hell’s handmaiden

It appears that despite my efforts, a number of US States still feel compelled, with the President, to deny some of their citizens equal rights under the law.

Apparently the governments of these states believe that marriage equals one man plus one woman, that gay marriage would be the end of marriage, that it undercuts the very fabric of society, resulting, certainly, in the collapse of western civilization if not in the end of civilization as a whole.

… here is a link to a very pro-gun site: LibertyNews.org - Liberty and Freedom for All

Popularity: 4%

The Questionable Authority’s headline is apt,Thou Shalt Not Be Bloody Stupid: His story has been all over the news lately - he’s the idiot with extensively drug resistant tuberculosis (XDR-TB) who took two intercontinental flights after being diagnosed with the disease because he didn’t want to mess up his long-planned wedding in Greece, or honeymoon in Rome.

Popularity: 1%

It is very common for creationists to complain that various radiometric dating methods– radio-carbon, potassium-argon, etc– don’t give the same dates. Thus, the misguided argument goes, radiometric dates can’t be trusted and let’s just scrap ‘em all.

I found, buried in a comment to an old post, possible the best response I’ve ever made to that objection.

Have you ever worked in a lab? Or been in a classroom where students did a lot of lab work?

Shoot a few, knock ‘em down, cost you half a buck now– The Guess Who.

An article– well worth reading– in the New Yorker closes with “There is no reason that any private citizen in a democracy should own a handgun. At some point, that simple truth will register. Until it does, phones will ring for dead children, and parents will be told not to ask why.”