Blogger Tom McMahon thinks that the National Park Service is "hostile toward Christianity" because it recommends that its publications use BCE (before common era) instead of BC, and CE (common era) instead of AD. From the editorial style guide of HFC:
Since when does adopting neutral non-religious writing style become "hostile toward Christianity"?
That's the problem with some of these people. They think that if you don't bend toward Christianity, you're "hostile" to it.
Hugh Jackman, performing in previews of "Steady Rain" (opening September 29), stops the performance for a cell phone ring in the audience. Happened last Wednesday.
AP:
NEW YORK – Hugh Jackman knows how to stop the show. He did it recently when a cell phone call interrupted a preview performance of "A Steady Rain," the Broadway play that stars Jackman and Daniel Craig. The moment captured on an amateur video shown by the TMZ.com Web site appears to have been recorded by someone in the audience.
It shows Jackman breaking character to tell the owner of the ringing cell phone, "You want to get that?" as the audience erupts in cheers. As the ringing persists, Jackman pleads: "Come on, just turn it off." He then paces the stage of the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre, waits about a minute for the ringing to stop and the play resumes.
Producers of "A Steady Rain" declined to comment.
The interruption occurred during an intense moment in the play, when Jackman's character, a Chicago policeman, reveals haunting memories.
A customary loudspeaker announcement reminds theatergoers to turn off their phones. Since the incident, ushers who seat patrons and pass out playbills at Schoenfeld are also instructing patrons to silence their phones.
"A Steady Rain," a taut drama about the relationship between two policemen, opens Tuesday for a limited engagement through Dec. 6. The play by Keith Huff already has proven to be a potent box-office winner, playing to capacity audiences since it began previews on Sept. 10.
Letter to the Editor recently:
Increasingly common
My wife and I recently attended a performance of Moonlight and Magnolias at Twin City Stage ("Movie Stage," Sept. 13). What we were hoping for was a wholesome comedy. What we experienced was a profanity-laced production that made frequent use of a variety of obscene language.
This is the type of language that is becoming increasingly common not only at Twin City Stage and in movie theaters, but also throughout our society.
A sewage pond is not pleasant to smell. Most people would try to avoid being anywhere near it. Yet, it seems as if many people in our society today don't mind hearing — and even speaking — obscenities.
Ephesians 4:29 instructs us to "let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth."
Likewise, Colossians 3:8 instructs us to rid ourselves of "filthy language out of your mouth."
It would be no stretch to assume these biblical passages also imply that Christians shouldn't casually stand by and listen to such language when it is spoken by others. Such language not only contaminates the person who is speaking, but may also contaminate those who are listening to it. Consider what the psalmist says in Psalm 19:14: "Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my strength and my redeemer."
How pleased God would be if each of us tried to honor him through the words we speak and the words to which we listen.
HARVEY E. ARMOUR
Winston-Salem
Ah, vox populli.
My favorite paragraph starts:
It would be no stretch to assume these biblical passages also imply that Christians shouldn't casually stand by and listen to such language when it is spoken by others.
"No stretch to assume these biblical passages also imply…?" In other words, he's saying the Bible commands him to condemn, although it actually doesn't.
People like Mr. Armour drive me nuts. It's not his objection to foul language. It's his supposition that we all must conform to his sensiblities. I call it the "prude veto". Mr. Armour can choose to live his life as he chooses, and take whatever steps he needs to avoid the cesspool of language which offends him so. There are off buttons on remote controls. There are knowledgeable people at the theater who can tell you language content. But to sanitize all things — especially all entertainment — to cater to the the likes of Mr. Armour is simply ludicrous.
People, in this country, you're allowed to clutch your pearls and swoon onto the fainting couch. You're not allowed to make other people do that. It's one thing to ask people to respect your religion; quite another to ask them to respect your taboos.
Glee:
All The Single Babies:
What happens when you gin up anti-government sentiment among the rightwing nuts?
The AP is reporting that Bill Sparkman, a 51-year-old part-time Census field worker and occasional teacher, was found hung to death in Kentucky with the word “fed” was scrawled on the dead man’s chest. Investigators are still trying to determine the motive, but “law enforcement officers have told the agency the matter is ‘an apparent homicide.’” “Our job is to determine if there was foul play involved — and that’s part of the investigation — and if there was foul play involved, whether that is related to his employment as a census worker,” said FBI spokesman David Beyer.
Before AP the report came out, Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.), in an interview today with Politico, exhibited bad timing:
[Cantor] expressed frustration with [Speaker of the House Nancy] Pelosi’s suggestion last week that the vitriol injected into the health reform debate could end in violence akin to the assassination of San Francisco Mayor George Moscone in the 1970s. “I think she’s living in another world — I really do,” Cantor said of the California Democrat.
Um….. not so much.
Media Matters has some interesting (and unfortunately non-embeddable) video of Fox News at the 9/12 rally.
Actually, it's two videos. One is what was telecast — Glenn Beck talking to a reporter on the scene of the D.C. mall during the 9/12 rally. Beck was saying to the reporter that critics of the rally were saying it was all staged/astroturfed, etc.
The second video is the same thing, but you don't see or hear Glenn Beck. Instead, you see the reporter, the camera, and the Fox News producer cueing the crowd behind the reporter to cheer. You know, like it was a studio audience.
That's right — while Glenn Beck was trying to get the message across to the TV viewers that the event was all natural and not-staged, the Fox News TV crew was directing the crowd behind the reporter when to cheer, trying to whip up enthusiasm.
Videos are here.
The news director of the segment was subsequently reprimanded. In a letter to the entire Fox News staff, the managing director of Fox News had to remind the entire Fox News staff that Fox News exists to cover the news, not create it… which is kind of like the Criminal Defense Division of the American Bar Association sending a memo out saying that criminal defense lawyers are supposed to litigate on behalf of accused people, and not go out and commit crimes themselves.
Seriously, where did these people go to journalism school, and how could Fox hire them? And retain them after commiting such breaches of journalistic ethics?
Keith Olbermann covered this, as well as the Fox News advertisement which — there's no other way to put it — lied about the facts.
Will Farrell and others are looking out for the insurance companies:
Attach a GPS enabled cellphone and a camera to a helium balloon and what happens?
Okay, Project Icarus, devised by MIT students, involved a little bit more than that, but it was still decidedly low-tech. The whole contraption cost $148 for everything — the balloon, the helium, the cellphone, the GPS tracking software, etc.
The launch was September 2.
The balloon reach an altitude of 93,000 feet (about 17.5 miles) taking photos all the way up. It went up for over 3 hours, entering near-space orbit, and was able to take photos of the curve of the Earth.
That's Long Island in the background.
At that point, it popped, and plunged to Earth (a 40 minute trip down). The GPS phone allowed the students to locate the package. (It was launched from Sudbury, Mass, and landed in Worcester, Mass.)
Read more at their website.
TPM reports:
Sen. Tom Coburn's (R-OK) chief of staff Michael Schwartz made the case against pornography. "All pornography is homosexual pornography," said Schwartz, quoting an ex-gay friend of his, "because all pornography turns your sexual drive inwards."
Schwartz then explained the side benefit of this finding — that if boys know pornography will make them gay, they'll never touch it, taking advantage of what Schwartz sees as a natural homophobia. "And if you tell an 11-year-old boy about that, do you think he's going to want to get a copy of Playboy?" he said. "I'm pretty sure he'll lose interest. That's the last thing he wants!"
You know what? I'd be interested in putting that to the test. Because I'll bet that if you tell 11 year old boys that reading Playboy will make them gay, most 11 year old boys will say "Okay. Whatever. I'll be gay. Now gimme my Playboy".
By the way,what Schwartz is advocating is using lies to manipulate young people. Think about that. Lies. At a Values Voters Summit.
For those who missed it (or want to re-live it) from last night:
The Rapture is scheduled for today. You can read the evidence here, but basically it all boils down to this sine wave graph (click to embiggen):
I hope you are using your last day wisely….
P.S. Anyone up for some pre-rapture sexual adventures?
"If the election were held today," said House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.), "we would have the majority of the House back."
Um…. I don't know about that.
Orly Taitz is an attorney and a doctor and she's the one filing all these lawsuits trying to prove that Obama was actually a Kenyan.
Having had one of her cases thrown out of federal court last week (with an admonishment from the judge that if she continues to waste the court's time, she'll be fined), now she's the object of conspiracy theories, apparently. My how the worm turns:
Please don't listen to vicious rumorsAttorney Orly Taitz responds to her criticsI am getting close to removing the Usurper, and there are more and more vicious rumors about me and my whole family. It is 5:30 in the morning and I had to cut on sleep yet again to take some time and debunk all those vicious rumors.
The Usurper is a Batman villian now, I think.
First, there was a rumor that there is a declaration by Larry Sinclair filed with court. Please, go on Pacer, it is a public record. There is nothing there, no such declaration. People need to understand that a person cannot just come from the street and file a declaration or an affidavit. It has to be filed by a party to the action. Either I, as an attorney for the plaintiffs, or the attorney for the defendants, assistant U.S. attorney, would file something. Neither I nor the U.S. attorney filed any such affidavit or declaration.
Dr. Orly Taitz learned that in law school. And I use the word "in" advisedly. You see, she received a law degree from William Howard Taft Law School. Which is a "distance learning" law school only. So she wasn't IN law school. Also, Taft isn't accredited by the ABA. No, I'm not kidding.
There was a rumor that there was some complaint filed with the CA bar and I was disbarred. None of it is true. Please go on the web site of CA bar and see that I am an attorney in good standing and never had any action against me.
Not yet, anyway.
There was a rumor that Philip Berg somehow became part of my case with judge Carter and filed a subpoena to ambassador of Kenya as part of this case. Again, Berg has nothing to do with this case. There is nothing in the case having to do with Berg.
Berg is another birther attorney who also gets his cases routinely thrown out of court. That's why it's easy to understand why so many people apparently think the two are working together.
Lastly, there was a vicious rumor that my husband is somehow connected with swine flu and swine flu vaccine. Again, ridiculous rumor.
My husband studied computer science and business. He never studied pharmacology, doesn't know pharmacology and wouldn't know the difference between a virus and an elephant.
One doesn't need to study phramacology to know the difference between a virus and an elephant.
He is a CEO of a company that produces a software, which is a tool used in research.
Whoa there, Einstein! You're going to fast. Now what is this "software" thing of which you speak?
It is used by many universities in the country. It is used in agriculture research, in chemical research, in any research that deals with molecules and computation of properties of molecules, that are being synthesised. There are millions and millions of molecules in the world. New ones are being synthesised every day, my husband has no clue what different companies are doing in their research. It is similar to any other software that is used as a tool.
So he makes software used for agricultural research and molecules. Actually, that does connect him with the swine flu — just as much as Obama's grandparents being Kenyan connects Obama to Kenya.
There is an accounting software, quicken. A computer engineer, who invented this software didn't become your accountant, didn't enter the information in your tax returns. Microsoft Word or Word Perfect is used by many writers, but it didn't make Microsoft a poet or a comedian or a screen writer. Microsoft Word or Word Perfect is just a tool.
No, no. I'm sorry. I'm just not following you, Orly.
I hope I explained this point and wouldn't have to go to it again.
That makes two of us.
My husband is a good man, he is a devoted father and he is there for our three sons when I am travelling around the country raising support for Obama's illegitimacy issue, when I am in court fighting to make sure this country doesn't turn into another Communist Hell, as I experienced as a child, so we don't live under Dictator Obama with all his szars like another Himler or Herring or another Beria.
In other words, your husband behaves responsibly, while his kids' mommy is annoying the country on her Dingbat Tour.
By the way, I know there are many ways to spell "czars" — or "tsars" — but "szars" is a new one for me.
I hope people stop attacking my family and start attacking Obama and demand that he produce his vital records immediately or resign or be removed immediately. Judge Carter has written "Court encourages discovery before the scheduling conference (it is on October 5th)" I have submitted a proposed deposition schedule. Let's make sure Obama shows up for his deposition with his hospital birth certificate ready for examination.
Yeah. Don't hold your breath.
UPDATE: It gets funnier as the day goes on.
TPM posted a letter one of Orly's clients, telling her to stop representation. Orly now says the letter is a forgery. Yup, Obama birth certificate is a forgery; so is the letter from her ex-client.
Here's what Orly wrote TPM today:
I don't know if this letter came from her, since she is in Iraq now and the Office -max store from where it came, states that they don't send faxes for customers. The signature on her notarized letter from Kansas and this letter looks different.
Regardless, whether it is her or not, there is no ground for accusations. She authorized me to proceed with the legal action. Motion for reconsideration is a routine procedure and attorney is not required to get an additional consent from the client. Any attorney will confirm that. That is particularly true in exigent circumstances like these.
Wrong, Orly. You can't do squat without the client's permission, especially when the client tells you to cease and desist.
It appears Connie was pressured by the military. It appear to be a concerted effort to quash all free speech, particularly any legal challenges to Obama's legitimacy, Attorney Hemenway in DC was threatened with sanctions of $10,000, I was threatened with sanctions. Connie Rhodes was threatened with high costs of litigation to be paid to the Department of Defense and Department of Justice. It is possible that this letter was written to avoid paying high litigation costs.
So the letter is from her now, and she was pressured?
The most important question is still on the table: why would the judge levy $10,000 in sanctions instead of instructing Obama to produce a real Hospital birth certificate with a name of the hospital name of the doctor and signatures , so we can locate this birthing file? Why go to such extend?
Because your case is bullshit?
The only answer is: that the administration is scared, they know they have nothing to show for except for the piece of JPG garbage that Obama posted on the Internet (no name of the hospital, no name of the doctor).
Yes, of course. And the judge is.. uh… in on it?
Well, all good that ends good. This threat of sanctions gives me an opportunity to demand rule 11 discovery and get all of Obama' records through the back door
Orly Taitz DDS Esq
Uh, you're going to lose your license, dear.
And by the way, no discovery under Rule 11.
Yup. That's what you're going to hear about, starting this week and going on for the next few weeks.
Here's the "scandal" in a nutshell, as described by the rightwing "journalist" who "broke" it:
I was invited by the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) to take part in a conference call that invited a group of rising artist and art community luminaries “to help lay a new foundation for growth, focusing on core areas of the recovery agenda – health care, energy and environment, safety and security, education, community renewal.”
Now if you read his article in full, he goes on to speculate:
Could the National Endowment for the Arts be looking to the art community to create an environment amenable to the administration’s positions?
As you should know by now, the answer to that question isn't relevant to the noisy conservative anti-Obamites. They will assume this is true, and within days, you'll be hearing (cue Glenn Beck) a lot about how we're going down the path of Leni Riefenstahl and Joseph Goebbels, those formidable Nazi propagandists.
None of it, of course, is true. Even if a work of art — whether it be a song, play, movie, drawing, whatever — is ostensibly about, say, health care, it doesn't necessarily have to be "amenable to the administration's positions", and nothing that happened in the August 10 conference call, or in any NEA materials requires that it has to be, in order to receive funding.
And even if some bit of NEA-supported art does arguably support the administration's position on one of these issues (and what would that look like anyway? "Public Option: The Musical"???), the NEA supports and finances TONS of things, most of which doesn't have an "agenda"-driven message at all.
And then there's things like this, which you can find right on the NEA website:
In 2008, U.S. Armed Forces active duty troops and veterans of both current and past conflicts will have an in-depth opportunity to reflect on their service through the National Endowment for the Arts’ groundbreaking initiative Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience. Operation Homecoming will host writing workshops at Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) medical centers, military hospitals, and affiliated centers in communities around the country.
Or another NEA National Initiative: the Great American Voices Military Bases Tour, which bring opera and American musicals to military bases.
None of this, of course, will matter to the rightwing propagandists at all. They are going to be using the ACORN template to try to bring down the NEA.