Carnival of the Godless!

Carnival of the Godless is a wonderful little post on Atheist Revolution that has links to quite a few blogs writing about atheism. It's a real treasure trove that could take quite a while to get through. I have to thank PZ Myers of Pharyngula for the link. I usually don't like leaving comments on blogs but I felt compelled to leave some on his earlier postings and he will now be a regular for me on Google Reader.
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Another good post can be found at Rationally Speaking, a blog by Massimo Pigliucci, talking about the presidential abuse of power in American. We owe a great debt to Washington for refusing to be king. At the end of the revolution many wanted him crowned but he refused, at the end of his 2 terms as president the public cry was, once again, for him to be king. His comment was “I did not battle George the III all those years just to become George I.” Without his great humility we might never have been a democracy. But he was also the first president to invoke Presidential Privilege, which was not mentioned in the constitution when they drew up the blueprint of presidential powers.

Biologists Helping Bookstores

This a blog about a biologist in Orange County who has taken it upon himself to rearrange the books on the shelves.

Particularly Intelligent Design books that are placed in the Science section. He quite properly removes them and places them in the Religion section, but he doesn't pick only on Christians, he also moved Hitchens' book, "God is not Great" over to the philosophy section.

This is unacceptable, and something must be done. Booksellers are not scientists, maybe we shouldn't expect them to be able to discern between science and books desperately trying to wrap themselves in scientific credibility. I, however, am a scientist - and I can clearly see when an error has been made when stocking the shelves of the science section.

It is my mission to correctly re-shelve books to the appropriate section of the bookstore.

I would think he's only helping out the bookstores, after all, anyone who would read Behe wouldn't have any reason to be in the science section.

One Great Blog

The name probably looks intimidating but don't let it bother you. This is what it means: "Ballard (1981) coined the term "pharyngula" to refer to the embryo that has developed to the phyolotypic stage, when it posesses the classic vertebrate bauplan." The tag line under the log, in case it's too small to see is: "Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal."

See? Very simple. This is a science blog run by a biology professor but is really much more of a social commentary about the state of America today.

Take this interesting article which is about why you have to register with the government to buy a chemistry beaker in some states but any idiot can buy a gun without registering it at all.

Or this one: An almost biblical curse about a very tragic case of inbreeding in a small Mormon community that believes in polygamy.

This one is about Paul Hill, who murdered an abortion doctor outside his clinic:

" Behold, Paul Hill Days.

A couple of deranged Christian organizations are planning to send their members to Milwaukee, Wisconsin at the end of July to thump about like a gang of gumbies, bellowing about what a good man Paul Hill was. God's man. A hero. A martyr.

And to crown this exercise in lunacy and poor taste, they're planning a reenactment of the murders."

It's truly amazing that there are people who think it's a good idea to celebrate a murderer, and that reenacting the murders is a fun day.

The whole blog is filled with these gems and is really worth a look. Back in the day the hippies used to say that our society was sick, they were right but we were downright sane back then compared to America in the 21st century.

I'm sure glad the iPhone will be out soon to cheer me up, though I probably won't be getting one for a couple of years, since I just signed up for 2 more years at Verizon with 2 new free phones. Hopefully in 2 years the iPhone will be even better, more affordable, and - wishful thinking - Cingular will have become a provider worth having. Or maybe a competitor will come up with a phone almost as good that sells only for Verizon. Sounds like a great idea for Palm or LG, because right now Cingular would have to pay me to use their service, and if it wasn't a whole lot of money I'd still turn them down. Which means I can be bought but I'm not cheap.