Bipartisanship as Political Ecumenicism

A while back I wrote a post decrying the importance of separation of church and state and why political parties should stay as far away from religion as possible. The impetus of that post was the Democratic Party’s plan to have an interfaith gathering at the 2008 Democratic National Convention. When I tried the liberal [...]

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Hey Nevada, is this what you want?

When Jim Gibbons calls his special session, I hope our legislators take notice of this. A cautionary tale from Colorado Springs (H/T David Sirota) This tax-averse city is about to learn what it looks and feels like when budget cuts slash services most Americans consider part of the urban fabric. More than a third of the streetlights [...]

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How to report the news

Spot on.  (H/T to vastleft)

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Apology

Regular readers of this blog may be aware that in my past I was a fundamentalist Christian. I was in church whenever the doors were open. I sang in the choir, taught Sunday School, led Bible studies, did street witnessing, spoke in tongues, and on and on. Since “seeing the light” I’ve looked back on my [...]

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Medicine and the Media

On the heels of the Wakefield news: Awesome [...] the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation will donate $10 billion over the next 10 years to the cause of fighting disease around the globe through vaccines and immunizations. Ben Goldacre reminds us that Andrew Wakefield did not operate in a vacuum and takes the media to [...]

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Friday Night News Dump

I’m going to be sick. While the progs are jumping up and down over Obama’s Q&A, this is what I’m looking at. Mike Isikoff and Dan Klaidman put up a post about an hour ago letting the first blood for the Obama Administration’s intentional tanking of the OPR (Office of Professional Responsibility) Report. In light [...]

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Andrew Wakefield rebuked

L.A. Times The British doctor whose suggestion of a link between the MMR shot and autism helped cause vaccination rates to plunge conducted his now-discredited research in a dishonest and irresponsible manner, medical authorities here concluded Thursday. It was the latest development in a long-running health controversy that has seen measles make a comeback among [...]

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“no imminence of danger” UPDATE

Good. In the end, Wilbert allowed the testimony but restricted how much Roeder could say about abortion. And at the end of the day he ruled that he would not give jurors the option of considering a voluntary manslaughter conviction. Such a defense requires that a person must be stopping the imminent use of unlawful [...]

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I read them all

RIP – J.D. Salinger Mr. Salinger’s literary reputation rests on a slender but enormously influential body of published work: the novel “The Catcher in the Rye,” the collection “Nine Stories” and two compilations, each with two long stories about the fictional Glass family: “Franny and Zooey” and “Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: [...]

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I’m still shaking my head

Received yesterday: Dear Friend, We are coming up on a crucial deadline in the campaign next week and I need your help. Only 5 days remain to reach our goal of $10,000 before the Primary. Please contribute $5, $10, $25 or $100 today to help us reach our fundraising goal!  I am fighting to ensure [...]

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