Happy Halloween!

Here’s a new video by the Obama campaign:

Absolutely brilliant!

Have a safe and happy Halloween!

Religulous

I just saw, for the second time, Bill Maher’s Religulous. The first time I saw the film, I walked away with the impression that it was a terrific comedy but a “documentary” on par with Ben Stein’s Expelled as far as evidence and convincingness is concerned.  My opinion is now much different.

It occurred to me while watching Religulous that the film does exactly what it claims to do:  Show the absurdities of all religions while showing that the price one must pay to believe in such nonsense is incredibly high, namely the end of human civilisation as we know it.

One person outside of the Grandin Theatre where I watched the film tonight said, “You see religious people come out and they really enjoyed the film.  It clearly made them laugh and think.  You see nonreligious people come out and they knew all that stuff already.  They were expecting something new and they were disappointed.”

The movie makes sense once you realise that the intended audience is the moderate religious.  The style of the documentary is very close to Dawkins’ The Root of All Evil? and some elements (the precursor Christ-like gods, the personal history of the filmmaker, etc.) were more akin to Brian Fleming’s The God Who Wasn’t There.  The reason why Religulous made it big and Dawkins’ and Fleming’s documentaries never hit theatres is because of Maher’s chosen audience:  Moderate religious people.  Whereas Dawkins and Fleming made great tools for Atheists to prepare themselves for debate, Maher takes cues from Dawkins and Fleming but skipped the middle man and brought it straight to the general public, sprinkling generous amounts of humour on top to keep the audience from feeling like parishioners at the First Church of Atheism.  In fact, I can’t recall a single instance of that “dirty word” Atheism in the whole film.

Maher keeps the audience laughing at everyone else’s religions–and possibly gets a few chuckles out of moderate and liberal Christians, Jews and Muslims over their own beliefs–but the audience is lulled into accepting that religion, in all forms, has its silly moments and its dangerous moments, then, after covertly building up his case for the length of the movie, Maher talks directly to the moderates, telling them that they are enabling religious zeal and extremism and that they need to stop their fundamentalist counterparts before the nukes fall into the wrong hands.

Say what you want about Bill Maher and his various crackpot beliefs, but Religulous is a heavy hitting documentary, and one that religious people will be less inclined to walk out on than any of its predecessors.

Can Obama’s Family help stop racism in America?

I think an Obama Presidency would definitely help end racism in America, but not for the obvious reasons.  Racism is extremely difficult to extinguish in an adult, and I don’t see any way that racism can be significantly suppressed in my parents’ or my grandparents’ generations, but I am very optimistic for my generation and the generations that will come after mine.

No bill that President Obama could sign, no law that he could enact can put a damper on the flame of American racism that, as we’ve seen recently, is so easily fanned into a blistering inferno.  The only way we can truly minimise the hold of racism on American culture is to cut it off in our children, showing them that black families are no different from their white counterparts.

I truly believe that if American children can watch Malia Ann Obama and Sasha Obama grow up in the White House for eight years under the love and guidance of Michelle and Barack, American children will have much more difficulty believing what they hear from older generations about blacks being less cultured than whites and will be more sceptical about racist claims.

I cried.

ERV asks, “Who cried watching the Obamamercial?”

I did.

Palin 2012

Palin announced she is going to run for President in 2012, saying, “I’m not doing this for naught.”  What?  Does she feel hopeless about the race this year?

Thank Ah Puch the world is going to end that year.

Obama Not Lawless, Bigoted Enough for Christians; Also a Soviet

The inimitably stupid cunt, Janet Porter at WorldNutDaily, shat into the intertubes yesterday.

She writes:

You cannot be a Christian and vote for Obama

To all those who name the name of Christ who plan to willfully disobey Him by voting for Obama, take warning. Not only is our nation in grave danger, according to the Word of God, so are you.

First, the facts on life: On July 17, 2007, Barack Obama spoke to Planned Parenthood and said:

On this fundamental issue of [abortion rights], I will not yield and Planned Parenthood will not yield. … The first thing I’ll do as president is sign the Freedom of Choice Act. That’s the first thing that I’d do. …

And what is the “Freedom of Choice Act”? It would completely federalize the abortion issue and strike down all state laws from parental notification to the Woman’s Right to Know Laws to bans on partial-birth abortion, declaring them null and void with the stroke of an Obama pen.

So what scares Porter most is that Obama plans to uphold the existing law of the land, specifically Roe v. Wade.  How terrible it would be to elect a President who cares about the law instead of a President who promises to destroy the law of the land like the last President has done time and time again!  What is this world coming to when a serious contender for the highest office in the land seeks to protect the law?

After throwing Bible verses at her poor readers for a few hours, she switches gears to the second-most feared choice that people whose governments allow them to have equal civil rights might make: Gay marriage.

No more dirty politics, huh?

It took a gentle rib nudging from Reed for me to write this. Mmm…sorry for my recent apathy concerning the Blog-o-sphere.

In my yard, for the better of two months, I had two signs. We don’t usually do yard signs, but mom and I are both really fired up this year.

We had two yard signs. One said “Obama, Warner, Rasoul” and the other was for Mark Warner (If you aren’t from Virginia, Mark Warner gave the keynote speech on…*scratches head* Tuesday? of the DNC — he is running for Senate.)

One day, maybe two weeks ago, I wake up and go to leave for work…and notice something is wrong. Our Obama sign is missing. We live on a mountain and it does get rather windy…so I think about checking the ditches when I get home…but I am really sure it’s been stolen.

My mom beat me home that night and as soon as I walk in the door she is telling me about how she checked all of the ditches surrounding our house, the backyard, etc. The sign is gone. It was stolen.

So we let it go. Well…sort of.

A few days later I pull into the drive way and mother is standing in the front yard over a piece of plywood with a can of spray paint. This coul be nothing but trouble. As I approach I can read the sign, it says: “You can steal my sign, but not my vote! Obama ‘08″

She said that as redneck as she thought it was, she was mad and wanted to show it.

I loved it. I love the sign. It’s amazing.

So a good happy story right?

I am driving home two nights ago, and as I am approaching my driveway I suffered a shock which almost sent me driving down my front yard into my house. In my front yard, next to the Mark Warner sign and in place of where my Obama sign had been….was a MCCAIN/PALIN sign…..

Now I would like it to be known that I haven’t so much as TOUCHED another person’s sign. I am an avid Obama supporter…and I wish more people in my neighborhood were too…but I am not going around replacing all of their signs thinking that it will make them feel any differently. In fact, it might make them hate Obama more. That’s how I feel.

I flipped the sign inside out to reveal the black underside and took some green spray paint and wrote “Obama 08″ — I wanted some witty…but mom said she didn’t want a sign that said “Republicans are dirty” or “Republicans for Voldemort”….

Why is this person fucking with me, and why do they think sticking a sign in yard will result in anything good?

–Katie

Was I too hard on this girl?

(2:43:54 PM) Twitchels: oh and im a little worried that i could maybe possible be pregnant
(2:44:34 PM) Reed: Go to the doctor and have it sucked out of you. It’s a cancer.
(2:45:01 PM) Twitchels: i dont know if i am yet…i had unprotected sex and forgot my pill for a few days
(2:45:12 PM) Twitchels: and im not getting it sucked out of me even if i am pregnant
(2:45:42 PM) Reed: Jesus, don’t ruin you life because you forgot the pill
(2:49:01 PM) Twitchels: and i would never get an abortion
(2:49:08 PM) Reed: Why?
(2:49:21 PM) Twitchels: idk..its just not something i would do
(2:50:24 PM) Reed: It’s not a baby if you catch it early. It’s a blob that will grow into a baby… which will in turn grow up to suck away all money you ever make, force you into the lower class at your age, and most likely ostracise you from family and friends.
(2:58:39 PM) Twitchels: its only been like 2 weeks since the actual sex…but i had unprotected sex sunday too
(3:02:33 PM) Reed: Well, since you’re anti-abortion for some odd reason, I hope you’re not pregnant. That will seriously hinder your ability to move forward in life and dramatically increase your chances of trying to pull out a third mortgage on a double-wide at some point in the future.
(3:03:00 PM) Reed: My best advice would be to smoke and drink a lot, do a lot of drugs and fall down as many staircases as possible.

So… am I pushing this anti-choice-but-pro-abortion thing too hard?

While I’m plugging…

Tim listens to my podcast, Two Smokin’ Hot Freethinkers, and he casts pods as well!  Go check him out at Tastes Like Burning.

And Jake Cordova no longer answers my texts or emails, but go listen to Jake and Erin at their podcast Just Not Right anyway.

I should be getting paid for this.

Two New Blogs

In the sporadic windows of Internet access I’ve been able to glean in the past few weeks, I’ve been thoroughly enjoying two new blogs, The Labyrinth and Separate Spectrum.  I’ve talked to the authors The Maze Monster and Cereal, respectively, and they’re both very interesting individuals and their blogs are reflective of that:  Eccentric, entertaining and diverse.

Go read their blogs.  Do it now!

Sarah Palin Pals Around With Terrorists

Sarah Palin won’t stop using her idiotic and untrue quip about Barack Obama “palling around with terrorists,” so I’m going to go ahead and turn that around on her:  Sarah Palin pals around with–and is running on the same ticket as–terrorists!

Of course, because no one that I know of in the McCain camp has tried to bomb anything–and I’m not Sarah Palin, so I will not stoop to her level and mention domestic terrorist, former Hitler admirere and hero to the Right, G. Gordon Liddy–I will have to define what I mean by terrorism.  Unlike most in the McCain-Palin camp, I will use the dictionary to define my terms.  (Apparently none of them have looked up all possible definitions of maverick or rogue before labelling themselves.)

Let’s use the first definition of terrorism on Dictionary.com:

the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, esp. for political purposes.

Palin pals around with John McCain, who under that definition of terrorism, is a terrorist.  He intimidates voters into voting for him by making threatening remarks.  John McCain says he knows how to find and capture Osama bin Laden and, seemingly, won’t help the Army do that unless he is elected President… which is a threat.  Many of Sarah Palin and John McCain’s supporters call for violence on Obama.  Even when people scream, “Kill him!” “Terrorist!” and “He’s a nigger!” at GOP rallies, McCain and Palin do nothing to stop their angry rioting–except for the one time McCain pulled the microphone away from a crazy woman who called Obama an Arab, which McCain used as an opportunity to slight Arab-Americans by making a false dichotomy between Arabs and “decent citizens”.  This could be seen as ‘endorsement by not condemning or silencing’ as the Bush Administration saw the silence of Muslim groups after 9/11 and other Islamic terror attacks.  McCain’s television ads, which he signs off on, use fear of race and fear of funny names to incite a feeling of terror in voters and make them feel obligated to vote for John McCain out of fear.

Sarah Palin is a terrorist who pals around with other terrorists, like John McCain, if we want to get technical.

Iraq War: You’re Doing It Wrong

Guardian: US forces kill eight in helicopter raid on Syria

I Can Has Internets!

Through the grace of my lovely new neighbours, Meghan and Brent, I finally have wireless Internet in my new apartment.

Yay!

Much thanks are due to CJ and Dick for keeping the blog alive while I was out.

I have 476 emails and over 1000 unread blog posts and webcomics to get to, so don’t bother me today unless you want a swift and brutal ass kicking.

I Am Chimbley And I Making This My Blog Now, Okay? Yes, This Is Definitely My Blog Now.

  Hello there, people of the Internets.  My name is Chimbley and this is my blog.  You may also call me Chimbles, Chim, Chimberly, Sir Chimshire the Bold or Chimblefuck.  I do not care; I am a cat!

I live alone in my apartment with my human, Silly Person Laurie.  This is my Silly Person Laurie begging for some attention.

 

She’s cute, no?  That’s why I keep her.

My new neighbour’s name is Reed.  You may know him.  He is a fruitcake, which I believe means he sometimes takes it in the bum bum pooper.  What a silly thing!  It is not for us cats.  We live with these fruitcakes and keep watch over them so they cannot revolt.  They do not know of our plans.  There is currently installed in each single fruitcake’s apartment one cat.  We are that good, no?

So back to me now, okay?  I am a cat, as I may have told you, and us cats are not godly animals.  We do not have time for such silly things.  We are what you might call Atheists, but we call ourselves Superior.

Right then, so this Reed fellow moved in a short time ago and brought all sorts of godly craziness with him.  He must be half god-folk on his mother’s side or something.  I do not know.  But he put this tacky little dead Jesus and his fatass mother on the windowsill where I like to sit!  The nerve of some people!  So I pushed it off.

Us cats do not care for such things.

Reed, the takes it in the bum bum kind of guy,  also has a lot of books.  Us cats love books.  They are so warm and soft to sleep on when our people try to read them.  Reed has god-folk books too, the silly man.  They make great toys though.  This is a page of something that Reed called his “Koran” or “Qur’an” or something equally silly.

Reed also has books that aren’t about stupid silly people things.  He has this one book by this Richard Dawkins man, perhaps you have heard of it, no?  It is my absolute favouritest book.  It is called The God Delusion and it highlights the silliness of some people.  Here I am reading this very not-silly book.

Anyway, that is a bit about me.  I am a cat and I must now go do cat things.  There are millions of keyboards to lay on in this world and there is only one me.  Alas, the life of a cat is so difficult, no?  Good bye now peoples.

Apartment Update

     I’m writing this on Tuesday, 21 October, 2008 but it won’t be published until I have an Internet connection here.  I hope it won’t be long.

Anyway, I have half my shit moved in now and I’ll be moving in the rest of it tomorrow.  Here’s a few pictures of my living room as it is right now.  I’ll be decorating it a bit more in the future–it’s not gay or liberal enough right now–and I’ll give you more updates then.

Any decorating ideas?

Hitchens isn’t perfect

By Dick

I think I’m going to name my kid “Hitchens,” too.

The only counter-example I think Hitchens should have made here is when Hannity tried to argue that it took greater faith to believe that the universe just happened, rather than created by a higher power, Hitchens should have asked “Well then, who created god? Nothing you say, you think that god just is? How is that different from saying the universe just is?”

Aggies for McCain

By Dick

In Texas, Aggie is synonymous with intellectually-disabled people. Admission requirements at A&M include being able to tell the difference between cattle and a dogs at least 90% of the time, owning a truck with a grill guard and gunrack, and knowing how to ride a horse or drive a tractor. SATs are optional. (On the other hand, College Station is well known for their sweet, cornfed cowgirls who are dying for attention from men who aren’t more interested in how jacked-up another guy’s truck is. Ah, memories.)

So, an Aggie volunteering for McCain in PA is alleging that a black man (Oooo!) Obama supporter mugged her and carved a B on her face.

Republicans aren’t democratic

By Dick

538 interviewed a Republican county chairman today, and I found something particularly odious:

We discussed voter registration, and the varied approach each party’s campaign takes. “Democrats use a shotgun approach to voter registration. Republicans use a rifle.” If Democrats are setting up a voter registration table on the Downtown Mall, for example, “they’re registering a lot of Republicans.” By contrast, Schoenewald said, “we’re going after very targeted people.”

California, vote ‘No’ on Prop 8 already

By Dick

I’ve really about had it up up to here with idiots blathering on about Proposition 8. Forgive me if I have to do a little ranting about it; I know I’m not going to convince the religious people — it’s likely that their brains have undergone too much neurodegeneration to sway[1]. No, I’m doing this so that rational people can shout “Right on!” and “Preach it, brother!”

Virginia, Meet Barack.

Yesterday I had the rare opportunity to see Senator Obama speak here in Roanoke. The event was absolutely packed, but determined to get in, I arrived with a group of five at around 7:30, the doors opened at 10AM, and we had gotten there early enough to get inside by 10:30 and be only 26 rows back. Prior to the Senator speaking, there was an invocation that made my blood boil. Key points were “We all thank God for the blessings of this day” (Everyone else in the auditorium had been standing in shit and cold and rain for anywhere between one and four hours, but that’s beside the point). And a nifty little line about “We as a people will rise and glorify you” that I hope meant Christians and not Americans, because that restarts the whole Christian Nation argument. The pastor concluded with “Thank you, our Creator, in Christ’s name, Amen” Which was definitely excluded the non-Christians in the room (including Muslim congressional nominee Sam Rasoul). However, following that, A Congressman whose name I did not hear, and whose speech I did not see, spoke briefly enough that I smoked a cigarette for the entire duration, followed by the Mayor of Roanoke, David Bower, who rambled nonsense and yelled the name of the city a few times, then left the stage. Senator Webb spoke about job loss in Virginia and Senator Obama’s plans to create American jobs, and restore the American economy, and also Senator Obama’s plan for healthcare coverage. Senator Obama spoke expansively, for about 25 minutes, covering topics from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan,  troop funding, social security, medicare, healthcare coverage, the economy, fuel prices, energy independence and even spared a little time at the end to take a jab at John McCain’s ability to lead, by questioning in his judgment in the rash addition of Sarah Palin to the ticket. Overall, despite the mildly offensive prayer, the Senators spoke well and did an excellent job highlighting the reasons Virginia would prosper in a President Obama economy, including a reduction in unemployment and increases in wages and the standard of living.

-CJ