosecute the offenders and those in leadership. Most people seem content to just take them out of their positions and make sure they don’t do it again. Are there any other positions of authority and respect that are ‘so sacred’ that we would allow them to get away with raping our children? I don’t think so.

If you have a few hundred followers, and you let some of them molest children, they call you a cult leader. If have a billion, they call you ‘Pope.’.

-Bill Maher

Can the party of the evangelical right really be Satan in disguise?

Check out the standard symbol of the GOP, as displayed all over the GOP website:

Now, draw a star. Yes, the one you drew in grade school. The five sided pentagram. Done? Now compare it to the three pentagrams in the GOP symbol. Do they match? Probably not? Why? OMG! They aren’t regular pentagrams. They are inverted pentagrams, the signs of the devil, the DREADED BAPHOMET:

Say it ain’t so…say it ain’t so.

I can think of no reason that man should go to war; however, I am not under any delusions or belief that the nations of the world can peacefully co-exist without war.  I cannot imagine being required to fight in a war, much less in a war that I personally believed to be unjust and unnecessary.

On Tuesday, July 15, Staff Sgt. Danny Dupre was on a classified reconnaissance mission about 70 miles west of Baghdad when he was struck and killed by a sniper’s bullet. I went to high school with Danny. I was in JROTC with Danny. I wasn’t close friends with him, but I knew him nonetheless.

Shouldn’t Danny’s death push me further into pacifism? Danny’s mother commented that ‘if it wouldn’t have been for this damn president we have, he wouldn’t be there’? Perhaps this is true. Perhaps Danny wouldn’t have died in Iraq. But would he have died in war? Probably so.

My opinion began to shift when I visited Danny’s myspace. I looked at his photos. He breathed military. He sweated ‘ooh rah’. Of course he didn’t want to die, but he wanted this. He wanted to fight. War was in his blood.

Am I too quick to conclude that just because non-violence is my personal choice that it should be everyone else’s choice as well? Maybe I am not designed to be a Spartan, but who am I to suggest that others be deprived of the right to war, if that be what they choose? Last time I checked, our country still has a volunteer military.

What if we gave conscientious objectors a choice? If a soldier doesn’t believe the war in Iraq to be a just war, that Marine is given the option of serving in another combat zone or being released from duty? This is probably antithetical to the military notion of ‘giving up one’s choice/freedom when you sign on the dotted line’, but maybe some things deserve to be revisited.

This morning was actually quite productive as compared to most lazy Sunday mornings. I woke up around 7:15. Because Somer took care of tending to Mila for most of the night (feedings, etc.), I decided to give her a break and take care of the baby so she could get some much needed rest.

At first, I was going to just go downstairs, put on the television, and rock the baby and watch television. Instead, I went to the kitchen, plugged in my iPod dock, put it on random and started working. I cleaned the entire kitchen, washing all the dishes. Then, I washed two batches of clothes, and vacuumed the floor in the basement. I’m sure you’re wondering: ‘Where was the baby this whole time. I can’t believe you let the baby tend to herself, while you cleaned’. Well, I didn’t.

Enter, stage right. The sling. It’s a wonderful device that women around the world have been using for years, but only recently been adopted by Western cultures. I put Mila in the sling, and patted her booty until she feel asleep. She slept the whole time I cleaned, even while the vacuum was on. It was a great experience, and a slight workout to boot.

We are now both refreshed and ready to go see The Dark Knight this afternoon. I’m sure it will be amazing. I was hoping to see it in IMAX, but they were all sold out except for the 9am showing, which was a no-go. I still may see it in IMAX, but it’ll be another day.

If you’re looking for new music, WAY new, check out Chester French. They don’t even have an album out yet, but mark my words, you’ll hear from them way more within the next year. Also, Conor Oberst’s new album is a home run. What else can you expect from such an imaginative lyricist. It reminds me of Eliot Smith’s best stuff. I comes out August 5th, so be looking for it.

I’m probably going to start a series of blog posts which I will call ‘open letters to people I don’t know (and probably never will)’. It will consist of open letters (duh) to famous people I don’t know. Basically, if I had the opportunity to sit them down, and let them know what’s up, this is what I’d say. Not that they will actually read them. It will be more of a vent for me to get some feelings and emotions out on the table. I’m expecting my first ones to be Barack, Amy Winehouse, and Miley Cyrus. If you have any people that you think need an ‘open letter’, let me know, and I just might do it.

If there wasn’t a video, I’d think it was from The Onion.

Dallas County Commissioner, Kenneth Mayfield, a white man, made a comment in a public hearing that central collections had become ‘a black hole’, with much paperwork getting lost at ever-increasing intervals. Commissioner John Wiley Price, a black man, took offense to the term and threw a minor tantrum asking that Mayfield rephrase his comment to not be racially insensitive.

If that’s not enough, the presiding county judge, Thomas Jones, also black, asked Mayfield to issue a formal apology. Are you frakking kidding me? It makes me scared to live on a planet that holds people as dumb and ignorant as these two.

If you don’t believe the story, watch the video.