Sadly, No!

Doop-dee-doop, checkin’ the email.

Conference on ‘U.S. Sponsored Torture’ Conveniently Overlooks Everyone Else and Features 9-11 Conspiracy Theorist

Hmm, this one’s from UMAction, a Methodist group concerned with social justice.

“It’s hard to take seriously a conference that regards the world’s oldest continuing democracy as an egregious human rights offender, but has nothing to say about Kim Jong-il locking away Christians in reeducation camps or China executing prisoners and trafficking their organs for sale.” — Mark Tooley, Executive Director UMAction

Indeed, maybe they ought to change the name of the conference, since it’s so misleading.

Doop-dee-doop, checkin’ the…

Hey, wait just one single, solitary second here! Speaking of misleadingly naming things, this isn’t from the social-justice Methodists at all, but from a foundation-funded right-wing front group (run by neocon Catholics) pretending to represent Methodists. Here’s a caveat from another UMAction, a genuine Methodist group:

There are some very well-funded organizations whose agenda it is to take control of the United Methodist Church (as well as other denominations) and who use the same techniques that led to the religious right coming to control the Southern Baptist Church. Their agenda is to constrain the wisdom of John Wesley in emphasizing both the works of mercy of social justice and works of piety of attending to the presence of God. They are very selective when it comes to who should be treated in a just manner and who shouldn’t. In other words, they may be long on piety, but quite deficient when it comes to social justice.

This site contains information regarding the funding and perspective of the IRD (Institute on Religion and Democracy), under whose influence and coordination fall the Confessing Movement (“Good News”) and other examples of the “Religious Right.” You’ll also find links to resources advocating a church that truly does have “open hearts, open minds, and open doors.”

So, on behalf of the many United Methodists who are concerned about those organizations and their efforts,
here are links to pronouncements from the IRD…
…and here are some links to inform and connect us.

And here’s Mark Tooley, apparently a big wheel in Christian pro-torture smokescreening:

Above: Eddie Munster wants his shirt back

Bonus fun: Here’s Tooley taking on the ‘anti-land mine lobby,’ and here he is in the wake of the Matthew Shepard murder, doing what seems to be his usual trick:

Although most of the organizers of the “Stop the Hate Day” are affiliated with nominally Christian institutions, the victims they mention are only those targeted by racists and homophobes, such as Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, the black man dragged to death in Texas. Isaiah Shoels of Columbine High School is mentioned because he was targeted by his killers as a black student. Unmentioned are students who died professing their faith in God. The anti-Christian blasphemies shouted by the killer at Wedgewood Baptist Church in Fort Worth are also ignored.¹

…Tellingly, the speakers at the anti-breast cancer walk only mentioned illness caused by breast cancer. Unmentioned were the women who died under Communism.

The “Stop the Hate” coalition should be more honest about its real goals.

Thus is revealed the hidden agenda of the aptly-named ‘pink ribbon campaign.’

¹ Cf.

Doop-dee-doop, checkin’ the email.

NRB ‘Night of Comedy’ Decried by Veteran Broadcaster/Former NRB Board Member

That’s the National Religious Broadcasters. Wonder what that’s about.

NASHVILLE, March 8 /Christian Newswire/ — “It is ironic that Christian broadcasters will be crowding into the Gaylord Opryland Resort’s Delta Ballroom on Monday night, March 10, for a “Night of Comedy,” says 50-year veteran Christian broadcaster, Dr. Vic Eliason…

I’ll say.

…And for a ‘night of comedy,’ too.

Doop-dee-doop, checkin’ the email…

The Anti-Defamation League, whose stated goal is to “fight anti-Semitism and all forms of bigotry,” is refusing to condemn Pastor John “Catholics follow a theology of hate” Hagee:

Hagee’s endorsement “is not a Jewish issue,” Foxman told the Forward. “Are we troubled by Hagee’s support of McCain and McCain’s acceptance? The answer is no, and that’s where it ends for us.”

The difference “between Farrakhan and Hagee is self-evident,” Foxman said. “So to compare the two and to say: ‘Well, if you ask Obama to distance from Farrakhan — well, Farrakhan is a black racist, an antisemite, anti-Israel, consorts with America’s enemies. Hagee is a supporter of Israel, an advocate of Israel, opposed to antisemitism, and there are issues on which members of the Jewish community and some organizations disagree with, and so from time to time they or we have indicated our disagreement, but it’s not of the same nature or category or being.”

And why, precisely, is Hagee such a big ol’ buddy of Israel? Because he thinks it’ll help bring JEEEEEE-ZUUUUUS-SAAAAAAH back:

Foxman, who has dedicated his life to securing Jews’ civil and religious freedom, said Hagee has pledged time and time again that no strings are attached to his mission. Assuming Hagee is true to his word, Jews should be glad for the help. […]

He added that those Jews who are concerned about End of Days scenarios — that Christians just want Jews in Israel to fulfill the messianic prophecy — shouldn’t worry so much. He compared the Christian-Jewish arrangement to politics, wherein candidates seek support of voters in exchange for representation of their positions.

“If they have an ulterior motive to have the second coming, they’re entitled as long as they don’t require us” to go along with it, Foxman said. “They are entitled as long as they don’t make it conditioned to us to accept their other agenda, which is Christ.”

To be clear: Foxman understands that Hagee and his merry band of goobers are complete nutters. He knows that the only reason they have fondness for Israel is because they think it’s the key to bringing about the apocalypse. But as long as they keep shoveling dollars to pro-Israel organizations, he doesn’t care.

Stuff like this makes me believe that the late Kurt Vonnegut wasn’t a satirist but was actually the most startlingly accurate realist of the twentieth century. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to chug a big ol’ glass of ice-nine just to make sense of it all…

Gavin adds: And you know what’s supposed to happen, in the End Times, to the Jews who refuse to convert to Christianity.

You’d think Foxman would want to get a head start on those Gospels, just in case.

Doop-dee-doop, checkin’ the email.

Homosexuals Blaspheme Christ and Mock Christians Again and Again

Well this one seems promising.

MEDIA ADVISORY, March 7 /Christian Newswire/ — “What would homosexuals say if Christians mocked homosexuality by dressing up like flamboyant homosexuals and gathered monthly to burn rainbow flags?

They’d say, “Pass the Chex Mix, I think I’m having an artgasm.” They’d say, “Here’s an extra rainbow flag; burn the outfit.” They’d point at people’s golf shirts and be like, “If that’s what’s hanging in the closet, I’m glad I’m out.” I give up; what would they say?

The Christians would be accused of being hateful bigots.

Or of acting like self-hating homosexuals, which — well, no change there.

Yet, every month homosexuals gather for a drunken “Mass” while dressed in drag as nuns.” said Rev. Gary Cass, of the Christian Anti-Defamation Commission.

Above: Gary “Not Gay Moustache” Cass

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Oh, it’s Gary Aldridge Cass again, our Backwards Bataille of Broward.

“This is Christian bashing pure and simple, yet no one condemns it. You have to be willfully ignorant to miss the double standard.”

Yes, pure and simple, this is the exact equivalent of shooting a 17-year-old kid dead on the sidewalk because of how he was dressed. Except just because no one dies or is wounded or inconvenienced, no one condemns it.

On January 28th, 2008 the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence sent out a press advisory promoting “Sisters Saturday Night Mass.” According to their release, the San Diego Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence will present a “Leather Mass” at Bacchus House, Saturday March 8th 2008.

…For charity. Here’s part of the detailed ‘about us’ section of the SD Sisters’ website:

SPI has a long history in helping the community. SPI-SF printed the world’s first safe sex pamphlet, and organized the first known AIDS benefit. When asked, “Why are you mocking nuns?” we answer, “We are nuns!” We do all that traditional nuns have done for centuries. We are 21st-century nuns, free from guilt associated with many traditional religions. SPI worldwide has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for AIDS and other social causes. We visit the sick, educate and promote safer sex and generally service the community.

Whereas, Gary Cass does what Christ said to do: foment pettiness and anger by appealing to a low sense of thwarted entitlement. Back to his press release:

“The Sisters would like to invite all to come and dance and frolic in the name of “Kink Fetish Fantasy”… [t]he Sisters have a fun night planned for all who attend, Come dressed in your most “SINFULL” Leather Fetish Wear. We have hot music… lots of irreverent Sister fun on stage, and just when you’re pumped up from dancing, The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence will present our Confessional Contest, with prizes for the “Hottest” confession!”

Gary’s hottest confession: He doesn’t have bodybuilding magazines in his basement, and no, you can’t look at them.

Anyway, wow, that was truly off-putting and petty. Hey, here’s a truly compelling and life-affirming alternative:

“Ironically, the homosexual community says they want the church to affirm their sexual behavior and then say nothing when Christ and Christianity are desecrated,” said Cass. “This reveals their true pathological hostility against Christ and the Christian church.”

…Wait, no, strike those phrases. Reverse them.

Gotta love the may this and may that:

Al-Qaida terrorists may be plotting more urgently to attack the United States to maintain their credibility and ability to recruit followers, the U.S. military commander in charge of domestic defense said Thursday. […] While he said that U.S. authorities have thwarted attacks on a number of occasions, he said terrorist cells may be working harder than ever to plot high-impact events. […] “So I think there may be a certain sense of urgency among that organization to have an effect.”

Bonus 1:

Asked about the terror threat, Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke said, “There continues to be no credible information telling us about an imminent threat to homeland at this time.”

Good thing there’s this then:

Which brings us to bonus 2:

On Thursday, however, Chertoff said the U.S. has successfully lowered the risk of a large-scale domestic terrorist attack for the near future.

“We have significantly reduced the risk of a major attack in the short term,” Chertoff told a group of editors at The Washington Post in a report posted online Thursday.

And ends with bonus 3:

In July, U.S. intelligence analysts, in a threat assessment, concluded that al-Qaida had rebuilt its operating capability to a level not seen since just before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The report said the terror network had regrouped along the Afghan-Pakistan border, but it also noted that officials knew of no specific credible threat of an attack on U.S. soil.

Awesome. (Our first Bear Weapons of Mass Destruction in the Woods post).

ABOVE: John J. Miller
The Pre-Wingnut Years

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Over at the house that segregationism built, aka America’s Shittiest Website™, John J. Miller is giving a lesson on diversity, which is rather like Jonah the Whale teaching a high-impact aerobics class or John Derbyshire teaching a course in dental hygiene. The starting point of Miller’s lesson is an appearance by Michael Chertoff yesterday before a Congressional hearing. Chertoff showed up with an army of aides, ten to be precise, all of whom were whiter than K-Lo’s sheets at 3 a.m. and maler than a Taliban prayer service in Diyala, Iraq. Of course, leave it to that racist African-American liberal fascist Congressman Mel Watt to engage in a high-tech lynching of all these poor white guys just for being white by saying:

[W]e need to understand that there is an element of diversity in our country that is not represented here.”

And leave it to Miller to rush to the aid of those poor persecuted white guys:

There is more than one or two kinds of diversity. As it turns out, there was indeed diversity in the group, a DHS spokesman said yesterday. One of the men was of Peruvian heritage, he said, another was born in Russia of Jewish heritage and a third was a lawyer originally from Iran.

Moreover, one of the guys liked to listen to rap, another had lots and lots of freckles, a third knew 10 words in Spanish (only five of which were “dos mas cervesas, por favor”), and another had dressed up as a black prisoner for a DHS Halloween party. That’s not just diverse, it’s the whole fucking rainbow.

LOLhacks — Photoshop Friday
—Ace

Over at MyPetJawa, Rusty posted a nasty pic of Helen Thomas. I brilliantly added the comment/caption “I Can Haz Pulitzer?” and thereby created the first LOLHack, LOLCat spoofs of our stupid-ass arrogant media.

I say, chums, whoever imagined that man could fly — and in a rocket submarine, no less? Why, there’s simply no telling what that clever Ace lad will think up next.

Slublog makes the first official one:

Our finest minds are at work trying to reverse-engineer this technology. Oh wait, a breakthrough:

Above: CPAC Blogger of the Year, Ace of Spades

Update: Welp, here’s what that clever Ace lad thought up next.

See, I actually think both of those posts are pretty good, in a formal sense. They’re allusive yet not overdetermined, and provide what the musicians call a ‘circular bassline.’

Oh goody:

In a conference call just now, the Clinton campaign called on Barack Obama to fire Samantha Power for calling Hillary a “monster.”

There are advisers and then there are advisers. Power is Barack Obama’s Condi Rice.

A Harvard Law grad, former foreign correspondent, and Pulitzer Prize winning author, Power left her Harvard faculty gig to go work on Obama’s Senate staff for a year. It might be a little condescending to say she schooled him on foreign policy, but that’s close to accurate. In the constellation of Obama advisers, the 37-year-old Irish-born Power has as high a profile and as close a relationship to the candidate as anyone.

All of which is to say that her intemperate comments have put her and Obama in a bind — and the Clinton campaign knows it.

This is a good test for Obama. I think he should tell the Clinton campaign to suck it and keep Power on his staff. Because if he does fire her, St. McCain and his barbecue courtiers will see it as a sign of weakness and will call on him to fire and denounce every single bloody person who makes an intemperate remark.

If Obama caves and fires Power, I don’t want him running against the GOP in the general election. I’m not a big Hillary fan by any stretch of the imagination, but if she’s shown us one thing it’s that she knows how to fight. If Obama’s got some fight in him too, now would be a good time to show it.

UPDATE: Well, she’s stepped down. Terrific. If Obama wins the nomination, we’re going to be stuck with another candidate who can’t stand up to the damn wingnut attack machine. As Atrios likes to remind us:

Not that anyone listens to me, but if the person who becomes the nominee fails to win the general election then he/she will become a reviled figure in Democratic politics.

And not to be overly pessimistic here, but St. BBQ is going to be tough to beat.

I need a drink.

Hello, Mr. TRex; hello, Messrs. Balloon Juice. Hello as well, Mr. Sifu Tweety. Would you like to see a video?

Above: Sarah Brightman – ‘I Lost My Heart to a Starship Trooper’ (4:17)

You may now collect your dead.

Update:

Your Kung Fu is Strong, Gavin

But you will not defeat me.

I see your disco flashlight choreography and raise you Annabel Lamb singing the Doors, clutching a teddy bear.

Look on my works, ye flighty, and despaaaair….

Ooh, the secret ingredient is revealed. Battle (I say) Battle: Unfortunate New Wave Cover Songs.

[Chairman Kaga takes a bite from a cow patty.]

Read the rest of this entry »

I’m starting to worry somewhat about Dr. Mrs. Ole Perfesser. Witnesseth:

Every once in a while I go down to my basement library and re-read a book by gun expert Jeff Cooper (now deceased) just to keep myself in a self-defense mindset.

Speaking politely, this is an extremely sub-normal thing to do. Let’s review:

• DMOP likes to keep herself in a “self-defense mindset.” Why? Are there scary monsters lurking behind the bushes of her house? Have the terrorists already succeeded in taking out New York, Washington, Chicago and every other major American city and are now moving in on suburban Tennessee? Is American civilization teetering on the brink of total collapse and about to be overrun by marauding biker gangs a la The Postman?

• And what does she do to keep herself in a self-defense mindset? Does she take kick-boxing lessons? Does she shoot targets on the firing range? Do she and the Ole Perfesser take bows and arrows with them on a canoing trip into the wilds of the Deep South? No, no and no. She instead goes down to her basement and reads a book. A BOOK. This has to be the least self-defense-y thing I’ve ever seen anyone do. What is she going to do when those Mexican-Arab biker gangs storm into her condo and demand that she hand over her entire stash of ice creams? Will she be like, “Hey, buttholes, you don’t know who you’re messin’ with! I JUST READ A FUCKING BOOK!!! OOGAH-BOOGAH-BOOGAH!!!!!”

Above: What Dr. Mrs. Ole Perfesser sees when she gazes fearfully
out her window.

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I mean, really.

Continuing:

Some useful bits of information that Cooper provides is that one must train himself into a state of mind in which the sudden awareness of peril does not surprise him. “His response should be not “Oh my God, I’m in a fight!” but rather, “I thought this might happen and I know what to do about it.”

I often think how few people in our society would really know what to do if they were confronted with a mortal confrontation. Sadly, our mindset is now more like The New Feminized Majority in which soft power and discussions are slowly taking the place of the Combat Mind-set.

Above: How Mr. Ole Perfesser imagines an Obama win

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For the love of God.

The one thing that really baffles me about people like Mr. and Mrs. Perf is that they seem to enjoy fantasizing about living in a post-apocalyptic hellhole where they have only their wits and their guns to keep ’em alive from the savage enemies who want to steal their iPods and flat-screen teevees. Of course, there is a big reason why we humans have spent the past few centuries developing silly “laws” and “systems of justice” that employ wimpy feminized “words” to create and maintain order. And that reason is this: lawless anarchy is not an enjoyable state of existence. But for people like DMOP and her readers, lawless anarchy sounds like an awesome time where they can be all like, “BLAM-BLAM, TAKE THAT YOU CRIMINAL SCUMBAGS, AIN’T NO ONE TAKIN’ MY CH33T0Z AWAY FROM ME!”

Incidentally, guys, there are places in the world where men are free of the oppressive and feminized statist concepts of “soft power” and “discussion,” and where people join heavily-armed militias to keep their families safe. Two such places are Somalia and Iraq. Funny how I don’t see y’all lining up to move there.

UPDATE: Oh lordy. From the comments:

Wife and I were walking back to our car from having dinner out. Place was well lit and patrolled so I did not figure on any problems. But I detected footsteps other than our own behind us. I told my wife to keep walking and I slowed down my pace.

The only ‘weapon’ available were the keys. So I pulled them out and turned. Yep there he was. First thing out of his mouth was — “Hey man don’t get violent! I only wanted a $1.” He took off 2 secs later.

Cooper’s right. I guess I looked menacing and ready prevented a confrontation.

Yeah, boy! You show that delirious hobo who’s boss!

Gavin adds: You know, I used to read Jeff Cooper’s columns from time to time, and while I was only a bit put off by the wingnut zaniness, it was a bit hard getting past things like, for instance, his frequent and always carefully-phrased references to Rhodesia during the white-minority days, when the cough-cough were properly in power, and before the ahem-hem took over. (Cooper, an American, fought on the colonial side in the Rhodesian Bush War.) Or the arguments regarding the inferiority of Arabs.

Above: Col. John Dean “Jeff” Cooper

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You would often, as well, find items like this mixed in with gun gossip and political grousing:

It is indeed a troublesome thing to observe the historical tomfoolery of many of our modern activists. I recently saw a statement to the effect that six million Negros died in the slave trade between Africa and the New World. Considering that a slave trader only made money out of a live slave, this would seem very poor economics, but beyond that it is doubtful if there were six million Negros available in Africa at any one time to be enslaved.¹

The solution to this arithmetical problem is left to the reader (it seems not to make any sense in either direction), but the cumulative effect of Cooper’s notes on slavery, Negroes, OJ Simpson, various racially-motivated crimes in America, former white-minority states in Africa, Arabs, Negroes, Colonialism, and also sometimes Negroes, is an air of mouldering patrician resentment, of cod-Spencerian dyspepsia, of an old white man longing to say ‘nigger’ again, over a warming tumbler of scotch, under a wall of stuffed Ibex and Okapi heads.

¹ J— adds: Let alone a ship big enough to carry them all.