Orthodox Jewish Youths, The New Testament, Fire

In case you were wondering what the love we pour out to Israel has wrought, from the International Herald Tribune:

Orthodox Jews set fire to hundreds of copies of the New Testament in the latest act of violence against Christian missionaries in the Holy Land.

Or Yehuda Deputy Mayor Uzi Aharon said missionaries recently entered a neighborhood in the predominantly religious town of 34,000 in central Israel, distributing hundreds of New Testaments and missionary material.

After receiving complaints, Aharon said, he got into a loudspeaker car last Thursday and drove through the neighborhood, urging people to turn over the material to Jewish religious students who went door to door to collect it.

The books were dumped into a pile and set afire in a lot near a synagogue, he said.

Just in case you were under the impression that Islam was the only religion that wasn't on the table with Christianity.

McCain as The Christ Figure

From ajc:

Georgia Republican Party chairwoman Sue Everhart said Saturday that the party's presumed presidential nominee has a lot in common with Jesus Christ.

"John McCain is kind of like Jesus Christ on the cross," Everhart said as she began the second day of the state GOP convention. "He never denounced God, either."

Everhart was praising McCain for never denouncing the United States while he was being tortured as a prisoner of war in Vietnam.

"I'm not trying to compare John McCain to Jesus Christ, I'm looking at the pain that was there," she said.

He's no Billy Budd (full Melville text). That's for sure.

Damn the Vegan Terrorists!

Some BoingBoing love:

What they were looking for, Carroll says, was an informant—someone to show up at “vegan potlucks” throughout the Twin Cities and rub shoulders with RNC protestors, schmoozing his way into their inner circles, then reporting back to the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, a partnership between multiple federal agencies and state and local law enforcement. The effort’s primary mission, according to the Minneapolis division’s website, is to “investigate terrorist acts carried out by groups or organizations which fall within the definition of terrorist groups as set forth in the current United States Attorney General Guidelines.”

I would bet a great deal of money - by my standards - that we don't have FBI sidling up to any prude, impressionable, socially-awkward college students to infiltrate the bible-thumping nutters who plan to fall into the category of DNC protesters just in case they might be homegrown terrorists.

Media bias rolls back and forth depending on the time, cause, and source, but I think more dangerous - and, really, terrifying - is a governmental bias that always predetermines who "The Bad Guys" are. And when Bush and Cheney are the moral and political measuring stick of what constitutes "The Good Guys," then, yes: that is true, real horror.

Fake TV

Basically, LEDs make burglars think you're watching TV during every second of darkness. It's fucking brilliant.

FakeTV via DVICE

Ricky's Wisdom Today - 5/21/08

When we fall on the ground it hurts us, but we also need to rely on the ground to get back up.

     -Kathleen McDonald, How to Meditate

Obama and the Masses

When I found this picture of Obama speaking to folks in Portland, Oregon, it said 65,000 attended. Now I'm hearing from grumpy-angst Lynn Samuels that it was 85,000.

Impressive.

Even more impressive: just before Obama spoke, The Decemberists gave a free concert.

Those lucky, lucky bastards.

Stop Uwe Boll

For those of you who are not familiar with the travesty that is Uwe Boll, it is safe to say that he has horrified gamers and moviegoers alike by turning successful video games - namely House of the Dead, Alone in the Dark, and Bloodrayne - into horrible, embarrassing movies. How bad? All three of the aforementioned movies are on the IMDB Bottom 100, more than any other director in the world.

We, the undersigned, respectfully ask that Uwe Boll give proper weight to the wishes of the video game community, the horror community, and the film going community in general and stop directing, producing, or taking any part in the creation of feature films. His distasteful handling of the subject matter and lack of acknowledgement of his failures simply cannot be abided any longer.

Mr. Boll has repeatedly shown a complete lack of comprehension regarding the videogames he has dragged, kicking and screaming, to the silver screen and his ham-fisted approach to horror has soiled future possibilities for anyone else who may attempt to bring videogames to film.

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

Visit the website. Sign the petition. Stop Uwe Boll.

U.S. Armed Forces = God's Army?

The Real News Network has been doing some great work providing the public with information you can't get anywhere else. This story is about the separation of church and state and how the evangelical movement in the U.S. Military is raping that dry.

Warning: this will make you angry.