More demanded respect

Posted on March 28, 2011 by Michael

The separation between church and state – a fundamental concept to the secular nation of the United States – goes quite far. One way it is commonly applied is in exceptions to the law. Many times they are fair exceptions. But other times religions just think they should be allowed to do as they damn well please:

The Supreme Court will decide whether a teacher at a church-run school is a religious or secular worker when it comes to the Americans with Disabilities Act.

The high court on Monday agreed to hear an appeal from Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church and School of Redford, Mich.

Cheryl Perich, a teacher and commissioned minister, got sick in 2004 but tried to return to work from disability leave despite being diagnosed with narcolepsy. She taught third and fourth graders

The school said she couldn’t return because they had hired a substitute for that year. They fired her after she showed up anyway and threatened to sue to get her job back.

Here we have yet another example of unearned and undeserved respect being demanded by a religious group. Perich was a teacher, not a priest or Rabbi or any other sort of religious leader. Her job was secular and she functioned within it in a purely secular way. To act as though she loses her rights because religion is involved is absurd.

We can be sure Scalia and Thomas will be ready to side with the religious group, ignoring everything to do with the law as usual, but I don’t see how the school as a leg to stand on.

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Oh, corporate America

Posted on March 26, 2011 by Michael

You’re so silly:

A piece in today’s New York Times by David Kocieniewski outlines how G.E. skirted paying any taxes on $5.1 billion in profits in 2010–in addition to claiming a $3.2 billion tax credit.

Bank of America also is paying nothing.

U 2 CORPORATE AMERICA

Y?

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Target makes things worse

Posted on March 25, 2011 by Michael

Target donated money to a group that then supported a bigoted candidate for governor in Minnesota this past election cycle. (The guy lost.) This caused problems with non-bigots, especially the ones who are being actively denied rights. As a result, many pro equal marriage protests have been taking place against Target stores across the country, including in San Diego. Now Target has decided to make things worse for itself:

Target Corp. is suing a San Diego pro-gay marriage group to get it to stop canvassing outside its San Diego County stores, alleging its activists are driving away customers.

Yeah, that’s kind of the point of protests. Now expect a lot more of them, Target.

Morons.

Filed under: News, Same-sex marriage | Tagged: , , , , | 17 Comments »

400lbs man completes marathon

Posted on March 21, 2011 by Michael

“I’d like to see the Kenyan improve his marathon time by two hours,” he joked.

That’s what Kelly Gneiting said after completing the second marathon of his life in nearly 10 hours of jogging and walking. Normally that would be a terrible time, but considering that the guy is a 400lbs sumo wrestler, I would say that’s pretty good.

I can’t say I’ve ever had a goal of running a marathon, but several of my Kilimanjaro group members were and are active runners, completing various running thing-a-ma-jigs. One of them, Jim Hodgson, even used to be a pretty big guy 10 years ago. Now he completes marathons and Ironman competitions fairly regularly, throwing in the occasional hike up massive boobs. It’s an inspiration, even to a skinny guy. I’m still not going to be in the Boston Marathon anytime soon, but I am going to make it my goal to run at least 10 miles straight by the end of the summer, with an ultimate goal of 15.

If a 400lbs guy can do it, so can I.

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Supermoon tonight

Posted on March 19, 2011 by Michael

According to every other Facebook status update – and this news article – the moon is at its closest point to Earth in 18 years. The best time to see it? Probably when the sun set. But since no one has a time machine yet, the best time is right meow. Go.

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Want Jesus out of government?

Posted on March 19, 2011 by Michael

A Jewish lawmaker form Minnesota wants to take Jesus out of legislative sessions. Great, right? Not quite.

A Jewish Minnesota lawmaker is asking Senate leaders to allow only nondenominational prayers to open sessions, after feeling “highly uncomfortable” when a Baptist pastor repeatedly mentioned Jesus Christ and Christianity in one of the invocations.

Democratic Sen. Terri Bonoff says she wants Republican Senate Majority Leader Amy Koch to change the letter submitted to all visiting chaplains to say they are “required,” rather than “requested,” to make prayers nondenominational.

“I’m a very religious woman and believe deeply in God,” said Bonoff, of the Minneapolis suburb of Minnetonka. “We honor God in public and our political discourse, and that’s proper. But in doing a nondenominational prayer we are honoring him without violating the separation of church and state.”

Uh-huh. It’s not okay to prayer to Jesus because it makes people uncomfortable. But praying to God? Why, that’s just dandy. Who could that possibly offend? What part of the constitution could that possibly violate?

Bonoff is obviously a mental midget, but she still may be able to win this battle. She just needs to look at the system itself.

Koch said Wednesday she wouldn’t support such a requirement. She said the Senate invites leaders from numerous Christian and non-Christian faith traditions to pray, and notifies them that senators come from a diverse background. “I’m not going to get into the process of sort of editing prayer,” Koch said.

If senators can invite leaders from all sorts of organizations, Bonoff ought to invite an atheist leader. It’s Minnesota, get PZ Myers. Or any other atheist. It doesn’t matter. As long as the person proudly wears the label of “atheist”, all these Republican mooks will immediately start backtracking. Get the person to appear over and over; don’t let anyone think it’s just a one-time thing. Show the anti-constitutional Republicans that if they want to violate the separation of church and state by using government resources to promote religion, then they’re going to have to deal with the consequences of promoting views they don’t like. (Actually, the “consequences” would probably be very good, but I’m biased with my positive views of reason and rationality.)

Filed under: News, Religions | Tagged: , , , , , | 3 Comments »

LePage, Scott, Walker = Three Stooges

Posted on March 14, 2011 by Michael

At least according to Stephen King:

“So, you’ve got LePage in Maine, Walker in Wisconsin, you’ve got Scott in Florida. Larry, Curly and Moe. That’s what we’ve got here,” he said, according to a video of the event posted on YouTube.

It’s a good one, but I liked this very straight-forward – and true – point King had to make:

“As a rich person, I pay 28 percent tax. What I want to ask you is, why am I not paying 50 percent? Why is anybody in my bracket not paying 50?” he said. “Well, you know what? The Republicans will tell you — from John Boehner to Mitch McConnell to Rick Scott — that we can’t do that. Because if we tax guys like me, there won’t be any jobs. It’s bull. It’s plain, old bull.”

King said he and his wife, Tabitha, try to make up the difference between what they pay in taxes and the 50 percent threshold they feel is appropriate by making charitable donations to support libraries, schools, fire departments and veterans.

But that wasn’t the best part:

He also sarcastically praised Scott’s decision to decline federal funding for a rail line in Florida.

“He’s probably right, probably it would be a bad deal, considering how low the price of gasoline is,” King said, referring to Scott’s decision. “Who would want to get on a railroad when they can ride scenic I-4? And wait in traffic? Maybe my next horror novel could star Rick Scott.”

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No more protections for faith healers in Oregon

Posted on March 11, 2011 by Michael

It seems like all I’ve been seeing is terrible legislative news the past few weeks. It’s so nice to see an elected body, somewhere, actually doing something good for a change:

The Oregon House approved a bill Thursday that would remove legal protection for parents who choose faith healing over medical intervention when treating their children.

The bill passed unanimously, though two Republican representatives raised concerns that the legislation was taking the issue away from juries and sending the state down a slippery slope.

The legislation comes in response to an Oregon City church, the Followers of Christ, that has a long history of child deaths even though the conditions from which the children died were medically treatable.

Currently, spiritual treatment can be used as a defense against some* homicide charges. The bill would eliminate that defense and subject parents who chose faith healing over medical treatment at the expense of their child’s life to mandatory sentencing under Measure 11.

Faith healing has been one of the shining examples of how we give undue respect to religion. These abhorrent laws have taken the protections already granted by the constitution and twisted them into legal defenses for neglectful parents. I am absolutely ecstatic to see them get thrown away in Oregon.

Twenty-nine states to go.

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TeenNick to bring back the 90’s

Posted on March 11, 2011 by Michael

I’m not sure if TeenNick is different from Nickelodeon insofar as it’s a different channel or insofar as it’s a different sort of programming on the same station a la Nick@Nite, but whatever it is, it has some damned smart executives:

TeenNick will dust off old faves like Rugrats, Kenan & Kel, Pete & Pete, The Amanda Show, All That and Clarissa and air them in a new midnight-to-2 a.m. programming block dubbed (appropriately enough) The ’90s Are All That. The tween cabler came up with the idea after seeing the huge interest in early Nickelodeon programming on social media sites. There are several Facebook pages — followed by millions of fans — that are devoted to Nickelodeon shows from the ’90s.

Naturally, no one gives two shits about anything Keenan Thompson has ever done, but I like the idea of bringing back good shows like Pete & Pete. I’m unlikely to watch very much, if any, of this programming, but it embiggens my heart to know that another generation gets to experience some of the same programming I had growing up. It’s a lot like how Nick@Nite made me an expert in I Love Lucy and The Dick Van Dyke Show by bringing them back so many years after the fact. (Do you know there are people who don’t remember That Girl, much less Marlo Thomas?) I’m glad today’s tween generation has a quality opportunity to get familiar with some quality television of the past.

Of course, there are several shows missing from the lineup already. Salute Your Shorts, Hey, Dude!, Are You Afraid of the Dark? These are key 90’s Nickelodeon pieces of art. When you go retro you pick the best of the best of a generation (which makes the presence of All That confusing here).

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Wisconsin boycott

Posted on March 9, 2011 by Michael

Now that the Republicans have helped to further weaken the middle class so they can continue giving money to the wealthy without any significant economic return (except to their own campaign funds), I’m going to be sure I never buy a single thing made in Wisconsin for at least the next 4 years. I have no desire to help increase the income gap, even if it is in another state.

But isn’t it interesting how the Republicans are always justifying how ridiculous CEO salaries are okay because companies need to attract the best talent, yet when we’re talking about teachers that argument goes out the window?

Filed under: News | Tagged: , , | 13 Comments »

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