Non Fluffy Wicca

Annual end-of-the-world post 2008:

So, none of last year's predictions concerning the end of the world have come true. Nor has there been any sign of Jesus. This, of course, will not stop the prophets of doom. So, what can we expect in 2008?

Last year, we started with ARMAGEDDON 2007 EZEKIEL 4 TIME PROPHECY JERUSALEM ISRAEL PROPHECIES. The person behind the site has not been put off by the predictions failing to come to pass and the page has now been born again as Bible Prophecy Revelations Armageddon 2008.

Though Armageddon did not commence in 2007 as we expected, the process leading to that war sometime in 2008, has begun.

The predictions for Jerusalem remain intact, with a disclaimer.

If probation for the Jews ended in 2007, how far are we from this dreadful war? We've already stated here on the eve of 2008 we believe it's just a couple of months away now!

And some gratuitous homophobia:

Why is such a war needed? The land of Israel has been flagrantly defiled. We believe such a war is needed to prevent the opening of any more brothels and casinos in the Holy Land! We believe such a war is needed to prevent Tel Aviv from becoming the gay capital of the world! We believe such a war is needed to prevent any more gay marches from defiling Jerusalem!

I suspect that San Francisco, Brighton and similar places hold no fear that lgbt tourists will take their money to Tel Aviv any time soon, no matter how sunny it is.

To Infinity And Beyond! has only one possibility for the coming year, and it's one of Marilyn Agee's many dates for the start of the end-times:

PRE-TRIB RAPTURE, FIRST "TRUMP OF GOD" Probably Pentecost, Sivan 6, 5768 (June 9, 2008)




TEMPLE CONSTRUCTION BEGINS

Sacrifice of the red heifer when she is four years old (she is 3.5 now)

Priests, purified with the ashes of the red heifer, start building the Temple after the Rapture




THE BEGINNING OF THE TRIBULATION, 1ST SEAL

SEVENTH DAY OF UNLEAVENED BREAD - Pre-Trib Rapture, April 26, 2008

Beginning of the 2300 days of Dan. 8:12-14 (Jewish inclusive reckoning)

First beast begins to rule...

Another obsessive cataloguer has produced The Doomsday List, which should make this job much easier in future years. The compiler notes that the majority of predictions for 2008 come from Bible Code nerds The Lord's Witnesses. They use the Jewish Calendar, but with Gregorian years, just to confuse us, and admit that they have made many mistakes in the past. Their favourite prediction concerns a nuclear strike on New York, which has been failing to happen for two years now. The most recent dates for this have passed without incident:

We now believe and calculate that it must happen somewhere along the East Coast of the US between Washington and NYC possibly at Annapolis but more likely at the UN Tower in Manhattan from 2007Tebbeth4 to 2007Tebbeth7

That's between Thursday, 13 December 2007 and Sunday, 16 December 2007. A further refinement of this has been made, but it's still in the past:

We now calculate that somewhere on the East Coast of the USA, between Washington and NYC, possibly at Anapolis or more likely at the UN Tower in Manhattan, will be hit by a sea borne dirty bomb or nuclear bomb on or before Saturday December 22nd, 2007

Here's the list of dates which will be refined in the next year:

2008 February 3/4, 2007Shebat21. The little horn of the EU corrupts the UNGA and God's people are given into his hand for 3½ Times, which are months, 105 days, until we are rescued by Jesus on 2008Sivan6.




2008 March21, 2008Nisan14, Satan loses throne and kingdom and authority, but UN does not yet, it battles with the lamb during Armageddon....




2008 March23, 2008Nisan16, Kingdom of God begins.




2008 May 5, 2008Iyyar29. The Sign of the Son of man appears in heaven at the end of the 1335 days of Daniel 12. The faithful are happy as described in Daniel 12.




2008 May 12, 2008Sivan6. Jesus comes, the 1NC saints descend as humans. They start gathering the church sons of the 1AC together to be raptured. The door of Noah is closed, no more first time entrance into the LWs, the ICC is closed other than rebpatisms. The faithless say: Lord, Lord!! The UNPBC has its second head cut off.




2008 September 18/19, 2008Tishri15. Earthly celebration of the 2NC by the great crowd, all the sons of the CRC and by all those who are raptured and by all the saints, the sons of the ARC.




2008 October 3/4, 2008Tishri30. Miriam, the sealed 1NC saints, is permitted back into the camp in heaven. 7 year kingship Malediction on 1NC saints ends. The bride has prepared herself. The Marriage of the lamb can now begin. End of LW water baptism.




2008 October 4/5, 2008Heshvan1. This is the Megiddo administration or Har Megiddo or Armageddon. This administration fights Jesus for 150 days from 2008Hesvhan6 to 2008Nisan6.




2008 October 9/10, 2008Heshvan6. Last day of Zoar, the Rapture. The ark hits the mountains of Ararat after 150 days. The 5 times of the hand of Lot and his wife and his daughters end. The 616 days of UNGA authority over God's people ends with this rapture. 50% of mankind is beamed up as angels. The UN is still in existence at this time. The war of the great Day of Jehovah, the evening meal of God, begins. Jesus attacks the Megiddo administration for the next 150 days, since Lot escaped from the Midst of the overthrow of the cities of the religious administration of Sodom and of the secular administration of Gomorrah. Lot is in the gate of Sodom, but not in the gate of Gomorrah.

And something more tangible: The world will run out of Wheat in Q1, 2008!

T. Chase of Revelation 13 is still obsessed with Vladimir Putin and remains convinced that he is the Antichrist. The world population is also approaching a significant figure:

When the world population reaches 6.66 billion in about April 2008, that may be a terrorism caused by Iran and Al Qaeda, or this could be the rise of the Antichrist, Russian President Putin.

He also uses Bible Codes, and has some specific predictions for some specific places. His dates are less specific, as any of the following events could occur any time between 2008 and 2010. Those events are:

• A Canary Islands Volcano collapsing into the sea, causing a tsunami, and Yellowstone going up. These are both things that scientists worry about.


• Possibly as a result of the above, a tsumani will hit Miami. I wonder what Florida-based Pat Robertson will make of that? The same page forecasts a threat of nuclear terrorism by Osama bin Laden and Al Qaida, an Al Qaida biological attack, an asteroid will hit in the ocean ... causing a tidal wave, a disease plague (possibly Ebola), a star which is close to supernova might actually go supernova,


• World economic chaos. Well, duh!


• Diseases: Ebola Virus, Marburg Virus, AIDS/HIV, Mad Cow Disease, Flu.

More precise dates for other events can be found on the Calendar page, where we see Christian astrology in action.

There are more Bible Code predictions at Satan's Rapture, but this site includes some more precise dates, including for May 2008, a terrorist attack using biological agents, probably Ebola, on Philadelphia in May 2008 and the assasination of Barak Obama and John Edwards, allowing Hilary Clinton to become US president in the November 2008 elections. Hilary Clinton is, of course, the Antichrist.

Another person convinced that the end is nigh in 2008 is Robert Weinland, author of 2008 - God's Final Witness. So convinced is he of this that he's made the book available as a free download, in four languages (English, Dutch, Spanish and Italian). He predicts four events will bring about the total collapse of the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and some countries of Western Europe (p. 116) and By the fall of 2008, the United States will have collapsed as a world power, or it will have begun its collapse and no longer exist as an independent nation within six months after that time (p. 244).

Let us not forget the true Russian Orthodox Church, the cult currently holed up awaiting the end of the world in May 2008.

Daniel Min also sees armageddon this year:

But it's all merely academic at this point, seeing that the 2008 election will be cancelled, and far more importantly is the great tribulation, Armageddon unto end of the world, is clearly imminent, and there is nothing anyone can do to stop it, neither postpone it: any more than they can stop the revolutions of the planets in orbit.

Posted by mikki at 07:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Passport Card Rule Will Weaken Border Security and Privacy:


Today, the Department of State released a final rule for the new "Passport Card," which is intended to be used by American citizens who frequently travel by land or sea to Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, and Bermuda. The new rule calls for the use of "vicinity read" RFID technology without the use of encryption. This means the card will be able to be read remotely, at a long distance. CDT strongly objected to the use of this technology--developed for tracking inventory, not people--because it is inherently insecure and poses threats to personal privacy, including identity theft, location tracking by government and commercial entities outside the border control context, and other forms of mission creep.

Posted by mikki at 12:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Romney's Founders:

ACSBlog is on hiatus until January 2. Please enjoy this Guest Blog post from earlier this year.

by Geoffrey R. Stone, professor of law at the University of Chicago

Mitt Romney’s recent reflections on the role of religion in American politics implicitly called to mind a disturbingly distorted version of history that has become part of the conventional wisdom of American politics in recent years.

That version of history suggests that the Founders intended to create a “Christian Nation,” and that we have unfortunately drifted away from that vision of the United States. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth.

Those who promote this fiction confuse the Puritans, who intended to create a theocratic state, with the Founders, who lived 150 years later. The Founders were not Puritans, but men of the Enlightenment. They lived not in an Age of Faith, but in an Age of Reason. They viewed issues of religion through a prism of rational thought.

To be sure, there were traditional Christians among the Founders, including such men as John Jay, Patrick Henry and Samuel Adams. Most of the Founders, however, were not traditional Christians, but deists who were quite skeptical of traditional Christianity. They believed that a benevolent Supreme Being had created the universe and the laws of nature and had given man the power of reason with which to discover the meaning of those laws. They viewed religious passion as irrational and dangerously divisive, and they challenged, both publicly and privately, the dogmas of traditional Christianity.

Benjamin Franklin, for example, dismissed most of Christian doctrine as “unintelligible.” He believed in a deity who “delights” in man’s “pursuit of happiness.” He regarded Jesus as a wise moral philosopher, but not necessarily as a divine or divinely inspired figure. He viewed all religions as more or less interchangeable in their most fundamental tenets, which he believed required men to treat each other with kindness and respect.

Thomas Jefferson was a thoroughgoing skeptic who valued reason above faith. He subjected every religious tradition, including his own, to careful scrutiny. He had no patience for talk of miracles, revelation, and resurrection. Like Franklin, Jefferson admired Jesus as a moral philosopher, but insisted that Jesus’ teachings had been distorted beyond all recognition by a succession of “corruptors,” such as Paul, Augustine, and Calvin. He regarded such doctrines as predestination, trinitarianism, and original sin as “nonsense,” “abracadabra” and “a deliria of crazy imaginations.” He referred to Christianity as “our peculiar superstition” and maintained that “ridicule” was the only rational response to the “unintelligible propositions” of traditional Christianity.

John Adams, who identified most closely with the early Unitarians, also believed that the original teachings of Jesus had been sound, but that Christianity had subsequently gone awry. He wrote to Jefferson that the essence of his religious beliefs was captured in the phrase, “Be just and good.” As President, Adams signed a treaty, unanimously approved by the Senate in 1797, stating unambiguously that “the Government of the United States . . . is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion.”

George Washington was respectful of traditional Christianity, but he did not have much use for it. His personal papers offer no evidence that he believed in biblical revelation, eternal life, or Jesus’ divinity. Clergymen who knew Washington well bemoaned his skeptical approach to Christianity. Bishop William White, for example, admitted that no “degree of recollection will bring to my mind any fact which would prove General Washington to have been a believer in Christian revelation.”

Tom Paine, the author of Common Sense, The Rights of Man, and The Age of Reason, insisted that “the religion of Deism is superior to the Christian religion,” because it “is free from those invented and torturing articles that shock our reason.” Paine explained that deism’s creed “is pure and sublimely simple. It believes in God, and there it rests. It honours Reason as the choicest gift of God to man” and “it avoids all presumptuous beliefs and rejects, as the fabulous inventions of men, all books pretending to revelation.” Paine dismissed Christianity as “a fable, which, for absurdity and extravagance, is not exceeded by anything that is to be found in the mythology of the ancients.” In Paine’s view, traditional Christianity had “served to corrupt and brutalize mankind.”

These words no doubt sound shockingly blunt and “politically incorrect” to modern ears, but they were in fact the views of many of our most revered Founders. The fable that the United States was founded as a Christian Nation is just that – a fable.

It is worth noting that the Declaration of Independence does not invoke Jesus, or Christ, or Our Father, or the Almighty, but the “Laws of Nature,” “Nature’s God,” the “Supreme Judge,” and “Divine Providence,” all phrases that belong to the tradition of deism. The Declaration of Independence is not a Puritan or Calvinist or Methodist or Baptist or Protestant or Catholic or Christian document, but a document of the Enlightenment. It is a statement that deeply and intentionally invokes the language of American deism. It is a document of its own time, and it speaks eloquently about what Americans of that time believed.

The Constitution goes even further. It does not invoke the deity at all. Unlike the Puritan documents of the early seventeenth century, it makes no reference whatever to God. It cites as its ultimate source of authority not “the command of God,” but “We the People,” the stated purpose of the Constitution is not to create a government “according to the will of God” but to “secure the Blessings of Liberty.” Significantly, the only reference to religion in the 1789 Constitution expressly prohibits the use of any religious test for public office.

The Founders were not anti-religion. They understood that religion could help nurture the public morality necessary to a self-governing society. But they also understood that religion was fundamentally a private and personal matter that had no place in the political life of a nation dedicated to the separation of church and state. They would have been appalled at the idea of the federal government sponsoring “faith-based” initiatives. They would have been quite happy to tolerate Mitt Romney’s Mormonism – as long as he keeps it out of our government.

Posted by mikki at 11:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So tell me...how do you "take back a nation for Christ" yet not impose your religion on others? Hmmmm?

CNN Political Ticker: All politics, all the time - Blogs from CNN.com:


WASHINGTON (CNN) — Republican Mike Huckabee said Sunday he would not back down from a 1998 statement in which he said he hoped Baptists would "answer the alarm clock and take this nation back for Christ."

The ordained Baptist minister made that remark at a meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention nearly a decade ago. On NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Huckabee said that "it was a speech made to a Christian gathering, and certainly that would be appropriate to be said to a gathering of Southern Baptists."

Related video: Huckabee gets tough on Romney as polls tighten

Evangelicals have been a driving force behind his rise in the polls. But with Huckabee’s ascending fortunes has come greater scrutiny of the role of religion in his campaign.

On Sunday, Huckabee tried to address those concerns, saying a person’s faith, or lack of faith, would not keep them from serving in his administration.

"The key issue of real faith is that it never can be forced on someone,” Huckabee said. “And never would I want to use the government institutions to impose mine or anybody else's faith or to restrict."

The presidential hopeful said he does not believe that women should face legal penalties for having abortions, but that the doctors who perform the procedure should.

"I don't know that you'd put him in prison, but there's something to me untoward about a person who has committed himself to healing people and to making people alive who would take money to take an innocent life and to make that life dead," Huckabee said.

The former governor also defended a 1998 book excerpt in which he said that “homosexuality is an aberrant, unnatural and sinful lifestyle."

“I don't know whether people are born that way,” Huckabee said. “People who are gay say that they're born that way. But one thing I know, that the behavior one practices is a choice. …”

"But the most important thing is to find out, does our faith influence our public policy and how? I've never tried to rewrite science textbooks. I've never tried to come out with some way of imposing a doctrinaire Christian perspective in a way that is really against the Constitution. I've never done that," he added.

Posted by mikki at 11:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In the latest "how bloody selfish can one person be" segment of Non Fluffy, we find this beastly creature who had no problem putting others at risk, and her idiot doctor who didn't make sure she couldn't fly. Time to make this public so that everyone exposed to the bitch can sue her sorry ass.

TB Patient's Trip To Bay Area Causes Alarm - News Story - KTVU San Francisco:


SAN JOSE, Calif. -- A Santa Clara County woman was hospitalized in isolation after becoming infected with a dangerous strain of tuberculosis and then taking a plane flight to return to the Bay Area.
Health officials said the 30-year-old woman was being treated for a form of TB at Stanford Hospital that is considered a public health problem because it is difficult to treat and has a higher mortality rate than conventional TB.
"The patient is in isolation, and we're taking all necessary precautions -- both to protect her and the public and our employees," Shelley Hebert, executive director for public affairs for Stanford Hospital & Clinics, told the San Jose Mercury News.
The woman was overseas when she flew back to the United States earlier this month.
Dr. Marty Fenstersheib, Santa Clara County's public health officer, did not know how the woman could have ended up on an international flight given she was diagnosed with TB while overseas and told her strain was probably resistant to multiple drugs.
"If people were here in our county and we know they're infectious, we would not allow them to fly anywhere," he told the paper. "She was aware of it. Her doctor was aware of her diagnosis. And then she got on a plane and came here. But there's no question she had symptoms."
Health officials also contacted the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention who will contact and do a follow-up investigation with passengers on the woman's flight.
"Three or four rows in front or back of where she was sitting," on the plane will be contacted, according to Fenstershieb.
Stanford officials were also contacting those who may have come in contact with the woman when she was in the emergency room. Hebert said that was fewer than 10 people.
"The risk to those people is very low and there is no risk to the public," Hebert said.
The woman's name or the flight she was on has not been released.

Posted by mikki at 03:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

You got your Jesus in my peanut butter!

Priests brawl at Jesus' birthplace - CNN.com:


ETHLEHEM, West Bank (AP) -- Greek Orthodox and Armenian priests attacked each other with brooms and stones inside the Church of the Nativity as long-standing rivalries erupted in violence during holiday cleaning on Thursday.


The basilica, built over the grotto in Bethlehem where Christians believe Jesus was born, is administered jointly by Roman Catholic, Greek Orthodox and Armenian Apostolic authorities.

Any perceived encroachment on one group's turf can touch off vicious feuds.

On Thursday, dozens of priests and cleaners were scrubbing the church ahead of the Armenian and Orthodox Christmas, celebrated in early January. Thousands of tourists visited the church this week for Christmas celebrations.

But the clean-up turned ugly after some of the Orthodox faithful stepped inside the Armenian church's section, touching off a scuffle between about 50 Greek Orthodox and 30 Armenians.

Palestinian police, armed with batons and shields, quickly formed a human cordon to separate the two sides so the cleaning could continue, then ordered an Associated Press photographer out of the church.

Four people, some with blood running from their faces, were slightly wounded

Posted by mikki at 07:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

More commentary on the creationist theme park:

One of the stated aims of the AH Trust's proposed Creationist theme park is that it will provide an alternative to binge drinking for young people. David Mills ponders this in the Guardian's Comment is Free section:

Although the trust correctly identifies that there is a drinking problem endemic in the culture of young people today, to believe that by providing religion as an alternative so that youngsters will put down the White Lightning and pick up a bible, seems quite naive and out of touch.

What's more, he wonders whether the Bible is really good for young people.

To correct the wrongs of society, perhaps the theme park - using its multimedia to maximum effect - will tell the story of how Lot was prepared to give up his daughters to the Sodomites and eventually slept with them himself? Is it appropriate moral guidance to show how Abraham was going to kill his son because God ordered him to? Will it also tell the story of Cain killing his brother Abel? How will tales of rape, incest, infanticide, fratricide and mass homicide become the antidote to binge drinking and a society that watches too much sex and violence on television? Theologians would say they are not meant to be taken literally but how are they meant to be taken? Are these the kind of family models we want "our youth" to look up to?

Taking children for a ride—Comment is Free, 23rd December 2007.

Posted by mikki at 10:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Pagans ask for displays by parks' nativities:


Zoroastrians and other pagans, both claiming roles for their faiths in the Christmas tradition, say they won't stop fighting to have their holiday displays placed alongside nativity scenes in Ohio state parks. Efforts by both so far have been rejected by the administration of Gov. Ted Strickland, an ordained Methodist minister, who recently ordered Christian creches placed back in two state parks that had disallowed them because of religious concerns.



The battle comes in a year that the Rev. Charles Nestor, an Assemblies of God minister in Lakeland, Fla., promoted "Operation Nativity," urging Christians to flood the country with nativity displays at their homes, churches, and businesses. The effort was an attempt to reclaim the role of Christian faith over secularization in the Christmas holiday. David Russell, whose recent request to place a Zoroastrian display at Shawnee State Park was rejected by Mr. Strickland, said he will pursue his request "to its logical conclusion." Already, the Madison, Wis.-based Freedom From Religion Foundation has asked for an investigation of whether Mr. Strickland violated his oath of office to uphold the constitutions of Ohio and the United States by allowing the religious displays.

Posted by mikki at 03:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Nicklas Johnson · morons.org - VA School Censors Lesbian Student:


PORTSMOUTH, VA - The American Civil Liberties Union today demanded that a high school that punished a student for wearing a t-shirt featuring a lesbian pride symbol apologize to the student and guarantee that it will no longer illegally censor her in the future. School officials at I.C. Norcom High School had threatened the 17-year-old senior with suspension because a teacher was upset by her t-shirt, which bears an image of two overlapping female gender symbols.

"When my teacher told me she wanted me to turn my shirt inside-out or cover it up, I was confused, because I've worn that shirt to school several times before and nobody ever said a word about it," said Bethany Laccone, who attends a different school full-time but goes to Norcom High every morning for a hotel management class. "I wear that shirt because I want people to know that I'm proud of being a lesbian and comfortable with who I am. And I have the same Constitutional right to free speech as any other student."

In a letter sent to I.C. Norcom High School officials this morning, the ACLU demanded that any mention of the censorship be removed from Laccone's student record, that the school guarantee it would not illegally censor Laccone or other students in the future, and that the school apologize to Laccone for its actions.

"What's happening to Bethany Laccone is a clear-cut case of unconstitutional censorship," said Kent Willis, Executive Director of the ACLU of Virginia. "Bethany Laccone has the same rights to express her opinions and be open about who she is as any other student. We intend to make sure I.C. Norcom High School stops breaking the law and treats all of its students equally regardless of their views."

Laccone says that on December 10 she was pulled out of class by a teacher who said she shouldn't be wearing the shirt at school and then sent her to the assistant principal's office. The assistant principal and the teacher then told Laccone that the shirt violated a section of the school dress code that bans "bawdy, salacious or sexually suggestive messages." In a later meeting with Laccone's father, the assistant principal said that he was upholding the censorship, and added that because the teacher is "very conservative" she claimed she was so upset by the t-shirt that it "interfered with her ability to teach."

"A public school teacher's job is to serve the needs of all the students who go to that school," said Christine Sun, a staff attorney with the ACLU's national Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Project. "If a teacher can't deal with the fact that there are gay students in her classroom, that doesn't mean she gets to violate that student's First Amendment rights."

In 1969, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the landmark ACLU case Tinker v. Des Moines that students have a Constitutional right to free speech. As Justice Abe Fortas wrote, "Schools may not be enclaves of totalitarianism. Students and teachers do not shed their constitutional rights to freedom of expression at the schoolhouse gates." In addition to being a symbol of lesbian pride, the symbols on Laccone's shirt are also commonly used in chemistry, astronomy, and astrology and are believed by some scholars to date back as far as ancient Roman times.

The ACLU of Virginia and the national ACLU Lesbian Gay Bisexual Transgender Project are working together in handling Laccone's complaint.

Reporters interested in interviewing Bethany Laccone should contact Chris Hampton at (212) 549-2673. More information about Laccone's case, including a photo of the t-shirt and a copy of the demand letter the ACLU sent to I.C. Norcom High School, can be found online.

Posted by mikki at 02:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well said, well said....

American Chronicle: The Case for Christ-Free Christmas:


Christmas is only a few days off, and I think it’s as good a time as any to speak up for a segment of humanity that is too often ignored and forgotten by the media around the holidays. I speak up for this faction of society not only because I believe it to be vastly in the majority, but also because I happen to be a member. I’m talking about those of us who celebrate a secular Christmas.

My favorite time of year for as long as I can remember has been Christmas. As a child, I strung popcorn onto thread, hung ornaments from pine branches (we always bought a real tree back then), and stood alongside my mother as she baked cookies decorated with brightly colored red and green sugar. When I was young enough to still believe in him, I wrote letters to Santa Claus and left a plate cookies and a glass of milk out on the kitchen table for him. One year I even constructed a crude object d’art from yarn and glued-together popsicle sticks and left it out for Santa to take with him, labeling it in my letter simply “a toy.” I figured he could deliver it to some underprivileged child behind the Iron Curtain who wouldn’t know the difference. When I woke up that Christmas morning, my homemade toy was gone, and Santa thanked me for it in a note left on the kitchen table.

At the time it was a thrilling surprise, though now when I think about it, I am suspicious of the similarity of Santa’s handwriting to that of my mother.

My mother’s father was a minister. My father’s upbringing wasn’t nearly so religious, but he wasn’t brought up an atheist, either. Mercifully, they both decided before I was born not to push religion on me. Except for a few months when I was in first grade, when Dad temporarily let his elderly grandmother guilt-trip him into it, we never attended church. Our Christmases were centered around Santa, snowmen, food, and family. And presents, naturally, which my younger brother and I soon realized were best of all.

As an adult, I’ve outgrown Santa and snowmen, and the rapacious lust for receiving gifts, but I still treasure the time spent sitting around the tree with my mother and father, my brother, my grandmother, and, these last few years, my girlfriend. We sing no hymns, we say no prayers. Jesus, most assuredly, is not among our reasons for the season.

And good for us, because that particular bit of bumper sticker sloganeering has always gotten on my nerves. For one thing, there’s the obnoxious insistence that any Christmas celebration not centering on the Christian concept of the holiday is illegitimate. For another thing, it makes no rational sense—no matter how you look at it, Jesus is not the reason for the season.

If you take “season” to mean the season of winter, the period of the year, in the Northern Hemisphere, between the winter solstice and the vernal equinox, characterized by colder temperatures and fewer hours of daylight, then the season is the result of the 23 degree tilt of the Earth’s axis relative to its orbital plane. Jesus is neither the source, nor the cause, nor in any sense the reason for this season.

If you interpret “season” to mean the season of celebration surrounding the solstice in late December, then it is the result of virtually every culture throughout Europe and Asia marking the time of the solstice as a significant annual event. Many of these cultural celebrations predate Christianity by hundreds or thousands of years, and most have nothing whatsoever to do with Jesus. Even the connection of Jesus to Christmas is questionable; Christians take the day to mark his birth, but a careful reading of the Biblical account suggests his actual date of birth was during spring or summer. The Christmas celebration was established in late December to replace the pre-existing pagan celebrations, including Saturnalia, which were already popular in the Roman Empire before its conversion to Christianity.

So if I want to celebrate a non-religious holiday in late December, why bother with Christmas at all? There’s Yule, which is a major donor of traditions and trappings to modern Christmas—why don’t I trade in the tree for a log, and call the family to feast in honor of Thor? Because I don’t want to celebrate Yule. It means nothing to me. I want to celebrate Christmas. What the evangelical “Jesus is the reason” crowd hates to admit is that, while they weren’t looking, especially during the last hundred years or so, Christmas became a secular holiday.

Some Christians, I know, object to Christ-free secular celebrations being referred to as Christmas. “Put the Christ back in Christmas,” goes another popular slogan. But the word, like the holiday itself, has evolved beyond its origins. Modern Christmas is no more limited by the original conventions of Christ’s Mass than modern Halloween is by the Catholic celebration of All Hallows Eve.

I also don’t believe there is a war on Christmas. I’m not an officious alarmist who sees department stores and local governments wishing people “Happy Holidays” as part of an insidious scheme to delete Christmas from the public consciousness, like a certain television and radio host whom I shall not name, except to state that his initials are “Bill O’Reilly.” I know that many public schools no longer allow their show choirs to sing Christmas carols, and are even afraid to label their Christmas pageants as such, but I chalk that up to misplaced, overboard, however well-meaning, political correctness rather than some nefarious desire on the part of teachers and administrators to disenfranchise Christians.

I have no problem with schools holding Christmas assemblies, with the local, state or national governments hanging Christmas decorations on public property, or with the mayor or the governor or the president wishing us all a “Merry Christmas,” so long as we’re talking about the secular Christmas that virtually everyone in the United States, regardless of cultural or religious background, celebrates, even if only a little, and not the self-righteously pious Jesus-fest around which many church calendars revolve.

Not that I’m the type to brag about this sort of thing, but the Supreme Court agrees with me. In 2001, the highest court in the land upheld a lower court’s ruling in the case of Ganulin v. United States that Christmas served a legitimate secular purpose. It is not an exclusively religious holiday, and it hasn’t been for a long time.

Secular Christmas isn’t perfect. I’m as put-off by the commercialism and materialism surrounding it as anyone. I don’t want it to be an occasion for overindulgence or conspicuous consumption. I hate the emphasis on shopping that dominates the season, kicking into high gear the day after Thanksgiving and enduring for a solid month. Christmas is a sacred day to me. It’s a day for family and friends, for sitting around the table and eating great food, for gathering in the living room to watch Miracle on 34th Street—hell, if Dad wants to, I’ll even hold my gorge down long enough to watch It’s a Wonderful Life. Making it a secular day shouldn’t make it a cheap day, a commercial or tawdry day.

For me, it’s always been the most wonderful time of the year, and it’s never had anything to do with the birth of Jesus. If you and your family treasure your religious Christmas, if you look forward to attending church services early in the morning, if you proudly display your illuminated plastic crèche in your front yard, more power to you. You have a right to your Christmas, just as I have to mine.

Anyway, whatever your Christmas looks like, whether its central figure is a child in a manger or a fat, bearded fellow on a sleigh; whether your tree is topped by an angel or a star; whether your yard is adorned with a nativity scene or a giant inflatable snowman; whether you believe in Christ, or Santa Claus, or neither one; whether you adore it or couldn’t care less, have a good one. Merry Christmas.

Posted by mikki at 01:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Howard County Man Sentenced For Poisoning Neighbor's Dog - News Story - WRC | Washington:


ELLICOTT CITY, Md. -- A Howard County man is facing a month in prison for poisoning a neighbor's dog.
Jack Schroeder admitted in a plea agreement in November to feeding the dog -- which later died -- antifreeze and chicken bones. Charges of aggravated animal cruelty were dropped.
Schroeder was sentenced in Howard Circuit Court to 18 months with all but 30 days suspended. He was also placed on 18 months supervised probation, counseling and ordered to pay a $2,000 fine.
Schroeder said he is embarrassed by his actions, but the dog's barking forced him to sleep in a back bedroom and hurt his relationship with his wife.

Posted by mikki at 12:56 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Judge: White House visitor logs are public documents - CNN.com:


ASHINGTON (CNN) -- The White House must release its visitor logs and cannot hide behind a shield of privilege, a federal judge ruled Monday. The Bush administration has resisted public disclosure while it fights a lawsuit over alleged political influence by conservative Christian leaders.

The Bush administration has been fighting the release of White House visitor logs.

U.S. District Court Judge Royce Lamberth concluded the information is part of the public record and is subject to disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act as "agency records."

"Because the Secret Service creates, uses and relies on, and stores visitor records, they are under its control," said Lamberth.

He ordered the Secret Service to produce records within 20 days.

The White House claimed exclusive control of the documents, subject to the complete discretion of the president over their release.

Secret Service records have been an important tool for advocacy groups and members of Congress seeking information on the inner workings of the executive branch.

Congressional investigators used the records a decade ago in their investigations of the various Whitewater scandals involving President Clinton and his associates, as well as allegations of influence peddling by the Clinton campaign in the 1996 elections.

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a self-described government watchdog group, sought the visit records of prominent conservatives James Dobson of Focus on the Family, Wendy Wright of Concerned Women of America and seven others including the late televangelist Jerry Falwell.

"CREW is pleased that the judge saw through the White House's transparent attempts to hide public documents from the American people," said Melanie Sloan, the group's executive director. "We look forward to sharing the documents we obtain through this lawsuit."

The White House and Justice Department had no immediate reaction to the ruling.

Separate legal action by CREW and other groups, including Judicial Watch and the Washington Post, sought White House visitor logs that listed lobbyist Jack Abramoff. He pleaded guilty last year to public corruption charges.

The White House and the Secret Service in 2006 signed an agreement that visitors to the White House complex were not subject to public disclosure. That "memorandum of understanding" was disclosed during legal action over the Abramoff records.

Lamberth called that a "self-serving" agreement because it was issued after the records were created and after the CREW lawsuit.

The judge, in a separate ruling Monday, said he lacked the authority to order the Secret Service to stop destroying its visitor records once copies were turned over to White House officials. But Lamberth noted the National Archives had to approve any destruction of the logs.

Another federal judge in Washington ordered the release of Secret Service logs of visitors to Vice President Dick Cheney's office. Cheney claimed those logs were subject to executive privilege. That ruling is being appealed.

Lamberth noted the Secret Service has an important "protective mission" when compiling electronic information -- including background checks -- of those seeking to enter the White House complex. But he said the agency's claim of "limited use" of the data does not mean the records are not subject to judicial review.

"This does not mean the Secret Service does not read or rely on them," wrote Lamberth. "If that were the case, any convenience store patron who has ever bought a losing scratch ticket could claim they did not gamble simply because they held the ticket for only a few minutes."

The issue of White House privilege over visitor logs has not been fully addressed by the Supreme Court.

The case decided Monday is Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington v. U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

Posted by mikki at 07:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

That's obviously their punishment. :-) for the humor impaired.

Massive 'ice-maker' stops Heartland cold - CNN.com:


DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) -- Schools closed for thousands of youngsters, Iowa's biggest airport shut down and thick layers of ice brought down more power lines Tuesday as a major ice storm glazed the nation's midsection.

At least 22 deaths had been blamed on the storm system since the waves of sleet and freezing rain started during the weekend.

Officials in Missouri, Kansas and Oklahoma had declared states of emergency, and hundreds of thousands of people had been blacked out.

Iowa's largest school district closed for the day in Des Moines, telling its nearly 31,000 students to stay home, and kids across most of Oklahoma stayed home for a second day.

Schools also were closed in parts of Wisconsin, including Milwaukee Public Schools with 85,000 students. "We thought about our kids on foot," said Milwaukee schools spokeswoman Roseann St. Aubin. Some drivers couldn't even get to their buses, she said.

Posted by mikki at 03:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

US lesbian couple cannot get divorced in their home state - Pravda.Ru:


The state Supreme Court ruled that a lesbian couple who got married in Massachusetts cannot get divorced in another state.


>The court, in a 3-2 decision Friday, said the state's family court lacks the authority to grant the divorce of a same-sex couple because Rhode Island lawmakers have not defined marriage as anything other than a union between a man and a woman.

"The role of the judicial branch is not to make policy, but simply to determine the legislative intent," the court wrote.

Cassandra Ormiston and Margaret Chambers wed in Massachusetts in 2004 and filed for divorce last year in the nearby state of Rhode Island , where they both live. But opponents of same-sex marriage said the court correctly avoided taking a step toward recognizing such unions.

Massachusetts , the only state where gay marriage is legal, restricts the unions to residents of states where the marriage would be recognized, and a Massachusetts judge decided last year that Rhode Island is one of those states.

No law specifically bans same-sex marriages in Rhode Island , but the state has taken no action to recognize them. The justices said Rhode Island laws contain numerous references to marriage as between a woman and a man.

"My civil rights, my human rights have been denied," Ormiston said in a phone interview after the ruling. "It's no small matter."

Nancy Palmisciano, Ormiston's lawyer, said couples married in other states and other countries are routinely granted divorces in Rhode Island , and the same freedom should apply to this couple.

Now Ormiston is stuck in a marriage she does not want to be in, Palmisciano said. The women's lawyers have said at least one would have to move to Massachusetts to get a divorce, but Palmisciano said Friday that was not a viable option for her client.

"I'm disappointed for anyone who's involved in one of these marriages who's a resident of the state of Rhode Island ," she said. "I think these people are being confined to a legal limbo."

Louis Pulner, a lawyer for Chambers, said he was surprised by the decision.

"I feel that it's unfortunate that two people who are legally married can not get closure here in the state of Rhode Island ," Pulner said.

Lawyers for the women had argued that the court should consider only whether Rhode Island could recognize a valid marriage from another state for the sole purpose of granting a divorce petition.

Opponents of same-sex marriage praised Rhode Island 's top court for rejecting even a limited recognition of same-sex marriage.

"The meaning of marriage in Rhode Island is the union of a man and a woman," said Monte Stewart, president of the Marriage Law Foundation, which filed a brief in the case. "You have to have a marriage before you can have a divorce."

Karen Loewy, a staff attorney for Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, said she viewed the court's decision as a narrow ruling, but feared that same-sex marriage opponents would use it to argue against broader legal recognition for same-sex couples in Rhode Island .

"You're essentially asking these women to move to access justice," Loewy said. "The door of the courthouse has been barred for them."

Posted by mikki at 07:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

One of the things that continues to bother me is that more "New Agers" don't stand up and say "hey, wait just a minute here" when the latest "Pagan Star" stands up in front of a group and tells them they can all learn the extra special secret Indian whatever spirituality thing from them because they're ever so important and 1/1000th Foo Foo Indian from the Secret Tribe of Nobody Ever Heard of Em, for only 199.95. (I still should find a translation for "Spewing Butt Cheeks" and use that as my sacred Indian name).

We really do need to stand up and say "that is not us" and not be afraid to piss off those few in our community who don't understand what this rape of someone else's culture is about and think "it's all good." Well, it's not. and we have to say so, and not feed into this.

The Danger of 'Wannabes':


by Jason Pitzl-Waters

The Colorado Springs Gazette features an editorial from columnist Barry Noreen on the problems faced by Native Americans trying to preserve their religious culture in the face of appropriation and exploitation by the New Age community. Noreen continues this theme in his blog for the newspaper, where he recommends the NAFPS (New Age Frauds and Plastic Shamans) group, and claims that spiritual exploitation is "another way to attack Indians".

"Christians aren't the only ones for whom spirituality is a matter of life and death. So Jacob Anaya has taken up the role as a defender of the faith. Anaya, owner of All My Relations Creations in Manitou Springs, acknowledges he is a bit like the little Dutch boy, standing up against the latest assault on American Indian spirituality: New Agers. Anaya, originally of the Laguna Pueblo in New Mexico and later a teacher of Lakota traditions, gives presentations to sound warnings about modern charlatans who will sell sweat lodge, vision quest or pipe ceremonies for a price ... Typically, Anaya said, a New Age spiritualist will know some of the sweat lodge details and perhaps a snippet of Lakota language. They're all about trying to create a ceremony, not about treating it as a way of life ... These wannabes sometimes hand out certificates - "they start handing out (Indian) names like cigars," Anaya said, derisively suggesting someone can become "Squeaking Squirrel Butt" overnight."

Posted by mikki at 10:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

CNN is reporting that Mike Huckabee is now leading other republicans by 22 points in Iowa. This is a man who says he can't separate faith from politics. This misogynist would overturn Roe v. Wade, would appoint only "pro choice" people into public positions that have anything to do with women's choice, and says:

# As Governor, I did all I could to protect life. The many pro-life laws I got through my Democrat legislature are the accomplishments that give me the most pride and personal satisfaction. To me, life doesn't begin at conception and end at birth. Every child deserves a quality education, first-rate health care, decent housing in a safe neighborhood, and clean air and drinking water. Every child deserves the opportunity to discover and use his God-given gifts and talents.

Without even going into his draconian approach to religion, and his thoughts that global warning is a "moral issue," isn't this enough to reject the guy? What's going on there in Iowa anyway?

Perhaps the pundits have it right - the reason why Huckabee is doing well is because the media never thought he really had a chance, so hasn't seen fit to play hard ball with him and give the voters the information they might need. But wait a minute....does this mean that if "the media" chooses a candidate then we'll only get good information about that candidate? Do we really give them that much control of our lives and our votes? Is "One Nation Controlled By the Media" real?

Maybe that's why so many media conglomerates are against net neutrality..... Think about it.

Posted by mikki at 09:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)