A Whole Lot About Mostly Nothing

Oh my. Lovely.

You get the feeling that they are genuinely surprised to find that Catholics are attaching far more importance to the descration of the Eucharist than, say, the desecration of a Rosary. They seem to have reeled a bit at the volcanic response. Now they are getting their footing and realizing this *really* ticks off Catholics and so, like eight year olds, they are enjoying being in (they think) the position of saying, “Take one step closer and I’ll torture your cat!”

I won’t mince words. Myers is an evil man. (I won’t go that far, but he is an asshat of the first water and engaging in evil acts.-ed) And as evil men, particularly evil intellectuals, tend to be, he is also a mad man as are most of his acolytes and followers. One need only read Pharyngula to know this. Not all atheists are driven mad by their atheism. Many are quite respectable human beings. But those who make it their raison d’etre tend to be made crazy by it. That’s the tragedy of sins of the intellect. They don’t just make you stupid. If you persist in them, and particularly if you persist in them to this degree, they make you crazy.

(snip)

The hatred breeds lies like, “I’m just exercising freedom of expression”.

No. You are committing theft, vandalism, and incitement.

Or else you lie and say, “Unless Catholics can prove the Eucharist is actually the Body and Blood of Christ and not a worthless cracker, I’m just guilty of being rude.”

No. Catholics are under no obligation to prove that in order to show that you are guilty of theft, vandalism and incitement.

(snip)
Yet another demented lie to cover up your naked act of aggression is to play the victim:

It’s just so darned weird that they’re demanding that I offer this respect to a symbol that means nothing to me.

The answer to this lie is that *nobody* is demanding Myers offer respect to the Eucharist. He’s blasphemed the Eucharist on his blog off and on since forever. Catholics are free to disagree with him, just has he is free to disagree with them. That’s the first amendment in action and I, for one, am glad to live in the land that is not Canada where even demented professors whose careers are stuck in Wilbur Weed Boxtop Diploma Mill can have a voice in the public square, if only to serve as a warning to normal people of what hatred of God can do to the human mind.

(snip)

Myers’ logic is that of Kristallnacht, punish all Catholics everywhere with theft, vandalism and incitement because of the (alleged) actions of a couple.

OoohWEE!! Read it all. Wonderful.

ALSO, a a great round-up at The Daily Kraken.

Kevin Jones also thinks PZ is an asshat and deserves reprimand, at least.

UPDATE: Somewhat interesting combox exchange at Mark’s with some of the more lucid Pharyngulites.

It is instructive to note that even these calmer people toss out “challenging” questions -as if no one has ever thought of them before- and are then directed to consult proper Gospel commentaries.  And guess what?  All they do is re-phrase the question, and suggest that our lack of actual response indicates sure evidence that the Church is bogus.

In part cause he says that he absolutely intends to follow through on his desecration.

The man reminds me of a rabid homophobe who has secret homosexual tendencies.  The more he raves at the object of his secret obsession, the safer he feels.

Minnesota Indy interview (full of softball questions.  The comments are typical, though tjswift is hilarious.

Anchoress.

Cartago Delenda Est.

Frances Beckwith here and here.

Catholic League news release.

Fox News on the original foofaraw that got PZ’s panties all in a bunch.

Washington Times.

Fr. James Martin in America.

Then PZ went and posted all the public information on a couple of lintheads who sent him evil threatening e-mails.  PZ ended up taking them down, because his sycophants went crazy on the lintheads.  PZ re-wrote the post, with this classic quote:

It is most definitely not intended to incite harassment. I do not want you to be dunning these people with email, threatening them back, signing them up for spam, or otherwise being a jerk. For one thing, we can’t be certain that an innocent’s account hasn’t been hijacked; for another, we’re supposed to be better than that.

Res Ipsa Loquitur.  They cannot be better; philosophically, logically, they are acting exactly as they should; with malice and venom.  PZ knew that was going to happen, and he simply didn’t care.  Orac, another ScienceBlogs writer, took PZ to task on this idiotic action of his with great charity:

What on earth did you expect, P.Z., posting the e-mails and the entire headers?

Clearly you didn’t think things through.

Posted by: Orac | July 14, 2008 4:57 PM

But he did.  PZ is a sanctimonious, hypocritical asshat, a fundamentalist prophet of the Church of Atheism, but he is not stupid.  He knew what would happen.

Anyway, there is more, much more, more than one could possibly care to stomach over at Pharyngula, but those can be searched for by others.

I for one, am very curious to see exactly what he does to commit sacrilege to the Eucharist.  Not for any real harm that can come to Christ; I am confident that He can take care of Himself.  No, I am more curious to see how it further illustrates PZ’s consistent, pathological hatred (that word is used carefully) of religion, particularly Christianity.

(link). . .and Dawkins runs to his aid. (Beckwith claims that Pharyngula has been taken down, but as of the time stamp on this post, that is incorrect. PZ is still blathering full bile ahead.)

Mark Shea says it best:

The guy’s a bag lady screaming at the traffic–on the Minnesota taxpayer’s dime. Tell me again what the hell any of this has to do with science?

All this has spurred on a perfect storm of imbecilic comments (from BOTH sides) all over Myers’ pestiferous blog.  More than I have ever seen.  Illiterate commentary espousing violence from putative Catholics makes for a lousy witness (not that PZ would ever actually pay attention to a witness example, but that doesn’t absolve us from the responsibility to try), and the sanctimonious responses from Myers’ Sycophantic Horde is no better.

And that’s all I’m going to say on this. Res ipsa loquitur.

. . .or does Bennett have some incredible blackmail information on the NBA Commissioner?

Bennett began his “good faith” effort at keeping the Sonics in Seattle by demanding that government/taxpayers pony up $500 million to build a new palace in suburban Seattle.  That would be the richest of its kind in the nation.

Stern claimed that this had to happen for basketball to stay in Seattle, as KeyArena -despite having been remodeled to the specifications of the Sonics -is supposedly so inimicable to NBA owners basketball.  Stern claimed there was no other option, not even remodeling Key would do.

Then, as Seattle Gasbag Mayor Nickels looked for some way out of a lawsuit that most people were sure he would win going in -but in hiring incompetent attorneys screwed himself and the city-, and was agonizing over the fury of outraged hoops fans as the Sonics were hijacked to OKC, Stern then came oiling in and said that a $300 million remodel of Key would do the job.  Nickels, desperate for some sop to the voters in an election year, then took the $45 million from the smirking Bennett.

Stern backs Bennett in every instance.

NOW Bennett is facing the ex-owner of the Sonics, Howard Schultz in a tussle over ownership, claiming that Bennett did no exercise good faith in negotiating with the City.

Well, Schultz is probably correct.  But as Thomas More reminded us:

The world must construe according to its wits.  This court must construe according to the law.”

And in the law, “good faith” is one damned hard term to nail down.  We ALL know Bennett didn’t act in good faith.  You know it.  I know it.  Schultz, the trial lawyers, judges, David Stern, hell, even Clay Bennett knows it.  But they have a snowball’s chance in hell of proving that according to the law.

But that isn’t enough.  Either Bennett and Stern have been getting down in S&M clubs like the recently disgraced chief of F1 racing and they are all agog over one another, or Bennett reminded Stern of those compromising photographs or whatever he is using to leverage Stern and Stern has responded like a good lapdog.  The NBA is intervening in the Schultz lawsuit.

The NBA wants to intervene in former SuperSonics owner Howard Schultz’s bid to regain control of the team, claiming it would interfere with the stable operation of the franchise.

Schultz is trying to reverse his 2006 sale of the NBA franchise to Clay Bennett, claiming the Oklahoma City businessman failed to follow through on a promise to negotiate in good faith to keep the team in Seattle.

The league filed a motion Tuesday to intervene in Schultz’s lawsuit in Seattle’s federal court.

(snip)

That agreement included a clause that the deal would be broken and the team would return to Seattle if Schultz, the chairman of Starbucks Corp., were to prevail in this lawsuit, filed April 22.

(snip)

The NBA claims in its motion that the transfer of the franchise to a court-appointed receiver and a subsequent transfer back to Schultz would both be prohibited by the league’s constitution. (So the NBA trumps US civil law.  Fascinating -ed.)

The motion also claims that if a court-appointed receiver were to be appointed, the NBA’s constitution allows for the league’s owners to put that team “under the management and control” of commissioner David Stern.

“The relief requested by plaintiffs is entirely inconsistent with these reasonable and lawful regulations of the NBA, and the disposition of this action therefore threatens the ability of the League to protect its justifiable interests,” attorney Ralph Palumbo wrote in the motion.

The NBA also claims that Schultz’s ownership group signed a release as part of the league’s approval of the 2006 sale that prevented the former owners from suing Bennett’s Professional Basketball Club ownership group.

Stern left Seattle to twist in the wind, but whenever Clay Bennett needs help, Stern the Lapdog is right there to provide fellatio relief.

What is UP between those two?

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

H/T: Mark Shea.

Check ‘em all. Good, heartrending and sometimes blood-boiling stuff.

Steve Kelley. Art Thiel. Truehoop and how maybe Seattle won’t get to keep much of anything at all. More Truehoop again and the wailing and gnashing of teeth of the fans, such as Sherman Alexie:

I cannot live with the thought that the Oklahoma City guys can hang retired Sonics jerseys in their rafters if they so choose. I would only hope that Bennett and the gang are not cruel enough to do that; and if they are, I can only that the players with those retired jerseys publicly protest it.

Bad news, my reservation friend. Bennett is exactly that cruel. He’ll screw this over too just to stick it further to Greg “spineless jellyfish gasbag” Nickels.

Kevin Jackson. with a grim reality check that anyone’s team can be moved, no matter the local support. The only support team owners are interested in is taxpayer extorted supported arenas. J. A. Adande.  Jim Caple.

And let me vent for just a moment on cnnsi.com’s coverage:

It SUCKS. All the links above I got from espn.com. Yes, I know there are sportsbloggers out there who think it is the Wal-Mart of sports reportage, but dammit, they thoroughly covered this story, while all SI ran was the two main AP articles.

Nickels (gasbag mayor of Seattle) and Bennett (felonious assbucket) have agreed to a $75 million deal to allow the Sonics to bolt to OKC effectively pretty much immediately.

Clay Bennett has done it. He has stolen the Sonics and turned them into the OKC Raiders.

I had said previously that both of these guys suck. Nothing has changed.

UPDATE:

Lester Munson of espn.com:

Q: Why would Seattle settle? Why wouldn’t the city wait for the judge’s decision, hoping to keep the team for two years?

A: Before the six-day trial, Bennett was willing to pay $26 million to buy his way out of the lease. After the six-day trial, he increased his offer to $45 million. It could go up another $30 million in five years if the state of Washington authorizes at least $75 million in public funding to renovate KeyArena but Seattle is unable to obtain an NBA franchise of its own. Bennett increased his offer by nearly $20 million after watching both the city’s lawyers and his lawyers score some points in the trial. Bennett clearly thought there was a chance that he would be forced to stay in Seattle and was willing to pay a high price in settlement.

Although they had a powerful legal position in the language of the arena lease, mayor Greg Nickels and Seattle’s city council somehow reached the conclusion that $45 million was preferable to two years of lame-duck NBA basketball and $11 million in rent from Bennett. Most legal experts predicted that the city would have prevailed and could have held the team in Seattle for two years.

Nickels and the city hope that Seattle will somehow qualify for another NBA franchise. But, after arguing that no sum of money could replace two years of Sonics basketball, they gave away their team for a modest sum of money. It will become more of a political issue than a legal issue as Nickels and the council members face re-election.

Q: The settlement agreement includes a “negotiated statement” from NBA commissioner David Stern on “the future of professional basketball in Seattle.” What, if anything, does this mean?

A: If the choices are “meaningful” or “meaningless,” the Stern statement is meaningless.

Mayor Nickels and the city council needed something to try to show that their betrayal of Sonics fans was not a total betrayal. They needed something reassuring and hopeful in the face of what many fans thought was a disaster. The NBA was already involved in the discussions, assisting and advising Bennett on his exit from Seattle — given that, it was easy to ask Stern to say something for the fans in Seattle.

(snip)

The statement reiterates the position the NBA has argued since the controversy began. Seattle is, of course, a “first-class NBA city,” Stern said. It is so fine a city that its team is leaving for Oklahoma City.

Stern also repeated his demand for a $300 million renovation of KeyArena before the NBA will consider a return to Seattle. And he added that it must be funded in the next 18 months. Then, and only then, Stern says, the NBA will keep Seattle “informed” if there is a sale of a team, a relocation of a team or an expansion team.

Mayor Nickels will use the statement to defend his settlement, but that will be its only meaningful use.

Nickels is a gasbag who allowed himself to get played by Bennett, the Assbucket of the Year, while Stern, the main asskisser in this low-rent tragedy continues to pillory Seattle for not ponying up the requisite blackmail money.

There is NO ONE in this drama worth rooting for.

And more, really good stuff, from JA Adande, who is in a fine state of piss-off, while saying all the right things.

Henry Abbot.

Keep this statistic in mind -Metro Seattle went 65% Democratic in the 2004 Presidential race- when considering the oft-held tripe that liberals are more compasstionate. (Amusingly, I tried to find a quote about compassionate liberals on kos. Here’s what I found:

That’s right. Nothing.)

Big surprise. But let us allow the NetNuts their delusion that they really are the Party of Compassion (despite evidence here, here, and here, just for starters, that this idea is all a bunch of hooey). Here is some concrete proof that these are utter horsefeathers.

Driving home from work early Sunday, (State Trooper Kim) Triplett encountered an overturned SUV on Interstate 405 in Renton. Several people were injured, including a man who was trapped beneath the vehicle and gasping for breath.

Triplett parked on the freeway and tried to commandeer passing motorists to help her lift the vehicle off the man. Many ignored her pleas, driving through the accident scene as if it were an obstacle course, Triplett said.

It wasn’t until she stood in front of several vehicles and forced the drivers to stop that she was able to get enough help to lift the SUV off the injured man.

(snip)

Triplett was still in uniform and on her way home at the end of her 6 p.m. to 4 a.m. shift when the cars in front of her began braking and skidding on Interstate 405 just south of Highway 900, she said.

She saw a woman crumpled in the middle of the HOV lane, Triplett said. An injured girl sat nearby. In the right lane, a 1990 Ford Explorer lay on its side.

Cars kept pushing through the lane between them, driving over photographs, CDs and clothing that had been scattered when the SUV flipped over. Shattered glass glistened under their brake lights.

The accident had just happened. No one had even called 911, Triplett said.

When she got out of her car to help the woman, Triplett didn’t see the 18-year-old man trapped beneath the driver’s-side door of the Explorer. But then she heard him screaming.

She grabbed a bright-yellow emergency blanket from her patrol car and draped it over the woman so people wouldn’t hit her. She then crossed traffic to get to the pinned man.

“He was gasping and gurgling,” Triplett said. “He was in 40 seconds or so of losing his life.”

Triplett knew she couldn’t lift the SUV alone. She tried waving down cars, which were still passing slowly in the lane between the victims, but nobody stopped. Some people said, “Sorry, I’m late for the airport,” or told her they had to get to work as they drove by.

People were callous, Triplett said (no frickin’ duh -ed). One car brushed her leg as it passed.

(Snip)

“Finally, I decided to forcibly stop cars and ask people to get out and help me save this guy,” she said. “I basically stood in front of the cars until somebody got out.

Let’s revisit that stat: 65% of King County residents (that’s Metro Seattle) voted for John Kerry in ‘04, ostensibly because he is of the more “compassionate” Left. Out of the easily 100 cars that passed this unfortunate trio even before Trooper Triplett arrived, don’t you think at least ONE of the 65 “compassionate” liberals that stats suggest ought to have driven by the accident might have stopped to help?

Hell no, they had planes to catch/jobs to tend to.

Damn liberals. And damn all King County drivers. Self-indulgent assbuckets, relying on the Nanny State to solve all problems.

H/T Rachel Lucas

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.