Vox Popoli

A complaint on the new National Socialist Review:

Subject “Neocon” Now Has No Meaning Part 3,717,206

You’re often noted that “neoconservative” has a very hazy definition. Indeed to some people it’s become what Orwell said of Fascism just another word for “bad’.

Perhaps Goldberg himself didn’t, but I do seem to recall a few NRO writers claiming that neocon was a synonym for “Jew”. Those who nonsenically expand definitions are in no position to complain about the definition is expanded beyond all usefulness.

After a very busy week, I ended up playing in an indoor tournament over the weekend. Seven 24-minute games was more than a lot of our guys could take; our 30-man roster was divided into three teams and every team lost at least three guys to one petty injury or another.

We did pretty well, though, as my team took second in the tournament despite being the club’s second team. We beat our own first team in the semifinals – which irritated my best friend on squad to no end – then ran out of gas and got brutalized by a team they had beaten in the qualifying round.

Still, it’s nice to have intra-squad bragging rights for once and I was pretty happy that the nagging muscle pull I’ve had since the end of last season held up throughout. My legs feel about as flexible as iron bars today, though. I’m not sure this is the best way to get ready for the resumption of the outdoor season, but we had fun.

I thought I did all right, all in all, and our manager was so pleased with my play that he announced publicly he was moving me up to number 28. Old team joke; a while ago I asked him if I was dropped to number 30 following a game in which I gave up a dumb penalty that cost us two points in the standings, but after a teammate somehow managed to miss what should have been a certain goal, his only comment on the matter was to elbow me and murmur “29 now”.

The book with blood on its binding:

A painter fascinated with best-selling conspiracy thriller The Da Vinci Code committed suicide after becoming convinced she was the subject of a real-life murder plot. Caroline Eldridge, 38, moved to Italy to pursue her interest in Leonardo Da Vinci, but her mind became “muddled” by the mysteries surrounding his work, her father said.

Caroline Eldridge, a Da Vinci scholar and artist, who killed herself after becoming obsessed with the mysteries surrounding the artist and the best-selling novel The Da Vinci Code. She suffered paranoid delusions that she and her family were in danger “because of the knowledge that she had” of Leonardo after working on an exhibition about his paintings.

After repeatedly telling her family, “I’m not going to let them take me alive,” she took an overdose of paracetamol.

I have to admit, I am kind of curious what sort of knowledge of Leonardo she could have possessed that convinced her she was in danger. I mean, what with the Jesus Institute or some other pseudo-scientific foundation declaring its possession of proof that Jesus was actually a gay amphibious alien from Alpha Merovingus every six months, it’s not like the “secret” of the Da Vinci Code was anything that anyone hasn’t heard before.

Homosexuality is not immoral. Okay. So, how about theft, is theft all right now? Or drinking blood, I’m particularly interested to know if blood-drinking is no longer to be considered immoral. I assume rape is fine, of course.

I’m sort of curious as to know what basis Hillary Clinton is making these ex nihilo pronouncements on morality. It certainly isn’t the Bible.

Your Republican President:

“Senator Kennedy is one of the best legislative senators there is…. He can get the job done.”
– President George W. Bush (R) speaking about immigration reform amnesty.

Yes, now do tell us what a wonderful conservative the pro-abortion, pro-gun control, thrice-divorced transvestite Rudolph Giuliani is.

I don’t know why anyone would expect anything Green to make sense in the first place:

When you pool together all the combined energy it takes to drive and build a Toyota Prius, the flagship car of energy fanatics, it takes almost 50 percent more energy than a Hummer – the Prius’s arch nemesis.

Through a study by CNW Marketing called “Dust to Dust,” the total combined energy is taken from all the electrical, fuel, transportation, materials (metal, plastic, etc) and hundreds of other factors over the expected lifetime of a vehicle. The Prius costs an average of $3.25 per mile driven over a lifetime of 100,000 miles – the expected lifespan of the Hybrid.

The Hummer, on the other hand, costs a more fiscal $1.95 per mile to put on the road over an expected lifetime of 300,000 miles. That means the Hummer will last three times longer than a Prius and use less combined energy doing it.

But… but the Toyota marketing department told you that you were saving the environment? Yeah, well, tell that to Mother Gaia AS YOU MURDER HER, YOU SELFISH PLANET-KILLING BASTARD!

I, on the other hand, have committed to save 40 percent of the energy consumed by my automotive requirements by switching from a 2000 Lamborghini Diablo to an environmentally friendly 2007 Porsche 911 GT3 RS. Still, don’t thank me, thank Al Gore for inspiring us all.

That would be anti-semitic:

The Israeli ambassador to El Salvador has been recalled after he was found drunk, naked and bound in sexual bondage gear in his yard, an official said Monday. The British Broadcasting Corp. reported that he could identify himself to police only after a rubber ball had been removed from his mouth….

Last year, Israel replaced its ambassador to Australia, Naftali Tamir, after he said Israel and Australia are “like sisters” because both are located in Asia and their peoples don’t have the Asian characteristics of “yellow skin and slanted eyes.”

I eagerly await Mr. Abe Foxman’s statement denouncing the BBC, Fox News and the country of El Salvador for their reprehensible irresponsibility denying the Holocaust like this.

It was Pharyngula’s head. Courtesy of his good friend and fellow atheist Scott Adams:

I’ve been trying for years to reconcile my usually-excellent bullshit filter with the idea that evolution is considered a scientific fact. Why does a well-established scientific fact set off my usually-excellent bullshit filter like a five-alarm fire? It’s the fossil record that has been bugging me the most. It looks like bullshit. Smells like bullshit. Tastes like bullshit. Why isn’t it bullshit? All those scientists can’t be wrong.

If you are new to the Dilbert Blog, I remind you that I don’t believe in Intelligent Design or Creationism or invisible friends of any sort. I just think that evolution looks like a blend of science and bullshit, and have predicted for years that it would be revised in scientific terms in my lifetime. It’s a hunch – nothing more….

The bottom line is that DNA tests (which do not set off my bullshit detector) have shown that you can’t really tell what set of bones begat other sets of bones just by looking at how they differed and how old they are. Apparently evolution is more complex than imagined, and there were lots of ape-people varieties wandering around at the same time. Some had modern features that they weren’t supposed to have. The so-called modern features apparently popped up and disappeared more than once, and in more than one species.

Like Scott Adams, I have always been an evolution skeptic. Not on the basis of my religious faith, as my skepticism long preceded that, but because it’s so obviously smoke, mirrors and mad dancing around flaw after flaw after flaw.

No disrespect to Patrick Ewing, (being raised a bit of a Hoya fan by my grandfather), but I can remember the first time I watched him play for Georgetown and thinking, you know, if they dug him up tomorrow, scientists would swear he was our giant ape ancestor.

I don’t know what DNA will reveal in this latest chapter, I’m merely looking forward to the first discovery of a T-Rex with a human in its stomach or something like that. And then all of the back-pedaling, followed by arrogant and superior statements about how we NOW know exactly what’s going on and if you don’t blindly put your trust in it, you’re just stupid and uneducated.

It’s tough to take today’s scientists and their certainties too seriously if you’re sufficiently well-read in history. The probabilities are high that 22nd century scientists will be denying their beliefs are “true science” in the same way that they try to disown 1930s German science.

The Good Fraters have some fun with the failed Bancroft Arnesen Explore expedition:

World-renowned polar explorers and educators, Ann Bancroft and Liv Arnesen, today suspended their historic expedition to the North Pole seven days in, citing severe safety concerns due to a combination of damaged gear, frostbite and extreme cold….

“The goal of this expedition is to help you learn more about global warming; we realize that it is ironic that frostbite and the cold temperatures contributed to our return. But, please know that global warming is real, and with it can come extreme unpredictable changes in temperature. Evidence abounds within this region and in our few days here we already observed some of its evidence.”

Such as toes freezing but not actually falling off, apparently. It is a shame, of course, that global warming has cost Bancroft and Arnesen their opportunity to invent the dykesicle.

I will, however, give them credit for not memetic cleansing their bulletin board. A lot of left-wing blogs, and more than a few right-wing blogs, would do well to take a lesson from them in this regard.

I’m not sure which is funnier, the one guy’s insinuation that all atheists are homosexuals or the grasp of theology demonstrated by the other one:

Simon Owens: Do you think the “blasphemy project” is an effective way for atheists to come out of the closet?

Brian Flemming: The Blasphemy Challenge has certainly encouraged quite a few godless folks to unequivocally state that they aren’t afraid of Satan. I think it’s hilarious that this is actually a controversial statement to make — as if Satan were not a purely mythological character. The Blasphemy Challenge is radical compared to how we normally talk about superstitions such as Christianity, but it shouldn’t be. It should always be acceptable to declare one’s independence from Bronze Age myths. In fact, it shouldn’t really be news at all.

Atheists have a tendency to think that Christians are afraid of their arguments. The truth is that we’re much more likely to marvel at their utter incompetence and demonstrated ignorance. For starters, it’s not Satan that one should fear after blaspheming against the Holy Spirit, it’s the one who has announced His intentions of throwing Satan into the incinerator once his day is done.

I do think the Blasphemy Challenge would be an interesting way to test how many atheists truly have the courage of their convictions, although I’d never set anyone to it.