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POPSWhy Too Much Praying Is A Bad idea It seems to me that a lot of praying, instead of achieving its intended purpose of praise and glorification instead reduces a deity to a petty servant. Internet evangelist Stuart Shepard issued a call to pray that Barack Obama's planned speech in a stadium in Denver gets rained out. That goes beyond petty into the realm of the ridiculous and juvenile.
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POPSWorld's Oldest Bible Now Online The Codex Sinaiticus is the oldest known complete copy of the Judaeo-Christian bible known to exist. It is now online, and it will give you a chance to read a text uncorrupted by the fog of translation. Of course, you'll have to be fluent in classical Greek and a number of other dead languages, but, after all, if you're serious about scripture, what's a little learning?
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POPSIs Voting Republican Bad For Your Health? The chart wouldn't clip . You'll have to click through to see it. From the source: "As Forbes noted: The annual ranking looks at 22 indicators of health, including everything from how many children receive recommended vaccinations, to obesity and smoking rates, to cancer deaths." They just want to drag everyone down to their level. Red states also have the highest overall divorce and teenage pregnancy rates. Way to go.
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POPSStewart to Huckabee: At What Age Did You Choose Not To Be Gay? For over seven minutes last night, Jon Stewart grilled former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee on his opposition to gay marriage. Huckabee is touring the country to promote his new book, "Do The Right Thing." When Stewart compared gay marriage bans to interracial marriage bans, Huckabee restated his view that homosexuality is simply a behavior choice:
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POPS101 Ways To Be Annoying More: 14. Name your dog "Dog." 15. Insist on keeping your car windshield wipers running in all weather conditions "to keep them tuned up." 16. Reply to everything someone says with "that's what YOU think." 17. Claim that you must always wear a bicycle helmet as part of your "astronaut training." 18. Declare your apartment an independent nation, and sue your neighbors upstairs for "violating your airspace". 19. Forget the punchline to a long joke, but assure the listener it was a "real hoot." 20. Follow a few paces behind someone, spraying everything they touch with Lysol. 21. Practice making fax and modem noises. 22. Highlight irrelevant information in scientific papers and "cc:" them to your boss. 23. Make beeping noises when a large person backs up. 24. Invent nonsense computer jargon in conversations, and see if people play along to avoid the appearance of ignorance. 25. Erect an elaborate network of ropes in your backyard, and tell the neighbors
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POPSOriginal First Page of the Bible They recently discovered a smaller scroll hidden in the cylinder of the first scroll of the ancient Biblical scriptures, believed to be the actual "first page" of the Bible. When deciphered, it read ...
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POPSAtheists Stunned by Amazing Toast that Does Not Resemble Charles Darwin Whatsoever
The image, said nonbelievers, was further evidence that there is no God, and that the universe is what it is by chance, not the hand of a creator. But religious leaders were quick to say that the toast may still be significant . Details appeared on the Atheist News Service, based in Massachusetts, which specializes in irreligious broadcasts. They reported that the toast, served to Richard Dawkins at breakfast one Tuesday, did not reflect the image of the man who first advanced the concept of evolution. Noted atheist P.Z. Myers, a scientist and someone who did not ever meet Charles Darwin, said he was convinced the toast did not show Darwin. "As you can see from the photo, this toast doesn't look anything like Darwin. Just plain, ordinary toast. Maybe if you squint, you can see a squid...no, I'm just kidding. It just looks like toast." "I'm sure it's delicious with butter, but it doesn't even resemble Christopher Hitchens, much less the author of The Origin of Species."
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POPSIt's Not Who Votes That Counts... Historical note: Stalin never called himself Josef Stalin; he was known only as "Comrade Stalin". It was a common thing for Slavic political activists to adopt one-word pseudonyms. Similarly, there was no Vladimir Lenin or Josip Tito. Vladimir Ulyanov was First Comrade Lenin (his party card number was #1) and Josip Broz was Marshal Tito.
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POPSGeorge Orwell's Birthday Today is George Orwell's Birthday. Eric Arthur Blair was born on 25 June 1903. Nearly everybody in the English-speaking world has at least heard of, if not read, the iconic books 1984 and Animal Farm , or has at least heard of Big Brother. Less familiar is his work as journalist, essayist, poet and critic. Our language has acquired the adjective orwellian to describe a situation nobody wants to be facing. When I taught writing, my students' first assignment was to write an in-class essay, then read Orwell's essay Politics and the English Language , which is the source of the material in the clip above, then rework their own essay using the rules Orwell recommended. It usually improved their work. However, rereading Politics and the English Language finds me thinking that in the sixty-three years since it was first published, that, firstly, in all this time, few people have taken its advice to heart; (continued in comments)
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POPSWhat Do Women Want? Whatever it is, it's not what they say. When exposed to erotic images of varied sexual orientations, the physical responses of men were consistent with what they said they were feeling. Women, however, frequently reported a response that was at odds with their physical arousal readings. For once, it seems, men are more in touch with their feelings than women. A more thorough explanation, including the down and dirty on bonobo pornography, is at the source. If the link at the top of the clip doesn't work, try http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/25/magazine/25desire-t.html?_r=3&hp=&pagewanted=all
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POPSHoney, I Killed the Superbug A message for people who think that local ecologies are not significant in the grand scheme of things. If the tree became extinct, this stuff wouldn't exist (the source doesn't mention whether the bee species is also specific to this type of honey. This makes the decline in the bee population over the last couple of years a matter of even more concern. Undoubtedly, there are people who would, without this information, consider either the trees or the bees not worth saving were they endangered. As they used to say, "Bee healthy; eat your honey!"
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POPSPowell-As-Traitor Cartoon Receives Condemnation Cartoonists from all shades of the political spectrum: left, right and center, have been close to unanimous in agreeing that this is, in the words of Matt Bors, one of the "...top ten worst political cartoons ever created. Since time began. Hands down.” Even Michelle Malkin, who is so far to the right that she can't walk without spinning around, said, "It’s a mistake to attribute Powell’s endorsement primarily to some kind of race loyalty." It's not even much of a cartoon, as the images are from the top of the list of Google image searches for "Benedict Arnold" and "white flag".
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POPSSanta May Run Out of Reindeer There are 60% Fewer of Them Today Primarily Due to Climate Change. Other odd reindeer facts at the source: 2. Reindeer vs. Caribou 3. A royal species 4. They really can handle the cold 5. They may not fly but.... 6. A sign of power 7. Is Santa's team an all-girl group?
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POPSIt's Alive! It's Alive! I am not sure about the charges, though. "larceny" doesn't really apply, since he didn't take the barrels from their original site, nor does "injury to personal property" apply, since the barrels are not owned by an individual.
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POPSStormtroopers For Jesus There is a radical branch of right-wing Christianity which goes by several labels: Dominionism, Dominion Theology, Xtian Reconstructionism, Xtian Nationalism, among others, that seeks to replace the constitution with the bible (including all those lovely death-by-stoning-&-burning crimes like eating shellfish and wearing blended fabrics). Now, it seems that Pastor Rick Warren is part of this movement. Also from the source: He lies, prevaricates and removes things from his website that might be embarrassing (like the dinosaurs and forbidding active homosexuals from joining Saddleback Church--something he yanked after he met with Melissa Etheridge, because like she has a wife and so probably has sex, and it's like better to have Teh Celebrity Gay than to tell the truth, Rick?) Warren then exhorts the crowd to hold up the sign by their seats that say "Whatever it takes" and concludes his speech with: " Whatever it takes"
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POPSRepublican Re-Education Camps? MN Representative Michelle Bachmann (Schlockmann?) went ballistic and called AmeriCorps a system of "re-education" camps". It turns out that Rush and his GOP butt-kissers are the ones actually talking about "re-education". Those will be the placces where the staff uniforms include flip-flops. You have to give Cantor credit for having a spine more flexible than a cat's. Back in 1960, people were worried that a Democratic win would mean a White House controlled by the Vatican. It would seem that the Republicans are being controlled from a radio studio in Palm Beach Florida.
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POPSSeven Cardinal & Contrary Virtues Most people are aware of the seven deadly (or cardinal) sins, but few are aware that there are two sets of seven virtues as well, one set standing in direct contrast to the sins. I find it interesting that a page devoted to atheism had a concise and easily found description of these attributes, but the religious sites I visited required wading through reams of theology much too extensive to clip. There is a clip on the Seven Cardinal Sins posted at http://clipmarks.com/clipmark/B17AB9AE-948C-4C29-8867-F0FC3434B26B/ by Sheroug.
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POPSMcCain Campaign Forces Job Walkout Also from the source: "We were asked to read something saying were against protecting children from danger," this worker said. "I wouldn't do it. A lot of people left. They thought it was disgusting." This worker, too, confirmed sacrificing pay to walk out, saying her supervisor told her: "If you don't wanna phone it you can just go home for the day." The script coincided with this robo-slime call running in other states, but because robocalling is illegal in Indiana it was being read by call center workers. Representatives at Americall in Indiana, and at the company's corporate headquarters in Naperville, Illinois, didn't return calls for comment.
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POPSGood luck selling that "refridgerator" In the past fifteen years or so, I've also noticed that a lot more errors are showing up in print - newspapers and magazines. I attribute this to reporters' use of direct terminals to write stories. In less technological times, the editor and, perhaps, a number of copyreaders (copyboys in the old days - think Jimmy Olsen) had a chance to catch the obvious slips. As a last bulwark against typos, or sometimes a last source of them, were the human typetters who ran the Linotype machines. I can sympathize with the author at the source; At one point in my life I taught college composition and wallowed daily in the dregs of bad writing. In recent years, I've become more prone to typos thanks to nerve damage from an injury, and am mortified when a mistyped item escapes my notice before I click on the 'done' button. Hence, Jorjor's Law: Intelligent people make typographical errors; stoopid peepul dont no hau too spel.
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POPSAmericans Marry 'Other Species' I was unable to clip the video that goes along with this text, so you'll have to go to the source. I love the expression on the Faux News Bimbo's face as she tries to wrap what little brain she has around what this loon Kilmeade is saying.
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POPSWe've Been Trapped Inside a Bad Health Care System So Long, We Don't Know How Much We're Missing Other points: My neighbors heal, recover, and go on with their lives. The U.S. disability rate last year was 19.1 percent, and rising fast. In Canada, it's 14.3 percent My neighbors start small businesses. Americans routinely stay chained to jobs they hate because they can't afford to lose coverage. My neighbors stay home with their kids. My neighbors invest. They've got stable household budgets that aren't being thrown off by surprise health events. My neighbors travel. Americans don't get vacation time; and when they do get it, they tend to stay in-country. A lot of Canadians take three weeks off in the winter to go somewhere fabulous and warm. That $15K-a-year savings will buy a whole lot of margaritas in Cancun. My neighbors seldom go bankrupt. The Canadian bankruptcy rate has soared in the past year to 4.3 per thousand. In the U.S., it's 11.1 per thousand. Perhaps most important: My neighbors have never seen anyone die because they didn't have health
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POPSThe Real Barack Obama Revealed The Friday edition of a South African daily comic strip. As a resident of the US, it`s interesting for me to take a look at how others see us.
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POPSEnglish: The Criminal Language A paraphrase of a quotation made by James Nicoll. "The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary." It's hard to find a major language that hasn't been mugged and robbed by English.
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