1. Richard Dawkins Responds to Rabbi Shmuley Boteach

Comment #181254 by hightrekker on May 16, 2008 at 7:02 pm

Well, at least our Cabbage For Christ friends have the moral high ground:
Texas minister charged in Internet sex sting
Friday, May 16, 2008
(05-16) 18:33 PDT Bryan, Texas (AP) --

A minister from a Dallas-area Baptist megachurch was caught in an Internet sex sting and charged with online solicitation of a minor, police said Friday.

Undercover officers posing as a 13-year-old girl communicated with Joe Barron, 52, of Plano for about two weeks. The online conversations were sexual in nature, police said.

On May 6, Barron suggested meeting the girl in person. He eventually made the nearly 200-mile drive to Bryan on Thursday, when he was arrested. Police said they found a web-cam and condoms in his car.

Barron remained in Brazos County Jail on Friday on $7,000 bail. Police did not know if he had an attorney.

Barron is one of 40 ministers at Prestonwood Baptist Church, one of the largest churches in the country with 26,000 members. He ministers to married adults.

Mike Buster, executive pastor, said in a statement that the church had no record or knowledge of previous improprieties or saw any inappropriate behavior in the 18 months Barron was on the church staff.

Buster said church officials are fully cooperating with police.

"We are disturbed and saddened by the reports we have heard and we are praying for the Barron family," he said.

2. Pacific Islanders' Ancestry Emerges in Genetic Study

Comment #113882 by hightrekker on January 20, 2008 at 10:21 pm

As someone who has lived in both Polynesian and Micronesia, the peoples of both areas are of Astronesian decent (Taiwan).
Hawaii and New Zealand were the last places on Earth occupied by humans (except for some minor Polynesian islands).
I surprised this is new information, as it has been assumed to be the case.
Melanesia was settled long ago by different colonizers.

3. The Evangelical Rebellion

Comment #103478 by hightrekker on December 25, 2007 at 7:19 pm

FightingFalcon---
What you are describing is not capitalism. Capitalism entails ownership of the means of production in which the difference between user and exchange value one extracts profit through labor. This has never existed without a strong state to enforce it's policies and ownership.
I'm an anarchist-- so I'm with you on the power of the state.
I open for suggestion on new economic relationships-
Capitalism is as superstition based as religion. It ignores thermodynamics.

4. The Evangelical Rebellion

Comment #103385 by hightrekker on December 25, 2007 at 10:54 am

On the Ron Paul thing--
I find it rather hilarious that a political campaign based on abolishing Income Tax and the Federal Reserve rings true to so many dedicated market capitalist libertarians, Capitalism has never existed without a strong central state (from it's rise in the Italian City States in the 15th Century until the current model of enforcing policies of Global Capitalism), and needs a State to enforce it's rules, often violently.
The Fed just protects the interests of the Creditor Class, and evens out the dips in a chaotic system.
Libertarian are just capitalists who like to sell and smoke dope.

5. The Evangelical Rebellion

Comment #103334 by hightrekker on December 25, 2007 at 7:43 am

"... surely the average American is not this stupid"
Unfortunately we are. As a former teacher, I surprised this train wreck is still on the tracks. True, we do have some brilliant and talented people, but these are a small segment of society.
Reform is not possible with a population as unskilled and dumbed down as in the US. Critical thinking is not possible as sound bites and simple narrative explain religious and conspiracy theories.
This will be sorted out on the other side of the wall we are about to smash into by the survivors (if any).

6. Mitt Romney's Faith In America address (as prepared for delivery)

Comment #97257 by hightrekker on December 11, 2007 at 8:20 pm

Jesus General on Republican Revolution:
The Republican Revolution delivers again
The greatest propaganda coup of the last century wasn't birthed at a stadium in Nuremberg or in the the dark recesses of the Kremlin, it was given life by an American president in an Oval Office meeting with his top advisers. That president was Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and his propaganda victory was the acceptance of the idea that the role of government was to serve the people.

Prior to FDR, government served only those who deserved it: the corporations. Indeed, it was merely a few decades earlier that corporations were granted personhood and at least one senator, after proudly stating he represented Standard Oil, proposed that Senate representation should be given to corporations rather than the states.

But all that changed with FDR. He and his successors perverted government's purpose by forcing it to address things like the 40 hour work week, workplace safety regulation, state subsidies for the elderly and the sick, and eventually, even civil rights.

The election of Ronald Reagan signaled the beginning of the end of this tyranny of the public good. We've come a very long way in the last 28 years in restoring the important master/servant relationship between corporations and government. I think a recent incident involving Haliburton subsidiary KBR and the US State Department serves as a great example of just how far we've come.

A little over two years ago, a group of KBR employees drugged and gang raped Jamie Leigh Jones, a 20-year-old female American staffer. Jones responded by attempting to report the incident and management reacted by ordering their security division to lock her up in a shipping container.

A sympathetic guard eventually allowed her to use his cellphone and she called her father. He, in turn, called his congressman who contacted the State Department and asked them to dispatch embassy personnel to free her and take her to a medical facility for treatment.

Jones was examined by a doctor who determined that she had been vaginally and anally raped multiple times by the KBR contractors.

At this point, the State Department had a decision to make. Should they allow the rape kit to be sent to the FBI and the Justice Department or given to Jones for a potential lawsuit (contractors are shielded by law from being arrested for anything) and by doing so, side with the young woman against the contractor, or should they seize it and give it to KBR--the company that had imprisoned her to keep her from complaining--and thus honor the sacred covenant Our Leader made with the owners in his ownership society.

As one would expect from any agency run by a good Republican soldier like Condi Rice, State sided with the contractor and gave the rape kit to KBR security, who promptly lost it.

No rape kit; no problem; the Republican revolution delivers again.

posted by Gen. JC Christian, Patriot

7. Tests of faith over 'The Golden Compass'

Comment #83395 by hightrekker on October 29, 2007 at 10:55 pm

Might be time to jettison the Cabbages For Christ as a market segment. When you let ignorance control content, ignorance is perpetuated and continued.

8. Logical Path from Religious Beliefs to Evil Deeds

Comment #78509 by hightrekker on October 13, 2007 at 11:03 am

On this date (Oct 13)---
1988 -- Shroud of Turin, alleged burial cloth of Jesus Christ, declared a fake. "Not a ghost of a chance," claim the experts.
Anastasio Cardinal Ballestrero, archbishop of Turin, announces the Shroud, revered by many as the cloth covering the body of Jesus after the crucifixion, dates only from the 13th century. It had first come to the attention of the Roman Catholic Church in the mid-14th century. Determination was made by radiocarbon dating. Ballestrero said the church never claimed the shroud was a holy relic, but because of the image on the cloth, it would continue to be regarded with veneration...Those Who Want to Believe are not considered crazy.

9. Poll: Are Dawkins and Hitchens good for humanism?

Comment #72888 by hightrekker on September 23, 2007 at 10:42 am

Dawkins is a yes---
Chris H, well, anyone who can be duped by a bunch of Neothugs, and then mugged by the Straussians needs to be questioned.

10. A Matter of Faith

Comment #66108 by hightrekker on August 28, 2007 at 8:09 pm

"Chomsky as 'a tired old communist hack" - someone's ignorance is being reveled.
Chomsky is a anarchist (there are so many views within anarchism, it would be over the heads of our simple, washed friends to go much further)--
His mistrust of communism is well documented.

11. A Matter of Faith

Comment #66107 by hightrekker on August 28, 2007 at 8:00 pm

Hitch is very naive politically - his Iraq stance is one example.
It's so amusing that this jaded, cosmopolitan intellectual was so easily taken in by a bunch of Straussians.
The neocons rolled a drunk, philosophically speaking. He's still fumbling in his pants, saying "whahapn'?
He does make fun of the Sky Daddy's-----

12. Authors at Google: Christopher Hitchens

Comment #66098 by hightrekker on August 28, 2007 at 4:41 pm

Let's be honest- Hutch is incredible naive politically.
It's so amusing that this jaded, cosmopolitan intellectual was so easily taken in by a bunch of Straussians.
He is defiantly not someone I would trust to read a street smart situation, especially if my life was involved.
But, elite intellegensia have never stayed in a 8 peso hostel in Chiapas, or really had to do much of anything other than checking in at the Hilton--
I love his rants against Cabbages For Christ and our Loving Muslim Psychopaths.

13. Feeding the fear gene

Comment #65700 by hightrekker on August 25, 2007 at 7:09 pm

These should help our New Age Friends--
http://www.ericisgreat.com/tinfoilhats/index.html

14. The Pentagon Sends Messengers of Apocalypse to Convert Soldiers in Iraq

Comment #64271 by hightrekker on August 19, 2007 at 7:54 am

These Cabbages For Christ will kill us all---
There is no bottom for ignorance with these poor meme infected hosts for toxic replicators.

15. Authors at Google: Christopher Hitchens

Comment #64208 by hightrekker on August 18, 2007 at 4:34 pm

Opposition in European countries

Around the 2003 Invasion of Iraq and subsequent occupation of Iraq, polling data indicated that opposition to military action against Iraq was widespread in Europe [10].


'Anti-Bush' and anti-war sentiments were reflected in many western European countries, generally with the populace less sympathetic to the U.S. stance even when the government in a given country (e.g. the United Kingdom, or Italy) aligned themselves with the U.S. position. Opinion polls showed the population was against the war, with opposition as high as 90% in Spain and Italy, and also widespread in Eastern Europe.[11] The electorates of France and Germany were strongly opposed to the war and it would have been difficult for their governments to fail to reflect these views. Some suggest that the reason for the EU's negative view of the war are Europe's economic interests in the region [13].

After the first UN resolution, the US and the UK pushed for a second resolution authorising an invasion. The French and German governments, amongst others, took the position that the UN inspection process should be allowed to be completed. France's then-Foreign Minister, Dominique de Villepin received loud applause for his speech against the Iraq War at the United Nations on February 14, 2003. Neither of these countries have sent troops to Iraq. However, despite popular opinion in their countries, the governments of Italy and Spain supported the war politically and militarily, although Spain ceased to do so after the election of a Socialist government in 2004 partly due to anger about the war in Iraq.

In the United Kingdom, both the governing Labour Party and the official opposition Conservative Party were in favour of the invasion. The Liberal Democrats insisted on a U.N. resolution; they opposed the war as a result, but were not particularly vocal about this until after Saddam was toppled. Outside parliament, anti-war sentiment was more widespread: the 15 February 2003 protest in London attracted between 750,000 and 2,000,000 supporters from various walks of life (in contrast to more typical anti-war movements which have in the past been dominated by the far-left). Prominent politicians and other individuals expressing anti-war views included: Charles Kennedy, Sir Menzies Campbell, Robin Cook, Tony Benn, George Galloway, Chris Martin, Ms. Dynamite, and Bianca Jagger.

[edit] Opposition throughout the world


Opinion polls showed that the population of nearly all countries opposed a war without UN mandate, and that the view of the United States as a danger to world peace had significantly increased. [12] [13] [14]

[edit] Religious opposition

On September 13, 2002, US Catholic bishops signed a letter to President Bush stating that any "preemptive, unilateral use of military force to overthrow the government of Iraq" could not be justified at the time. They came to this position by evaluating whether an attack against Iraq would satisfy the criteria for a just war as defined by Catholic theology. [15]

The Vatican also came out against war in Iraq. Archbishop Renato Raffaele Martino, a former U.N. envoy and current prefect of the Council for Justice and Peace, told reporters that war against Iraq was a "preventative" war and constituted a "war of aggression", and thus did not constitute a just war. The foreign minister, Archbishop Jean-Louis Tauran, expressed concerns that a war in Iraq would inflame anti-Christian feelings in the Islamic world. On February 8, 2003, Pope John Paul II said "we should never resign ourselves, almost as if war is inevitable." [16]

Both the outgoing Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, and his successor, Rowan Williams, spoke out against war with Iraq.

The executive committee of the World Council of Churches, an organization representing churches with a combined membership of between 350 million and 450 million Christians from over 100 countries,[17] issued a statement in opposition to war with Iraq, stating that "War against Iraq would be immoral, unwise, and in breach of the principles of the United Nations Charter." [18]

Jim Wallis of Sojourners Magazine has argued that, among both evangelical Christians and Catholics, "most major church bodies around the world" opposed the war.[14]"

16. Authors at Google: Christopher Hitchens

Comment #64170 by hightrekker on August 18, 2007 at 9:25 am

Hitch and Iraq----
I have been listing to Hitchens (when he was on Marc Coopers show on kpfk in Los angeles in the 1980's) and have always been suspect of his motives. He has switched side numerous times, and in the future, if we can judge from the past, we may be addressing him as Christopher khamenei--
He was obviously wrong about Iraq, and the United Nations has declared the War illegal: http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1305709,00.html
But, despite these obvious shortcomings, he is dead on right on this issue, and a great writer and debater.
He has a alcohol problem, and some issues being a "child of the left", but we will leave that to the psychologists.

17. Believe it or not: the sceptics beat God in bestseller battle

Comment #63752 by hightrekker on August 15, 2007 at 4:25 pm

Who gets royalties on the bible?
God and Jesus do-- the pope transfers it on, and the Talking Snake does the actual deposit--
Where do you think the term Jesus Saves comes from?
Jesus saves at Bank of America---

18. Science and the Islamic World

Comment #62824 by hightrekker on August 11, 2007 at 5:59 pm

KK---
Agreed, let's support anyone trying to free themselves form this mass delusion and these toxic ideas---
Support is needed, this is a bold and dangerous act, in a culture that admires and cultivates ignorance, and punishes intelligence.

19. Science and the Islamic World

Comment #62782 by hightrekker on August 11, 2007 at 12:15 pm

Third--
The West had Greek Thought--- The rest of the world didn't--
5th Century Athens had already conceived of the atom, the dialectic,
scientific method, democracy, the basis for modern drama, the gymnasium-- just to mention a few--
Christianity and Islam buried this for 1500 years, but then the Renaissance discovered Greek tools and analysis--
Unfortunately the combination of Christianity ability to separation reality into compartments and ignore reality and consequences, combined with these powerful Greek Tools to deal with the psychical world has produced the fix we are currently in--

20. Come Out!

Comment #59503 by hightrekker on July 29, 2007 at 9:16 am

gd---
Come, now, You closet Cabbages for Christ have thicker skins than that----
whiners and trolls might not be a such a bad description-- censorship of opinion only appeals to
ideologues and authoritarians--
Of, course, that is what religion is about--

21. Come Out!

Comment #59496 by hightrekker on July 29, 2007 at 8:48 am

I agree the "A" will be interpreted as Anarchism here in the Bay Area, with it's political centric view--
I may order one, and wear it at strategic and opportunistic times--
The Left is becoming more superstition and conspiracy bound, and anti science in the process--

22. All the mistakes of the godly are merely metaphor

Comment #59209 by hightrekker on July 28, 2007 at 9:42 am

Can you imagine a Cabbage For Christ admit that one of their invisible friends didn't exist?
Science has other standards, and observation and reality count--

In PLoS Computational Biology, volume 3, issue 3, doi:10.1371/journal.pcbi.0030051:

As a result of a bug in the Perl script used to compare estimated trees with true trees, the clade confidence measures were sometimes associated with the incorrect clades. The error was detected by the sharp eye of Professor Sarah P. Otto of the University of British Columbia. She noticed a discrepancy between the example tree in Figure 1B and the results reported for the gene nuoK in Table 1, and requested that she be sent all ten nuoK Bayesian trees. She painstakingly did a manual comparison of those trees with the true trees, concluded that for that dataset there was a strong correlation between clade confidence and the probability of a clade being true, and suggested the possibility of a bug in the Perl script. Dr. Otto put in considerable effort, and we want to acknowledge the generosity of that effort.

The major conclusion of our paper, as given in its title, is therefore invalid, and the paper must be retracted. It is important to stress that the responsibility for the necessity of retracting our paper is entirely mine (Barry Hall), and that my coauthor Stephen J. Salipante bears none of the responsibility. I wrote the Perl script and failed to check its accuracy sufficiently.

We have now corrected the script and reanalyzed the trees in Tables 1–6. The results show that there are strong correlations between clade confidence and the probability that a clade is valid for Bayesian posterior probabilities and for Maximum Likelihood bootstrap percentages and weaker correlations for Maximum Likelihood aLRT values. We have prepared a new paper describing this reanalysis and the results achieved and have submitted it for publication.

23. The hitch in Hitchens' thinking

Comment #58961 by hightrekker on July 26, 2007 at 6:53 pm

I know how to resolve this debate:
Let's fly over on Mohammed's Horse and ask the Talking Snake--
Bronze and Iron Age myths make for such good campfire stories--
Science is Satan!

24. The hitch in Hitchens' thinking

Comment #58843 by hightrekker on July 26, 2007 at 11:32 am

"Unencumbered by serious theological or biblical knowledge"--
Ah yes, Mr Hedges, we are now playing tennis with the net down--
Metaphysical and superstition cannot be put into reason based arguments, as that is why it is called metaphysical--
Mr Hedges will demand the net up on the return volley, as that is how these meme infested delusions operate-

25. Richard Dawkins Replies to David Sloan Wilson

Comment #55569 by hightrekker on July 11, 2007 at 2:45 pm

When ever invisible friends are involved, we are playing tennis with the net down, and everything is traveling through Fantasyland--
The problem is, the waco religious delusionist demand the net up on the return volley--
Carp fishing on valium!

26. Evangelicals See Dilemmas in G.O.P. Field

Comment #55385 by hightrekker on July 11, 2007 at 12:01 am

Someone this Christopathically detached from reality needs help--
These Cabbages for Christ need mental health care, not media attention.

27. At a Theater Near You ...

Comment #54279 by hightrekker on July 6, 2007 at 8:56 am

Well Tom, maybe the World is Round after all------
Of course, Mohammed knew that anyway, as he viewed it from his flying horse---
If you don't believe me, just ask the Talking Snake---
That was a few Friedman Units Ago (google if you are curious about the definition of a Friedman Unit)

28. Yes, the universe looks like a fix. But that doesn't mean that a god fixed it

Comment #53696 by hightrekker on July 2, 2007 at 4:52 pm

I have always read Paul Davies with deep suspicion (equanimity of view brought this on, no matter what letters he has behind his name)--
Paul Davies is a closet Cabbage for Christ

29. Science of the Soul? 'I Think, Therefore I Am' Is Losing Force

Comment #53603 by hightrekker on July 2, 2007 at 7:47 am

Well, this is a bit surprising---
I thought the "Ghost in the Machine" was something only the Cabbages for Christ and our other religious friends clung to--
I think a critical reading of Pinker's "Blank Slate" might "enlighten" everyone--
It is a bit chewy for Joe Six Pack, and uncomfortable to both the left and right, but worth the insight --

30. Messiah

Comment #52563 by hightrekker on June 27, 2007 at 9:40 am

Magical Thinking:
From a post on The Oil Drum--
"It is fascinating to read the Canadian Round-Ups -- we get virtually no news of Canada in the USA media, even though Canada is the #1 source of imported hydrocarbon, and our closest neighbor in countless ways. Thanks be to OilDrum for helping bridge the gap.

Yesterday I unwittingly started a rather silly pseudo-philosophical thread -- my fault for not being clear. The point was that the Disney Machine, powered by cheap oil and set in the fabulous Shangri-La of California had converted Yankee pragmatism into magical thinking -- which could be sustained only so long as the oil lasted. The point about David Hume was that people who were forced to abandon belief in deductive reasoning would likely naturally gravitate to magical thinking -- especially if it were so attractively packaged as the Disney package. Most people, in my experience, are extremely uncomfortable with skepticism and either collapse into rigid orthodoxy or New-Age wu wu. Students of Hume (I count myself a reader, not a serious student, and I'm sure I miss a lot of his message) must recognize what their position sometimes creates-- if unintentionally.

Enter Canada -- the new Source. The magical thinking can continue for a while, bolstered by the promise of Endless Tar Sands. It looks, from the Round-Up that the magical infection is spreading to our pragmatic cousins up north -- I sincerely hope their immunity to claptrap is stronger than ours down south."

31. Look Forward to Anger

Comment #52352 by hightrekker on June 26, 2007 at 8:32 pm

The sad truth is that the level of ignorance and superstition in the USA has made "freedom" and "democracy" impossible. Without a well informed public, democracy is impossible.
As far a Saddam and the USA, a quick history:
http://www.bushflash.com/thanks.html

32. In the name of the Father

Comment #51765 by hightrekker on June 24, 2007 at 7:31 pm

OT: To our UK friends----
Pope Keeps Blair Out of Heaven because of Iraq

by emptywheel

Via Cannonfire, I see that Pope former-Nazi has finally done something worthwhile with his position: he told the Poodle that God meant it about that commandment that, Thou shalt not kill.

Tony Blair yesterday used his last official foreign engagement before leaving office to tell Pope Benedict he wanted to become a Roman Catholic, a Vatican source said last night.

But, in talks lasting more than half an hour, the outgoing Prime Minister was left in no doubt that the Pope took a dim view of his record in office.

[snip]

Vatican sources said the Pope remained unmoved in his view that Blair had been wrong over Iraq.

The whole exchange seems worthy of Monty Python, really. Now perhaps we can hope that Pope former-Nazi starts telling American far right Catholics that that commandment not only applies to Bush's little war, but also to the death penalty.

33. Doctors' beliefs can hinder patient care

Comment #51697 by hightrekker on June 24, 2007 at 6:53 am

It is just common wisdom--
Don't let a Cabbage for Christ give you medical care--
Delusion and superstition cannot be compartmentalized--
it permeates all the sick, meme addled, simpletons--
Stay away from primitives.

34. An Inquisition in science's name

Comment #51176 by hightrekker on June 21, 2007 at 9:04 pm

Attention, Atheists! You Are Wrong. There Is A God.

by tristero

And His name is Dick Cheney, a supernatural being answerable to no earthly power:
The Oversight Committee has learned that over the objections of the National Archives, Vice President Cheney exempted his office from the presidential order that establishes government-wide procedures for safeguarding classified national security information. The Vice President asserts that his office is not an "entity within the executive branch."

As described in a letter from Chairman Waxman to the Vice President, the National Archives protested the Vice President's position in letters written in June 2006 and August 2006. When these letters were ignored, the National Archives wrote to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales in January 2007 to seek a resolution of the impasse. The Vice President's staff responded by seeking to abolish the agency within the Archives that is responsible for implementing the President's executive order.
Now some of you skeptics out there might continue to deny Him, snottily asking, "Would God be so careless around shotguns, huh? Answer me that!"

Oh, ye of little faith! How can we mere humans judge a Superior Being by our own measly standards? His ways are not our ways.

35. The Great Mutator

Comment #50037 by hightrekker on June 14, 2007 at 4:22 pm

Behe is a addict--
"Religious distress is at the same time the expression of real distress and the protest against real distress. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a spiritless situation. It is the opium of the people. The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is required for their real happiness. The demand to give up the illusion about its condition is the demand to give up a condition which needs illusions."
Karl Marx, Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right

Until we can offer these dope addicts a better drug, they will continue to abuse religion, and all the horrible pain and suffering that religious addictions bring on.

36. We of little faith

Comment #49418 by hightrekker on June 11, 2007 at 10:46 pm

the great teapot----
About Buddhism: The earliest text, the Pali Cannon, was written 400 years after the death of Buddha, in a different language, on a island (Sri Lanka) by monastics. The fidelity of this information is questionable, obviously.
99% of Buddhism is like any other superstition based religion, social and political control by a elite, restricted actions and thoughts for a future reward, acquiring land and other resources.
That said, the 1% is quite interesting. What differentiates Buddhism from other religions (Vedic especially) is the concept of Codependent Origination, a dialectical process of feedback loops and change through conditions continually arising (Basic concept, much more than that). Anyway, all truth comes through observation and personal experience and inquiry. If something the Buddha says doest stand up to testing, it is discarded. Accept nothing on face value, test it all.
Obviously, the popularity in the west is one of exotic romance, and sitting 10000 hours observing your thoughts is a tough gig, and only a elite, supported privileged group of people has the conditions to do this--
Anyway, Blackmore is a Buddhist, and has examined memes thoroughly. I like her writings.
Blair is a Cabbage for Christ, and should be regarded as a idiot.

37. Can we really learn to love people who aren't like us?

Comment #49090 by hightrekker on June 10, 2007 at 9:20 am

Proves the obvious point:
"Man will be free when the last king is strangled by the entrails of the last priest" (or anyone with Father Mother Reverend Rabbi Ajan Lama-- take your pick)

38. Can we really learn to love people who aren't like us?

Comment #48937 by hightrekker on June 9, 2007 at 4:39 pm

Ah, yes- Militant Atheist who demand reason and observation to make a decision--
Our writings are "stupid," unlike those "sensible stories where a guy houses every species of flora and fauna in the world for over a month on a homemade boat, or where a virgin's resurrected son ascends bodily to heaven."
Yes, we must respect religion, for if we lose our "belief in the belief in religion" we will actually scrutinize these absurd notions, and
it will come tumbling down.
Of course, we could always ask the talking snake--

39. The 'Is God...Great?' Debate

Comment #48327 by hightrekker on June 7, 2007 at 1:11 pm

I have followed Hitchens for quite a while (first major exposure was on kpfk in LA with Marc Cooper in the 1980's), and became immediately suspicious.
He is morally suspect, to say the least.
We may soon be addressing him as Christopher Khamenei, if his past actions are a guideline.
Wrong on Iraq, right on Religion--
We may as well ride this one as long as we can, but look for a knife in the back.

40. The 'Is God...Great?' Debate

Comment #48151 by hightrekker on June 6, 2007 at 8:17 pm

Baeoz---
Close- the FSM is my cousin on my Goddess side----
Run with the hunted-

41. The 'Is God...Great?' Debate

Comment #48147 by hightrekker on June 6, 2007 at 7:29 pm

Reza is civil---
I have been going back and forth with him on another site, and he has commented that it would be best if we were never in the same room---
I think it was the comment about a book I had just read on women who had climbed K2-- and how they were sexually harassed in Pakistan, and these experienced world travelers had come to the conclusion that Pakistani Men were the biggest pigs they had encountered in all their travels.
Reza had some issues with this, I guess---
Reality is not welcome to our superstition based religious friends, and the light is hard to face up to.

42. Group Threatens to Sue Pentagon Over Military Role in Evangelical Festival

Comment #45565 by hightrekker on May 28, 2007 at 8:22 am

Mixing Cabbages for Christ and weapons is never wise-----
Politically encouraging it is probably going to get yourself removed from the gene pool.
We are living in the Dark Ages----

43. The Cyclic Universe: A Talk With Neil Turok

Comment #42479 by hightrekker on May 18, 2007 at 9:19 am

"I'm not convinced the landscape is real"--
Well, neither am I. Strings and Branes have some serious credibility,
and after the Standard Model of the 1970's, physics has been going in a listless direction, and is lost politically in string theory, which,
if I'm understanding these correctly, is still background dependent.
Einstein in 1905 already address this illusion.
Read Lee Smolan for a different take on our current predicament in physics. He takes a Darwinian View.
We have "discovered" dark matter, and some interesting boundary anolomies on Black Holes, but can't explain these fully yet.

44. Pedal power takes Islamic shape in Iran

Comment #42182 by hightrekker on May 17, 2007 at 8:40 pm

We need to break the spell of religion---
These people are barbarians, living in medieval societies that are terrified of the feminine, and repressed sexually.
We do not have to be respectful to this barbaric treatment of women.
Speak up now, or be reprimanded for seeking the truth.
This is a turn away from reason, and toward the toxic parasitic trash that Islam is.

45. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41316 by hightrekker on May 15, 2007 at 9:40 pm

A Eulogy for Rev. Falwell
The General welcomes a new guest poster tonight. I hope you will too.

Jerry Falwell saved me.

I didn't know I needed saving at the time. I had a top-rated television series, money coming out the wazoo, and the ability to show sizzling-hot porn on a video monitor I had mounted in my stomach. You can't imagine how popular that made me with the guys. Yes, I said guys. You see, my name is Tinky Winky, the formerly-purple teletubby, and I am a recovering homosexual.

I hadn't meant to become a friend of Dorthy's (or actually Dora's in my case). I didn't go looking for the demon of homosexuality; I was just trying to find a party.

You see, Dipsy, Po, the Sun Baby and I were attending our first children's programing convention. We were just kids then really, but we were cocky kids with a new, fantastically successful television show and we were willing to try anything. And try everything we did. I don't think Dipsy showed up for a single autograph session. He was far too busy talking any of a number of the ever present groupies into reorienting his antenna. Po and the Sun Baby might as well have ducked the signings too, Lord knows they were way to fucked up on smack to autograph pictures.
Me, I was constantly hungover from all the parties the other stars were throwing. It was at one of those parties I first heard sodom's siren call.

It started out innocently enough. I ran into Dora the Explorer and Velma from Scoobie Doo in the hotel bar. I tried to make small talk, hoping to pick one of them up, but they didn't seem interested until I showed them I could tune-in the College World Series of Women's Softball on my stomach--it's an old pick-up trick I must have used a thousand times. It seemed to work. They invited me to come up to their suite later to party.

Man, was I excited. A few months earlier, I was just plain old Tinky Winky, a lonely loaner TV at Jim's Television Repair in Elwood, Utah and now, here I was in a fancy hotel room in New York, polishing my picture tube in preparation for what I thought would be a threesome with Velma from Scooby Doo and Dora the Explorer. Unfortunately, I was sadly mistaken.

I tried to hide my disappointment when I entered the suite. Dora and Velma were not alone. The place was packed with stars, old and new. Bert and Ernie were there, trytng to convince Squidward to join them in some mysterious activity. Josie was in the corner grooming one of the Pussycats. Spongebob Squarepants was grooving with Jughead. And Race Bannon from Jonny Quest was poking a finger into He-Man's chest as Dr. Benton Quest tearfully tried to intervene.

Suddenly, I felt a hand grabbing my ass, and turning around, hoping to see Velma or Dora, I was face to face with Bob the Builder, who quickly leaned forward and slipped me some tongue. I was surprised at first, then angry for a brief moment, and finally very excited as I found myself hungrily returning Bob's attention by twisting his screwdriver. Everything's a blur after that, except for the part that involved the Snuffleupagus and felching--you never forget something like that--but of one thing I was certain, I had been recruited into their lifestyle.

I lived that way secretly for years, always worried that Dipsy would learn about my dalliances and use that knowledge to move up to becoming the Teletubby who dances around the bunnies. Or worse yet, Po would wake up early out of his opiate-induced haze and realize why his mouth always tasted funny in the morning.

Then Jerry Falwell saw my purse. I'm surprised he was the first to notice it. I'd been flaunting it for over a year, perversely taking pleasure from the adrenaline buzz I received by risking exposure so blatantly. Of course he immediately went to press with the news, announcing it in the same magazine he used to expose the Bill Clinton's bloody, cocaine-fueled, rampage through Mena, Arkansas, during which he personally killed over 730 people with a pointed stick and an anvil.

Angry, I blackmailed the Celery Guy from the vegi-tales into giving me Falwells number and I called him (Oh the stories i could tell about celeryboy, the tomato, and Gumby's parties, but that's for another time; let's just say there's a reason Gumby's pony is called "Pokey"). Of course, I was very angry at Falwell, and I laid into him right away. Rev. Jerry didn't interrupt. He let me get it all out, then, he said the following words to me:

"Tinky, Jesus loves you. That's why he's going to have you tortured in Hell for all eternity for wanting to share your life another man."

I had never heard of anyone loving someone so completely like that until then--this was before President Bush began sharing his love with brown people--and I was very touched by it. The rest of the call was very pleasant after that. We discussed God, gladiator movies, what I was wearing at that moment, etc. You know. We just talked about everything. Finally, he ended the call by asking me if I was willing to undergo reparative therapy and become an ex-gay for Jesus. I immediately answered yes, and here I am today, 756 aversion-therapy-prescribed electrical shocks to my naughty bits later, happy, Christain, ex-Gay, and waiting for the treatment's side effects to wear off so I can smile. Oh, and I'm no longer purple. I've died my fur a more heterosexual shade of fuchsia.

I owe all that to Jerry Falwell. I'll miss him.

46. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41239 by hightrekker on May 15, 2007 at 5:02 pm

"Only in America...
Only in America could such an obese, greedy spewer of hatred and intolerance be given any attention whatsoever, other than sympathy and a recommendation that he get help. May the Teletubby Crocodile Christians pray for him..."

From another bldg------

47. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41189 by hightrekker on May 15, 2007 at 3:34 pm

Let's be elated this piece of Toxic Trash is gone----
Let's move on and make the rest of these horrible creatures so trivial and meaningless, they will be ignored, or given the mental health care any compassionate society would do their mentally ill citizens.

48. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41109 by hightrekker on May 15, 2007 at 1:53 pm

More toxic meme's are eliminated from the gene pool--
A good day fro the human species, a bad day for delusion and ignorance

49. Among the Disbelievers

Comment #40681 by hightrekker on May 14, 2007 at 4:56 pm

Come now Shuggy--
Ayn Rand is really cool when you are 16---
You get to be a hero for being a complete azzhole--
Could anything be better than that when you are 16!
Sure, only simpletons continue to believe that, but someone
needs to continue on with Peter Pan--

50. Among the Disbelievers

Comment #40496 by hightrekker on May 14, 2007 at 11:06 am

Ah yes, another member of the left who accepts that "the belief in the belief of religion" as a good thing.
Yes, Bronze Age creation myths are childish and embarrassing, but religion has to be good-- I mean Liberation Theology has the same view of Production and Class as Marx---
Daniel Lazare should take some valium the next time he goes carp fishing.