Go Feck Yourself

found online by Raymond

 
From nojo at Stinque:

“Feckless” is one of those words you may have heard, maybe even used, but haven’t much thought about. If one can be feckless, what is it to have feck?

The part you know reads as expected: useless, incompetent, good for nothing. The part you don’t know is what’s lacking: effect. As for how you get from effect to feck — and thus the absence of effect — well, ask the Scots. We hear they’re good cussers.

As is Samantha Bee.

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Call to Worship a New Deity


 

It seems strange that it would be Rudy Giuliani who would remind us of the last question put to Jesus before his execution. At least according to the Gospels.

Not that the entire Trump story is not replete with unintentional biblical references. Exact parallels exist between the least of these and refugees fleeing from oppression. Jesus could have been speaking of such refugees:

…as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.

Matthew 25:40

Christ could have been telling us how we ought to think about those of other faiths as he constructed a story of a Samaritan. Samaritans were regarded as religious antagonists, to be viewed with suspicion: Much as some Christians view Muslims, or atheists, or anyone who worships differently or not at all.

One of the last sermons by the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King suggested one reason that the mythical non-believer, the Samaritan, could have put aside any concern for his own wellbeing to help the beaten, injured man at the side of the road, when believers passed him by.

…if I do not stop to help this man what will happen to him.

Even the most literal minded of my brothers and sisters in Christ, at least those who support the harsh attitudes of my President, have been able to ignore the number of the beast.

You need wisdom to understand the number of the beast! But if you are smart enough, you can figure this out. Its number is six hundred sixty-six, and it stands for a person.

Revelation 13:18

Okay, so the most sensible of scholars recognize that an exiled Christian, confined by Roman authorities to a cave on the Greek island of Patmos might write in code about the emperor. Especially if that emperor happened to be famous for torturing those of different religions. 666 was a numerical equivalent to the letters in the name and title of the Emperor Nero.

But I am surprised at how far my sisters and brothers have come. They can now openly embrace a President whose son-in-law holds title to that address: 666 Fifth Ave. I suppose I should be proud of those folks for finally shrugging off nearly 2,000 years of violent superstition. People had been tortured and killed for their accidental association with that number. All it took was a Presidential candidate who hated the same folks they did.

Rudy Giuliani reminded me of the last great question put to Jesus by Pontius Pilate.
Continue reading “Call to Worship a New Deity”

Rank President, Russia Links, School Shootings, Puerto Rico Deaths

Rituals

found online by Raymond

 
From Infidel753:

To many Americans in the future, Christianity will look the way Islam looks to most Americans today — a group with unfamiliar and bewildering beliefs and practices, largely represented in the popular mind by its extremist minority which holds intolerant, threatening, and frightening views. It’s hard to imagine them finding this appealing. Even today, the number of atheists who join a religion is tiny compared with the veritable stampede in the opposite direction. Whatever ground religion loses is, by the time the second generation arrives, lost to it forever.

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Trump DM’s Michael Cohen By Pardoning Dinesh D’Souza

found online by Raymond

 
From Frances Langum:

But this story is NOT about douchebag Dinesh.

It’s about Michael Cohen. And sending him a message to “stay strong” and not flip. (I don’t know how that works if Cohen is facing state charges in New York but maybe Trump forgot about that.) And on Stephanie Ruhle’s program, legal analyst Seth Waxman didn’t sugarcoat it:

SETH WAXMAN: Could this be any more transparent? His fixer for ten years is alleged to be involved in passing campaign contributions from others through to his campaign in the context of Stormy Daniels or passing Russian funds through, and then kind of out of nowhere, Mr. Trump pardons D’souza who is accused of doing just that. I can’t see this as anything other than trying to send information–Donald Trump to say “I will take care of you in the future, just stand by me.”

Add “abuse of power” to the impeachable offenses, folks.

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Pay-to-Play in the Press: A Case Study

found online by Raymond

 
From Jon Perr at PERRspectives:

If Donald Trump was a Marvel character, his name might be something like “DeceptiCon.” That is, the never-before-seen frequency and magnitude of Trump’s lies combine to create a Cloak of Confusion, a black hole-like force from which the truth seemingly cannot escape. Defying the laws of physics and logic, he was after all a Schrödinger’s Candidate, often for and against the same thing at the same time. And now as the Heisenberg Uncertainty President, it is virtually impossible to ever simultaneously know what Trump would believe, say, and do on any issue. Most insidious of all, DeceptiCon has produced learned helplessness in almost all who observe him, especially among members of the media. Slowly but surely, the search for objective truth is abandoned as Trump’s unceasing torrent of frauds, falsehoods, and fictions is gradually accepted as routine, normal, and even entertaining.

This process was essentially complete well before Election Day in November 2016. On August 18, 2016, Trump relaunched his campaign under the guidance of Kellyanne Conway and Steve Bannon. In what was billed as a major address in Charlotte, North Carolina, Republican nominee Trump pledged:

“One thing I can promise you is this: I will always tell you the truth.”

Of course, his meta vow wasn’t true. Not even close.

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Sideshow in Singapore

found online by Raymond

 
From Infidel753:

The bad-hairstyle summit in Singapore has ended with news of a deal — but there’s less here than meets the eye.

The full text of the joint statement is here; an analysis is here. Most of it is diplomatic fluff and vague promises about improving relations in the future; there is language about recovering POW/MIA remains which will be meaningful to those who have POW/MIA relatives. The main issue is addressed in a single sentence:

3. Reaffirming the April 27, 2018 Panmunjom Declaration, the DPRK commits to work toward complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.

Note that even this is explicitly presented not as something new, but as a reaffirmation of something already declared at the April 27 summit between North and South Korea. The phrase “work toward” is odd. North Korea is a dictatorship.

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Fox legal analyst: ‘No evidence whatsoever’ for Trump’s ‘spy’ lie

found online by Raymond

 
From Tommy Christopher:

Trump’s “spy” lies took a serious beating this week. Even Fox News legal analyst Judge Andrew Napolitano absolutely crushed them in about 20 seconds.

On Tuesday night’s “The Story With Martha MacCallum,” Napolitano was asked to weigh in on Trump’s false claim that the FBI was “spying” on his campaign at the direction of the Obama administration.

“The allegations by Mayor Giuliani over the weekend, which would lead to us to believe that the Trump people think that the FBI had an undercover agent who inveigled his way into the campaign, and was there as a spy on the campaign, seem to be baseless,” Napolitano said. “There’s no evidence for that whatsoever.”

Napolitano added that the FBI’s alleged use of an informant “talking to people on the periphery of the campaign, that is standard operating procedure in intelligence gathering, and in criminal investigations.”

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Classical Music Composition Linked to Interest in Chemistry?

found online by Raymond

 
From The Journal of Improbable Research:

What correlation, if any, is there between the study of chemistry and talents for classical music composition?

Answers are unclear, but the late emeritus professor of chemistry at the Catholic University of America, Leopold May, provided an excellent resource for those wishing to investigate further.

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