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 Friday, July 8, 2005
Fred Phelps: Thank God for the bombing of London[base ']s subway today - July 7, 2005 -
I took a look at the Westboro Baptist Church today and well...I guess I wasn't surprised by their actions which is kind of scary.
Think Progress says: Fred Phelps, head of the Westboro Baptist church, isn[base ']t content with just celebrating hate crimes or the death of American soldiers. The group has now posted a press release in response to yesterday[base ']s horrific attacks on London.
Thank God for the bombing of London[base ']s subway today - July 7, 2005 - wherein dozens were killed and hundreds seriously injured. Wish it was many more. [Crooks and Liars]
Remember this guy's name. He has been going around the country picketing the funerals of soldiers. They picketed the funeral of Matther Shepard becasue he ws gay. They have created a web site called 'God Hates Fags.' This site is so far out that I thought it was a parody site. But reading the FAQ page was really chilling. This one for example: Why do you preach hate?
Because the Bible preaches hate. For every one verse about God's mercy, love, compassion, etc., there are two verses about His vengeance, hatred, wrath, etc. The maudlin, kissy-pooh, feel-good, touchy-feely preachers of today's society are damning this nation and this world to hell. They are telling you what you want to hear rather than what you need to hear, just like what happened in the days of Isaiah and Jeremiah: "That this [is] a rebellious people, lying children, children [that] will not hear the law of the LORD: Which say to the seers, See not; and to the prophets, Prophesy not unto us right things, speak unto us smooth things, prophesy deceits: Get you out of the way, turn aside out of the path, cause the Holy One of Israel to cease from before us." Isaiah 30:9-11; "Then the LORD said unto me, The prophets prophesy lies in my name: I sent them not, neither have I commanded them, neither spake unto them: they prophesy unto you a false vision and divination, and a thing of nought, and the deceit of their heart." Jeremiah 14:14; "They have healed also the hurt [of the daughter] of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace; when [there is] no peace. Were they ashamed when they had committed abomination? nay, they were not at all ashamed, neither could they blush: therefore they shall fall among them that fall: at the time [that] I visit them they shall be cast down, saith the LORD." Jeremiah 6:14-15. And also in the New Testament we are warned: "For there are many unruly and vain talkers and deceivers, specially they of the circumcision: Whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole houses, teaching things which they ought not, for filthy lucre's sake. One of themselves, [even] a prophet of their own, said, The Cretians [are] alway liars, evil beasts, slow bellies. This witness is true. Wherefore rebuke them sharply, that they may be sound in the faith." Titus 1:11-13; "But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. And many shall follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of." II Peter 2:1,2. What you need to hear is that God hates people, and that your chances of going to heaven are nonexistent, unless you repent. What you need to hear is a little fire and brimstone preaching, like Jesus preached. What you don't need to hear is that you're okay just the way you are, and God accepts everyone without exception. Don't listen to the money-grubbing heretic who stands at the front of your church. Listen to God. If you are one of His elect, you'll hear.
What a sad world these people inhabit. 1:06:50 PM 
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White Wolf cuts own throat with "licensing fees" for game organizers. Cory Doctorow:
White Wolf, who publish live action RPGs (LARPs), have changed their policy so that anyone who runs a game where fees are collected have get permission in the form of a $20 per-player-per-year license from White Wolf (White Wolf also wants you to take this license in exchange for the right to print t-shirts and other schwag with the name of your own troupe on it).
Serious LARPers who love and promote the hobby (and have therefore kept White Wolf in business) often go to great personal expense to organize games: renting halls, making props, printing and photocopying materials, etc, and they ask their players to pay fees to recoup those costs -- indeed, it's hard to imagine LARPing as a viable hobby without this practice, since it would practically limit play to those willing to buy a pig in a poke by investing in their own props and such before they've played their first game.
These LARPing evangelists are being treated by White Wolf as infringers (though WW generously allows that the infringement might have been unintentional) and White Wolf requires that these pirates pay a fee to get legit.
When I was a kid playing RPGs in Toronto, I'd spend every Saturday at a rented hall in the Harbourfront complex, where every RPG imaginable was on offer. I paid a modest fee ($2?) to help cover the cost of the rental. If the organizers had had to get licenses from all the game publishers whose wares were in play at those events, it would have been impossible to manage.
I spent fortunes on gaming crap as a result of those Harbourfront games, pouring all my discretionary cash into the industry. The games I played the most were the games I spent the most money on. The way I got to play those games was by being introduced to them by GMs who were charging fees.
White Wolf is cutting its own throat, treating its super-recommender customers like thieves, and demanding that the entire world of LARPing rearrange itself to White Wolf's increased convenience and profitability. This isn't running a business, it's crybaby capitalism, the hysterical terror that someone, somewhere is turning a dime without cutting you in for a nickel. Nice going WW. See you on the scrapheap of history.
In brief, White Wolf is requesting that those who wish to charge players to play White Wolf games (beyond standard fees at a convention) obtain a license to do so from us. We request this both in order to ensure we can provide a consistent level of support and play experience to those fans looking to play our games and in order to protect our rights in terms of trademark and so forth. Yes, our games are meant to be played and we encourage everyone to do so âo[per thou] but charging players is stepping into a commercial arena and license agreements then come into play. Our vehicle for granting this license is membership in the Camarilla.
I do understand that there is going to be resistance to this policy. Many people have run or played in a wide variety of pay-for-play games (especially live-action games) using a White Wolf setting or system without any intention of infringing our rights. I hope that our efforts to support the various licensed games (listing on our website, promotion on mailing lists and in newsletters, promotional giveaways and prize support, etc.) will ultimately outweigh what may feel at first like an effort to stifle fan enthusiasm.
Link
(Thanks, Garrett!)
[Boing Boing]
Even companies that cater to fanatics make really stupid business decisions. Wizards of the Coats did and it looks like something similar. Somehow these companies think that fans are idiots and can be easily made to keep paying, as if they are drug addicts or something. But fans get pissed really quickly when disrespected. Some things do not change. 12:52:52 PM
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Judge: Lethal injection not cruel, unusual. (by Last Night in Little Rock)
CNN reports today that a Kentucky trial judge upheld lethal injection as a form of execution, as long as the state does not use the jugular vein if another vein is not available.
While upholding lethal injection, the judge said the state should not be allowed to administer the fatal drugs through an intravenous catheter stuck into the prisoner's jugular vein, in the neck, if no suitable veins can be found in the arms or legs.
He said it was unconstitutionally cruel and should be removed from the process. Officials said they had already removed that step as an option.
Unless somebody has witnessed an execution, one cannot say that even lethal injection is completely painless. I've watched two clients die, and the experience never leaves you. They gasp for air and their face turns gray as life slips away. 'They' say it is peaceful, but it isn't. Why anybody would volunteer to witness an execution is beyond me. I did it because I was obligated to as counsel and among the last friend the clients seemingly had. [TalkLeft: The Politics of Crime]
As I recall reading, this procedure would not be used on animals, that the possibe screams of the prisoner are not heard because their diaphram is paralyzed, that the procedure has not been vetted to see just what alternatives might be used, ones that result in a more humane death. 12:33:17 PM
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Norm Ornstein: Announcing a New Contest. A few weeks back, there was a ballyhooed competition for the most memorable lines in movie history, which naturally included the likes of "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn," and "May the Force be with you." It is time for the Huffington Post to launch a comparable competition for the most memorable lines in political history. At lunch today, the discussion turned to Marion Barry, and I reminisced about a key element of his enduring legacy: "The bitch set me up." It won't make number one on the list; my first-cut candidate there is "I am not a crook." "It all depends on the meaning of the word is" will be somewhere up there. A new candidate, moving up on the rail is "The insurgency is in its last throes." Actually, my favorite candidate from President Bush, but one that is unlikely to make the top twenty, came soon after Saddam was toppled, when he said of Iraq, "It will take some time to restore the chaos." He was wrong, of course. I have barely scratched the surface here, but I invite fellow Huffington Posters and outside observers to join in. It may make for an amusing diversion as we try hard to restore the chaos here in Washington [The Huffington Post | Blog Picks Feed]
QUite a nice idea. The comments have a ton of them. 12:26:11 PM
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David Sirota: Brit Hume Goes On TV & Says He Wants to Profit Off the Terrorist Attack.  Media Matters points out that Fox News' top anchorman, Brit Hume, gave us a glimpse into just how cynical, greedy and disgusting the right-wing's outlook on the world is:
"My first thought when I heard - just on a personal basis, when I heard there had been this attack and I saw the futures this morning, which were really in the tank, I thought, 'Hmmm, time to buy.'"
- Fox News's Brit Hume, 7/7/05
That's right - his first thought after hearing about the awful terrorist attack in London today wasn't "how tragic," or "let's say a prayer for the dead," or "how can I help the victims" - his first thought was, there was a terrorist attack, how can I personally profit off it? In fact, his impulse to use the bloodshed to make himself money was so intense, he actually voiced it on national television (FYI - in case you'd like to voice your displeasure, Brit's email address is brit.hume@foxnews.com and his office number is 202-824-6300).
Of course, this was only the worst example from Fox. Earlier in the day, Fox reporter Brian Kilmeade seemed to cheer on the attack because he said "it works to our advantage." Meanwhile, Fox's Stuart Varney was genuinely excited that the attack will mean other progressive issues will now be knocked out of the public debate. "It takes global warming off the front burner," Varney frothed. "It takes African aid off the front burner. It sticks terrorism and the fight on the war on terror, right up front all over again."
Remember, these people are using the public's airwaves to spew out this bile. To call these people nauseating is an insult to nausea. [The Huffington Post | Blog Picks Feed]
Nothing to really add here. Just continuing confirmation that my choice to stop watching Fox and CNN was correct. These guys just do not know how to discuss breaking events. They can show lots of pictures ut have little ability to place the pictures in any context. Anyone who could look at what happened and even think about making money on the stock market, much less his first thought, should not have the job. And to believe that is a thought we all want to hear, demonstrating his shallowness, makes me feel good that I do not waste my time with Brit Hume. The BBC, Knight-Ridder, Google News, Reuters Television provide a much better, mutli-perspective idea of what is happening. (Reuters TV actually has a lot of Raw News feeds of breaking events, so you can see what happened with little editorial interference. 12:18:06 PM
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Bill Scher: Why Does Pakistan Have A Veto Over Our National Security?. Here's a crazy idea for how the UK and the US could respond to the July 7 terror attack: get Osama bin Laden.
Conveniently, our CIA chief says he has an excellent idea where he is.? CNN, the BBC and others reported that his full remarks suggested he thinks Osama is in Pakistan.
What's stopping us? Pakistan, our ally? doesn't allow US troops to enter its country in pursuit of terrorists. As the NY Times reported back in Dec.:
Pakistan does not permit American military and intelligence forces in Afghanistan to cross the border to go after militants. This prohibition on cross-border "hot pursuit" makes it relatively easy for Taliban and Qaeda fighters to initiate attacks on American bases in Afghanistan, and then quickly escape to the safety of Pakistan. American soldiers have complained about being fired on from inside Pakistan by foreign militants while Pakistani border guards sat and watched.
As a result of the restrictions, American military and intelligence personnel in Afghanistan are no longer really hunting for Mr. bin Laden, an intelligence official said.
In the 2004 campaign, George Bush said, 'The use of troops to defend America must never be subject to a veto by countries like France.? His convention's keynote speaker, Zell Miller, said, 'Kerry would let Paris decide when America needs defending. I want Bush to decide.'?
Well, Bush has decided for some time that Pakistan should have a veto over our national security. Pakistan decides where our troops can go to defend America.
Unfortunately, getting Osama three years too late won't have the same impact that getting him right after 9/11 would have.
Last year, the CIA reported that the cancer of Al Qaeda has metastasized, so demolishing the Al Qaeda organization at this point wouldn't change much:
The steady spread of Usama bin Ladin's anti-US sentiment âo[base "] [through] the wider Sunni extremist movement and through the broad dissemination of al-Qaida's destructive expertise - ensures that a serious threat will remain for the foreseeable future[,] with or without al-Qaida in the picture.
We should fully understand since the terrorist threat has grown much larger than Osama, capturing or killing him does not solve all our problems. But he's still unfinished business. Bush needs to be asked the question: why do you continue to give Pakistan veto power over our national security? [The Huffington Post | Blog Picks Feed]
Self consistency is not a standard pattern currently. We let an 'ally' keep us from Osama because it is politically expedient. This will come back to haunt us. What happened to you are with us or against us? 12:10:19 PM
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Academia vs. Right Wing Think Tanks. Academia wins. Again. [Chris C. Mooney | The Intersection]
Poor science always seems to be the hallmark of idealogues. Trying to make the facts fit the hypothesis, instead of the other way around, is a major problem in the current world. Perhaps someday the benefits of the Enlightenment and the Scientific Method will help enrich those who seem to quick to make purely political points, damn the facts. 12:04:48 PM
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