Daily Archives: November 13, 2010

Republican takeover of the House is much worse than you may have thought, no matter how bad you thought it was

I am speaking of Representative John Shimkus, R-Ill, and the truly astonishing words he uttered before Congress demonstrated in a video that is constnatly being trolled off Google and YouTube by those who don’t want you to see it:

Source and more information here.

If God’s Word is infallible, unchanging, and perfect, then dinosaurs did not live in a different era than humans, and not in great antiquity, and what geologists and paleontologists say about the “age of dinosaurs” must be the word of Satan designed by the dark lord of the underworld to confuse us.

If God’s Word is infallible, unchanging, and perfect, then there can be no destructive climate change. There can only have been one “mass extinction” … the noachain flood.

The person who is reasonably likely to be the next US House of Representative Chair of the Energy Committee has stated that we live on a “Carbon Starved Planet” because the paleontological evidence suggests more carbon in the atmosphere hundreds of millions of years ago, yet he also claims that since God said in Genesis that there will be no more climate disasters after the Flood.

Unbelievable. This madness has got to stop.

John Shimkus has surpassed Michele Bachmann as the worlds most dangerous moron.

You can email me at gregladen@facebook.com

Maybe.

Just the other day I was thinking that I’d love pop mail access to my facebook “email” account. Facebook “email” is annoying and broken as an email service, but then again, it is not supposed to be an email service, is it?

Untill it is. Facebook will probably, according to rumors on the intertubes, roll out a revamp of its “inbox” which will make facebook email work with something like yourusername@facebook.com and generally behave like a mail server. Then, I will be able to access my facebook mail with alpine! Monday. It’s all going to happen on Monday.

It’s snowing dogs and dogs outside

It is funny to see this headline on our local news (CBS) web site:

“Some Prep for Snow, Other Think Flakes Won’t Fly Yet”

Then I look outside the window and see accumulations nearing a half foot of snow, then I look at the weather maps and realize that the local CBS affiliate is probably buried, so no one could update the story about how it might not snow and stuff.

Speaking of WCCO, the local CBS affiliate, yesterday Tim Pawlenty, our lame Governor (insert the word “duck” in there if you want, though I’m not sure why you would), did his last weekly radio address. I never did listen to one of those, but the news faithfully reported the stupid-ass things he said every week.

Last night an 11 year old girl was shot in the neck about four blocks from my old house in South and two blocks from the where Taiesha Edwards was killed by a stray bullet a few years back while sitting at a table in her home doing her homework. This time, the girl was on her front porch, and she will be OK. No arrests, no suspects, but we do know a gun was involved. And yes, there are people in this world who think, every time an innocent grade schooler is shot or killed, how nice it would be to produce and distribute MORE guns (those are the gun nuts) there are those of us who think the opposite.

But no one was on the local television news this morning being indignant about this. It was reported,causally, as though it was normal, and the news casters moved on.

Regarding another story, however, the news casters and the police being interviewed were apoplectic. Police were indignant, some were crying, vengeance was clearly on their minds, because someone stabbed their doggie during a police operation.

Don’t get me wrong, I feel bad for the dog (which was injured but not killed), but not only should the 11 year old girl who was shot while standing on her porch get more press than the dog that was stabbed in the line of duty, but her story should be in the list of headlines, above the story about the police dog that was stabbed. Instead, the police dog that was stabbed was in the CBS/WCCO featured headline section, and the story about the girl (and these events occurred about the same time) not in the headlines, placed well down the web page below the story about the hockey team losing (which is not news) and the basketball team winning (which I admit, is astonishing and unlikely news, probably a reporting error).

Possible human remains were found in a park Amanda and Julia sometimes bike in over across the river (oh, that’s where Julia snowboards). Probably a dog.

Speaking of dogs, how about a reality check: An Akita in Burnsville took out two kids (3 and 5 years old) yesterday (both will be OK) and according to the news:

The dogs’ owner, Chuck Svare, only knows Koda and Pepper as good companions and has had them for years.

“He should have never bitten a little girl. That’s my opinion, but she had to, something was done to provoke it,” said Svare.

Never listen to the shit that comes out of people’s mouths, One of the two dogs involved in the attack attacked a neighbor’s dog a while back, and neither dog is up to date on vaccines.

Am I down on dogs today? No, not really. In fact, I’m going to be nice to dogs all day because we are expecting a foot of snow here, and I may need to be rescued by one.

Louisiana Does The Right Thing, But Will Still Probably Screw It Up

Louisiana is one of those states where really stupid stuff tends to happen, especially when it comes to evolution in the school curriculum. Recently, a state panel was in a position to chose either creationist textbooks with which to abuse the children for whom they are responsible, or good biology textbooks to educate the children for whom they are responsible. Under considerable pressure to not become the next national laughing stock, the advisory council voted 8-4 to use the correct books.

That’s good news, but it ain’t not over yet. This was only a preliminary vote, and the final vote will be carried out next moth by the state board of education.

Barbara Forrest writes on the LA Science Coalition blog:

We now have a Texas-style attack on the selection of biology textbooks, courtesy of the Louisiana Family Forum (LFF), which brought us the creationist Louisiana Science Education Act (LSEA) of 2008…. This attack began with a volley of letters written by LFF operative Darrell White to various Louisiana newspapers in July…

Barbara then goes on to explain the recent history of this particular attack. This is a very worthwhile read, as an exemplar of this sort of shenanigans.

In the end, there may be creationist textbooks used in Louisiana. Or, there may be stickers inserted in actual biology books. And then there will be law suits. And Louisiana will be forced, at great expense, to do the right thing. What a waste.

See also Erik Robelen’s blog post covering recent events in Louisiana. I’ll keep you posted, and the NCSE will probably have an update soon (their current press release is here).

Update: This jsut came out from Barbara Forrest’s blog at LCS: Hell just froze over in Louisiana.