Stones Cry Out

My Take: 5 reasons Christians should love ‘Twilight’ is a confusing piece, from CNN Opinion, attempting to argue for the merits of the Twilight series due to some intersections (so the author claims) it has with Christianity. The mistake here is that she appears to fall into the Moral Therapeutic Deism camp. Rather than do a stretch search for Biblical principles in something like Twilight, how about looking at what the Bible has to say? Or at least peruse the works of authors who intended to write fiction with a Biblical grounding (e.g., C.S. Lewis, JRR Tolkien, PD James, Stephen Lawhead, etc.).

The five reasons Jesus would love Twilight?

1. The supernatural surrounds us whether we’re aware of it or not.
2. Love results in, and even requires, sacrifice.
3. Humans crave divine perfection.
4. A drastic change of direction may be exactly what you need.
5. You’ll only really fit in after you accept what it is God has designed you for.

Oh, and I really like the Jeremiah 29:11 reference as an argument for reason # 5 [sarcasm].

Paramedics equipped with oxygen masks for… pets?
From the OC Register,

Every fire engine and truck operated by the Orange County Fire Authority will now carry oxygen masks for household pets – thanks to a donation from an Anaheim pet owner whose rescued dog was displaced in a wildfire.

Is this merely a sign of compassion in our society, where we acknowledge the soulish qualities of higher mammals? Or does it reflect a potentially twisted view which places certain species of the animal kingdom on a higher plane than warranted? Or… is this merely another indicator of a society so immersed in peace and prosperity, that we are able to allocate resources to such an end?

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Church Food Bank donations – picked up by limo?
A tad much to expect your food donations for an elderly couple will be picked up by their limo? From the article,

An email sent out to members of the Crystal Cathedral congregation requesting meals for founder Robert H. Schuller’s wife Arvella, who is ill with pneumonia, is creating mixed feelings of sadness and outrage among members.

According to longtime member Jim McDonald, an email was sent out by administrators to Bible study groups as well as church elders, asking that meals for the reverend’s wife be dropped off at the cathedral’s Tower of Hope where the Schullers’ limo drivers will be waiting to pick them up at the designated time.

Sigh.

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Ahhh, Disneyland – the happiest place on Earth… even for coyotes
Seriously, folks, you’ve got to watch out for these critters just about all over the country or, even in pump tunnels.

A coyote wandered onto the grounds of the Disneyland Hotel last month and somehow got into a pump room in the tunnels beneath the hotel.

Disneyland Resort security personnel contacted Orange County Animal Care at 10:13 a.m. on Oct. 10 to see if they could come out and help.

They may not always get the roadrunner, but they get just about everything else.

I suppose Disney Security had to call Animal Care because they were too busy surrounding 10 year-old girls and elderly ladies in motorized wheelchairs. What? Didn’t hear about that one?

Good, err, day.

1. Noodle tech, in my household from my grad school days when they were a staple at 7 for one dollar, they are known as “papa noodles.”
2. Regulation pretending to spur employment just raising costs and killing actual productivity.
3. A correction to the “spending” problem … if spending to fix the recession means real investment then temporary stimulus ain’t gonna help.
4. Atheists attempting to be clever, not successfully.
5. On atheists and their hermeneutic, this has been my experience as well the people I’ve actually interacted with who stick to a “literal” reading hermeneutic have been atheists.
6. A likely suggestion.
7. The gravity of the situation.
8. Wealth is never “created” by theft and fraud. It might be collected, not created.
9. Obamacare glitch?
10. Transcarpathia.
11. Just going for a jog.
12. Bias in academia, an example. Oh, and how not to argue in favor or public schooling over homeschooling.
13. Fall and invasion … symptom or cause.
14. For your Christmas tree a little math for the occasion.
15. An OWS sympathizer talks about the now that it’s over status.

Link posting scheduling will be spotty. I’m in Pacific TZ + hotel connection is not the best … and doing this during down time at the job site will be catch as catch can.

1. Who cracks first?
2. Faces, here and here.
3. A book recommended. I was reading it on the flight (and finished the City and the City).
4. Water water everywhere.
5. An exterior criticism of top down policy design.
6. Retail and tomorrow’s hack/theft opportunities.
7. Impartiality for the judiciary?
8. American Orthodoxy and gay rights … I haven’t listened to this yet, but in part this will serve as a reminder. What do you think?
9. Yes. Government can create “real jobs” … the problem is incentives are hard to keep lined up with providing a good service inexpensively as well as its hard for competition to drive innovation, which is why government creating jobs like that is horrible idea.
10. OWS as unhappy Deadheads.
11. Build a better battery and … the world will beat a path to your door.
12. Two books noted.

Good morning. Traveling West tonight, for the first of (hopefully) a two week startup straddling the Thanksgiving week.

1. A suggested blog title found here which is sure to amuse Ms Minerva.
2. Vroooom.
3. Oddly, religion not specified. Was it or was it not relevant?
4. Zippo in the persons per mile per gallon metric.
5. Two rules for the pack attack.
6. Just 10? Huh, that’s the tip of the iceberg.
7. Da Vinci meets … American marketing genius.
8. Normally that’s 2nd term stupidity … does Mr Obama feel like a one termer?
9. So, immersed in the west should it be called the Advent fast? or not?
10. I like batch.
11. Likability?
12. Some OWS supporters push the meme that the gatherings are very law abiding. Really?

Good morning. Off again today, still sleeping in. 😀 …. Links?

1. Our unemployment woes.
2. About grade and taste in the syrup world.
3. No price gouging here. Especially if you define price in a way that make that impossible.
4. In the wake of the Penn State kerfuffle.
5. Oooh, somebody at the NYTimes has a really really reprehensible idea. Let’s put a price on our integrity and sell it off.
6. We didn’t “know then” and not “know now” … we just have regulated “building” out of the realm of possibility.
7. I wonder if the sign holder realizes the subject of his/her criticism holding the sign.
8. 185k pages! That’s the real scandal.
9. What the Democrats wish for in the health care realm.
10. Tampering with history …. don’t do it. The way to do with regrettable incidents is not to whitewash, to forget and move on.
11. US integrity and willingness to stand up for what is right … out done by the Arab league?
12. And some wise advice.

Well,  running a little late, I’m “on vacation” at home today, i.e., the day off. I, err, slept in.

1. Geek, ya’ think?
2. About that thing you have …
3. Farce and art.
4. Seriously?
5. Bike sans fork.
6. Oh, please … Marvel mutants aren’t proxies for gays and such, it’s a connect with generic teenage feelings of alienation. Duh. “Dad you just don’t understand me at all!” isn’t a teenage plea that is exclusive to gays.
7. Come on, that’s just cruel.
8. A biopic.
9. Uhm, that’s a really really bad metaphor … letting the Trojan horse allowed the sack of the city, rapine of the women and sale of the people into slavery. And that’s touted as a good thing.
10. Do the poor benefit? Well, alas, yes quite a bit.
11. Mr Cain’s accusers linked?

Good morning.

1. Mad men and the police procedural.
2. A counter to the “end bonuses” notion.
3. Education as ritual.
4. Climate and a paper on the same, examined in some detail.
5. What? No ASL? No Third Reich? Shocking?
6. Until they run out of Joe.
7. Book titles doing more than announcing the contents.
8. Evil, not just banal. I wonder if the Penn State kerfuffle has a connection.
9. Crying for Argentina.
10. Never work. Seems to me most guys think there are about 8 colors with names like red, green, blue, and purple. For example, fuschia is a plant, not a color and the putative color given that name is just purple. At the gym a few weeks ago, I had an outraged daughter scandalized by my calling some stretching pads “black” and “lighter black”.
11. Dreaming a little dream.
12. Two generations at one posting.
13. Cinema.
14. Mr Jobs and the elephant in the Apple fandom’s closet.
15. Reforming higher ed, some thoughts.

Good morning.

1. Peacocks? That’s unexpected. I wonder what they use them for.
2. A (missing) view of the game.
3. The new communism and free (leisure) time.
4. Bring out your dead, uhm, bones.
5. The Wisconsin governor and this years Christmas wars.
6. Fantasy and religious backgrounds … although I thought the golum had Jewish (or Arabic) origins, Ms Shelley notwithstanding.
7. That’s an interesting question, what if the OWS blockages were in front of abortion clinics? Same reaction to “non-violent” protests?
8. Odd that liberals denounce Cain bringing out the Clinton sex-scandal playbook (which is not to say, for example, that I approve of the doing so).
9. A recommendation passed on.
10. Connected to the Internet? Who thought that was a good idea? (hint: it is not by any stretch of the imagination an good idea).
11. Stupid scholastic tricks.

Good morning.

1. A global network map, colored by language.
2. OWS domiciles.
3. A reminder of Mr Obama’s (putative) strategy of moving to a non-nuclear world … somehow.
4. Elite.
5. Skillz or pull?
6. Swim swim swim against the current.
7. Marking time.
8. Green energy failing “because it’s too cheap” … heh.
9. Our global economy.
10. Context for descriptive language …
11. And this likely has been seen done by men to men.
12. Cain’s non-banishment in the polls reason one, we don’t trust the media and reason two Ms Hill and Mr Thomas in which this story is reprising that mountain-from-molehill kerfuffle.

Good morning.

1. Petaflops ten and an electric bill.
2. Ben Franklin as Scripture still hanging on.
3. That liberal echo chamber explicitly demonstrated.
4. So is it green to have built in short longevity?
5. Executive and Legislative branches.
6. Romney tackles the third rail.
7. Aussie higher ed as a model?
8. Action movie sans any action.
9. A new way to look at fear and trembling, if you don’t have the faith equal to that of Abraham then you’re an atheist.
10. Science/Engineering education.
11. Mr Obama’s Iraq legacy.
12. Grand strategy: an essay. (HT).
13. Two years down the road, finally a response to stimulus and Mr Bastiat.
14. OWS and the Scouting Jamboree.

Online Security (HT: Justin Taylor)
A 5 part series providing good tips and info on keeping your online actions secure. I’ve added excerpts from each part.

Part 1 -General Overview

There is still risk in using the Internet (inversely proportional to the amount of effort the user puts into security), and this guide makes no mention to the many online security risks users have absolutely no control over (you might have nightmares and be frightened off the Internet if I told you about those).

Part 2 -General Tips

Log out of web based email, banking/shopping sites and social networks such as Facebook when you are not actively using them. If for example you have Facebook logged in on one tab, malicious code on another site in another tab can attack your Facebook account.

Part 3 -Social Networking

Facebook applications can attack users, including their other social networks, other friends on social networks and other sites, including banking sites. The only even relatively safe way to use Facebook is to turn off all Facebook apps and quizzes.

Part 4 – Banking & Shopping

If the site does not use https, do not use it.

Part 5 – Privacy

Many people ignorantly downplay the risk of privacy, saying that they have “nothing to hide.” However, privacy is not mainly about hiding bad behavior, but about controlling the context in which personal details about our lives are disclosed. All of us have had sensitive, very personal conversations with our closes friends that we would not make public.

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If faced with a mob, thank the founding fathers you’re able to have a shotgun in your hands
From the files of Tea Party OWS violence, it seems that one developer in San Francisco was able to “discourage” a mob from vandalizing the building he works in, without having to wait for the authorities to show up (assuming, of course, that they would show up).

“We had people who attempted to break into our building,” the landmark Rotunda Building on Frank Ogawa Plaza outside City Hall, Tagami said Thursday. He grabbed a shotgun that he usually keeps at home, went down to the ground floor and “discouraged them,” he said.

“I was standing there and they saw me there, and I lifted it – I didn’t point it – I just held it in my hands,” Tagami said. “And I just racked it, and they ran.”

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Freedom of Religion distortion of the day
Once again, we see the misguided notion that the 1st Amendment of the Constitution is all about freedom FROM religion instead of freedom of religion.

Ron Baker, pastor at Russell Baptist Church in Green Cove Springs, said that he would continue to pray no matter what happens. The flagpole, which is the site where the prayers have been taken place, is at the center of an ideological standoff between the school board and those who wish to pray. “Did you ever think that in America you’d be in trouble for praying at the flag? It’s disturbing.” Baker told Fox News.

The issue was raised when the attorney for the Clay County School Board, J. Bruce Bickner, submitted an opinion declaring that praying at the flagpole was against the law, “it is a violation of the United States Constitution for a teacher, school administrator or other school district employee to join in a prayer session during their work time.” Wrote Bickner.

[emphasis added]

Umm… no, it’s not.

The first amendment protects the people from the government establishing a state religion, as well as allowing the citizenry the right to exercise the religion of their choice.

For Bickner to be correct, he will have to demonstrate how holding the prayer during school hours is equivalent to the state establishing a religion (which would certainly surprise quite a few other protestant denominations, Islamic, Jewish, Hindu, etc. congregations across the country), and how this action could prevent anyone, including Bickner, from exercising the religion of their choice.

Good luck.

It’s been a tough week for presidential candidate Herman Cain who has been battling unsubstantiated charges of inappropriate conduct. A Cain super-PAC has decided enough is enough and released this devastating ad today:

It’s powerful stuff. Meanwhile, Mr. Cain is not taking this lying down either. He fought back in his own way and gave liberals new reasons to get their collective panties in a wad:

If Mr. Cain can maintain this optimistic attitude that won him so many fans early on he could be a formidable candidate.

Good morning.

1. East coast academia where diversity means people with differing backgrounds submit to conformity.
2. Imagine publishing in academia redux.
3. Occupy Oakland and the consequences of rioting for a populist movement.
4. My daughter liked this clip.
5. And a very clever two y/old.
6. Cain’s problems viewed from the middle.
7. Obamacare and Mr Obama’s compliance.
8. A Berber’s thoughts on the Arab Spring.
9. Mr Corzine and the no-skin in the game problem.

Daniel Hannan, writing for the London Telegraph, poses the following question.

Now that [Archbishop of Canterbury] Rowan Williams is intruding into the debate about a financial transactions tax, I’d like to ask him a question. Which does he consider more meritorious – to give your own money to good causes…or to force your customers, clients and shareholders to do so in the name of ‘corporate social responsibility’? Which has more virtue – to ‘sell that thou hast, and give to the poor’, or to be expropriated through the tax system?

His article is a good, short read on the subject.