A Whole Lot About Mostly Nothing

The Naked Loon. Rakes the sanctimony that oozes from the Soviet. Opening goodness. Act II.

H/T: Mark Shea.

Seems that Obama is considering expanding the faith-based initiatives started by GW Bush. Right now, this is the ONLY thing about Obama that I can stand. I still won’t vote for the guy, though. However, what might cause me to vote for the Obamanator is the possibility of watching noted atheist moron PZ Myers’s head explode, as the committed Democrat will have to hold his nose and vote for a politician that -in terms of lip service, at least- is in favor of expanding aid to religious institutions.

He’s still proposing an expansion of Bush’s faith-based initiatives — he’s going to be handing out billions of dollars to religious organizations. It’s nice that he’s specifically saying there will be restrictions, that the money can’t be used in programs that discriminate, and it must be for secular purposes, but he’s still propping up a religious middleman between government aid and the people, and that’s a tool that will be used to proselytize indirectly, even if they don’t simply flout the rules. This is a bad idea.

Well, it’s a bad idea only when you’re an atheist nutjob who sees radical religious conspiracies under every collection plate. WHEN will this bearded blowhard come to terms with his fear of God? If he will simply admit that he is terrified that his Lutheran upbringing was possibly correct, then he can come to terms with it like a good Freudian misfit, and live his life out in fearful quiet in the wilds of Minnesota.

Ain’t likely.

So, as a consolation, I do get to see him become agitated about this Obama/faith-based initiative sop to the religious of America. Twill be amusing to watch PZ get all atwitter about this. NOTHING else at this point is worth paying attention to in this wretched election year.

What we have here is an assbucket of the first water:

. . .that would be Clay Bennett, principal owner of the OKC Raiders Seattle Sonics.  Said assbucket is being sued by the City of Seattle, which is ruled in principle by this gasbag:

That would be Greg Nickels, the Mayor of Seattle.

Seattle is suing Bennett because Bennett bought the Sonics with the intent of moving them to OKC as soon as possible.  Seattle is hoping to force Bennett and his cronies to keep the Sonics in Seattle another two years, the length of their lease with the City on Key Arena.

Lester Munson thinks Bennett is in deep water:

In the lease between Seattle and the Sonics, the contractual language appears to be strong enough. The contract was written in anticipation of the team trying to move and the city trying to stop the move. The key sentence is this: “The obligations of the parties to this agreement are unique in nature; This agreement may be specifically enforced by either party.” The key word in this key sentence is “unique.” Both sides agreed when they signed the lease in 1994 that the presence of NBA basketball in the city’s arena was irreplaceable. They agreed there was no sum of money that could replace the Sonics for the 15 years of the lease. Because city lawyers anticipated the current situation when they negotiated and signed the lease, the city’s position is strong. It is hard to see how Bennett and his OKC crew could avoid playing two more seasons in Seattle.

Heh heh heh.  Bennett, of course, claims that the city doesn’t care about the Sonics.

Munson responds:

They will try to compare the support in Oklahoma City with the declining support in Seattle, asserting that they are entitled to go where it is profitable. Some of it will qualify as evidence that counts in the outcome, but some of it will not. Much of the decline in fan interest in Seattle likely can be attributed to the team’s worst-ever 20-62 record last season and to Bennett’s attempts to abandon the city. (my bold font -ed)

Then waiting in the wings is the idiot Howard Schultz, who inflicted Bennett on Seattle by selling the Sonics to the highest Assbucket bidder, accepting at face value Bennett’s bullshit claims that he would do everything he could to keep basketball in Seattle.

(Bennett) faces not only the lease that probably will keep him in Seattle as a lame duck for two more seasons but also other lawsuits. The most interesting is (Starbuck’s CEO Howard) Schultz’s attempt to take the team back from Bennett and his group and resell it to what Schultz calls an “honest buyer.” None of the other owners who moved their teams as free agents faced anything quite like the Schultz attack. Although Bennett claimed at the time he purchased the team from Schultz that he intended to try to keep the team in Seattle, a series of damaging e-mails has surfaced that indicates Bennett always thought he was a free agent and was preparing to move from day one. If Pechman rules for Seattle and against Bennett, Schultz will have two years to succeed in recapturing the team and selling it to a group that will keep it in Seattle. Bennett might be further from free agency than the average rookie.

We’ll be watching this suit very closely.  Too bad one of the twerps up above has to win.  Every one of them, Bennett, Nickels and Schultz are asshats.  But I guess Bennett is the biggest of them all.

In an effort to stem a serious case of The Fear that has gripped me for the last two days, I submit the following (PROFANITY ALERT):

A big-time WTF goes out to these fools:

I mean, gut-bustingly so.

But here’s the funny part:  It is Pythonesque in its approach.  Meaning, it’s poking fun at both science and religion.

Now, the ironic part is that the Brights just don’t get what it’s really about.

Look, you fools, go re-watch the first part of the video, before the rap.  You clowns are being schooled.  The rap then schools both camps.

Mark Shea has a great takedown on this.

If I could find a way to host videos on this blog, this is the first one I’d put up.  It’s devastating.

She has no idea who I am, but I’m putting in a plug for her anyway.  Take a look at the dog on her title bar, then read the caption.

See if that doesn’t make you laugh.

Then check some of her go-for-the-throat prose.

Mmmkay. Behold the thought processes of true liberals. I know it’s unlikely since I live in Texas, but I so deeply wish some of these turdeaters would come to my city. I’d have to be sure to find them as soon as they landed because they wouldn’t last long on the ground here, and I would like to capture their beatings on video.

Yes, my daily reading list just got a little longer.

HT: Anchoress (who else??)

Delicious irony, anyone?

Federal prosecutors have unsealed an affidavit that details a rendezvous in a Washington hotel room last month between a prostitute and a client who a source tells CNN was New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer.

The affidavit does not mention Spitzer by name, but a source with knowledge of the case said the subject identified as Client 9 is the governor.

(An unfinished bit I wrote some months ago.  I decided to publish it as is, with the understanding that it will remain unfinished.)

God help the biology students at University of Minnesota-Morris. I have heard the dreaded PZ Myers lecture. Christians of the US may rest easy. The man reaches a lot of people by his idiot blog, but once you hear him speak for real, boredom and ennui rapifly settle in. The one thing that kept me going was his occasional non sequitur bleats about how there are no angels to be found in the neuro-electrical activity of the brain.

This stimulates a form of interest, the same sort that might come about after been having trapped by the resident party bore, having cornered you and droned on uninterrupted for 20 minutes about the technical aspects of his exceedingly dreary job, thereby causing you to unfocus and begin daydreaming about maybe falling asleep in front of a TV documentary on catfish harvesting; when suddenly the party bore breaks out with an previously unsuspected case of Tourette’s, cursing the hostess at the top of his lungs and loudly proclaiming her deviant sexual practices. The usual response in such a situation would be the classic, “WTF???? Where did that come from?” So too it is PZ Myers. Droningly dull blather, punctuated by the occasional, completely un-related WTF moments.

Here, in Part 1 of a talk entitled “There Are No Ghosts in Your Brain”, Myers goes on at great length, though in relatively simplistic fashion, about the basics of neurophysiology; detailing the micro-neurophysiology of neuron function, and the macro-neurophysiology of brain mapping. In between, he briefly concedes that the ground between the micro- and macro-neurophysiology, exactly how these millions upon millions of neuronal pulses leads to motor control, sensory management and manifestation of the personality. It’s really a standard primer lecture on intro to neuroscience for the layman with no previous exposure to the subject. If you can get past his enormously boring lecturing voice, I suppose it serves the purpose. There is no doubt that Myers has a firm grasp of the science involved.

But the Tourette’s style, WTF moments come right after he gets done detailing the micro-neurophysiology, and again after outlining the macro-neurophysiology. In both cases, he then mutters, apropos of nothing, “See? There are no angels to be found here. It can all be explained through materialistic means.”

Why would we expect there to be angels involved there?

(It pays to keep in mind that he is addressing a meeting of the Minnesota Atheists; and his expectation is to prove through his lecture on neuroscience that there is no God. He has a audience loaded with sycophants who will nod vigorously at everything he says; at both his solidly grounded science and at his outre, bullshit ventings about how this proves there is no God.)

There is no expectation from Catholics, at any rate, that minute examinations within neuroscience would show angels dancing on the head of a dendrite. Yet PZ, in his demented exclamation that there is no God, claims that the failure of finding the angel where we would never expect to see it anyway proves there is no God.

He then goes on in his smartass fashion to suggest that the materialistic method as espoused by scientists is doing a much better job of understanding the brain than your neighborhood minister.

No kidding? To me, this is akin to suggesting that the local cook has been doing a much better job at processing, preparing and serving food than your local scientist. I should hope so. But this means that I then denigrate the scientist for not succeeding in managing food?

Looking to feel better at the expense of someone else? You need no longer go to Pharyngula and read vast amounts of gibberish to find someone who has failed more than you (though Myers certainly fits the bill. . .acres of swill are not fun to read.)

No! Eschew Pharyngula! Go instead to the mighty Fail Blog. Many, many pictures of creatures acting dumber than you!! (though not so dumb as PZ). Enjoy!

Example:

Then there is the Shipment of Fail and DoingItWrong as well.