Iliad 9/11

While attending the University of Victoria, I used to send out satirical essays -- well, essays may be too grand a word-- to my friends and family via e-mail (this was from 2003 to 2005, the days before blogging became widespread). While searching through my old e-mails, I came across one of those essays, entitled "Iliad 9/11." Basically, the essay used elements of Greek mythology, particularly Homer's Iliad, to satirize the 2004 US presidential election. So, because I was sick of posting videos, I thought I'd re-post the essay here, unedited.

Hi guys. I thought you might find this bit of news interesting, in light of the upcoming presidential elections.

A parchement was recently discovered by Turkish archaeologists which dates back to the 6th century B.C., the time of the legendary war between Greece and Troy. This parchment sheds new light on what was until now thought to be a settled matter of history.

The document, written in Greek, reveals that after the sacking of Troy, Greek warriors did not find Helen, wife of Paris, nor did they find any evidence that she had ever been in Troy. Moreover, it turns out that the Greek diplomats who were charged with searching for Helen did not find any evidence that she was in Troy at all. This means that the whole basis of the Trojan War was a lie!

It gets better. After the war, which raged for ten years and resulted in countless casualties on both the Greek and Trojan sides, a massive quarrel raged between Agamemnon, King of the Greeks, and Achilles, demigod and veteran of the Trojan War. Achilles charged Agamemnon with going to war on false pretenses, and called the Trojan War "The Wrong War, in the Wrong Place, at the Wrong Time." He also pointed out that, contrary to the official reports made by kings Agamemnon and Menelaus, there was no connection between King Priam, leader of the Trojans, and the kidnapping of Helen. Finally, he chargeed Agaemnon with squandering an perfect oppotunity to capture Aeneas, instead letting him flee, further adding that Aeneas could have travelled as far as Rome or Carthage.

Agamemnon contended that the war was in fact justified. While Greek diplomats did not find evidence of Helen's presence, he points out that king Priam did not allow diplomats access to his private palaces. He then stressed that he was guided by a 'higher power', ie Zeus, to fight against the Trojans, and that the Trojan people are better of now that the 'evildoer' Priam has been removed from power. He ends by questioning Achilles' war record: He has won many commendations for injury in the field, but medical records suggest that his only injury was to his heel!

Achilles, not impressed by Agamemnon's arguments, appealed to the Greeks to proclaim him as their new King. He accepted Ulysses, the handsome, well-rounded, down-to-earth country boy from Ithaca, to be his vice-king, despite his inexperience in politics (Menelaus claims that he never met Ulysses until the very debate chronicled here). He claimed to have a plan to get Greece out of Troy, as well as tackle other Greek political issues. He took a liberal stance on same-species marriages.

Agamemnon and Menelaus also appealed to the Greeks. He urged Greece to stay the course in Troy. He also stressed his belief that marriage is strictly defined as being between a Man and a God. (Women weren't considered 'people' back then. They were considered to be WMD's. Hahahahaha...). He accuses Achilles and Ulysses of being flip-floppers (First Achilles is out of the war, then he's in; First Ulysses tries to avoid the draft, then he urges warriors to keep fighting, then he tries to end the war he supposedly supported). Finally, he sicked Nestor, the aged warrior and staunch supporter of Agamemnon, onto Achilles and Ulysses. Nestors claims were quite exaggerated: "Achilles would wait for approval from Gaul before attacking another nation!", "He would make sure that the Greek army was reduced to fighting with spitballs!"

When Achilles questioned his claim, stating that he couldn't possibly believe that Achilles would reduce the Greek army to fighting with spitballs, Nestor reacted harshly: "I wish this was the age when I could challenge a man to a duel!" When Achilles replied that 6th century B.C. was, in fact, such an age, Nestor lost his nerve and struck Achilles in his heel, killing him. Ulysses, enraged, strung his bow amd, with the help of his son Telemachus, slayed Nestor, Agamemnon, Menelaus, and all the suitors of his wife, Penelope (heir to the Ithacan ketchup fortune). Ulysses then proclaimed himself King of the Greeks.

Thus democracy was born in Greece!

Historians are split on whether this document is indeed accurate, with 50% in favour of the authenticity of the document, and 50% claiming it is a hoax.

What do you think? Send in your vote to guy_on_bus@hotmail.com. Yes if it is authentic, no if it is not. Votes must be entered by November 2nd.




Mmmmmm....that's good satire!

Jeremy.

So. . . yay relevance?

On "equivocation". . .

A couple of weeks ago Naomi sent me a link to WWII era Bugs Bunny cartoon.

Great stuff. They even do the "What's Opera Doc?" parody of Wagner's Die Walküre, a decade before "What's Opera Doc?"

My enjoyment was tempered, however, upon reading one of the comments left in response to the video. First, I'll point out an earlier comment:

All U people that think that Hitler is good are the most horrible people in the planet.He killed mora than 1000 jews and homosexuals.You people wouldnt like him too kill all the people of your religon so Shut the f**k up kwgitho

Bad grammar and incorrect statistics aside, I do agree with the sentiment. Fuck Hitler, and fuck his modern-day admirers.

The comment that irritated me so much was in response to the one above:

He killed millions of Jews and thousands of Christians. Let's not equivocate the small percentile of homosexuals, which is a lifestyle preference, and though unfortunate, pales against the tragedy and degree of the Nazi's religious persecution.

That said, I miss Looney Tunes.

Hoooo-boy.

Where do I begin?

Am I to take it that if there were only a few thousand Jews murdered by the Nazi's, then the Nazi's would somehow be less evil? Supposing that Hitler was utterly incompetent and allowed millions of Jews of escape from Europe-- does inability to perform evil acts make you less evil? Is the act of genocide somehow more tolerable if your killing off a small population rather than a large one? Would wiping out every Muslim or Catholic be more atrocious than wiping out every Jew just because there are a billion Muslims and Catholics and only millions of Jews?

Of course not.

As for that "lifestlye choice" comment (a common argument made by fundamentalist homophobes), many Nazis had a somewhat different view. From Wikipedia:

Nazi leaders such as Himmler viewed homosexuals as a separate people and ensured that Nazi doctors experimented on them in an effort to locate the hereditary weakness many party members believed caused homosexuality.

I was going to point out the absurdity of dismissing homosexuality as a "lifestyle choice" while crying bloody murder over religious persecution-- as though religion isn't a lifestyle choice-- but in this particular instance, I knew it didn't apply. To the Nazis, the Jews were inherently degenerate-- conversion or apostacy solved nothing.

Anti-gay bigotry: An official member of my lifetime "Fuck Thats".

Seven Days. . .

Okay, it's really only six days until the federal election, but I came up with the title on Monday, and you gotta admit that an allusion to The Ring is gonna be a helluva lot catchier than Six Days. . .

Six days. How the hell did that happen?! I knew that there was an election going on, but. . . damn! I've been so focused on University and the American election (I was also recently rear-ended, but that's a whole other story I'd rather not get into) that I haven't had time to really consider who I will vote for.

I won't vote Conservative. I know that much. There are many reasons for this, including this one. Stephen Harper, before becoming PM, did everything he could to come across as a far-right loon-- it's only after he got elected that remodeled his image into that of a mere centrist douchebag. I worry about what he would do if he ever got a majority government. . .

But that said. . . in his latest campaign ads-- and I am truly sorry to say this, Naomi-- Stephen Harper looks surprisingly, frighteningly similar to Josh. It makes me almost able to tolerate that insipid "Stephen Harper Loves His Kids so Vote Conservative!" nonsense.

I most likely won't vote Liberal. Frankly, the only reason I would is if there was a good chance that the Liberal candidate would beat the Conservative one-- and this being Prince George, I think you know how likely it is for that little scenario to unfold.

I won't vote Bloc-- no Bloc candidate.

I'd consider voting for the Marxist-Leninist party just to make a statement! Problem is, I don't know what that statement would be.

So, in the end, I'm torn between the NDP and the Greens. The NDP have been making a lot of headway in the polls recently. There's a chance -- and, mind you, I base this on absolutely nothing other than a vague trend-- that they could beat out the Liberals to form an official opposition. Plus, my (metaphorical, I'm not British) Old Labour blood obliges me to vote for the leftist party.

On the other hand. . . all I've really heard and seen from the NDP ad's, website, and even platform are soundbites ("Man, fuck dem Eastside Boardroom table motherfuckas! I'm all about da Westside kitchen tables up in dis bitch! Ya feel me?") along with a few vague, nice-sounding ideas(Increased support for pedestrian and bicycle paths "as part of [the NDP's] commitment to sustainable transport"-- I'm not joking). To be fair, I haven't checked out the other party platforms and websites, but my feeling is that they won't be much better.

Adding to that is the fact that, well, Jack Layton seems to be a bit of a douche. I'm basing that solely on the fact that he, along with Stephane Dion, has been judged by the public to have come off a bit dickish during the English language debate (I say "appears" because I didn't watch the debate. . . Yes, I'm a terrible citizen, but I'm getting to that). Indeed, the two party leaders who came off looking the best, according to people who I have mostly never met, are Stephen Harper and Green Party leader Elizabeth May, which leads me to the other end of my conundrum. . .

The Greens. The environmentalist party. From what I've heard, they're left-leaning on social issues and environment, but right-leaning on the economy. Considering that the economic meltdown in the U.S. appears, by all accounts, to have occurred as a result of Republican emphasis on deregulation, the latter may well be a liability. On the other hand, as mentioned earlier, their leader comes off as intelligent, knowledgeable, and reasonable-- from what I hear.

That, and they support a carbon tax, while the NDP support a cap and trade system. You see, carbon tax is good, and cap and trade is bad. . . from what I hear. . . somehow.

Sigh.

If you've made it this far, you've probably come to the conclusion that I really am an ignorant slut. You may have even decided that it would probably just be a better idea for this jackass (me) not to vote in the first place.

That, you see, was be design.

If you've been clicking on the links, you've probably visited my sister's blog, wherein she expresses her anger at those who choose not to vote for reason of every party sucking. Or, as she said herself:

I'm sitting on the CFUR couch listening to some guy rant about how he's exercising his democratic right by not voting. He claims hating every party as his excuse. . . . Enough people are stupid enough to either a) vote FOR [Harper] or b) NOT vote at all? No wonder North American politics are such a joke.

I know that Naomi isn't talking about this issue specifically, but her blog entry seems to suggest that compulsive voting might be the answer to some of our democratic woes.

I've always taken issue with the idea of compulsive voting. First, I do believe that if you have the right to vote, you have the right not to vote. While I do not agree with said CFUR guy's assessment of the political landscape, I could envision a circumstance wherein all the parties would screw the public with equal intensity. In that case, what good does it do to vote? "Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos?"

Secondly, as this blog post has demonstrated, I really have no fucking clue as to who I should vote for. Really, I'm just stringing together a few random facts (Polls! Arts Funding! Kyoto!) along with a few gut level associations (Harper = Bush = BAD! NDP = Left = GOOD!) to form the basis of what is really an incredibly significant civic duty. I mean, really, would you want someone like me choose who your political leader should be? If I were this ignorant about anything else. . . well, I am a physics lab instructor, but that's not the point!

The point is, I'm somebody who actually gives half a shit about politics, or at least that's what I thought. Just imagine someone who really couldn't give a damn one way or the other being forced by law (or social pressure) to participate in the voting process. They don't care one way or the other, so they may as well vote for the guy who looks like Naomi's cute boyfriend.

The Greatest Political Ad Your Sorry Asses Will EVAR See!

. . . which isn't saying much, I'll admit. Still, this ad from Republican Mike Huckabee beats Hillary Clinton's pathetic Sopranos parody by a long shot.

Chuck Norris' endorsements of Democratic presidential candidates cure cancer. Too bad he's. . . oh, never mind!

Meet The New Boss. . . Same as the Old Boss. . .

. . . which in this case is a good thing. Two teams of scientists have discovered a way to convert skin cells into stem cells. Scientists have been trying to conduct research on stem cells for years, in spite of opposition from the U.S. Government, which has refused to provide federal funding due to political pandering to the religious right objections over the use of human embryos, which are killed during extraction. This new method of stem cell production should hopefully overcome the ethical barriers traditionally associated with stem cell research. From msn.ca:

Laboratory teams on two continents report success in a pair of landmark papers released Tuesday. It's a neck-and-neck finish to a race that made headlines five months ago, when scientists announced that the feat had been accomplished in mice.

The "direct reprogramming" technique avoids the swarm of ethical, political and practical obstacles that have stymied attempts to produce human stem cells by cloning embryos.

Scientists familiar with the work said scientific questions remain and that it's still important to pursue the cloning strategy, but that the new work is a major coup.

"This work represents a tremendous scientific milestone - the biological equivalent of the Wright Brothers' first airplane," said Dr. Robert Lanza, chief science officer of Advanced Cell Technology, which has been trying to extract stem cells from cloned human embryos.

"It's a bit like learning how to turn lead into gold," said Lanza, while cautioning that the work is far from providing medical payoffs.

"It's a huge deal," agreed Rudolf Jaenisch, a prominent stem cell scientist at the Whitehead Institute in Cambridge, Mass. "You have the proof of principle that you can do it."

The White House lauded the papers, saying such research is what President Bush was advocating when he twice vetoed legislation to pave the way for taxpayer-funded embryo research.

There is a catch with the new technique. At this point, it requires disrupting the DNA of the skin cells, which creates the potential for developing cancer. So it would be unacceptable for the most touted use of embryonic cells: creating transplant tissue that in theory could be used to treat diseases like diabetes, Parkinson's, and spinal cord injury.

But the DNA disruption is just a byproduct of the technique, and experts said they believe it can be avoided.

The new work is being published online by two journals, Cell and Science. The Cell paper is from a team led by Dr. Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University; the Science paper is from a team led by Junying Yu, working in the lab of in stem-cell pioneer James Thomson of the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Both reported creating cells that behaved like stem cells in a series of lab tests.

Thomson, 48, made headlines in 1998 when he announced that his team had isolated human embryonic stem cells.

Yamanaka gained scientific notice in 2006 by reporting that direct reprogramming in mice had produced cells resembling embryonic stem cells, although with significant differences. In June, his group and two others announced they'd created mouse cells that were virtually indistinguishable from stem cells.

For the new work, the two men chose different cell types from a tissue supplier. Yamanaka reprogrammed skin cells from the face of an unidentified 36-year-old woman, and Thomson's team worked with foreskin cells from a newborn. Thomson, who was working his way from embryonic to fetal to adult cells, said he's still analyzing his results with adult cells.

Both labs did basically the same thing. Each used viruses to ferry four genes into the skin cells. These particular genes were known to turn other genes on and off, but just how they produced cells that mimic embryonic stem cells is a mystery.

"People didn't know it would be this easy," Thomson said. "Thousands of labs in the United States can do this, basically tomorrow."

The Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, which holds three patents for Thomson's work, is applying for patents involving his new research, a spokeswoman said. Two of the four genes he used were different from Yamanaka's recipe.

Scientists prize embryonic stem cells because they can turn into virtually any kind of cell in the body. The cloning approach - which has worked so far only in mice and monkeys - should be able to produce stem cells that genetically match the person who donates body cells for cloning.

That means tissue made from the cells should be transplantable into that person without fear of rejection. Scientists emphasize that any such payoff would be well in the future, and that the more immediate medical benefits would come from basic research in the lab.

In fact, many scientists say the cloning technique has proven too expensive and cumbersome in its current form to produce stem cells routinely for transplants.

The new work shows that the direct reprogramming technique can also produce versatile cells that are genetically matched to a person. But it avoids several problems that have bedevilled the cloning approach.

For one thing, it doesn't require a supply of unfertilized human eggs, which are hard to obtain for research and subjects the women donating them to a surgical procedure. Using eggs also raises the ethical questions of whether women should be paid for them.

In cloning, those eggs are used to make embryos from which stem cells are harvested. But that destroys the embryos, which has led to political opposition from U.S. President George W. Bush, the Roman Catholic church and others.

Those were "show-stopping ethical problems," said Laurie Zoloth, director of Northwestern University's Center for Bioethics, Science and Society.

The new work, she said, "redefines the ethical terrain."

Richard Doerflinger, deputy director of pro-life activities for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, called the new work "a very significant breakthrough in finding morally unproblematic alternatives to cloning. ... I think this is something that would be readily acceptable to Catholics."

White House spokesman Tony Fratto said the new method does not cross what Bush considers an "ethical line." And Republican Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, a staunch opponent of publicly funded embryonic stem cell research, said it should nullify the debate.

Another advantage of direct reprogramming is that it would qualify for federal research funding, unlike projects that seek to extract stem cells from human embryos, noted Doug Melton, co-director of the Harvard Stem Cell Institute.

Still, scientific questions remain about the cells produced by direct reprogramming, called "iPS" cells. One is how the cells compare to embryonic stem cells in their behaviour and potential. Yamanaka said his work detected differences in gene activity.

If they're different, iPS cells might prove better for some scientific uses and cloned stem cells preferable for other uses. Scientists want to study the roots of genetic disease and screen potential drug treatments in their laboratories, for example.

Scottish researcher Ian Wilmut, famous for his role in cloning Dolly the sheep a decade ago, told London's Daily Telegraph that he is giving up the cloning approach to produce stem cells and plans to pursue direct reprogramming instead.

Other scientists said it's too early for the field to follow Wilmut's lead. Cloning embryos to produce stem cells remains too valuable as a research tool, Jaenisch said.

Dr. George Daley of the Harvard institute, who said his own lab has also achieved direct reprogramming of human cells, said it's not clear how long it will take to get around the cancer risk problem. Nor is it clear just how direct reprogramming works, or whether that approach mimics what happens in cloning, he noted.

So the cloning approach still has much to offer, he said.

Daley, who's president of the International Society for Stem Cell Research, said his lab is pursuing both strategies.

"We'll see, ultimately, which one works and which one is more practical."

When I learned that one of the two teams that made the discovery was Japanese, being the lovely little cynic that I am, I started to wonder whether this was part of Japan's "scientific whaling."

To Quote Naomi. . .

Fuck Fox News.

They are kinda pricks.

I Got Yer Freedom of Religion Right Here!

I have cousins in Austria, whom I might blog about in a future post. Thus, I was saddened to learn that one of Austria's provinices is governed by a far-right party that wants to ban the construction of mosques:

The provincial parliament in the southern Austrian province Carinthia called on its provincial government to prepare legislation banning the construction of mosques or minarets. The province's governor, the populist former leader of the rightist Freedom Party, Joerg Haider, had repeatedly called for anti- Muslim measures along those lines.

The proposal was adopted with the votes of the conservative People's Party, Freedom Party, and the support of the Alliance for Austria's Future, an equally rightist breakaway party from the Freedom Party, founded by Haider.

Alliance floor leader Kurt Scheuch said his party wanted to prevent the creeping Islamization by radical forces.

"We prefer churchbells to the muezzin's chants," he said.

So much for secularism. The government of Austria displays a clear and unabashed religious preference, and wants to use state power to enforce that preference. And as for that line about "prevent(ing) the creeping Islamization by radical forces," well, I'd like to prevent abortion doctors for being murdered by terrorists and gays from being hunted down and beaten to a fine paste by rednecks, but I'd be an idiot if I thought preventing the construction of churches was the answer to that.

The article, in clear contradiction of Scheuch's quote, goes on to say:

While the conservatives stressed that it was not their intention to prevent Muslims from practicing their religion, they argued that a mosque could not be compared with a Christian church, but was rather an "institution of a cultural community."

I see, so a mosque is an "institution of a cultural community," which distinguishes it from a church. . . how? Oh, that's right: the Church is the institution of the dominant culture-- or at least, what the dominant culture used to be in Europe, before the Europeans began avoiding chruches in droves.

Carinthia's Social Democrats and Greens, who had voted against the measure, slammed the proposal as a move to "prevent integration (and) hinder religious freedom" and called it an "open attack on democracy and the rule of law."

The Social Democrats pointed out that currently there were no plans for for building mosques in the province, unmasking the proposal as an attempt to "attract the right-wing vote," Social Democrat floor leader Peter Kaiser said.

Yup, pretty much sums it up. At least Haider isn't ruling all of Austria anymore.

Rick Steves: Cooler Than I Thought

Does anyone else besides me know who Rick Steves is?



For the uninitiated, Rick Steves is a travel writer and host of the PBS series Rick Steves' Europe, which I used to watch semi-religiously back when I was learning German and so wanted to visit the Fatherland.

Until quite recently, my assessment of his cool was pretty well summed up by the picture above. No tool by any means, but not someone you'd especially want to talk to at a party (though admittedly, I have only been to three parties in my life, two of them before the age of ten. . .). Well, appearances can be deceiving. Seems that spending a third of his adult life in Europe has turned Mr. Steves into a marijuana advocate. Below I've posted a video of his recent appearance at a Seattle pro-pot festival. A warning: It's long, roughly nine minutes.

UPDATE: A thought just occurred to me. . . maybe the guy who posts Japanese toy commercials on his blog should not try to judge how cool people are.

Right-Wing Facebook

Social networking for Republican Dummiez!

Click Here!

My personal favourite. . . Rudy Giuliani's Profile:

Networks: GOP Presidential Primary
Sex: Republican Pro-Choice Male (Rare Species)
Relationship Status: Married³
Interested In: 9/11
Birthday: 57 B.N. (Before 9/11)
Hometown: New York City
Political Views: 9/11

My God, It Actually Happened. . .

Al Gore won the Nobel Peace Prize.

Gore, who will share the $1.4 Million prize with the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, was awarded for his "efforts to build up disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change."

The prize puts Gore in the company of fellow peace prize winners/American Presidents Woodrow Wilson and Jimmy Carter, as well as scientist-turned-activists Linus Pauling and Andrei Sakharov. Unfortunately, it also puts him in the same group as Henry Kissinger and Yasser Arafat.

I can't wait to see how loony American conservatives react to this. They'll likely try to spin this as an example of the Nobel committee's evil left-wing bias, forgetting that right-wing heroes Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek have also won prizes (albeit for economics), and that anti-communist dissenters, like Sakharov, also won the peace prize.

UPDATE: Yup, It Happened.

UPDATE #2: Ha ha ha ha ha.

UPDATE #3: Ha ha ha ha ha, again.

UPDATE #4: Some have complained that that awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to an environmental activist is stretching the definition of "peace." Personally, I think this criticism is idiotic-- climate change will, and has, affected politics and economics, including war and peace. But on the other hand, for a long time I've thought that the Nobels should give a separate environmental award. Then again, I've always though they should give a prize for mathematics as well. . .

Still Not Enough Dubya?

Here are some of Presidents Bush's quotes on religion. You can find a more comprehansive list at The Times. I've picked out the real gems for you.

1. I am driven with a mission from God. God would tell me, 'George go and fight these terrorists in Afghanistan'. And I did. And then God would tell me 'George, go and end the tyranny in Iraq'. And I did. Sharm el-Sheikh August 2003

2. I trust God speaks through me. Without that, I couldn't do my job.
Statement made during campaign visit to Amish community, Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, Jul. 9, 2004

3. I'm also mindful that man should never try to put words in God's mouth. I mean, we should never ascribe natural disasters or anything else to God. We are in no way, shape, or form should a human being, play God. Washington, D.C., Jan. 14, 2005

8. I don't think you order suiciders to kill innocent men, women, and children if you're a religious person. Fond Du Lac, Wisconsin, Jul. 14, 2004

9. And there's nothing more powerful in helping change the country than the faith -- faith in Dios.
National Hispanic Prayer Breakfast, Washington, D.C., May 16, 2002

10. We believe in an Almighty, we believe in the freedom for people to worship that Almighty. They don't. Martinsburg, West Virginia, Jul. 4, 2007

11. The spirit of our people is the source of America's strength. And we go forward with trust in that spirit, confidence in our purpose, and faith in a loving God who made us to be free.
5th anniversary of the Sep. 11 attacks, White House, Sep. 11, 2006

13.We can never replace lives, and we can't heal hearts, except through prayer.
Enterprise, Alabama, Mar. 3, 2007

14. God bless the people of this part of the world. Minneapolis, Minnesota, Aug. 4, 2007

16. I couldn't imagine somebody like Osama bin Laden understanding the joy of Hanukkah
White House, Dec. 10, 200117.

17. I see an opportunity at home when I hear the stories of Christian and Jewish women alike, helping women of cover, Arab American women go shop because they're afraid to leave their home.
Washington, D.C., Oct. 4, 2001

18. It's a sign from above. Comment made when television light caught fire above crowd, Sioux Falls, South Dakota, Mar. 9, 2001

19. I did denounce it. I de- I denounced it. I denounced interracial dating. I denounced anti-Catholic bigacy... bigotry. Responding to attacks on his visit to ultra-conservative Bob Jones University, Greenville, South Carolina, Feb. 25, 2000

23. And I just -- I cannot speak strongly enough about how we must collectively get after those who kill in the name of -- in the name of some kind of false religion.
Press appearance with King Abdullah of Jordan, Aug. 1, 2002

25. By being active citizens in your church or your synagogue, or for those Muslims, in your mosque, and adhering to the admission to love a neighbor just like you'd like to be loved yourself, that's how we can stand up.
Remarks to the cattle industry annual convention and trade show, Denver, Colorado, Feb. 8, 2002

32. By the way, to whom much has been given, much is owed. Not only are we leading the world in terms of encouraging freedom and peace, we're feeding the hungry. We're taking care of, as best as we possibly can, the victims of HIV/AIDS. Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Jul. 20, 2004

37. Tonight I ask you to pass legislation to prohibit the most egregious abuses of medical research. ...Human life is a gift from our Creator -- and that gift should never be discarded, devalued or put up for sale. 2006 State of the Union Address, Jan. 31, 2006

39. Every new citizen of the United States has an obligation to learn our customs and values, including liberty and civic responsibility, equality under God and tolerance for others, and the English language. Tucson, Arizona, Nov. 28, 2005

41.Secondly, it's really important, Pete, that people not think government is a loving entity. Government is law and justice. Love comes from the hearts of people that are able to impart love. And therefore, what Craig is doing is -- he doesn't realize it -- he's a social entrepreneur. He is inspiring others to continue to reach out to say to somebody who is lonely, I love you. And I'm afraid this requires a higher power than the federal government to cause somebody to love somebody.

44. All of you -- all in this generation of our military -- have taken up the highest calling of history. You're defending your country, and protecting the innocent from harm. And wherever you go, you carry a message of hope -- a message that is ancient and ever new. In the words of the prophet Isaiah, "To the captives, 'come out,' -- and to those in darkness, 'be free.' Aboard the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln, a couple of miles away from San Diego May 1, 2003

47. It's also important for people to know we never seek to impose our culture or our form of government. We just want to live under those universal values, God-given values. Washington, D.C., Oct. 11, 2002

By Popular Demand. . .

Ladies and gentlemen, the American President:

Courtesy of Ed Brayton.

Mark Your Calendars. . .

October 9th is the earliest that I can expect to get my damned Pacific Century Scholarship money. After waiting until the 10th of September to officially be registered in my damn classes (I handed my registration form in August) and another two weeks after that to get my scholarship money deposited into my student account (which at least paid my tuition), I will now have to wait another two to three more weeks to transfer the remaining cash from the University to my own bank account.

I'm planning on doing a post on "big-L Libertarianism" pretty soon (right after the post on my research paper ;P), so I guess its fitting that I'm dealing bureaucratic bullshit, esspecially since University bureaucracies (both UNBC and UVic) have given me more trouble than any government office.

Still, there was Student Loans. . .

Quii

I've been taking a lot of useless internet quizzes in the last couple of months (How Logical Are You? What Kind of Pirate Are You? What Starship Crew Would You Be Part Of? etc.). Since some of these quizzes have cute little HTML decals for that person who just has to let the whole world know that they would indeed survive a zombie apocalypse, I decided to post a few of my prouder results.

If your blog were a movie, what would it be rated?



Why? Because my blog has three "fucks", two "asses" and a "hell." I shit you not.


Would you pass 8th grade science?

What's your bloated, useless corpse worth to science?

$5290.00The Cadaver Calculator - Find out how much your body is worth.

How much electrical power could your bloated, useless, still living corpse produce?

422 WATTS Body Battery Calculator - Find Out How Much Electricity Your Body is Producing - Dating

That's 69% more than the average person. I could power 4 lightbulbs, 106 ipods, 2 XBox 360's, and at least one DVD player runnning The Matrix.


Finally, a fairly comprehensive quiz on political orientation. This quiz actually puts me quite a bit further left, and way more small-'l' libertarian, than most US Democratic presidential candidates, including Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton:

Shinzo Abe to Resign

Ohayoo gozaimasu.

I know, I know, I keep promising to post something on my paper, but for now I've decided to put that on hold. I did make a genuine attempt at writing a post on the paper about a month ago, but then I realized that I had spent about five or six paragraphs trying to explain what "potential well" and "potential barrier" mean. I will write about it eventually-- in fact, right now I'm taking a graduate seminar class, which is all about effective communication of scientific ideas to the public, so that should help.

For today, though, I give you an exciting piece of news:



Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe has annouced he will resign.

And no, this is not just an obscure Japanophile thing. This is actually pretty good news for Japan and for all of Asia. Not great news, mind you, but a small victory. To understand the significance of Abe's resignation (to me, at least), we need to begin with an obscure piece of WWII history.

It's no secret, at least outside of many Japanese schools, that during WWII Japan's Imperial Army committed many horrendous war crimes. The Massacre of Nanking is the most infamous. Another example, particularly relevant to Shinzo Abe, were the so-called comfort women, ie prostitute slaves.

Lesser known, but even more appalling, was Unit 731, a human experimentation program established for the development and testing of biological weapons. It is estimated that over 3000 men, women, and children were butchered and killed in these experiments, and that hundreds of thousands of Chinese civilians were killed as result of "field tests" of biological and chemical weapons.

What makes this even more disturbing is that following the war, the United States govenment covered up Unit 731 and allowed those in charge of the Unit, who otherwise would have been charged as war criminals, to go free. In return, the United States was provided with data aquired from Unit 731 experiments. Many former Unit 731 officials went on to acquire prestigious and influencial positions in Japan and the U.S.: Dr. Kitaro Masaji co-founded the Green Cross corporation which, prior to a recent series of mergers, was one of Japan's largest pharmaceutical companies; Dr. Shiro Ishii, head of Unit 731, went on to give lectures at American universities, and eventually ended up supervising biological research at the university of Maryland; another Unit 731 officer became president of the Japan Medical Association.

Of course, none of the atrocities of Unit 731 have any direct connection to Abe. The cover-up of Unit 731, however, is one of the earliest examples of the United State's post-war cooperation with Japan's militarist, imperialist right-wing. In the hopes of supressing a potential communist/socialist take-over, the U.S. occupying forces, led by General Douglas MacArthur, began a supression of left-wing element. The occupying force's efforts ranged from the monitoring and censorship of over a thousand leftist publications to the forced cancellation of massive union demonstrations in Tokyo. (See John Dower's Embracing Defeat for an excellent account of this).

Even after the occupation officially ended, the U.S. continued its manipulation of Japanese politics. Joseph Grew, U.S. ambassador to Japan who was detained during the war, befriended Japanese Minister of Commerse and Industry-- and suspected Class A War Criminal-- Nobusuke Kishi (the latter apparently played a round of golf with the former during his captivity). After the war, Grew became the first member of the CIA's National Committee for a Free Europe. Using his influencial position, Grew arranged for Kishi to recieve CIA funding, which Kishi used to found Japan's Liberal Democratic Party, whose members-- mostly Japanese conservatives opposed to the Japan Socialist Party-- were recuited and approved by the CIA. With the CIA's coninued assistance, Kishi became prime minister in 1957, and the LDP swept into both houses of the Diet (the Japanese Parliament).

(Note: This is recounted in Tim Weiner's Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA. This link will take you the blog of Jim Lippard, who summarizes the relevant chapter of the book.)

Due to the combined influence of the U.S. occupation's supression of Japan's left and the CIA's financial support of the right-wing LDP, Japan has been, more or less, a one-party state since the nineteen-fifties. Until the early nineties, every Japanese prime minister came from the LDP (which, by extension, means that the LDP held the lower house of the Diet for every term up until the early nineties). And it was only last July that the LDP lost its majority in the upper house. It was this loss that prompted the resignation of Abe.

Even though the LDP's defeat seems to have occurred largely over issues of economic inequality and government scandals, I'd still like to think that, at some level, Abe's resignation symbolizes a rejection of right-wing nationalism in Japan. Abe, Nobusuke Kishi's grandson and a rightist's rightist, sought to remove pacifist clauses from the Japanese constitution, attempted to (re)introduce textbooks into Japanese schools that whitewashed Japanese wartime atrocities, and denied that comfort women were coerced. He resignation, to me at least, signifies the long overdue humiliation and rejection of a party founded by war criminals and spies.

Maybe the butchers of Unit 731 will come next (other than the ones who've already come forward, like Yoshio Shinozuka).

The Day They Kicked God out of the Schools. . . I think it was a Tuesday. . . It was rainy. . . I woke up late, so I had a quick breakfast. . .

Traffic was congested, as usual. . . When I got to work, John, my co-worker, said "Hi." I said "Hi" back. . . Not "Hi back," mind you, but rather said back to John, "Hi" . . . "Some rain we're having," he said. "Yes," I replied. "It is a hard rain that is going to fall," I said. . . But then it stopped raining, and the Sun came out, though it was still cloudy. . . In my early morning haste, I had forgotten to pack a lunch, so I went to Wendy's, to buy a Mandarin Chicken Salad with Thai Sesame dressing. It was delicious, and though the meal seemed light, I found it quite filling . . . In the afternoon, there was a meeting. My co-worker John was there, as were other co-workers, like Melissa from accounting. Perhaps it was the informal atmosphere, or perhaps it was my co-worker Danielle's liberal and, if I may say, quite racy use of Microsoft PowerPoint. . . but there was something about that meeting, something about that time and place that made it very special to be a part of. Maybe it meant something, maybe not, in the long run. But no explanation, no mix of words or music or memories can touch that sense of knowing that you were there and alive in that corner of time in the world. Whatever it meant. There was madness in any direction, at any hour. You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning. And that, I think, was the handle - that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn’t need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting - on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave. So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark - that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back.

Anyhoo. . . Here's a video, courtesy of the Jewish Atheist.

Yet tragically, he has never cried. . .

Remember Chuck Norris Facts TM.? Here one of them:

There is no theory of evolution. Just a list of creatures Chuck Norris has allowed to live.

And here's Mr. Norris' response:

It’s funny. It’s cute. But here’s what I really think about the theory of evolution: It’s not real. It is not the way we got here. In fact, the life you see on this planet is really just a list of creatures God has allowed to live. We are not creations of random chance. We are not accidents.

This was, I believe, part of Mr. Norris' very first column on the right-wing website WorldNutDaily (I've linked to an archive of his columns). I was reminded of this little episode of his by this video, which I found on Pharyngula:

Of course, after seeing this, I scoured YouTube to find more videos of He-Whose-Tears-Cure-Cancer making a right-wing ass of himself. Instead. . . I FOUND THIS!

In case you forget. . . It's Chuck. . . Norris!

Want more? Of coruse you do.

More Conservapedia

I was going to write a blog in defence of Miyuu Sawai, but I thought I'd save that for later (and get you wondering just who the hell Miyuu Sawai is) and instead continue, as promised, with my coverage of Conservapedia.

Since Miyuu Sawai is an actress (honest, she is!) and since conservatives just hate those "Celebrity Activists", those "Limosine Liberals", those "George Clooneys", I thought I'd look up entries on a few prominent A-list lefites:

George Clooney: Nothing
Susan Sarandon: Nichts
Tim Robbins: Nada
Barbara Streisand: Nope
Robert Altman: Empty
Jennifer Aniston: Vacant
Ed Asner: Blank
Alec Baldwin: Gone
Joy Behar: Nothing (but then, I've heard nothing of her either)
Harry Belafonte: The Invisible Man (oooooh! burn!)
Sandra Bernhardt: Nothing
Geroge Carlin, Cher, David Clennon, John Cusack, Ani DeFranco, Dixie Chicks, Jane Fonda. . . : And I finally got tired of looking.

The list of names above, apart from the first few that I drew from the top of my head, were taken from the website Celiberal, a right-wing website dedicated to

present[ing] all those Hollywood celebrity liberals (hence, celiberal) that have nothing better to do than complain about America, our President, and the brave men and women defending our way of life.

The names above are all certified Godless Hollywood commies, and yet Con'pedia has nothing on 'em.

I wonder what would happen if. . .

Arnold Schwartzenegger: Nothing. Dammit!

What kind of a conservative biased encyclopedia is this? Man, I'm almost desperate enough to try. . .

Miyuu Sawai: Nothing.

Crap. Well, Hollywood liberals were a dead end. But what about one of the philosophical fathers of Liberalism, John Locke:

Englishman John Locke (1632-1704) was the leading political philosopher during the Enlightenment, whose ideas helped the American colonists form a new government. Locke described society as a contract between individuals called the "social contract", and held that the formation of collectives by individuals was the only way to ensure economic prosperity (see his Second Treatise on Government). Locke’s view helped lay the foundation for the constitutional government that we use in the United States, though unfortunately the Founding Fathers do not appear to have read chapter IV of the Second Treatise. Locke had built on the prior work of Englishmen Francis Bacon and Thomas Hobbes.

Chapter IV, by the way, was about slavery, particularly about slavery being the bad.

Speaking of the bad, this blog entry has not been nearly as entertaining as I had hoped it would be. If you want to curse me for wasting your time, feel free. At least I'm updating my blog, Nay. Prick.

Conservapedia Update

Turns out my link in the earlier post was a dud. Oops! I just fixed it.

I still had to wait ten fucking minutes to access the site-- either they're really popular or their server is shite. But in any event, I was there.

Here's the full text of the encyclopedia's mission statement:

A conservative encyclopedia you can trust.

Conservapedia has over 3,800 educational, clean and concise entries on historical, scientific, legal, and economic topics, as well as more than 350 lectures and term lists. There have been over 633,000 page views and over 15,700 page edits. Already Conservapedia has become one of the largest user-controlled free encyclopedias on the internet. This site is growing rapidly.

Conservapedia is a much-needed alternative to Wikipedia, which is increasingly anti-Christian and anti-American. On Wikipedia, many of the dates are provided in the anti-Christian "C.E." instead of "A.D.", which Conservapedia uses. Christianity receives no credit for the great advances and discoveries it inspired, such as those of the Renaissance. Read a list of many Examples of Bias in Wikipedia.

Conservapedia is an online resource and meeting place where we favor Christianity and America. Conservapedia has easy-to-use indexes to facilitate review of topics. You will much prefer using Conservapedia compared to Wikipedia if you want concise answers free of "political correctness".

Contributions that comply with simple commandments are respected (and improved) to the maximum extent possible. Please improve this website as you use it, and please cite your sources. With your help, Conservapedia will continue to be an online encyclopedia you can trust. This is also a meeting place, and appropriate questions may be posted at Ask questions.

On the same page, you'll find a "Today in History" section. Religious-righters, though, don't tend to value accurate historical knowledge very much (for instance, many Christian fundie-rightists are trying to claim that America was founded as a "Christian Nation" and that all the Founders were fundies like them. In fact, they were largely Deists. . . but anyway). This might explain some of the historical milestones the excyclopedia lists, such as

February 2

Did you know that faith is a uniquely Christian concept? Add to the explanation of what it means, and how it does not exist on other religions.

Not only is that statement completely idiotic, but even by the most liberal (pun intended) definiton, this is not even a historical event!!

Sigh.

The mission statement claims that Con'pedia is "growing rapidly." To see it this was true, I randomly looked up a few topics. Here's what I turned up:

Japan

Group of islands of the western coast of Asia.

Yup, that's the whole article. And yup, he said western, not eastern, coast of Asia.

Judaism

Judaism is the world's oldest monotheistic religion, founded by Abraham around 1800 BC. Most modern day adherents to Judaism (known as Jews) live primarily in the United States, Russia, and Israel.

Their article on Islam is larger, but also kinda schizoid. The first part seems to be quite complimentary to the faith, praising its "simplicity", and could very well have been written by a Muslim:

Islam is a religion of Abraham that has grown to be the second largest religion with over 1.4 billion followers. . .Muslims practice complete monotheism, worshiping Allah and believing Muhammad to be his last and greatest prophet. They live by the Koran, the pure and holy word of Allah that must be treated with the utmost respect. Muslims wash their hands before reading the book, which is considered complete and perfect only in the original Arabic, and burn old copies instead of throwing them away. Muslims follow the five pillars of Islam, which are straightforward and easy to understand. The belief in one god is clear, and encourages familiarity. . . Giving to the poor keeps them from becoming greedy or putting too much stake in worldly possessions. A month of fasting brings them closer to Allah. A pilgrimage to Mecca shows respect for the prophet Muhammad and his journey. Intoxication, gambling, stealing, adultery, and false accusations of adultery along with other offenses, are forbidden and highly punishable. Because Islam is an uncomplicated religion to live by, it is sure to continue in its popularity around the world.

The very next section of the article abruptly switches gears, arguing that Islam is nothing more than polytheistic crap:

Although most Muslims profess belief in a single, almighty God, a substantial minority of accredited Western scholars believe that the Muslim belief system can be traced back to distinctly polytheistic antecedents. Some, for example, have attempted to to link Allah to a moon deity. [1] Others have pointed to the pagan roots of various Muslim prohibitions, such as the ban on pork originating in the 3rd-century AD Damascene cult of the pig-god Jamal. [2] There is some evidence that traditional Muslim scholars have been suppressing this information as well as various recently-recovered scrolls that hint at early Muslim human sacrifice (e.g., at Uhud).

Strangely enough, the article on Christianity is as brief as that on Judaism:

Christianity is a religion that follows the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, as described in the books of the New Testament. It is the world's most popular religion, with over two billion members.

The atheism atricle is actually very pro-atheist, and I suspect that it must have been written by a disgruntled ScienceBlogs reader and not a member of Con'pedia's target readership. You can read it for yourself; I'm moving on.

Jimmy Carter

Jimmy Carter was the 39th President of the United States. He was a democrat who served from 1977-1981, after being the governor of Georgia. Unfortunately, his method of leading was not compatible with Congress, as a result he couldn’t get things done. During his presidency he experienced many trying problems such as inflation, energy crisis and worst of all the taking of American citizens as hostages by Iran. In 2002 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for peace.

Ronald Reagan

. . .Considered by many to be the greatest American President, Ronald Reagan's greatest accomplishments include leading America peacefully through the Cold War, lowering taxes, promoting a free economy, and staunchly opposing socialism and communism, and ending the Cold War in victory for the United States. . .

Yup. . . Reagan led us through the whole Cold War, he did.

Global Warming

Global warming is a phrase which commonly refers to a scientific theory and to political proposals that follow if the theory is accepted. The scientific theory is widely but not universally accepted within the scientific community. Conservatives who are opposed to the political proposals that flow from acceptance of the theory, are properly skeptical of the motivations of the theorists, and challenge the scientific validity of portions of the theory. . . The theory is widely accepted within the scientific community despite a lack of any conclusive evidence, though that is not to say there is no evidence at all. . . It should be noted that these scientists are motivated by a need for grant money in their field of climatology. Therefore, their work can not be considered unbiased, though no more than any scientist in any other field . Also, these scientists are mostly liberal athiests, untroubled by the hubris that man can destroy the Earth which God gave him.

I was gonna look up more stuff, but me and my family are about to head out for Naomi's birthday dinner. I'll post more on a future blog.

Conservatives and their 'pedias

Are you a conservative?
Are you tired of the blatant liberal bias of encyclopedia websites like Wikipedia?
Well, then maybe its time you tried. . . Conservapedia!

Did you try it? Could you get through? No? Same here.

A little backstory might be good about now. For the past couple of weeks, pretty much every member of the Scienceblogs community has been writing about a new conservative website called "Conservapedia." The site was first revealed by Ed Brayton (who is, for my money, the best blogger on the web):

A long time reader emailed me a link to Conservapedia, a conservative version of Wikipedia that promises over 3200 "educational, clean and concise entries" on a variety of topics, all designed to counter their perception that Wikipedia is "increasingly anti-Christian and anti-American."

Another ScienceBlogger, P.Z. Myers, has a nice list of the many fiendish liberal biases that permeate Wikipedia, according to Con'pedia:

The use of "BCE" and "CE" instead of BC and AD in dates.

Wikipedia has lots of articles about trivia, like music and movies.

Some articles use the British spellings for words.

They just want more credit given to Jesus for everything.

The whole worldwide community of English speakers edits Wikipedia; they're going to emphasize American (by which they mean not liberal) opinions.

Too many Wikipedia entries are "gossipy" or sound like something from the National Enquirer.

For those wondering about that last one, Ed Brayton provides a direct quote from the site:

Gossip is pervasive on Wikipedia. Many entries read like the National Enquirer. For example, Wikipedia's entry on Nina Totenberg states, "She married H. David Reines, a trauma physician, in 2000. On their honeymoon, he treated her for severe injuries after she was hit by a boat propeller while swimming." That sounds just like the National Enquirer, and reflects a bias towards gossip. Conservapedia avoids gossip and vulgarity, just as a true encyclopedia does.

The site, as reported by too many ScienceBloggers to list by name, was founded by creationist Andrew Schafly. As one would expect, the site has become a soapbox for antiscientific nonsense. From John Lynch:

The following is the complete entry on Darwin:

Charles Darwin was born in England to a Christian family on February 12, 1809. He is the founder of Evolution. After spending some time on the Galapagos Islands and studying the animals that lived there, he came up with his theory of "natural selection" and published The Origin of Species in 1859.

That's the enitre article on Charles Darwin, the whole fucking thing. Their treatment of evolution isn't much better. Here's a driect quote from the site, again provided by Mr. Lynch:

The Theory of Evolution, introduced by Charles Darwin in his book On The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or The Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life, published in 1859, is a scientific theory that explains the process of evolution via natural selection. The basic principle behind natural selection, states that in the struggle for life, some organisms in a given population will be better suited to their particular environment and thus have a reproductive advantage, increasing the representation of their particular traits over time. Evolution has been largely discredited, though it is still taught in schools due to activist judges.

But the process of natural selection is not an evolutionary process. The DNA in plants and animals allows selective breeding to achieve desired results. Dogs are a good example of selective breeding. The DNA in all dogs has many regressive traits. A desired trait can be produced in dogs by selecting dogs with a particular trait to produce offspring with that trait. This specialized selective breeding can continue for generation after generation until a breed of dog is developed. This is the same as the "survival of the fittest" theory of the evolutionists. Many different types of dogs can be developed this way, but they can never develop a cat by selectively breeding dogs--that would be macroevolution. Natural selection can never extend outside of the DNA limit. DNA cannot be changed into a new species by natural selection. ....

Supporters propound upon the Theory of Evolution as if it has scientific support, which it does not. They switch tactics when pressed against the wall with solid scientific proofs against the Theory of Evolution by stating that evolution is "only" a theory. Using this flip-flop approach they try to have it both ways. They claim scientific support when none exists, and they claim it is only a theory when the theory straddles them with outlandish, impossible conclusion that violate scientific truths. Evolutionists simply ignore reality, slink into denial and walk away when presented with the scientific facts.

Speaking of activist judges, here's Mr. Brayton's reproduction of Con'pedia's article on "Judicial Activism:"

There are two major types of judicial activism practiced in the United States' court system:
1. Liberal judges striking down laws that uphold core conservative American values
2. Liberal judges refusing to strike down laws that subvert core conservative American values

The most famous example of this is Roe v. Wade

As a physicist-in-training, I was really pissed off by their entry on the theory of relatvity (courtesy of Chad Orzel):

Unlike most advances in physics, the theory of relativity was proposed based on mathematical theory rather than observation. The theory rests on two postulates that are difficult to test, and then derives mathematically what the physical consequences should be. Those two postulates are that the speed of light never changes, and that all laws of physics are the same in every (inertial) frame of reference no matter where it is or how fast it is traveling. This theory rejects Isaac Newton's God-given theory of gravitation and replaces it with a concept that there is a continuum of space and time, and that large masses (like the sun) bend space in a manner similar to how a finger can depress an area of a balloon. From this proposed bending of space the expression arose that "space is curved." But experiments later proved that space is flat overall.

I had long, beautiful hair once. . . then I read this, and ripped it all out.

Now you may be wondering, "Why doesn't Jeremy just quote from the site itself? Why is he ripping off the hard work of real blogger?" And thus, we return to the beginning. . .

If you tried the Con'pedia link at the top of the page, chances are that you, like me, sat for five fucking minutes waiting for the site to pop up, only to get a "This page cannot be displayed" message. According to Mr. Brayton, Con'pedia is blocking IP addresses. Apparently, a few people got together and decided that, well, Con'pedia is a self-parodying website anyway, why not make parody entries for the site? At least that's what they say: it actually looks like their trying to block their critics. I'm sure this is the case, seeing that even though I did not vandalize the site, or even attempt to visit it until today, I've been blocked, likely for visiting the highly critical ScienceBlog websites.

And as a result, I have, once again, completely missed the boat.

If anyone does does get through, be sure to comment on what horrors you have witnessed.