DoublePlusUngood: Abortion Doctor Killed

News reports are that Dr. George Tiller, a doctor specializing in providing late-term abortions recently acquitted of various criminal charges, was shot to death on the way to church this morning.

May Christ have mercy on his soul.

To the shooter:

You are a despicable terrorist, and we of the prolife movement cast you out from among us.

Murdering abortion doctors is NOT how to stop abortions, ever.

There's no excuse for this. None.

As for the rest of us:

Batten down hatches. There's a storm coming.

BECAUSE YOU KNOW WHO THEY'RE GONNA BLAME.

ADDENDUM 6:00 PM

Yep. The virtual krystallnacht has begun: Mike Hendricks at the Kansas City Scar blames everyone who considered Tiller a murderer.

Geek Humor ar ar

This morning, a story in the British press included the following stupid limerick:

An insect was heard to complain
That something had killed off its brain.
The cause of its sorrow
Was para-di-chloro-
Di-phenyl-tri-chloro-ethane!

...and that got me started.

- - - - -

A triceratops, name of Wright
Once challenged a Rex to a fight.
The tyrannosaur
Walked off, a bit sore,
But Wright's just a big coprolite.

Old Ida, part monkey, part cur
They're calling mankind's ancestor.
Tho Genesis says
It took God six full days
How long via Ida? Not sure.

LGF sez, the final solution
Can be found in the word 'evolution.'
Disagreeing with Chuck
Leaves you shit out of luck
You get banned and there's no absolution.

There once was a lady named Bright
Whose speed was much faster than light.
She set off one day
In a relative way
And returned on the previous night!

There once was a Stego named Tex
Who wanted to mate and have sex.
He gave a loud roar
Near a Tyrannosaur
And was later found inside old Rex.

Your turn.

Think They Can't Get Worse......?

"Yes we can!!!"



Credit: my good friend NH (whose full name I'll post if he gives me permission).

P.S. They told me that if I voted for Sarah Palin we'd have an utter mountebank, a harlequin, an utterly incompetent fool for vice president.

Well, I did.

And we do.

...Ida has come again.... and is she ticked.....

"Genesis allowed is not! Is planet forbidden!" - Charles Johnson*

Well, well, well. It turns out that the whole Ida thing is engineered hype-ocracy, the organized publicization of a fossil that was, in fact, dug up 20 years ago and purchased for some $1 MILLION DOLLARS, according to this story from the Ottawa Citizen.

Everything you've heard about this thing is therefore HIGHLY suspect.

Money graf:

The specimen itself was not, in fact, dug up a couple of years ago. It was instead purchased, for a reported $1 million, from an obscure private collector, who had held it for at least 20 years. From the beginning, the "research program" was an exercise in entrepreneurship, with an investment to be recouped. In the end, direct participants in this circus included the History Channel, the BBC, Little Brown, Hachette Livre, and other mainstream media "content providers."

In other words, someone needed to get their money back.

And the evo-fascists** all bought it.

What a bunch of lusers.

*Okay, the guy who said it it wasn't Charles Johnson, but hey, given the physical resemblance, it's an easy mistake to make.

**I'm an evolutionist. An evo-fascist is someone who acts like being a theist is the same as being a primitive animist with a bone through the nose. Like Charles Johnson.

...Our Honored Dead Have Not Died in Vain

This Memorial day weekend, I'd like to share a video that proves that the thousands of Americans who died in Korea, Vietnam, and other anti-Communist brush wars between 1945 and 1992 did not die in vain.

Let me introduce to you the Leningrad Cowboys, a Finnish (not Russian, alas*) rock group, playing Sweet Home Alabama... with the Alexandrov Ensembe, s Soviet-era military band**, no less, in concert ca. 1993.

(It appears that The Leningrad Cowboys started out as a fictional rock band in a comedy movie that eventually took on a life of its own... like the Monkees or the Blues Brothers. And yes, they do covers of both in other concerts.)

If anybody had told me I would ever see such a thing when I turned 18 (three days after the Soviets invaded Afghanistan and killed its President) I would never have believed it.

(We sometimes forget how miraculous the death of the USSR really was.)

Anyway. Ladeeez and Gentlemen.... THE LENINGRAD COWBOYS... et. al.

A better (but un-imbeddable) 4 minute version of this can be found here.

((Hat tip to Charles Johnson, who posted this one months ago. See? I don't ALWAYS have bad things to say about LGF.))

* Original post said they were Russian; they're not.
* Original post said they were the Red Army Choir; the Alexandrov Ensamble is the actual name of the group appearing here. This is from a 1993 filmed concert in Helsinki.

SPC Zachary Boyd, thank you very much.

He made the news this week by shooting at Taliban terrorists wearing body armor, a steel pot, .... and pink undies marked "I ((heart)) NY". Some newsy got a picture.

Others may mock him.

All I can do is salute him and admit, humbly, I could never wear his flip flops.

God bless you, Specialist Zachary Boyd. And good hunting.

French First Lady Sez: ...well, who cares what?

A few days ago, the wife of the French president denounced His Holiness, the Vicar of Christ, Servant of the Servants of God, by stating that contemplating his stance on birth control in Africa left her feeling "profoundly secular."

That's funny. Contemplating her stance in most of the pictures I've seen of her, they have left me feeling "profoundly lustful."

And both my feelings on the my subject and her feelings on hers have approximately the same significance. Except I get to use her picture to increase traffic on my blog.

Have a nice day, mon cherie.

Ida has died, Ida has been dug up.....

The WSJ tells us:

In what could prove to be a landmark discovery, a leading paleontologist said scientists have dug up the 47 million-year-old fossil of an ancient primate whose features suggest it could be the common ancestor of all later monkeys, apes and humans.

To which I say:

Way cool.

All I ask is that

(1) Everyone take a deep breath.

(2) Remember that Ida answers the question of whether we are more closely related to tarsiers (tarsidae) or to lemurs (adapidae), and ONLY that. (Tarsiers, looks like.)

(3) Remember that they were the bones of Ida, not of Jesus of Nazareth; as far as I can tell, Ida's linkage to us and His having risen from the dead remain, er, independent variables.

(4) Remember that it does NOT mean that you may act like a monkey at the zoo when you go to a bar on Saturday night--at least, not without consequences (including the eternal ones).

(5) Be sure to give me a call if they dig up Jesus. Please. Do.

(A priest friend of mine tells me that when he was in seminary, some pompous professor said "If they found the bones of Christ my faith would be unaffected." To which a seminarian replied: "If they found the bones of Christ I'm going out to get laid." Pithy. But true.)

Government to Blogger: STFU!

The city manager of Conneaut, Ohio, a small town about 20 miles from the Pennsylvania - Ohio border and on the shore of Lake Erie, population 12,000 or so, sent a letter last week to a private individual running a for profit blog to "cease and desist" anything further on the city government or people working for it. Only the City, it said, could determine what could and could not be on the site. The letter was authorized by the city manager, one Robert Schaumleffel Jr.

A member of the city council recognized the idiocy of the letter and called for the council to vote to rescind same. The motion to rescind died on a 3-3 tie vote, so the letter stands.

So it's official: STFU, citizen, or NO SOUP FOR YOU!

I suggest that you contact the city and express your love for them. For your convenience, I've included a copy of The Bill of Rights at the top of this post, and a model letter that I sent:

Robert Schaumleffel Jr.
City Manager
City of Conneaut
294 Main Street
Conneaut, Ohio 44030

By Fax: 440-593-6908

Dear Mr. Schaumleffel, Jr.:

It is reported this morning that you attempted to get a private web site to cease to publish information about your city without your personal approval.

I realize that today's educational system is not necessarily up to par, and/or that you may have been sick in the third grade the week that they discussed the Constitution of the United States.

Therefore I include for your review and edification a document colloquially known as "The Bill of Rights." It includes a number of statements which were incorporated into the Constitution as Amendments I - X and XXVII. You may wish to review it, particularly the line about 'freedom of the press' and 'not infringe'.

Best,

Richard L. Kent, Esq.
Attorney and Counselor at Law

Jerk!

Apology Not Accepted.....

[[Warning! Not Appropriate for Work! (And not very nice.)]]

It is reported here that CNN blovator Anderson Cooper "regrets" his off hand comment last month, wherein he equated those protesting the Obama tax increases with homosexuals who take other men's testicles into their mouths. (Sorry about the obscenity, but it's what he said: "It's hard to talk when you're teabagging.")

Anderson, backpedaling a month after the fact, said that it was a "stupid, silly, one-line aside" and that:

"I think it's an incorrect statement to say I was, in any way, trying to disparage legitimate protests ... I don't think it's my job to disparage, or encourage, which oddly other networks seemed to be doing. Protest is the great right of all Americans, and it's not my job in any way to make fun of people or disparage what they're doing." ... "If people took offense to that and felt that I was disparaging their legitimate right to protest, and what they were doing, then that is something I truly regret, because I don't believe in doing that," he said.

Mr. Anderson? Guess what.

It was not a "stupid or silly" comment.

It was obscene, degrading, and despicable and it shows your true feelings of hate toward your fellow Americans with whom you disagree politically.

Apology *not* accepted, Captain Needa!

Pres. Buchanan Calls for "Fair" Slavery Debate

News Item: Obama, appearing at Notre Dame, Calls for "Fair Minded" Abortion Debate

"All of this has happened before. All of this will happen again."
- Battlestar Galactica, 2004

Buchanan calls for 'fair-minded' slavery debate
The president is greeted by cheers, protests at University of Notre Dame

May 16, 1859

WASHINGTON - President James Buchanan strode head-on Sunday into the stormy slavery debate and told graduates at America's leading Abolitionist university that both sides must stop demonizing one another.

Buchanan acknowledged that "no matter how much we want to fudge it ... the fact is that at some level, the views of the two camps are irreconcilable." But he still implored the University of Notre Dame's graduating class and all in the U.S. to stop "reducing those with differing views to caricature. Open hearts. Open minds. Fair-minded words. It's a way of life that always has been the Notre Dame tradition."

One of the noisiest controversies of his young presidency flared after Buchanan, who supports slavery rights but says there should be no more slaves than economically necessary, was invited to speak at the school and receive an honorary degree. "I do not suggest that the debate surrounding slavery can or should go away," the president said.

The Rev. John Jenkins, Notre Dame's president, introduced Buchanan and praised the president for not being "someone who stops talking to those who disagree with him." Jenkins said too little attention has been paid to Buchanan's decision to speak at an institution that opposes his slavery policy.

Ahead of Buchanan's speech, at least 27 people were arrested on trespassing charges from protests outside the university, police said. They included Dred Scott, the plaintiff in the 1857 Dred Scott Supreme Court decision that understored legal slavery. He opposes slavery and joined more than 300 anti-slavery demonstrators at the school's front gate.

More than half held signs, some declaring "Shame on Notre Dame" and "Stop Slavery Now" to express their anger over Notre Dame's invitation to Buchanan, saying the university had lost touch with its Abolitionist roots.

On campus, Buchanan entered the arena to thunderous applause and a standing ovation from many in the crowd of 12,000. But as the president began his commencement address, at least three protesters interrupted it. One yelled, "Stop selling our children."

The graduates responded by chanting "White Legs Good, Black Legs Bad", the slogan that became synonymous with Buchanan's presidential campaign. Buchanan seemed unfazed, saying Americans must be able to deal with things that make them "uncomfortable."

The president ceded no ground on slavery. But he said those on each side of the debate "can still agree that this is a heart-wrenching decision for any slave buyer to make, with both moral and spiritual dimensions.

"So let's work together to reduce the number of owners seeking slaves by reducing unintended slavery, and making international trading more possible, and providing care and support for slaves who are working for their owners."

He said he favored "a sensible conscience clause" that would give anti-slavery health care providers the right to refuse to help slaveowners.

Before taking on the slavery issue, Buchanan told graduates they were part of a "generation that must find a path back to prosperity and decide how we respond to a global economy that left millions behind even before this crisis hit an economy where greed and short-term thinking were too often rewarded at the expense of fairness, and diligence, and an honest day's work."

Buchanan supports slavery rights but says that ownership should be limited. The Catholic Church and many other Christian denominations hold that slavery is morally wrong and should be banned by law. The contrary argument holds that property owners should be able to do what they want with their slaves.

Within weeks of taking office in January, Buchanan eased an executive order by President John Quincy Adams that limited slavery sales and cut off the U.S. from the international slave market.

Buchanan's appearance appeared additionally complicated by fresh polls that show Americans' attitudes on the issue have shifted toward the anti-slavery position.

A Gallup survey released Friday found that 51 percent of those questioned call themselves "abolitionist" as to the issue of slavery and 42 percent "pro-choice," or supporting slavery rights. This is the first time a majority of U.S. adults have identified themselves as "abolitionist" since Gallup began asking this question in 1845. Jst a year ago, Gallup found that 50 percent termed themselves "pro-choice" while 44 percent described their beliefs as "abolitionist."
=====
PS. This blog entry was depressingly easy to write.

The Squire of Gothos Threatens His Own

I knew Charles Johnson of LGF was a jerk.

But I didn't think he was dangerous.

It becomes clear that his outing of yours truly in February was not a mere mistake, it was POLICY.

IF YOU SHOULD CHOOSE TO POST TO LGF, NOTE THE FOLLOWING:



Source:

http://littlegreenfootballs.com/article/33620_New_LGF-Related_Blog-_Defending_the_Defensible, Entry 217

(Props: ChenZhen at LGF2)

UNDERSTAND THIS WELL:

This is a metaphorical gun held to the face of every LGF Lizardoid.

Cross Charles, and:

1. He WILL out you. (He did to me.)

2. He will unleash his minions to damage your reputation. (He did to me.)

I therefore urge EVERY LIZARDOID TO IMMEDIATELY RESIGN FROM LGF IN SILENCE.

If you ever say anything he doesn't like, IT MAY COST YOU.

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!

Newspeak, Crimethink, and LGF

An excellent analysis of the power of Political Correctness was given today in a slightly obscure publication out of Arkansas, the Northwest Arkansas News. Bradley R. Gitz, a local freelance journalist, points out that so long as the Left can silence people through labeling, ostracism and shunning, it maintains control.

Money grafs:

It is easy to ridicule political correctness, but it is the most powerful mechanism available for discrediting political views, not by refutation but by social ostracism. Express reservations about global warming theory and you become a global-warming denier; criticize racial preferences and you become a racist; indicate support for traditional conceptions of marriage and you become a homophobe.

The left dominates because it dominates the culture, and by dominating the culture it gets to decide what views are and aren't acceptable and how terms like "moderate" and "extremist" are applied. ....

As things trundle along in this direction, it won't be long before the ideas that America (as well as classical liberalism) was founded upon, and which contemporary conservatives still hold dear-limited government, free enterprise and individual liberty-are reclassified as "hate speech."

This recalls Orwell's essay on Newspeak: "It would have been quite impossible to render ["We Hold These Truths to be Self Evident"] into Newspeak while keeping to the sense of the original. The nearest one could come to doing so would be to swallow the whole passage up in the single word crimethink."

So how does this relate to Little Green STFUtballs? Simple. He's shunning people just like the leftists do: naming them as members of some nefarious member of a designated target of Two Minute's Hate, then shoving them into the disintegration chamber (If I can mix Classic Trek metaphors with 1984). One "Anonymous" on Defending the Defensible, an LGF sock puppet site apparently run by Charles himself, has defined the LGF MO as follows:

The methodology being used to generate a fanatical loyalty on the LGF board is well known. Saddam Hussein was wont to use similar techniques – at one meeting, reading out individually the names of half of the members of his inner circle and staff, who were then immediately dragged outside and summarily shot. The remaining survivors would clap and cheer at each reading of a name, becoming more and more heated in their hysterical enthusiasm as the process continued, in the hopes that their own names would not be shouted out.

In short, Charles Johnson is an intellectual thug: he silences his own people by publicly shooting some to educate the rest. Finding he can't educate them fast enough, he bans more and more. Eventually there will be nobody yet but a pile of sock puppets and asskissers.

ADDENDUM 3:00 PM EST

One "Sarge" on that same web site states:

“If I am to follow your line of reasoning about being banned, all those bannees must be jerks, fascists, right wing kooks, left wing kooks, creationists, Pastafarians, Rastafarians, vocal Christians, Mormons, Druids, Ron Paul supporters, Glenn Beck listeners, Pam Geller/Atlas Shrugs readers, Ron Popeil fanatics, secret illuminati sock puppets, rustlers, cut throats, murderers, bounty hunters, desperados, mugs, pugs, thugs, nitwits, halfwits, dimwits, vipers, snipers, con men, Indian agents, Mexican bandits, muggers, buggerers, bushwhackers, hornswogglers, horse thieves, bull dykes, train robbers, bank robbers, ass-kickers, shit-kickers and Methodists… or other undesirables, right? It ain’t so . . . and it shouldn’t matter if they are.”

Exactamundo. However, "Sarge" forgot to mention mother rapers, father stabbers, father rapers, those convicted of littering, and everyone else sitting on the Group W bench.

LGF used to be worth reading for something other than as a bad example. A shame, really.

Charles Johnson Stinks Up the Net (Again)

Little Green Footballs excreter Charles Johnson at the keyboard.

Did you know that Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs probably supports apartheid? Not only that, he may be a full throated supporter of the Nazi extermination of the mentally handicapped. He probably is for the re-institution of human chattel slavery, both in the Confederacy and in Sudan. He might believe that the Romans were perfectly justified in destroying ancient Israel and it is possible that he believes that the Turks should have murdered more Armenians.

How do we know that?

Charles never protested in front of the South African embassy in the 1980s. His blog has never denounced the Nazi killing of the handicapped even once. He has never been seen at a Juneteenth celebration and he has never contributed a nickel to stop the genocide at Darfur. He has never said that the Romans should have left the Judeans alone and his silence on the Turkish genocide of the Armenians speaks volumes.

Therefore, it is entirely possible that he be a Nazi, an apartheidist, a slavery supporter, a supporter of Muslim genocide of Christians, and desires the utter crushing of Judaism.

“But you’re a lawyer!” I hear you cry. “How can you say that? That’s not evidence! Otherwise all of us are completely guilty of supporting every single human institution of wrongdoing simply by the fact that we never protested it! That’s completely unfair! That’s utter bullshit!”

Indeed it is.

Charles is of course none of these things; I'm sure that he's as pure as the driven snow with regard to every one of the above statements. So, Charles, (yes I know you’re reading this) you can hang up your phone with your lawyer.

I’m just applying to Charles Johnson the same logic he applies to those protesting the undeserved appearance of our abortion-mongering President at the Catholic school of Notre Dame, in this (utterly stupid) post here:

Not one of these people uttered a word of protest when Notre Dame University tried to bring radical Islamist Tariq Ramadan to the school, to make him chairman of the Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies. But Tariq Ramadan is in favor of the death penalty for homosexuals, so maybe they have that much in common.

Charles, most days you merely annoy. But when you engage in madness like that, I can truly say: you certainly suck.

ADDENDUM I 11:30 AM EDT

Charles also commits actionable libel against Rev. Norman Weslin, founder of the Lambs of Christ abortion protest group, by claiming there are "links" between him and James Kopp, the man who murdered abortion provider Bernard Slepian.

And what is that "link"?

Kopp, in 1992, was a member of a forerunner to the Lambs of Christ, before he went on to murder Slepian in 1999.

By Charles' logic, YOU ARE TAINTED BY EVERY CRIME OR ILLEGAL OR IMMORAL ACT OF ANYBODY WHO HAS EVER KNOWN YOU, OR EVER WILL KNOW YOU, NOW AND FOREVER, AMEN.

I hope and pray that everybody that has ever posted on Charles's site was born without sin. Otherwise, what with all those sinners he knows, he will very likely have all their sins held against him one day.

Glass houses, Trelayne, glass houses.

ADDENDUM II 1:00 PM EDT

"Rhymeswithright", a poster on LGF, sez:

Charles -- but were they "perfectly fine" with letting the guy into Notre Dame? You make a big assumption there. After all, I have been involved in the pro-life movement for years, but have never participated in the any activities to raise money for breast cancer research. Does that mean I am "perfectly fine with women dying of breast cancer"? Or does it mean that I have chosen to focus my energies on an issue other than breast cancer? ... Besides, your response above makes it sound like you think there is something wrong with protesting "the legally elected President of the United States". Be careful lest you start sounding like those who argue that disagreeing with Obama is treason.

Charles' reply:

Thanks -- I'll give your advice all the careful consideration it deserves.

Rhymeswithright, at this point, has a -5 downding. Charles OTOH has two wet smoochie kisses smack on his ass.

Rhymeswithright's show trial, followed by disappearance into the night and fog, in five... four... three....

Racism Defined

There once was a time when having a single identifiable African-descended ancestor made you "black," and thus subjected to (inter alia) sitting in the back of the bus. This was called the "One Drop" theory.

Now we have a man who, born in Africa, having attained American citizenship, calls himself "African American"--and found himself suspended from dental school. Why? He was born in Mozambique, but is descended from Portuguese colonizers.

So. African. American. Therefore African-American. Right?

Right?

HERETIC!

Suspended from his school, defamed for his arrogance, he is now left suing his school for penalizing him for arrogating unto himself status that is only his by logic and reason, and not by Decree of the Leftist Nazis Who Must Decree And Enforce That Which Is So.

Well, I write as an African American. I'm descended from A. Afarensis, a species of creature well identified in Africa.

I'm also a Native American, an Alaskan. I was born here.

I'm also Hispanic. My late father, William, and my Grandmother Kent, and I all have speckled hazel eyes and epicanthic folds common among the Irish of the southern coast of the island; that trait is carried by the Black Irish, whose forefathers sailed in the Spanish Armada, which tried (rather unsuccessfully, IIRC) to invade England in 1588.

What? You telling me I'm *white*? You racist! I'm actually a pale tan color. How dare you infer that I suffer from albinism! That's slander!

What utter nonsense.

In the end, Lou Gossett, Jr. put it best: "Yo' blood's the same color as mine, ain't it, Mayonnaise?"

A WW2 Poster for Today

Hat Tip: Free Republic's "KARTOGRAPHER"

Sacrifice

A sad but beautiful story from the L.A. Times about a woman who gave her life rather than lose the child she was carrying:

She leaned on her husband, using his strength to hide her unsteadiness. Her steps were tentative, measured, cautious, with her gait more typical of a woman decades older than her late 20s. She could still walk, shake hands and almost smile, at least with one side of her mouth; she couldn't let the tumor take those gifts away -- not yet. She had to stay healthy another few weeks, until her baby was born.

I can understand and, truly, appreciate this woman's great sacrifice.

Let me tell you a story:

In the early winter of the year 1899 a woman named Elizabeth Martin Dueweke, 45 years old and the mother of 13 children, found herself pregnant again. Her doctor had warned her that she was too old to survive another childbirth and strongly advised her to abort (which was legal then under the circumstances).

A faithful Catholic, she declined. "Live or die," she said, "It is God's will."

She gave birth in May 1900 to a little girl she named Loretta.

And she promptly died.

Loretta, her fourteenth child, survived. She herself had ten children, 78 grandchildren, over 150 great-grandchildren, and an unknown number of great-great grandchildren; of these, at least 12 have PhD's, five J.D's, and two are M.D.s.

Elizabeth Martin Dueweke gave her life a century ago and now hundreds of people, through her youngest daughter, call her "grandmother".

Including yours truly.

She also may have over a thousand descendants by now. In a few generations, a whole nation.*

Sacrifice is often in vain. But not always.

(*Take that, ZPGers!)

"Behold a Wonder In The Deep"

In celebration of today's Shuttle mission to make one last repair to Hubble: a picture of the Universe that shows elements less than a billion years older than the beginning of the universe.

God is glorious, is He not?

H. lgfloresensis

Breitbart transmits the news that the minature hominids found on an island near Java are truly a separate species--a dwarf hangover of our ancient hominid cousins, probably H. Habilis--and not merely "pygmies whose brains had shrivelled with disease".

That's great to know.

But if they resemble "pygmies whose brains had shrivelled with disease", isn't it possible that they post on Little Green Footballs?

All joking aside...

As a Roman Catholic and an evolutionist (which is to speak redundantly) I think this is fascinating--and truly important. To think that our near human cousins were alive as late as 8000 years ago! That means they outdid even H. Neandertalensis! If these are derived from H. Erectus or even H. Habilus, it raises a 'baseline' from which we can measure subsequent human greatness. If they were animals instead of humans, it allows us to derive and study, from their differences with us, that which makes us truly human (and immortal).

If they were humans, ditto, except we can then derive that knowledge from the differences between the 'hobbits' and true animals such as the chimpanzee.

That evolution is fact (and the age of the universe 13.1 billion years or older) is beyond argument and absolute truth. It's clear that the anti-evolutionists (young earthers,e tc) believe because they accept without question the *literal* (as opposed to metaphorical) truth of The Book of Genesis. It would be nice if it were literally true. Unfortunately, it isn't.

The Telegraph Can't Handel the Truth

Out of the UK, The Telegraph reports that a forgotten funeral oratorio by Handel was played this week for the first time in 200+ years.

The story included the following two howlers:

His most famous piece is 'Water Music' a series of orchestral movements requested by King George I for a concert on the River Thames in 1717.

Oh, really? And how many people stand up and sing Hallilujah during Water Music? But admitting that his most famous work is The Messiah is admitting that there was such a thing as the Messiah, eh? Geez.

And:

Handel died in 1759, nine years after a carriage accident in Holland robbed him of his eye sight and was given a state funeral.

He died nine years after being given a state funeral????!?!??

(PS. Why couldn't they find Mozart's piano teacher? BECAUSE HE WAS HAYDN!) (thank you thank you I'll be here all week....)

Obama's Mama Converts to Mormonism...

...whether she likes it or not.

Apparently, some, er, genius, without permission or authorization, "baptised" the late mother of Mr. Obama as a Mormon, in spite of the fact that she was rather stubbornly Protestant. They "baptised" her using an obscure (and somewhat offensive) rite under the Mormon liturgy allowing for living people to baptize the dead without so much as a by-your-leave.

Bad idea, really.

Seriously, I have to admit that the Mormon practice of posthumously baptising the dead is a rather pointless practice. It's not as bad as simultaneous and multiple wives (Hey, this is America! Load your wives in series, not in parallel!), but, still. It annoys many of the relatives of the deceased (particularly if the deceased were Jewish or, especially, Holocaust victims) and seems to lack the primary ingredient of any conversion effort, i.e., volition. After all, you have no say in baptism (either way) if you are already dead.

But while I find the practice rather silly, I don't think it's a show stopper in human relations. If someone wants to wash away the sins of my dead relatives, wunnerful wunnerful. Just don't send me a donation request or ask that I waste a Saturday afternoon to witness it.

OTOH, my friend P.R. (whose full name will go here if he authorizes it) has written me to say that Mormonism is *the ONLY religion* in history which has made it unnecessary to convert to it. In fact, it is NOT IN YOUR INTEREST to convert, EVEN IF IT IS TRUE. Here's why:

-- If Mormonism is a false religion, it is 100% stupid to convert to Mormonism, as it will avail you naught and you will go to Hell.

--Therefore if Mormonism is a false religion, you should therefore convert to some OTHER religion that is (or may be) the True Religion, whatever you perceive that to be, as you will have a >0% chance of picking a religion that is the True Religion.

--If Mormonism is the True Religion, you should therefore convert to it. But....

--...if Mormonism is the True Religion, and you do NOT convert, then your descendants will eventually baptise you posthumously anyway (it being the True Religion), thus assuring that you get into heaven in any event.

Get it? It's sort of a reverse Pascalian logic:

_________MORMONISM TRUE?
_________YES_________NO

CONVERT?
YES:______HEAVEN____HELL
NO:_______HEAVEN____???*

Therefore, in order to maximize your chances of Heaven, do not convert to Mormonism even if it is true.

Makes perfect sense to me.

*Please forgive the sloppy look; BLOGGER doesn't like html table functions....

To Randall Terry: Beware of Moby Dicks

May 6, 2009

I hear say that Randall Terry, former prolife protest organizer and recent Catholic convert, is organizing the protests at Notre Dame against Mr. Obama when Mr. Obama appears there to get what is essentially a mail-order honorary sheepskin.

This abominable choice has greatly angered believers and life supporters nationwide; Mr. Obama's co-honoree, Mary Ann Glendon, has declined even appearing on the same stage as him.

I agree with those calling for the appearance to be cancelled and I agree that Obama's appearance must be protested in the name of Jesus Christ and simple justice.

But I also think that Mr. Terry is absolutely the wrong guy to be organizing this. I think he's a very foolish and dangerous choice, and those in charge of the thing need to rethink it NOW before it is too late.

To explain why, I have sent the following letter today to "Stop Obama Notre Dame."

- - - - - - - - -

Mr. Randall Terry
Stop Obama Notre Dame
PO Box 902
South Bend, IN 46624

Sir:

I write to you today as a full throated supporter of the protests against Notre Dame for their abominable choice in honoring Mr. Obama. I do not believe that Mr. Obama should be honored by any Catholic organization for any reason whatsoever. And I say this as a lifelong and unapologetic supporter of the life movement. [If you doubt me, read this blog.]

Unfortunately, I also do not believe you are the man to be leading this protest movement and I call upon your immediate resignation from any leadership
position associated with it.

Sir, you are a rabble-rouser. Your intention is to gain as much media attention as possible ... mostly for yourself. You are a very dangerous man to be leading this protest, for reasons I shall explain shortly.

Are you familiar with the concept of the "Moby", sir? Two years ago, an obscure rap artist by that name advocated leftists to invade every web site possible and deposit as extreme right wing rantings, gibbering racist claims, and insults, so as to discredit us. For that reasons, this variety of distruptive on line "troll" (troublemaker) is known as a "Moby."

"Mobys" (or "Moby Dicks") don't just appear on web sites; they also appear at protests. "Black bloc" anarchists who are willing to be arrested smashing windows at World Bank conference meetings are just as eager to be arrested in (say) Nazi uniforms at prolife rallies. I am afraid that by your eagerness for public attention that you will fail to properly vett people claiming to be activists on your (our) side, thus exposing us to being publicly humiliated by our enemies.

Your contribution to the prolife movement in past years is appreciated. But as a newly converted Catholic with a history of self aggrandizement and self promotion, you are not the man to organize or lead this protest.

This affair is not about you, sir. Leave the organization to someone better suited for the task.

For if you fail at this and embarrass us, this will not be forgotten.

Sincerely,

/s/

Richard L. Kent, Esq.
Attorney and Counselor at Law.

I'm not betting the rent, however, that he will pay it any heed. If the protests are a disaster, then let this be remembered.

Spector: They Killed Kempy!

Arlen Spector, AKA Spector the Defector, blovated yesterday that the GOP killed the late Jack Kemp.

Sen. Arlen Specter, Pennsylvania Democrat, said part of the reason that he left the Republican Party last week was disillusionment with its health-care priorities, and suggested that had the Republicans taken a more moderate track, Jack Kemp may have won his battle with cancer....

"If we had pursued what President Nixon declared in 1970 as the war on cancer, we would have cured many strains. I think Jack Kemp would be alive today. And that research has saved or prolonged many lives, including mine."

Senator Spector, this calls for a blunt two-word response, the second word of which is "you."

Wymmenpriest To Desecrate the Mass in Syracuse

It sez here that some female person claiming to be a priest is going to pretend to hold a mass in Syracuse, NY, this week.

The answer called for from His Eminence the Bishop of Syracuse is clear.

But it won't happen.

To paraphrase Cool Hand Luke: "What We Have Hyeah is a Failyuh to Excommunicate."