Subtle semantic shift

Effective whenever we think about it, the Progressive Review will replace the terms “Christian right” and “Christian extremist” with the more theologically correct phrase “Christian heretic.” That which is known as fundamentalist Christianity is in fact a considerable perversion of Christian teachings, a heresy in which the word of God is altered to suit the prejudices of the purported Christian.

Here is just one example from Matthew of Jesus’ teaching that is defied regularly by Christian heretics of the televangelical ilk:

“And when you pray, you shall not be like the hypocrites. For they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the corners of the streets, that they may be seen by men. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward.

“But you, when you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly.”

We don’t have to actually burn them at the stake in the manner of heretics of yore, but their cynical attempt to give bigotry the cover of Christianity should at least be directly challenged.

And while we’re at it, let’s replace the phrase “Religious Right” with “Religious Wrong.”

No Comments »

Sometimes cell phones save lives, as witness this high school kayak trip in the ocean off Florida that got hit by a storm.

Hall and Moody paddled for hours, disoriented. Their luck finally turned around midnight, when they spotted some lights onshore — from Horseshoe, Fla. — and paddled toward them until Hall’s cellphone got a signal. Hall called his wife, Christina, who alerted the Coast Guard. A search was launched.

Two perished, the rest were saved, including Hall and Moody who paddled back to the students and had to be rescued themselves when the storm worsened. Sounds like Hall, the faculty leader, was an accomplished guide who did everything right and everything he could, and without his cell phone, this tragedy could have been much worse.

As is often the case in wilderness tragedies, the major factor in the tragedy was the weather.

No Comments »

Trauma of Iraq war haunting thousands returning home

Lt. Julian Goodrum, an Army reservist from Knoxville, Tenn., is being treated for PTSD with therapy and anti-anxiety drugs at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington. He checked himself into a civilian psychiatric hospital after he was turned away from a military clinic, where he had sought attention for his mental problems at Fort Knox, Ky. He’s facing a court-martial for being AWOL while in the civilian facility.

US seeks dismissal of lawsuit over use of Agent Orange in Vietnam

The US Justice Department has sought to dismiss a lawsuit by Vietnamese who say they were poisoned by the chemical defoliant Agent Orange used by US forces in the Vietnam War, The New York Times reported Monday.

The lawsuit, filed on behalf of millions of Vietnamese, accuses US chemical makers of committing crimes against humanity by supplying to US forces Agent Orange, which contains dioxin and is extremely toxic.

However, the US government, which is not among the accused in the suit to be presided over by US District Judge Jack Weinstein, has contended the claimed effects of Agent Orange are not supported by direct evidence.

State Department lawyers sent a note to Weinstein last month, saying that if the case were not thrown out, the “implications of plaintiffs’ claims are astounding as they would (if accepted) open the courthouse doors of the American legal system for former enemy nationals and soldiers claiming to have been harmed by the US Armed Forces” during wars.

Goodness, we can’t have injured people suing, can we? It would just be too darned expensive. The profits of chemical companies are way more important than the health of people.

No Comments »

From Dave Winer, who was instrumental in the invention of blogs, rss news feeds, and podcasting, and who just led the charge against Google’s odious AutoLink.

One side goes down, the other goes up.

On yesterday’s radio show, the host, Laura Knoy observed that as blogs are decentralizing, the mainstream media is centralizing — coalescing into fewer and fewer larger and larger companies. I said it’s always that way. Today someone will die, and on the same day, someone else will be born. Happens every day.

Now, while it’s easy now to visualize the end of the Web, the great experiment in public access to the text airways, because the geeks at Google have figured out how to put ads everywhere, even inside other people’s web pages; we are starting up a new medium, podcasting, that’s immune to their devilish trickery! There are no links in podcasts. Heh.

No Comments »

Supreme court bans execution of juveniles

The ruling will spare 72 convicts who killed before 18. The majority opinion cites ‘evolving standards of decency’ as well as global norms.

The US, until this ruling, was the only country that permitted such executions.

No Comments »

Vermont residents vote on pulling US troops out of Iraq . 

Vermont voters went to the polls Tuesday to overwhelmingly support a referendum to bring US troops home from Iraq, according to preliminary returns released early.

I love Vermont, and have spent considerable time there. A few years back, Vermont became to first state to allow gay unions, and the meme then spread. May this meme spread too!

No Comments »