Archive for October, 2008

Barack Hussein Osama Nobama, the baby-murdering Muslim

Wednesday, October 22nd, 2008

In case you haven’t heard, there’s a guy running for president named Barack Hussein Osama Nobama. This Nobama was born outside America and secretly schooled in Islamic terrorism at a Wahhabi madrassa. He then moved to the United States to take up the radical ’60s teachings of the Weather Underground’s Bill Ayers, while also organizing for ACORN, a subprime-lending, voter fraud-committing collective of affirmative-action welfare queens. All this happened before he became an elitist celebrity advocate of socialism, infanticide, the sexual abuse of children and treason.

– Richard Kim, The Nation

An exaggeration, right? Nobody could possibly really believe such idiocy?

Right…

Ohio Christians against baby-murdering Muslims for President

The prosecution rests. :)

Posted in stupidity, us elections | 5 Comments »

Powell, Obama and racism

Tuesday, October 21st, 2008

Conservatives such as Rush Limbaugh, naturally, are ignoring all of Colin Powell’s stated reasons, and saying he’s endorsing Obama only because they’re both black. Which, they say, amounts to racism.

Does that mean that they are voting for McCain only because they and McCain are white? The racist bastards! :)

In fact, if we take this absurdity to its logical limit, the only non-racists out there are the whites who’re voting for Obama, and the blacks who’re voting for McCain. Everyone else is just voting according to skin color, nothing more. Racists!

And to think these creeps have millions hanging on to their every word…

Posted in politics, racism, stupidity, us elections | 2 Comments »

The Onion’s eerily accurate 2001 prediction

Monday, October 20th, 2008

Just saw the link to it on Peter David’s blog. It’s hard to believe it was written in 2001, instead of 2008 with the advantage of hindsight.

Some gems:

"My fellow Americans," Bush said, "at long last, we have reached the end of the dark period in American history that will come to be known as the Clinton Era, eight long years characterized by unprecedented economic expansion, a sharp decrease in crime, and sustained peace overseas. The time has come to put all of that behind us."

During the 40-minute speech, Bush also promised to bring an end to the severe war drought that plagued the nation under Clinton, assuring citizens that the U.S. will engage in at least one Gulf War-level armed conflict in the next four years.

On the economic side, Bush vowed to bring back economic stagnation by implementing substantial tax cuts, which would lead to a recession, which would necessitate a tax hike, which would lead to a drop in consumer spending, which would lead to layoffs, which would deepen the recession even further.

And, naturally:

Bush had equally high praise for Attorney General nominee John Ashcroft, whom he praised as "a tireless champion in the battle to protect a woman’s right to give birth."

"Soon, with John Ashcroft’s help, we will move out of the Dark Ages and into a more enlightened time when a woman will be free to think long and hard before trying to fight her way past throngs of protesters blocking her entrance to an abortion clinic," Bush said. "We as a nation can look forward to lots and lots of babies."

Continued Bush: "John Ashcroft will be invaluable in healing the terrible wedge President Clinton drove between church and state."

Bush concluded his speech on a note of healing and redemption.

"We as a people must stand united, banding together to tear this nation in two," Bush said. "Much work lies ahead of us: The gap between the rich and the poor may be wide, be there’s much more widening left to do. We must squander our nation’s hard-won budget surplus on tax breaks for the wealthiest 15 percent. And, on the foreign front, we must find an enemy and defeat it."

The Onion: prophecies 10,000 times more accurate than any book written by Bronze Age desert nomads. :)

Posted in politics | 1 Comment »

Bush’s job approval: it boggles the mind

Monday, October 20th, 2008

According to RealClearPolitics, Bush currently has, in the U.S., a job approval of 24.6%. On the other hand, 69.3% disapprove.

To me, this is impossible to even begin to understand, unless I lower my appreciation of the human race even more. How can anyone who’s not a major partner of an oil or weapons company approve of Bush’s presidency? Think he’s doing an acceptable job? From fighting the wrong war to ruining the economy, from supporting Creationism to vetoing stem cell research – twice –… how can anyone with half a brain support him?

The only – scary – explanation is that about 25% of Americans – or about 76.363.250 people – would support Bush (or any other Republican) even if they saw him, with their own eyes, eating babies – because, no matter what he’s done, at least he’s not a lib’ral, doggone it!

If this is not something to keep one awake at night, I don’t know what is.

Posted in politics, stupidity | 2 Comments »

Powell, Obama and Muslims

Monday, October 20th, 2008

You’ve probably read the news by now (and, if you feel like being disgusted, read the comments at the bottom of this page: the number of Republicans who didn’t even listen to Powell’s reasons and are accusing him of supporting Obama just because they’re both black is simply scary), but I couldn’t let this part of Colin Powell’s statement pass by:

I’m also troubled by, not what Senator McCain says, but what members of the party say. And it is permitted to be said: such things as, "Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim." Well, the correct answer is he is not a Muslim; he’s a Christian, has always been a Christian. But the really right answer is, "What if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country?" The answer’s "No, that’s not America." Is there something wrong with some 7-year-old Muslim-American kid believing that he or she could be president? Yet, I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion he’s Muslim and he might be associated with terrorists. This is not the way we should be doing it in America.

Kudos to Powell for having the guts to say that (remember McCain’s (paraphrased) “no, he’s not an Arab,” (meaning “Muslim”, really), “he’s a decent family man”, thus implying that a Muslim can’t be one?). The implication, which probably shocks and offends the Religious Right like few other things in recent memory, is that being a Muslim is somehow not inferior to being a Christian, that being a Muslim (or a non-Christian in general) doesn’t disqualify someone for the presidency.

What next, they may be asking? “Is there something wrong with being an atheist in this country?” ;)

I’m betting, of course, that the media will focus on “Powell endorses Obama”, and ignore this small bit of what he said, but, to me, that was the most important part. I can easily imagine Powell saying the same thing about any other religion, or about the lack of one, and these things need to be said, to combat the Religious Right’s dream of religious tests for high office (which, of course, you’d only pass by adhering strictly to their exact branch of fundamentalist Christianity).

Incidentally, it’s strange that I haven’t seen mass conservative cries of “Obama is an atheist”, since atheists are even more demonized than Muslims in the U.S.. I guess it’s the old “there are really no atheists, as deep inside everyone knows God exists” thing.

Posted in atheism, politics, religion, us elections | 1 Comment »

“No, really, the alternative will be EVEN worse! Trust me!”

Wednesday, October 15th, 2008

Articles like this, which I seem to be reading several times a day as I follow the U.S. elections, really get on my nerves. Not just because they’re wrong (they are), but because they spread ignorance, fear, and a complete unwillingness to learn anything, no matter what.

I won’t quote from that article here; if you’re interested in the subject matter, you’ve probably saw a dozen of them this week. The gist of them is always: no matter how bad things are, an Obama presidency / Democratic Congress will be even worse. No, really. Trust us. Things may be pretty screwed up these days, but Obama is a socialist! A liberal! He will destroy Capitalism, destroy the economy (as if it needs help, after the Bush administration), lead the United States into the dark ages, and so on.

Evidence? No need for that; Obama is a Democrat! What else do you need? Don’t you know that Democrats hate capitalism, freedom, America, and all that? If they win, they will raise taxes for everyone, spend money they don’t have (unlike the Bush administration, of course, which would never do such a thing), and, of course, promote the gay agenda, ban religion, force people to have abortions, surrender to Al Qaeda, move to the metric system (gasp!), and so on. Because that’s exactly what happened when Clinton was president, right?

What really makes me angry is this: Bush has been the worst president in recent memory, and the troubles are all his administration’s fault. Yet, without any data, without evidence, they claim that a change of administration would make things even worse. Bush sucks, but Obama is a liberal, and nothing is worse than that, to these people. And many believe them. Even though the last Democratic administration was actually much more fiscally conservative than the “oh, let’s spend a few billions each month in Iraq each month; it’s not as if they come out of our pockets” Bushites.

I’ve always believed – whether talking about U.S. elections, or Portuguese elections, or any others – that, if the group in power screws up, they must be punished, and that only a complete idiot will believe any “devil you know” arguments about the possibility of an even worse alternative. This is not a “devil you know” versus a “devil you don’t”: only the former has actually shown himself to be a “devil”. Suppositions and guesses about Obama’s future government (especially when they contradict all his stated policies) shouldn’t ever be comparable to real, actual, recent-past facts about Bush and I-voted-with-him-90%-of-times McCain.

Posted in politics, us elections | 1 Comment »

The State of Way of the Mind

Tuesday, October 14th, 2008

As you’ve probably have noticed, this blog hasn’t had any new posts since May 2008, which has led to some queries about it being dead. Fortunately, it isn’t (it’s just pining for the fjords… sorry, couldn’t resist), but I feel I have a duty to explain things to my dear, (formerly) faithful readers.

One reason for my absence (from WotM and every other blog I author) was the changes in my life during these past months. New job, several new places of work (in the same job), new girlfriend, and even many physical changes at my home. Now, this by itself should have only affected my blogging for a couple of weeks or so, but then, as any blogger probably knows all too well, it’s hard to come back; you always feel that you have to apologize for “not doing your job”, and it’s easier to delay it… and delay… and delay…

Another reason is that, while my interests and hobbies tend to remain forever, they change in intensity. I’ve always gone through “phases” in my life: more reading, more video games, more socializing, and so on; and even each of those also tends to vary; for example, while reading atheism-related blogs was my passion in 2006 and 2007, these days I tend to go for, incredibly enough, U.S. politics (go, Obama!). If you don’t read, you don’t feel inspired to write, after all… so you get the idea of what happened. I’m happy to report that I’ve began to read Planet Atheism again for the last couple of days, and I’ve only just realized how much I’ve missed this subject for the last 5 months.

(incidentally, Planet Atheism is yet another problem – I have more than 100 new blogs and blog changes in my “to-do list”. But that’s a subject for another post, coming later today, or tomorrow.)

Since recently I’ve been fascinated with the U.S. elections, as I’ve said, until November I’ll be writing about them as well (probably mostly about them). Atheism and religion will go back to being the main themes afterwards.

Anyway, sorry about my absence; the least I could have done was to explain things, and I didn’t do so. I’ll try to be more careful about it in the future.

Posted in way of the mind (site) | 4 Comments »