Lives in a Shoe

Be Sure to Wear Clean Underwear

End of world next Saturday -- begins with earthquake in Pacific Northwest.

Well Done

ACLU gets it right.  Terry Jones cannot be denied his right to demonstrate in front of a mosque in Dearborn.  And the transit worker who burned a Quran has been reinstated after being fired for doing so.

"The fact that society may find speech offensive is not a sufficient reason for suppressing it. Indeed, if it is the speaker's opinion that gives offense, that consequence is a reason for according it constitutional protection. For it is a central tenet of the First Amendment that the government must remain neutral in the marketplace of ideas."

Chief Justice Rehnquist, HUSTLER MAGAZINE v. FALWELL, 1988

 

Bizarro World

   Theocons and hedonistic liberals seem to be meeting somewhere in the middle for an amiable do-si-do.   Consider: 

   1.    Washington state, then the Feds, have ordered Four Loko off the market.  Why?  To protect the CHILD-ren.  Never mind that alcoholic beverages are already illegal to sell to kids or even to young adults under age twenty-one.  And never mind that a can of Red Bull and a vodka-rocks would have pretty much the same effect.  Banning a legal product for adult use on the basis that it's dangerous to children could apply to lots of things, like Happy Meals with toys inside, or fast food restaurants in poor neighborhoods.  Oh, wait...    

    2.    Pat Robertson has advocated decriminalization of marijuana.  "We're locking up people that take a couple of puffs of marijuana....We've got to take a look at what we're considering crimes... I'm not exactly for use of drugs, don't get me wrong, but I just believe criminalizing marijuana and criminalizing the possession of a few ounces of pot...it's costing us a fortune and it's ruining young people."

 In other news, on Planet Htrae, Bizarro Lois Lane tugged on Superman's cape and messed around with Jim.

Couldn't Have Said It Better Myself

Had a post about this written and ready to go.  But I'll defer to Bill Quick.at http://dailypundit.com/  (Below the jump.)

(CNSNews.com) — The federally funded National Portrait Gallery, one of the museums of the Smithsonian Institution, is currently showing an exhibition  that features images of an ant-covered Jesus... 

Girls Have Cooties But Old Ladies Don't

In late September last year, Saudi King Abdullah opened the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST), billing it as the Arab world's most advanced university on the northern shores of Jeddah.

Hoping to attract high-level international talent, the king took a gamble, announcing the university would be the kingdom's first co-educational institution, with male and female students from over 60 countries studying side by side, unveiled women driving around the 14-square-mile campus, and no religious police on site.

Then came the fatwa calling for all "modernizers" advocating gender mixing in the kingdom to be put to death. "Whoever allows this mixing allows forbidden things, and whoever allows them is an infidel and this means defection from Islam," a highly influential cleric ruled. "Either he retracts or he must be killed."

...Sheikh A-Najaimi, another senior Saudi cleric who had publicly supported the Al-Barrak fatwa calling for the death of those supporting gender mixing, attended an International Women's Day conference in Kuwait last month.

A-Najaimi stands accused of eating, sitting and talking with the conference's female attendees for hours.

The sheikh justified his attendance by claiming that the majority of the women at the conference were menopausal, therefore he is permitted by Islamic law to interact with them. Islamic scholars disputed A-Najaimi's interpretation of the Sharia, Islamic law, arguing that a woman must be post-menopausal, uninterested in men, and decide on her own whether or not to announce her status.

When some of the female attendees announced that they were not, in fact, menopausal, the sheikh allegedly told them "you are post menopausal whether you admit it or not!"

 

The Islamization of the World

Metronieuws has an interview with Afshin Ellian, a witness for the defense in the Geert Wilders trial in Amsterdam...Here's the key passage:

You said the Wilders Trial reminds you of justice in your country of origin, Iran. Is that not somewhat exaggerated?

“The Netherlands, of course, is not comparable with Iran, but it's about perception. If you cannot say that Islam is a backward religion and that Mohammed is a criminal, then you are living in an Islamic country, my friend, because there also you cannot say such things. Here I'm free to say that Christ was a faggot* and Mary was a whore, but apparently I should stay off of Mohammed.”

Heart of a Lion

Geert Wilders. His trial began yesterday in the Netherlands -- the charge: Hate Speech. Translation of his statement to the court below the break:

Haiti

We are Americans, the most generous people in the world.  The USS Carl Vinson is on its way now, complete with hospital, generators, helicopters.  Charities are loading planes, ready to send in volunteers, food, medical supplies.  Dig deep and give to a charity,  even if you can afford only five bucks -- send that five bucks.  Check it out first -- there are some good ranking organizations online, such as CharityNavigator.org.  Doctors Without Borders, which I've always admired, is given a four-star ranking.

By the way:  Pat Robertson is a nincompoop.  He must embarrass the crap out of his fellow Christians.  One of my uncles, in his 90s, during a reunion dinner of the staunch Baptists on my father's side repeatedly told stories about his Navy days, "...Ha!  I patted her ass and told her, Shake your titties, honey, and suck my..."  His pious daughters, mortified, tried to divert him by offering some nice green beans or maybe some cole slaw but he just kept talking until he pooped his pants and had to be cleaned up and put to bed.  Hey -- it was one of those funny things that you can't laugh at until it's over and you're driving home.  Anyway. 

At times of disaster Robertson pops up -- like some demented cuckoo -- to offer his bizarre historical theories to deserved ridicule.  He's been saying these weird things for decades so we can't really blame it on senility.  The charity he founded, Operation Blessing International, has a four-star rating.  If you are inclined to support a religious charity you could do worse than to help this one.  I imagine the folks at the charity are fervently wishing the good reverend would have a second helping of cole slaw and STFU.