Stan Taylor

Yesterday, the Supreme Court started hearing arguments about whether it’s constitutional for Texas and Kentucky to display the Ten Commandments on state grounds (Texas has a monument on the state capitol grounds). However, Fred Clark points out one issue I haven’t seen elsewhere:

The Pentateuch provides three slightly different versions [of the commandments], and various traditions have adopted these lists in slightly different ways. (ReligiousTolerance.org has a nice rundown of the differences.) The display of any particular version, therefore, requires a sectarian choice.

Interesting issue.

As a dog person, I can relate to Heather Armstrong’s comment:

I just spent $20 to have my dog’s anal sacs squeezed because he�s been greasing the couch lately. That may seem a bit exorbitant for a little gland squeezing, but it will definitely go down as the best $20 I ever spent: I DON’T HAVE TO SQUEEZE THEM MYSELF.

Unfortunately, cheap trumps disgusting for me.

My wife is a college rhetoric and comp instructor, so I frequently hear about instances where students let the spell check substitute the wrong word. Check this out (click on photo for a larger version and read the small type along the bottom):

A 22-pound lobster was caught off Nantucket, Massachusetts. Interesting. Even more interesting, from the article:

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals sent Wholey [the owner of the lobster] a letter asking him to work with the group to release Bubba back in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Maine.
Another group calling itself People For Eating Tasty Animals reportedly offered Wholey a hefty price for the lobster. At Tuesday’s price of $14.98 a pound, Bubba would retail for about $350.

UPDATE: Here’s the lobster:

The article that I mentioned in my previous post also contains the best description I’ve seen so far of G. W. Bush’s ‘ownership society’ concept:

On the campaign trail this year, President Bush has made the case that people are better off relying on themselves, rather than on business or government, in case of trouble. Under the banner of the “Ownership Society,” the president has proposed a series of new, tax-break-heavy accounts to let families pay for their own retirements, healthcare and job training. He also has called for partially replacing the biggest of the government’s protective programs — Social Security — with privately held stock and bond accounts.
Such arrangements might help people build up their personal assets. But the approach also would expose them to even more economic risk than they’ve already taken on.

The LA Times is running a series of articles titled, “If America is richer, why are its families so much less secure?” From the first article:

Starting in the late 1970s, the nation’s leaders sought to break a corrosive cycle of rising inflation and stagnating output by remaking the U.S. economy in the image of its frontier predecessor — deregulating industries, shrinking social programs and promoting a free-market ideal in which everyone must forge his or her own path, free to rise or fall on merit or luck. On the whole, their effort to transform the economy has succeeded.
But the economy’s makeover has come at a large and largely unnoticed price: a measurable increase in the risks that Americans must bear as they provide for their families, pay for their houses, save for their retirements and grab for the good life.
A broad array of protections that families once depended on to shield them from economic turmoil — stable jobs, widely available health coverage, guaranteed pensions, short unemployment spells, long-lasting unemployment benefits and well-funded job training programs — have been scaled back or have vanished altogether.

It looks like an interesting series of articles.

A recent Harris poll shows what American respondents believe about the following issues:

• 61% believe that Iraq, under Saddam Hussein, was a serious threat to U.S. security
• 64% believe that Saddam Hussein had strong links with Al Qaeda
• 47% believe that Saddam Hussein helped plan and support the hijackers who attacked the U.S. on September 11, 2001.
• 44% believe that Several of the hijackers who attacked the U.S. on September 11 were Iraqis

This article in The Nation offers a nice, succint summary of the religious beliefs of the ‘Founding Fathers’ of the United States. Suffice it to say that anyone who claims the U.S. was founded on Christian principles does not know or is ignoring historical fact.

This is something you have to actually hear to appreciate (I heard it on NPR yesterday): at a news conference at the European Union yesterday, President Bush was asked about the US’s intentions in regard to Iran. Mr. Bush responded: “This notion that the United States is getting ready to attack Iran is simply ridiculous. And having said that, all options are on the table.”
There was a very short pause, and then the press corps started laughing.

Part of growing up is realizing what a prick you used to be. —Cyrano