Church and State separation is being followed in Washington:

It’s also being followed in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania (http://friendlyatheist.com/2009/11/26/the-war-on-christmas-in-chambersburg-pennsylvania):

Poor Fox News.

And also in Pennsylvania, the Freethought Society of Greater Philadelphia, which my brother is involved with, has put up their new annual holiday display, the Tree of Knowledge (http://friendlyatheist.com/2009/11/26/tree-of-knowledge-will-go-up-on-monday).

This is my favorite of all the holiday season displays because it says all the right things. It’s not even an atheist display. It’s about promoting the free marketplace of ideas. On the tree are the covers of numerous books including philosophy texts, various religious holy books, and books of religious criticism by the so-called “New Atheist” aurthors. I hope that next year, other cities will follow suit with their own Tree of Knowledge displays, particularly New York. This definitely looks like a job for New York’s Center For Inquiry.

Happy Season of Reason everybody!

Every time I hear something about H1N1 on the TV or the radio it is always revolved around support for the vaccination. This is the same type of vaccination that caused Guillan-Barre syndrome in some of the people who took it back in the 70’s. This new version of the vaccine was hardly tested before it was handed out to mass quantities of scared citizens. Somehow they didn’t tell us that you should not take Tylenol when you have the flu because a little boy has now died from doing so. How many times have we given our children Tylenol or Motrin to reduce a fever when they have the flu or after they’ve had their vaccinations? How many times have our pediatricians recommended this?

Many people who die with complications related to H1N1 are young people. If you do your homework, you’ll find that children and teenagers who take aspirin while they have the flu are at risk for Reye’s Syndrome. This disease is horrific and destroys the internal organs very rapidly with the liver and the brain getting the worst of it and eventually causing death. The weird thing is, I’ve heard about this syndrome but wasn’t really sure what it was until I did a little research of my own. My child’s pediatrician certainly never pointed it out. Good thing I never gave my daughter aspirin when she had the flu last year. Phew, that was close. The doctor will tell you what to give your child, but doesn’t always tell you why not to give them something else. Tylenol and Motrin were supposedly okay to give to our children and now they’re not. Doctors are now recommending cool baths and more old-fashioned techniques for fever reduction when your child has the flu. We probably should have stuck with those in the first place.

There have been many deaths in Mexico linked to a combination of the flu and fever reducers because patients have not been informed of the deadly effects. Japan put a stop to the use of NSAID’s (ex. Tylenol, Advil, Motrin, etc.) for reducing fever for children with the flu in 2000 and the fatality rates for children with the flu declined. Many people with flu related deaths between 1918 and 1919 in the U.S. were found to have complications beyond pneumonia at the time of death that were attributed to taking aspirin. Just before the high rates of death occurred, the Surgeon General and other health organizations recommended aspirin to the public. According to The British Medical Journal, antipyretics (pain relievers and fever reducers) are the cause for many flu related deaths and people should not take any of these should they get H1N1.

The H1N1 pandemic has been haunting us since last year and you would think that I would not have to dig for this type of information to find it. The deadly combination of flu and fever reducers should have been public knowledge well before this pandemic even began. The government is so obsessed with pumping out this ridiculous flu vaccine that they are not paying attention to the fact that people are dying from something as simple as Tylenol and aspirin.

Keep yourself informed as this story changes daily, Fox News, CNN and Discovery Health Channel on Dish Network have all dedicated coverage to H1N1.

Today the Secret Service says they are embarrassed by the security breech. To think that someone off the street could get this close to the leader of the free world is just frightening. Why were these people passed through? Could it be a case of racial profiling? Would a black couple have been able to move so easily through the gates? I don’t think so we are constantly challenged to prove who we are. It was bad enough to see their pictures with the vice-president, but today we now know they were up close and personal with the president. Some are laughing this off as some kind of humorous prank, but this is serious. These people wanted their 15 minutes and they got it, but hopefully there will be some serious consequences from this incident.

We were spent! A big dinner for family given by Patty’s about-to-be in-laws one night, her birthday party the next night, the wedding celebration at Old Stone House the next day, a reception at our house afterwards–all in three days–and then, the daunting prospect that produced the blues, Thanksgiving facing us in two days, shopping, and the cooking of a turkey!

But the blues turn rosy. Henry and I, being the eldest of the bunch, kept our feast of Thanksgivers small: Pat, Will, ourselves, my niece, Dianne Brandi, of Fox News. And it turned out (good news!) to be a talk-and-turkey fest, as we munched an entire (almost!)  10-pound turkey– celebrating makes you hungry–chattering about all and sundry: Biden, Obama, the two break-in guests at the White House dinner, our relatives back in New Haven, Pat’s coming art exhibit in California, pumping mother’s milk (undecided as yet), Pat and Will’s weeklong trip to Morocco, looking at wedding pictures which Will, master technician, had managed to be shown on our computer screen.

And then, happily, to bed.

How HORRENDOUS that Washington decide to treat groups equally and avoid controversy?

Typically pathetic coverage by Fox News, of something that’s barely news. Spin spin spin…

Those filthy atheists that don’t celebrate anything. Those minorities. Ruining our celebration by not putting it on state property! Rah rah rah!

UPDATE 2: Were injuries caused by Tiger’s jealous wife?

UPDATE: Injured Tiger Looks to be Out of the Woods.

According to the Florida Highway Patrol, Tiger Woods was seriously injured in a car accident early this morning.

No confirmation of any specific details that I have seen yet except for brief updates by CNN and ESPN. I saw on RotoWorld.com that Tiger Woods agent told CNBC that Woods was fine. We’ll have to keep watching and hope that Tiger is OK.

If anyone does hear or find any links to more information, please feel free to leave in the comment section.

From the Associated Press:

Authorities say Tiger Woods has been seriously injured in a car wreck in Florida.

The Florida Highway Patrol says the PGA star hit a fire hydrant and a tree as he pulled out of his driveway early Friday in his 2009 Cadillac sport utility vehicle.

Woods was taken to Health Central Hospital. His condition was not immediately known, though the news release said his injuries were serious.

The highway patrol says the crash is still under investigation, and charges are pending. However, the highway patrol said the crash was not alcohol-related.

From CNN:

Golfer Tiger Woods has been taken to a Florida hospital after suffering serious injuries in a car wreck early Friday, officials said.

The one-car accident occurred about 2:25 a.m. near his home in Windermere, a suburb of Orlando, according to an incident report from the Florida Highway Patrol.

Woods, 33, had just pulled out of his driveway and begun to drive down the street when his Cadillac SUV struck a fire hydrant, the Florida Highway Patrol said.

The front of his vehicle then struck a tree. He has been transported to Health Central Hospital, the statement said.

From USA Today:

Tiger Woods was seriously injured in a car accident early this morning, the Florida Highway Patrol reported.

Woods pulled out of his driveway in the Isleworth community about 2:25 a.m. ET when he struck a fire hydrant, and then drove into a tree at his neighbor’s property, the FHP reported, according to the Orlando Sentinel.

Woods was transported to Health Central Hospital in Ocoee in serious condition, FHP told the newspaper. However, a hospital employee said at 2:30 p.m. ET that Woods was not a patient. A hospital operator would not say if Woods had been treated and released.

From the Miami Herald:

Famous pro golfer Tiger Woods was seriously injured in a car crash early Friday outside his Orlando home, according to The Orlando Sentinel.

The single-car crash occurred early Friday when Woods, 33, apparently slammed his Escalade into a fire hydrant and a tree at his neighbor’s property, the newspaper said quoting Florida Highway Patrol officials.

The crash occurred as Woods pulled out of his home in his Escalade in the Isleworth community at about 2:25 a.m.

Fox News host Glenn Beck put to rest any rumors of one possible “dream ticket” team for 2012: Palin-Beck. On his radio show Thursday, Beck said he was “absolutely” ruling out the possibility of running for office with the ex-governor at the top of the ticket. His proffered reason: Palin would always be “yapping,” like they were “in the kitchen.”

Earlier in the week Palin said that she was open to the idea of pairing up with Beck. Palin told Fox News she “got a kick” out of the idea of them running together. She went on cheerfully, “He probably thought it was just a hoot too. I don’t know, we’ll see.” Palin told Newsmax she could “envision a couple of different combinations, if ever I were to be in a position to really even seriously consider running for anything in the future, and I’m not there yet.” She added: “But Glenn Beck I have great respect for. He’s a hoot.”

It looks like the respect might not be mutual. From the morning’s radio show:

BECK: I don’t think things are hoots. I don’t. I don’t think it’s a hoot. I would never use the word hoot, and I respectfully ask that every time my name is brought up she would stop using the word ‘hoot.’ [...]No, no I’m just saying — Beck-Palin, I’ll consider. But Palin-Beck — can you imagine, can you imagine what an administration with the two of us would be like? What? Come on! She’d be yapping or something, and I’d say, “I’m sorry, why am I hearing your voice? I’m not in the kitchen.”

Listen:

The Huffington Post

From DailyKos, Jon Stewart calls out FOX News “Not even close to news” – as always, Stewart nails it.

I can’t get the video to embed … click the DailyKos link.

November 25, 2009

ABC News’ Teddy Davis reports:

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is planning to headline an event which is being promoted as the “First National TEA Party Convention,” according to Palin spokeswoman Meg Stapleton.

The “TEA party convention”, which is taking place in Nashville, Tenn., from Feb. 4-6, is an understandable target for Palin.

In her new book, “Going Rogue,” Palin repeatedly heaps praise on a TEA party movement that vigorously opposes the tax, spending, and borrowing policies of President Barack Obama. …

http://blogs.abcnews.com/thenote/2009/11/palin-to-headline-tea-party-convention.html

And the neocons keep displaying their RHETORIC talents. Not  a one, starting from the original neocon has a positive, constructive performance to show to America. And likely none would want investigative reporters hanging around. But it’s ok for FOX News people to show up as cheerleaders in their FAIR and BALANCED coverage of the news. And if the FOX news family can KILL Google prior to the “event”, perhaps the world will be forced to PAY for the fair and balanced reporting of FOX News.

And apparently the neocons have decided that Ronald Reagan is the most brainy of their lot. They want to dedicate the Republican Party to the original neocon - Ronald Reagan. His administration, in addition to selling cocaine to America, must have sold the neocon idea.

How in Hades can a political faction, start out selling cocaine and end up by crashing America’s economy – still picture itself as a viable political faction? One might reasonably wonder if they retained some of the cocaine that they intended to sell to minority Americans. The IN-DENIAL idea is inadequate to explain neocon behavior.

The Palin type neocons want to brainwash America into believing they are fiscal conservatives. If Americans believe that – then America deserves what it gets from the neocons. It is truly difficult to save America from itself! When we meet the enemy – and the enemy is us, then we have a problem.

Obama is spending on America’s population. Neocons are likely to call that socialism. What the neocons want is something that is the image of fascism. Putting money in the hands of America’s citizens rather than America’s businesses is not the idea of neocons even after the neocons bankrupted many in America’s population. The neocons, with perhaps one exception, are in a class by themselves.

Some politically connected companies “made out like bandits” as a result of the Iraq war. And the Iraq Oil! Anyone who believes the Iraq war was not about Iraqi OIL may be a neocon. The Halliburton Company made out nicely in Iraq’s hydrocarbon industry.

It is appalling how little the brains of the neocons thinks of the brains of Americans.

But, actually, the neocons are taking a page from Winston Churchill’s book: Never give up; Never Ever Give Up; Never Ever, Ever Give Up. However, the neocons are nowhere near Winston Churchill’s performance but – neither has Satan given up. And so long as the neocons have escaped prosecution for tons of illegal actions, why give up? Why not pull America DOWN to the neocons level?

Palin will headline – FOX News will likely byline. And America will once again be fed a dose of neocon RHETORIC. AT NO TIME WILL THE NEOCONS GIVE THEIR PERFORMANCE AS AN EXAMPLE OF HOW TO DO SOMETHING. And they have been leading America’s government for twenty-four years. Surely, they must have accomplished something of note – RIGHT?

A fool and his country are soon parted

They know that you don’t use a pie chart when your percentages total more than 100 percent:

But we already know that Fox News’ standards are ridiculously low.

Hat tip: Probably Bad News

The big chiefs at Fox News aren’t happy at the string of high-profile lies they got caught telling recently, so they’re going to start firing people who get caught in the future, because they hate having to admit mistakes. “That means we will start by going to air with only the most essential, basic, and manageable elements”, so no Glenn then?

Source:
http://gawker.com/5411282/fox-news-to-go-error free-in-2010

Is that all it takes? If viewers enjoyed Fox & Friends yesterday a little more than usual, they may be asking themselves, “Why?” Perhaps, it is because FNC which proudly embraces the “Fox” in its name was forced to be less miserly in meting them out. With co-anchor Gretchen Carlson in Florida interviewing former gov Sarah Palin, FNC Senior VP of Programming was “forced” to add a second main femme, Alisyn Camerota, to the almost “all boy” club at F&F.

It was a refreshing return to better days when both Aly and Gretchen graced the show daily. The audience was reminded of the time when F&F, weekday and weekend, was more gender proportionate. Then Shine had not yet replaced F&FW’s Ainsley Earhardt with Aly and, subsequently, pared the prominent position of newsreader (which had been aptly held by a female to help balance the second lad on the F&F curvy couch). It was before there was just one girl Gretchen to the duo of F&F boys, Steve Doocy and Brian Kilmeade and only one lass, Aly, to the F&FW trio of lads, Clayton Morris, Dave Briggs, and Rick Reichmuth.

Bill, a bit more sex parity, please. It’s time to make it Foxes and Friends once again!

Um, I didn’t think “fair and balanced” was supposed to mean “ignorant of basic arithmetic”, but I guess I was wrong.  Fox News is that bad.

The Visual Display of Stupidby Kieran Healy on November 25, 2009Fox News Pie ChartI’d almost be happier if this turned out to be some kind of fake. But in the meantime, while you may think of it as a badly flawed and unfair pie chart, I prefer to see it as actually just an extreme version of a genuine pie chart.

via The Visual Display of Stupid — Crooked Timber.

The next time you’re tempted to tell one of your Tea Party friends they are exaggerating about the Obama-run government, don’t.

Rush Limbaugh makes a joke one day, and the media or the Administration acts it out the next.

Glenn Beck is excoriated for saying Obama is going to fill the government with radicals—and then several quit under pressure because the American people can’t stomach their extreme views.

Sean Hannity is poo-poohed by “smart” so-called conservatives like Brooks, Buckley and Frum, saying Obama is not radical, he’s moderate, even conservative by “temperament.”  We get Cap and Trade, Government Motors and Socialized Medicine.

Vince Flynn’s latest thriller seems to take a point to the ridiculous extreme when his hero, Mitch Rapp, is hauled before a Senate committee for dislocating a terrorist’s shoulder while extracting information in the middle of a massive terrorist attack.  A friend chuckled and commented about my review, “I like the point, but that’s a bit far.”

You might think so, but as Steve Centani reported on Fox News last night, Ahmed Hashim Abed, the Iraqi terrorist who ambushed American contractors, burned their bodies and hung them from a bridge, (which precipitated the Battle of Fallujah) has filed a complaint against the Navy SEAL team that captured him.

A terrorist has a “bloody lip;” the SEALs are being court-martialed

And not because this piece of human debris only has a bloody lip.  This is not a joke.  Well, it is, but not a funny one.

The 2004 atrocity on the Fallujah bridge became a symbol of the brutality of the insurgency in Iraq.  The fact that these men are facing punishment instead of a medal ceremony is a perfect symbol for the futility of the Obama play-acting at war.

Of course, next week Barack Obama will be accepting a medal—and a million bucks.  Because the people on the committee expected precisely this kind of behavior from the United States now that he is President.

My head hurts.

An article by Rowan Scarborough on Fox’s website lists the three scapegoats to political correctness:

Matthew McCabe, a Special Operations Petty Officer Second Class (SO-2), is facing three charges: dereliction of performance of duty for willfully failing to safeguard a detainee, making a false official statement, and assault.

Petty Officer Jonathan Keefe, SO-2, is facing charges of dereliction of performance of duty and making a false official statement.

Petty Officer Julio Huertas, SO-1, faces those same charges and an additional charge of impediment of an investigation.

What’s mindboggling about this, is that the SEALs had handed Abed over to Iraqi custody, and he was returned after making the complaint.  The SEALs all deny he was punched while they had him.  (So much for the old fighting to the death thing, eh?)  It’s no secret the enemy would rather be in American custody than Iraqi custody.

So, the SEALs probably did not even give Abed the bloody lip; but this is certainly going to give the Obama Defense Department a black eye.

This is going to do wonders for recruiting.  I already know one college student considering OCS after graduation who upon hearing this news said, “Well that option’s off the table until we get a real Commander-in-Chief.”

The three SEALs were offered a non-judicial punishment called “a captain’s mast.”  A slap on the wrist to be sure, but a long-term derailment of three promising careers.  A mark on their permanent records, if you will.

So, McCabe, Keefe and Huertas rejected the plea agreement and demanded to appear before a Court Martial to fight for real justice.

Think it’s a stretch to blame Obama for this?  It’s pretty far down the chain of command, after all.

Look, admirals and generals know what their Commander-in-Chief wants, and know how to curry favor.  This is new ground.  While many of us were outraged at the Haditha prosecutions of Marines, non-combatants died there.  George W. Bush was a war president for 7 years.  There were no “fat lip” prosecutions during that time.  If you think that’s a coincidence…

To paraphrase Indiana Jones, have none of these people EVER seen a World War II movie?  Even the Geneva Convention, which the Obama crowd claims to genuflect before, allows you to take non-uniformed combatants out back and shoot them immediately.  To extend GC protections to terrorists makes a uniform a target, and not wearing one a distinct advantage.

I’m confident that no court-martial panel made up of warriors will convict these heroes.  And they are certainly better off facing a “military tribunal” of sorts than in falling into the hands of the Obama/Holder Justice Department, where the following is considered a possible war crime.

Think I’m kidding?  Read the Justice Department report on the justification for Holder’s persecution of the CIA.

Note that despite being three of the best-trained soldiers in the world, these three are still not officers.  Perhaps they should have lectured their comrades that Muslims around the world should rise up against the Yankee invaders, railed that infidels must be beheaded, tried to turn in other soldiers for war crimes, and reached out to al Qaeda recruiters with telephone calls.

Then, they’d likely be at least Captains by now in the politically correct military.

For enemy morale and recruiting, this is worse than Abu Ghraib, and even the future KSM trial.  Our most highly trained commandos, the point of the spear in our fight against the enemy, are being put ON TRIAL for something that would likely have a street cop given a week’s suspension.  Forget being trained to resist our interrogation techniques, now al Qaeda can just tell their operatives, “If you are captured, just cry `I have an owie!’”

Today, the Obama-led military has given al Qaeda something to be thankful for.  The biggest propaganda victory since the beginning of the war on terror.

Former Bush press secretary Dana Perino made a rather odd claim on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show last night.

Talking about how we ought to label the deadly shooting at Fort Hood — – Perino said no terrorists attacked the U.S. while Bush was President.

Source:
http://tpmlivewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/11/perino-no-terrorists-attacked-america-on-bushs-watch.php

Environmentalists Get Angry Over Climategate Scandal

 Today we learned that a couple, Tareq and Michaele Salahi,  breeched security and attended the White House State Dinner. This is the first time something like this has happened. How could this happen? According to NBC Brian Williams they tried to enter one of the entrances and they were turned around. They then entered the pedestrian entrance. How did they get through? They looked like they belonged. They were dressed appropriately and they had the right swagger, but what else? This couple managed to take pictures with Vice-President Joe Biden and they had the nerve to post them on their Facebook page. They are being called party crashers, but that simply seems a little too cute. These people are criminals there is nothing cute about this. Assassination attempts are up 400% since President Obama took office. This is a security breech and some heads need to roll on this one. This is simply unacceptable.

Im Internet sind Hunderttausende Pager-Nachrichten zu den Terroranschlägen des 11. September 2001 veröffentlicht worden. Die Website Wikileak, die sich nach eigenen Angaben darum bemüht, die “Wahrheit” ans Licht zu bringen, stellte die Textnachrichten ins Netz.

Twintowers

Es sind teils verzweifelte Aufrufe an Verwandten oder Eheleuten, sich zu melden, teils sind es auch Mitschnitte der Polizei und Feuerwehr.

“Bitte, geh nicht aus dem Gebäude raus. Einer der Türme ist gerade zusammengestürzt. Bitte sei vorsichtig!”, zitierte der Nachrichtensender Fox News aus einer der Mitteilungen. Aus anderen gehe hervor, dass der Geheimdienst befürchtet habe, dass das Flugzeug mit dem aus Florida nach Washington fliegenden US-Präsidenten George W. Bush ebenfalls ein Ziel der Terroristen sein könnte. Daraufhin sei die Maschine umgeleitet worden.

Insgesamt wurden nach Angaben von Wikileak 573.000 Textnachrichten veröffentlicht, die über Handys oder Pager in einem Zeitraum von 24 Stunden vor und nach den Anschlägen verschickt wurden. Bei den Anschlägen in New York und auf das Verteidigungsministerium bei Washington waren damals etwa 3.000 Menschen getötet worden.

WikiLeaks releases 573.000 pager intercepts from 9/11 2001.

8:51:31 AM Andrew.Terzakis@pentagon.af.mil|Please call Pentagon Weather|UNCLASSIFIED
           Please call Pentagon Weather.......reference 1030 Meeting.....703-695-0406
           ANDREW J. TERZAKIS, Lt
8:53:44 AM "NYPD Ops Div" <|1 PCT WORLD TRADE CENTER|--- 1 PCT - WORLD TRADE CENTER -
           POSSIBLE EXPLOSION WORLD TRADE CENTER BUILDING. LEVEL 3 MOBILIZATION TO CHURCH
           AND VESSY.
10:05:57 AM Please don't leave the building. One of the towers just collapsed!
           PLease, please be careful. Repeat,

http://911.wikileaks.org/files/index.html

Das Laufhaus in Wien