Vatican admits homosexuality not a choice

Yesterday the Vatican announced that it intends to bar from the seminary men who "support the so-called gay culture" or have "deeply rooted gay tendencies."

Now, that they are doing this isn't really the issue here. They are a religion and are free to do as they please.

This is what gets me:
Many people argue that being homosexual is a choice. So, in that it is a choice, you can choose not to be gay, or have gay tendencies.
However, by saying that someone has "deeply rooted gay tendencies", and they cannot take a vow of celibacy (thereby swearing off any homosexual lifestyle by default) you are basically arguing that they are gay and can't do anything about it, not even by taking a vow of celibacy.

I dunno, it seems a little silly to me. Someone is willing to take the vow of celebacy and devote his life to God and the church is going to tell him no because of something that the church thinks is a choice anyway. I guess I just don't really get it.

Thought Control?

Reason number...I don't even know...why I would NEVER let my children go to school in Kansas.

http://www.classkc.org/

torn

So I'm torn. Of course I want A&M to win today (note that wanting, and thinking might happen are two different things), but I don't want A&M to ruin UTs national championship hopes. Hmmm...So I guess I want it to be a good showing by A&M (which so far it has been), and for UT to win by a squeaker.
Cause really, if we lose we don't get to go to a bowl, but if we win, we get to go to a crappy bowl that we don't want to be at anyway.
So yeah, texas win, but just barely.

Go Aggies! :)

casting stones from a glass house?

Doesn't anybody see the irony in the fact that we condem other countries for torturing and yet we have secret torture prisons all over the world?
Cause I do.

educated/liberal

So I've seen many studies that show that the more educated you are, the more liberal you tend to be. It's completely obvious from my experience that there is definately a correlation between the two.
Danny and I were talking a while ago, though. The question is, is it because you are more educated that you are more liberal, or the other way around. I just don't know because both make sense.

1. You are more liberal because you are more educated. This is what I was leaning towards because it fits me. As I got more educated I've gotten more and more liberal. Education opens your eyes to the world. It has taught me to question the status quo and that I don't need to be afraid of things that are different.

2. You are more educated because you are more liberal. This is the one Danny sortof leans towards. Which it makes sense too. Liberals tend to want to know more about the world. Conservatives tend to have the political attitude of this is how we do it, screw the other guys. So there is a lack of desire there to learn about the other guys.

So I don't know, I can see both sides. I wish there were more studies done on this. I think it's really interesting.

Firing Line

There were some really good firing line from the Daily Texan today.
My favorite statement from "Let them get married":

Maybe you should ask yourself the same question: Why do you care if gays want to get married? It would never even effect you, now would it? ~ Mike Harris

Also from "Here's the plan":

If your marriage is threatened by gay marriage, then your marriage is probably a mistake. If you think God is threatened by gay marriage and it makes him feel shameful and like lashing out, I suggest you find a stronger being to praise. Truly brave people stand up to a tyrant unless their need to be told what to do is stronger than their need for justice. ~ Ben Chorush

Talking Heads

So today in class we talked about talking heads, and the media giving equal time to opposite views. This is generally the practice on many of the 24 hour news channel shows: Crossfire, Anderson Cooper, etc.

Sure give both sides some time to share their point. I see the idea, but is that always what should be done? I say probably not. Let's take global warming as an example.

The scientific community is pretty much in agreement about global warming and what is going on. Sure, you have a few people who hold out, but they are way off base with the rest of the research and the scientists. So what happens? A news show wants to talk about global warming so they get one scientist that's agrees it's happening and one that doesn't. But here's the problem. That one scientist who thinks it's not happening represents an extremely small fraction of the scientific community, while the other scientist is representing the majority. But the viewer doesn't see this. The viewer comes away thinking it's 50/50, and is more easily confused about the subject. Not good. Because of the way the media has portrayed this it comes across as there being a debate about the subject when really there is no debate at all.

We see this same thing with health effects of smoking and evolution.

Here's to you Mr. Robertson

Oh Pat Robertson, you have infinite wisdom.

"I'd like to say to the good citizens of Dover: if there is a disaster in your area, don't turn to God, you just rejected Him from your city," Robertson said on his daily television show broadcast from Virginia, "The 700 Club."

"And don't wonder why He hasn't helped you when problems begin, if they begin. I'm not saying they will, but if they do, just remember, you just voted God out of your city. And if that's the case, don't ask for His help because he might not be there," he said.

It's good to know we have such a vengeful God and not, say, one that would send his only son to save us from our sins. Nope, instead we have one that hopes we burn in the fiery pits of hell all because we think science should be taught in science classes and religion should be left to church.
Yep...these evangelicals just really don't believe in the new testement at all. (obvious from their lack of following of Christ's teachings: care for the poor, the elderly, forgiveness, etc.). So what I'm wondering, is if they don't actually believe in the God of the new testement, why do they call themselvs Christian, shouldn't they be called something else since Christian is derived from the word 'Christ'?
Oh, and lets not forget that for hundreds of years people have voted to keep church seperate from state, and I think it could be argued that God has still been there for many of these people. So what I'm wondering is where exactly does Mr. Robertson get his information?

Power?

WHY does UT have to have power plants right in the middle of campus. And WHY does my office have to be right next to one of them? Right now I can't even hear myself think because of something going on at the power plant. And it's not like I can be like 'hey! keep it quiet over there, I'm trying to work on my computer...that uses your power...oh...' :( I can't even tell you how much this sucks.

Sadness

The side of the issue that most people fail (or just don't care) to see.




From the Daily Texan.

Ashamed

I must say that I am ashamed to be a Texan right now. Proposition 2 passed with about 74% of the vote. I am ashamed that that many Texans are so wrapped up with themselves and their own religion and how gay marriage could possibly affect them and their God that they don't even care about their fellow human beings. Gay marriage was already outlawed, but no, that wasn't enough. We had to write discrimination and hatred into our constitution. I guess that's the Texas way, though.

I can't wait until 30 years from now. This will become a non-issue and we will look back on this much like we look back on the 60's. I have no doubt in my mind.

Note: At least Travis county voted against the amendment 60% to 40%.

Kansas, Intellegently Designed?

The reason why I will NEVER live in Kansas and especially never allow my children to attend school in Kansas.

In addition, the board rewrote the definition of science, so that it is no longer limited to the search for natural explanations of phenomena.

I'm not sure what they mean by "natural explanations of phenomena." But my guess it that they're trying to say that the definition of science can include using faith as an explanation for things. Science is testing things using the scientific method. You cannot test the truth of faith or the existence of a God. This makes it religion. NOT SCIENCE! Freaking A, believe whatever you want, but keep it out of the classroom for pete's sake.

Scary

It's been obvious that something like this has been going on for a long time. It's too bad the patriot act makes it so easy for our president to gain information on political enemies.

Spurred by paranoia and aided by the USA Patriot Act, the Bush Administration has compiled dossiers on more than 10,000 Americans it considers political enemies and uses those files to wage war on those who disagree with its policies.

The computerized files include intimate personal details on members of Congress; high-ranking local, state and federal officials; prominent media figures and ordinary citizens who may, at one time or another, spoken out against the President or Administration.

Rove started the list while Bush served as governor of Texas, compiling information on various political enemies in the state and leaking damaging information on opponents to friends in the press. The list grew during Bush’s first run for President in 2000 but the names multiplied rapidly after the terrorist attacks of 2001 and passage of the USA Patriot Act. Using the powers under the act, Rove expanded the list to more than 10,000 names, utilizing the FBI’s “national security letters” to gather private and intimate details on American citizens.

But worried White House insiders say the intelligence gathered by the Bush administration is far larger, more extensive and potentially more damaging than the excesses of previous occupants of the White House. Even worse, it dovetails into a pattern of spying on Americans that has become commonplace since Bush took office.

“We’re talking about Big Brother at its most extreme,” says one White House staffer. “We know things about people that their spouses don’t know and, if it becomes politically expedient, we will make sure the rest of the world knows.”

What makes this worse than them just gathering information on people is the way it's used. This administration has ALWAYS attacked the person insteady of the issues. It would be practically impossible for them to win on the issues, so instead of trying that, they try attacking their "enemies" personally. They did this with John McCain in 2000 as anybody who knows anything about the republican primary knows.

Ed Helms reports

Better watch out, gay marriage is definately causing a downturn in society in massachusettes:

"The statistics are clear cut. Now that gay marriage is legal Massachusettes ranks dead last in illiteracy; 48th in per capita poverty; and a pathetic 49th in total divorces.

We better stop this! (Note that Massachusettes, one of the most liberal states in the country, has one of the best quality of life. Related? Impossible! Liberals suck and just want to take your hard earned money away and then spend it on stupid wars and highways to no where...oh wait...)

Oil

Okay, so this is something we've been talking alot about in our class and I've learned alot of surprising things, and I figure most people have no idea about any of this stuff so I thought I'd write about it.

According to an estimate by the United States Geological Survey we have between about 1.5 and 3 trillion barrels of petroleum left in the world. This includes potential sources and known sources that haven't been drilled because of economic reasons.
Now, the average world citizen uses 4.5 barrels of petroleum a year. So at current consumption and current population (~6 billion) we can figure that the world's petroleum will last us another 111 years. However, at the current population growth rate (1.3%) we expect the population to double in the next 50 years or so. At this growth rate we expect the petroleum to only last us another 50 or so years.
Frankly this is big news. This means that in our lifetime we will have exhausted all the petroleum in the world.

Now lets look at the Alaskan wildlife refuge. They expect that it contains about 9 billion barrels of oil. Sounds like alot right? Well, we can assume that if drilled this oil will only be used for americans. So the average american uses 25 barrels of oil per year (note that this is more than 5 times the average world citizen), and there are about 300 million americans. So that means that if we swore off all other oil then we would have enough oil to last us 1.2 years.
Now I have heard the argument that the amount of oil produced per day is limited by the size of the pipeline, so factoring that in the oil will last us 200 years. But here's the rebuttel to that. Let's pump the oil through a line of drinking straws. Then it will last us thousands of years. Point is this argument is stupid. There is a finite amount of oil in there, and putting it into the number of years it would last us is simply a way for people to visualize how much oil is available.
So the real question is this, is it worth it? Is it worth drilling in a refuge for one years worth of oil? Especially when we could easily save this amount of oil if people would stop driving their SUV's and if we could get congress to improve higher CAFE standards. Even if people kept on with their SUV's we could save this simply by everyone filling up the air in their tires. It's not alot of oil and frankly I think we should be focusing on the larger problem of oil shortage than simply putting a bandaid on the problem by drilling.

This is a crisis we are headed towards in our lifetime. If we keep on like we are then there are big problems to come when we hit what's referred to as "peak oil". So here's the deal with peak oil. As our population increases we will increase the amount of oil we use. We are currently producing petroleum that keeps up with this rate. But, we will eventually reach a point when we are producing the maximum amount of petroleum we can and after that it's going to start tapering off. Well, the population is still going to be growing and therefore consumption increasing, but production will be decreasing. So we will reach an oil crisis where production can't keep up with consumption. Now if we haven't already invested in new energy sources we are basically screwed. The USGS expects us to reach peak oil anywhere from 10 to 30 years from now, but the thing is there is noway to really tell when we are going to reach this point.

Anyway, I've blubbered on about this enough for now. I just think this is a really important point that we need to start pushing our government to do something about. Letting the car lobbies get by with making congress vote down the higher CAFE standards just isn't acceptable. (BTW, the most recent vote that failed was to increase fuel effeciency from about 26mpg to about 33 mpg, not a huge increase).
Okay, that's all for now. More to come later, I'm sure.

My Favorites

My favorite t-shirts I've found. Now just to decide which ones to get.

"Of course it hurts. You're getting screwed by an elephant."

"If you voted for Bush, a yellow ribbon won't make up for it."

"Poverty, Healthcare, and Homelessness are moral issues."

"At least in Vietnam, Bush had an exit strategy."

"My dog is smarter than your president."

"Intelligent Design: Holy smokescreen!"

"Religious Fundamentalism: A threat abroad, a threat at home."

"Dissent is the highest form of patriotism - Thomas Jefferson"

"Evolution is just a theory. Just like, um, Gravity..."

"Land grabbers do it by eminent domain."

"I'd rather have a president who screwed his intern than one who screwed his country."

"Who Would Jesus Bomb?"

"If you support Bush's war, what are you still doing here? Suit up and ship out, soldier!"

"If Jeb runs, I'm moving to a country who's dictators come from a smarter family."

"You voted for W, so SHUT UP about the gas prices." - one of my favorites

"FACT: Bush Oil: 1999 - $19 barrell, 2005 $70 barrell"

"Jesus was a social activist liberal."

"If Bush is a Christian, then I'm the virign Mary."

"Keep your theocracy of my democracy."

"Pro-choice does not mean pro-abortion."

"To announce...no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president, right or wrong, is no only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American people. - Teddy Roosevelt"

"Unemployed but safe from gay marriage!"

"Don't allow yourself to become so moral that you forget what it is to be Christian. Embrace Christ, not hate."

"When Jesus said love your enemies, I'm pretty sure he meant don't kill them!"

""

The "Theory" of Gravity

Holy cow I came across this and it's GREAT!

Democrats Standing Up

I am proud, I really like that Harry Reid. He's got some balls.

While it is obvious the Republicans don't want to get to the bottom of what happened in the lead up to the war (because all arrows point to fraud on the R's part), the democrats do. One of the most important decisions a president can make is to send his country to war. And we now know that we were knowingly given false information and that the administration tried to silence any critics of the war (through any means necessary). We, as a democracy, have a trust in our elected officials. We were misled into supporting a war through made up intellegence.
Part of the reason we have 3 branches of government is because of checks and balances. Thus far the senate has done nothing to "check" on the administration.
Well, today Harry Reid led the senate into a closed session to investigate the run up to the war.

"They have repeatedly chosen to protect the Republican administration rather than get to the bottom of what happened and why," Democratic leader Harry Reid said.

"The Libby indictment provides a window into what this is really all about, how this administration manufactured and manipulated intelligence in order to sell the war in Iraq and attempted to destroy those who dared to challenge its actions," Reid said before invoking Senate rules that led to the closed session.

Unfortunately we have moved into a political climate that doesn't allow for questioning of your leaders. If you question this administration you are either labeled "unpatriotic", simply a "bush hater" or "clinton lover". You're not allowed to disagree without it being personal. We have completely lost the spirit of compromise (as obvious from the recent SCOTUS nominations). The media has turned into a machine of Republican talking points (no really, watch the news and you will get the exact same points on every station and they can all be traced back to the republican party) - as demonstrated by the attacks on democrats saying that they are against Alito because they are against Italian-Americans (which, of course, is absurd because it is the Republicans that are the party of discrimination). The American people have no independent sources of information any more and nobody is listening to eachother, and frankly, I blame Mr. Bush. After all, Rove invented the political climate we are currently living in - win at any cost.