Protests Over a Rule to Protect Health Providers - NYTimes.com
By ROBERT PEAR
Published: November 17, 2008

WASHINGTON — A last-minute Bush administration plan to grant sweeping new protections to health care providers who oppose abortion and other procedures on religious or moral grounds has provoked a torrent of objections, including a strenuous protest from the government agency that enforces job discrimination laws.

The proposed rule would prohibit recipients of federal money from discriminating against doctors, nurses and other health care workers who refuse to perform or to assist in the performance of abortions or sterilization procedures because of their “religious beliefs or moral convictions.”

It would also prevent hospitals, clinics, doctors’ offices and drugstores from requiring employees with religious or moral objections to “assist in the performance of any part of a health service program or research activity” financed by the Department of Health and Human Services.

NEVERENDING JESUS!

It could only be better if Sarah Palin were riding!

Was watching The Daily Show last night, and Newt Gingrich was on. At the end of his clip (below) he says something that so perfectly encapsulates the conservative/Republican viewpoint, I had to point it out.

The point he tries to make with Jon is that there’s a difference between Palin’s “policy” and her child. There’s a difference between “policy debates” and what goes on in families. And what I don’t get how THEY don’t get, is that the policy they make AFFECTS REAL FAMILIES. JUST AS REAL AS YOUR FAMILY. Duh.

You can’t separate your policy and the laws you’d enact from what you want for your own family. This world is made up of other people’s families. You can’t say “This is my public viewpoint, but at my kitchen table it’s all different.”

Well, I guess you CAN say that, but that’s what makes you a dipshitted conservative “nothing applies to me” asshat. Isn’t that really the conservative’s disease? That mindset that rules don’t apply to them? So they can cheat and lie and steal and fuck and drink and do drugs and fuck some more and start wars and talk bad about people and create havoc and Jeebus forgives them and it’s all OK once they go to rehab but there oughta be a law, by golly, to keep anyone else from doing those things?

*head shake*

*sigh*

This isn’t perfectly transcribed, there’s a reason I am not a transcriptionist by trade, I suppose. But the video is below (this convo starts around the 4:30 mark)

Jon: So what she’s in essence saying is “Respect my family’s ability to make this decision, and elect me so that I can keep your family from having the same opportunity.”
Newt: No. That’s not true
John: That strikes me as hypocrisy.
Newt: No. What she’s saying is… you and she can have a policy debate about whether or not Obama’s position defending infanticide by abortion doctors was appropriate in the Illinois legislature…
Jon: No this isn’t about Obama - I’m going by her words, no abortion even in the case of rape
Newt:… That’s right. You can say Obama’s position was one extreme, and her position may be the other extreme. That’s a policy debate. But the minute you mention her child…
Jon: But when it down to her family she says “respect her decision”
Newt: No she says respect the privacy of the family
Jon: “It was Bristol’s decision.” That was their press release.
Newt: She said respect the privacy of her daughter which is very different than…
Jon: She says respect Bristol’s decision. That’s another word for choice.
Newt: And she could make the choice, because I assume they have choice there.

Holy fuck, most Americans are even stupider than I thought. And I really, really thought they were stupid already.

Most Americans Believe in Higher Power, Poll Finds - washingtonpost.com

A belief in God or a higher spirit is pervasive. Even Americans who describe themselves as atheist or agnostic have a robust sense of a higher power: Twenty-one percent of those who describe themselves as atheists expressed a belief in God or a universal spirit, and more than half of those who call themselves agnostic expressed a similar conviction.

Smith said some people may identify with the term atheist or agnostic without fully understanding the definition, or they have a negative view of organized religion, even though they believe in God.

Website Lets You Send a Post-Rapture E-Mail to Friends ‘Left Behind’ | Threat Level from Wired.com

If millions of Christians suddenly disappear from the face of the Earth as the opening act for Armageddon, Threat Level thinks most nonbelievers will be too busy freaking the hell out to check their e-mail. But if they do log in, now they can be treated to some post-Rapture needling from their missing friends and loved ones, courtesy of web startup YouveBeenLeftBehind.com.

For just $40 a year, believers can arrange for up to 62 people to get a final message exactly six days after the Rapture, that day when — according to Christian end times dogma — Christians will be swept up to heaven, while doubters are left behind to suffer seven years of Tribulation under a global government headed by the Antichrist.

“You’ve Been Left Behind gives you one last opportunity to reach your lost family and friends for Christ,” reads the website, which is purportedly run “by Christians, for Christians.” The domain name is registered through an anonymous proxy service, presumably to protect the proprietors from the Forces of Darkness, and not because they’re up to anything shady.

The e-mails will be triggered when three of the site’s five Christian staffers “scattered around the U.S.” fail to log in for six days in a row — a system that incorporates a nice margin of safety, should two of the proprietors turn out to be unrepentant sinners or atheists.

This is just TOO damn awesome. Christians rock. Harvesting the unGodly power of teh internetz to use 4Jesus! Who would have thought?

I can’t wait until this system fails in some way, sending out the taunting pious “you’ve been left behind” emails prematurely and causing millions of the devout (primarily histrionic teens) all over the earth to kill themselves, thinking they’ve been left behind for the beast to make his mark on. Oooh! Hacker alert. That would be a worthwhile pursuit, eh?

Indian village proud after double honor killing | U.S. | Reuters

BALLA, India Reuters - Five armed men burst into the small room and courtyard at dawn, just as 21-year-old, 22-week pregnant, Sunita was drying her face on a towel.

They punched and kicked her stomach as she called out for her sleeping boyfriend “Jassa”, 22-year-old Jasbir Singh, witnesses said. When he woke, both were dragged into waiting cars, driven away and strangled.

Their bodies, half-stripped, were laid out on the dirt outside Sunitas fathers house for all to see, a sign that the familys “honor” had been restored by her cold-blooded murder.

A week later, the village of Balla, just a couple of hours drive from Indias capital New Delhi, stands united behind the act, proud, defiant almost to a man.

…

“From society’s point of view, this is a very good thing,” said 62-year-old farmer Balwan Arya, sitting smoking a hookah in the shade of a tree in a square with other elders from the village council or panchayat. “We have removed the blot.”

New Oklahoma Law: Women Seeking Abortions Must Have Ultrasounds Against Their Will | Reproductive Justice and Gender | AlterNet

The Oklahoma State Legislature is playing doctor again. Last year they dictated how specialists at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center may care for pregnant women who have medical complications. This week, despite intense lobbying efforts and the Governor’s veto, the legislature passed Senate Bill 1878, which mandates invasive and unnecessary medical testing for women.

Under the guise of obtaining informed patient consent, this new law requires doctors to withhold pregnancy termination until an ultrasound is performed. The law states that either an abdominal or vaginal ultrasound, whichever gives the best image of the fetus, must be done. Neither the patient nor the doctor can decide which type of ultrasound to use, and the patient cannot opt out of the ultrasound and still have the procedure. In effect, then, the legislature has mandated that a woman have an instrument placed in her vagina for no medical benefit. The law makes no exception for victims of rape and incest.

…

In a further reversal of standard medical practice, this bill defines failure to perform this unnecessary medical procedure as “unprofessional conduct” and suggests that the state medical board may remove the physician’s license. Failure to perform the ultrasound also leads to fines beginning at $10,000 and increasing to more than $100,000. By comparison, the highest fine for negligent homicide or driving under the influence in Oklahoma is $1,000.

Ha!

Atheist sees image of big bang in piece of toast
For Immediate Release: Miracle Toast?

(ACPA-london) Excitement is growing in the Northern England town of Huddlesfield following the news that a local man saw an image of the big-bang in a piece of toast. atheist donald chapman, 36, told local newspaper, “the huddlesfield express” that he was sitting down to eat breakfast when an unusual toast pattern caught his eye.

“I was just about to spread the butter when I noticed a fairly typical small hole in the bread surrounded by a burnt black ring. however the direction and splatter patterns of the crumbs as well as the changing shades emanating outwards from this black hole were very clearly similar to the chaotic-dynamic non-linear patterns that one would expect following the big bang”. “It’s the beginning of the world” he added excitedly.

It seems that Jesus does indeed love the little children.

ABC in trouble for ass it showed online 5 years ago. You know, our nightly ‘news’ broadcasts are much more offensive to me than some actress’s butt cheeks. Please. (Bolding mine)

Newsvine - Nude Buttocks May Cost ABC $1.4 Million

The agency said the show was indecent because “it depicts sexual organs and excretory organs — specifically an adult woman’s buttocks.”The agency rejected the network’s argument that “the buttocks are not a sexual organ.”

Well, ‘the agency’ is fucking retarded. Thank you, abstinence-only education. Soon my ass will be bearing your child.

This story’s got everything - Danny Elfman, anti-Tom Cruise and *snerk*-worthy snark. Full points!

HolyJuan: The Church of Scientology Sued for Copyright Infringement

The Church of Scientology has not commented on the lawsuit. Danny Elfman’s only comment was that he is in no way shape or form related to Jenna Elfman and requested that the media and blogosphere to please stop asking.

Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted): Top Fifty Atheist T-Shirt and Bumper Sticker Aphorisms

1. Abstinence Makes the Church Grow Fondlers

2. Honk If Your Religious Beliefs Make You An Asshole

3. Intelligent Design Makes My Monkey Cry

4. Too Stupid to Understand Science? Try Religion.

5. There’s A REASON Why Atheists Don’t Fly Planes Into Buildings

My favorite is #32

32. If God Wanted People to Believe in Him, Then Why Did He Invent Logic?

Southwest Missouri mayor charged in Internet child sex sting
ASSOCIATED PRESS
01/14/2008

DIAMOND, Mo. — A small-town mayor is in jail in Newton County on four counts of soliciting sex over the Internet from a police detective posing as a 13-year-old girl.

Police said 62-year-old Allen Kauffman was arrested Friday and remains in jail on $50,000 bond.

Kauffman is the mayor of Collins, a town of about 200 people in St. Clair County about 50 miles northwest of Springfield.

Police said Kauffman was arrested after an investigation by police in Diamond in Newton County.

Court records show Kauffman did not have an attorney as of Monday morning. A phone message left at his home was not immediately returned.

Diamond police said Kauffman is married and serves as a pastor of the Temple Lot Church in Collins.

There were way too many to choose a favorite to quote here, but I did so enjoy this one.

FSTDT Top 100

How can anyone beleive we evolved from monkeys heres a few questions for people who beleive that

1.If we did evolve from monkeys then how come babies arent born monkeys

2.Even Darwin said his theories were wrong before he died so why do you still believe them

3.do you really not believe the bible it says we were created in seven days not millions of years

4.how come we cant speak monkey

Just for a fact ape like creatures are monkeys Just in case certain people get on this thread

coolstylinstud, Christian Forums [Comments (126)] [2005-Jul-03]

But then again I really loved this one too:

No, everyone is born Christian. Only later in life do people choose to stray from Jesus and worship satan instead. Atheists have the greatest “cover” of all, they insist they believe in no god yet most polls done and the latest research indicates that they are actually a different sect of Muslims.

Trinidad and Tobago, CARM [Comments (260)] [2006-Oct-01]