Getting up to speed on the insulting antics of Professor Paul Zachary (PZ) Myers, the notorious professor desecration of the Eucharist, I go back to a thought I had sometime prior to this profaning incident and that is:  When will P.Z. Myers perform a similar act with say  . . . a Koran?  Just for instance?

One doesn’t have to read much to learn what serious and shallow issues Myers has with religion, generally Christianity and more specifically Catholicism.  By observation the one could make the judgment that Myers is simply a bigot.  His science background is even irrelevant to the situation at hand.  But all the same, his anti-Catholic exhibitionism (the desecration of the Eucharist), his rhetoric and his behavior in general makes scientists look bad. 

Now, I can list many Catholics and Christians in general, who were very good, constructive and creditable scientists.  The list is long, but my favorite is Belgian Roman Catholic priest Georges Lemaître who first proposed what is now known as the Big Bang theory.  Before any reader panics, Father Lemaître proposition of the theory wasn’t a religion one.  He wasn’t trying to “prove” the Book of Genesis.  Unlike P.Z. Myers, Father Lemaître was a very good, constructive and creditable scientist. 

Returning to a comment I made in the first paragraph: 

When will P.Z. Myers perform a similar act with say  . . . a Koran? 

I suspect not to see or hear of such an incident.  For me, it would be wrong.   But for P.Z. Myers, he doesn’t strike me as one who would risk a fatwa from an irate Imam demanding his death.  I suspect he does not have the courage of his convictions.

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The environmental movement for some has finally reached saturation point, and their saying so.  At least in England comments Alice Thomson from the TIMES ON LINE:

Only a year ago, according to MORI, 15 per cent of those polled put the environment in their top three concerns. That figure has dropped by a third to 10 per cent this month. Now that people are fighting for their own survival rather than their grandchildren's, they put crime, the economy and rising prices at the top of their list.

So, caring about the earth does have limits and guilt is thrown out the window:

According to Andrew Cooper, director of the research company, Populus: “There is a direct correlation between how people perceive the economy and the importance they place on the environment. When times are tough people resent paying more to salve their conscience.”

This sentiment translates well to the economic situation in American.  Concerns about the environment dwindle as the extra pocket money now goes into the gas tank.   In Britain as in American, “People have become wary of environmental causes that can turn out to do more harm than good. They don't want wind turbines marching across […] when nuclear power stations can do more to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.”  The rush for biofuels, first endangered and then cause serious damage to the world food supply.  Green taxes are seen for what they are stealth taxes.

Cares for a clean environment aren’t going to go away, and they shouldn’t.  Reasonable concerns for the environment must be link to a happy and successful lifestyle, so maybe a worldwide shock to the wallet was a necessary kick in the pants. 

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I’ve wanted to write about Russia’s war on Georgia for two days.  But the situation is so patently obvious I am at a loss as to what I can even add.  People with a far larger readership can, in a sense, vent my outrage far more efficiently and effectively.

Russia used Georgia military action to security a breakaway South Ossetia as a trigger to invade the sovereign nation of Georgia.  

Presently, I’m utterly disgusted by the inaction of the West and the stupidity of those on the American Left who can’t see or don’t want to see this danger because of the adolescent hatred of George Bush who even won’t be president next year.  But Georgia will still be torn asunder.  Does the Left care?  They ever have before.  Their romantic thoughts of tyrannical governments such as Russia’s goes on. 

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Here we go again, another direr prediction.

All U.S. adults could be overweight in 40 years

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - If the trends of the past three decades continue, it's possible that every American adult could be overweight 40 years from now, a government-funded study projects.

Now, how could—possibly—every American be overweight when millions and millions are jogging, dieting, and panicking about cancer, heart disease, and who knows what other horrible, calamitous, biological dysfunction the MSM will terrorize the public with next!

The first paragraph by its very supposition is moronic.  Okay.  I’ve said it.  It’s moronic. 

But we must continue:

"Genetically and physiologically, it should be impossible" for all U.S. adults to become overweight, said Dr. Lan Liang of the federal government's Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, one of the researchers on the study.

However,  . . .

That’s right, however, the impossible become . . . possible.   “[…] she told Reuters Health, the data suggest that if the trends of the past 30 years persist, "that is the direction we're going."

Hold one moment.  Let’s go back to the data, Dr. Lan Liang speaks of.  I don’t know about you but when someone starts thinking about the data, I flash on the Manmade Global Warming Crisis!

(Parenthetically speaking:  Why, if something is bad and assumed to be cause by the human species, is it always referred to as manmade?  Never like people made?  American women are no longer enslaved and chained in the kitchen.  And they tend to drive SUVs and Hummer.  Just a thought)

Getting back to the data statement, I always suspect it.  And always find the bearer suspect as well.

But the reason of the information goes as follows:

1.  some groups of U.S. adults have extremely high rates of overweight and obesity;

2.      among African- American women, for instance, 78 percent are currently overweight or obese.

All based on “government survey data collected between the 1970s and 2004.”  Also, “researchers estimate that 86 percent of American adults will be overweight by 2030, with an obesity rate of 51 percent. By 2048, all U.S. adults could be at least mildly overweight.”

And of course everything just gets worse as “[w]eight problems will be most acute among African-Americans and Mexican- Americans, the study projects. All black women could be overweight by 2034, according to the researchers, as could more than 90 percent of Mexican-American men.”

Of course, all of this data is a “Wake call!”  All this fat is directly proportional to the cost of health care!  But isn’t everything these days a direction effect on health care? And changes must be made, of course.  “Broader social changes are needed as well, she said -- such as making communities more pedestrian-friendly so that people can walk regularly, […]” but here’s the scary part as Dr. Lan Liang continues, and get “the food industry to offer healthier, calorie-conscious choices.”  It must be added that the individual effort is not enough.  "It really needs to be more than an individual effort," Liang said. "It needs to be a societal effort."

Can you say, government mandated exercise programs like it’s the business of Dr. Lan Liang or anyone else in government to be involved. 

Ultimately, and as always, it’s not about health or obesity, it’s about the government telling the American food industry what to produce and telling Americans what to eat and how miles to walk and how many push-ups to do. 

The obese U.S. Governmental bureaucracy should lead by example and cut some of its fat first.  So, Dr. Lan Liang should be carefully.  She could be putting herself out of a job.

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Finally, the FBI has nailed down the whole anthrax case begun just after the grim events of September 11, 2001. 

Army scientist Bruce Ivins had possession of purified anthrax spores linked to the deadly 2001 attacks. He worked alone.

They got him and then Bruce Ivins committed suicide. 

I’ve was going to write something more in-depth, but as I surfed I found conspiracies bubbling up as amateur detectives have set their fingers to flying over their keyboards.

For me the one thing I found curious is when NBC reported on Ivins motive: 

As for motive, investigators seemed to offer two possible reasons for the attacks: that the brilliant scientist wanted to bolster support for a vaccine he helped create and that the anti-abortion Catholic targeted two pro-choice Catholic lawmakers.

Of the five people who died none were political, but the stretch to make a religious connection appears, to me anyway, to be a real stretch, even if the FBI is doing the stretching. 

But if any negative connection, which can be made to a religion, especially a Christian one and more specifically Catholic, appears good enough for the MSM no matter how odd.

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It’s true:

It’s America’s fault because the people have the money to buy stuff that, of course, makes them selfish, and the government’s, no, no Bush’s energy policy is imperialistic.

There are people who believe that, but the whole statement is malarkey.

First of all, Americans can only consume the stuff, those resources, until some other country makes the product and sends the stuff here.  In China they mine their own resources, make spoons and other high-tech stuff and we buy or consume those products.  (Okay, the spoon comment was a joke, but the premise remains true.)  So, we don’t consume all of it. What I’m trying to get across is American can’t use/consume all those resources, because China is going to keep some of the mined resources and the spoons they’ve made. 

Some products are made specifically for the US.  What is a Malayan going to do with a parka anyway?   I’m making a point here, not just a joke.  The point is products are produced to fill a demand.  That’s Economics 101.

Now, what is an imperialistic energy policy?  Maybe we should ask the Ukrainians.   The Russian government made the threat of cutting off their natural gas supply.  That seems pretty imperialist, even terroristic to me. 

But we’re dealing with America, which means America is bad—bad, bad America!  But I can’t figure out how America or rather Bush has an imperialistic energy policy, considering the fact that American is getting squeezed at the pump by foreign oil producers. 

So, Bush’s energy policy is imperialistic is only Marxist verbal diarrhea to be ignored at all cost. 

For America to really share and care, America must drill for its own oil, which will release the petroleum we used back into the world market, making the world a better place. 

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Atheism use to be the mark of a ‘lone wolf’ belief.  The individual as atheist simply didn’t believe.  That’s it.  No elaborate arguments were needed, no books had to hit the best sellers list, and no debates were staged.  An atheist was the epitome of the nonbeliever.  But now, they’ve had to come together in their unbelief.  Commune, let’s say, and invent rituals:

Atheists bond during 'de-baptism'

Nonbelievers say they need to show their numbers

Belief in God symbolically evaporated when more than a hundred atheists were "de-baptized" with a blow dryer yesterday.

Not only must they perform a ‘de-baptizing’ ritual, they must also ‘bond.’  Yes, bond.  We’ve gone from lone wolf nonbeliever to the Atheists’ Support Group:

Organizers of the event in Westerville, described as a "coming out party" for atheists, agnostics and humanists, served root beer and crackers with peanut butter and honey to top off the late afternoon ceremony.

Apparently, children were present, but couldn’t they have livened up the party just a bit?  Root Beer?  Peanut butter crackers?  What?  No wings and real beer!

Putting the sad fair aside, I understand their effort to ridicule the Sacrament of Baptism, but it was simply goofy.  They substituted cheap performance art for their lack of a rational argument.

But it actually gets worse as Frank Zindler, president of American Atheists, pronounced the . . . incantation, I guess, and said:

"Do you agree that the magical potency of today's ceremony is exactly equal to the magical efficacy of ceremonial baptism with dihydrogen oxide, and do you agree that the power of all magical ceremonies is nonexistent?"

He just delegitimized magic and put The Society Of American Magicians out of a job.  He then stated,

 "It sounds perhaps frivolous, but it's a very serious thing,” . . ."The event is more of an invitation to a revolution more than a party in a sense. Until we come out of the closet and let people know our numbers, politicians think they can ignore us."

Apparently, Mr. Zindler recently stepped out of a cave and never heard of Madalyn Murray O'Hara and the fight she won, which reduced a school prayer to a moment of silence, and the removal of a sculpture of the Ten Commandments from a courthouse.  The list does go on.  I just want to know how he figures his belief is being ignored. 

At this session of the Atheists’ Support Group, a young lady reports that after becoming “more vocal about being an atheist after she said she was fired in the fall from a Columbus truck dealership because of her atheism.”   Now, I’m not an atheist but she needs a lawyer because she has a legitimate lawsuit here.  If she’s not pushing for reparations, I find her charge suspect.

Someone else who participated in this symbolic de-symbolizing ceremony “was studying to become an apologist for Christianity before he decided that Christianity wasn't rational.”  First of all, how does one studied to become an apologist for anything, let alone, Christianity?  What school was he going to?  Apologist 101 wasn’t in my course catalogue.  Putting that quandary aside, I will puzzle over how “he decided that Christianity wasn't rational.”  I just don’t know what that means.  But that’s not his fault.  It’s the fault of the woman writing the article.

If I took the ‘ex-studying to be an apologist’ aside, he’d have the opportunity to explain what he meant by “Christianity wasn't rational.”  As far as I know there are many things in the world which defy rational explanation, but people believe in them.  Aliens from outer space always come to mind.  I’m not knocking this person’s unbelief, but he should keep in mind is that what is rational is ways up for debate.

The ‘ex-studying to be an apologist’ also has concerns about the label atheist and “usually avoids the term atheist when he meets people.”  (So, he hides his light under a basket—a little Bible bit there)  "It invites people to have overly simple stereotypes," he said. Stereotypes?  Like people who gather and mock the beliefs of another group. That kind of stereotype?  Of course, he says those other people, "They believe we're moral relativists who don't believe in truth."  Maybe he should consider the fact that there are atheists who are moral relativists, and an ideology such as Marxism is Atheistic and has more than just a little blood on its hands. 

One of the party goers said, "The de-baptism doesn't have any magical or supernatural aspect.”  Oh, really?  No magical or supernatural aspect?  Who’d thought that?  Finally, she concludes by adding, "It's just symbolic and a way to out themselves."

To ‘out one’s self’ is a very popular thing.  But, you see, I know people who believe in Providence as George Washington referred to God, but they don’t ‘out themselves.’ They have no need to.  If you didn’t see them walk through a church door you wouldn’t know they were a religious.   

If an atheist didn’t say, “Hey, I’m an atheist,” no one would know or even care he existed.  Maybe that’s it.  When faced with oblivion, what is a 21^st century atheist to do, but gather in their unbelief, but all in all it’s about one’s self. 

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Reading Solzhenitsyn has had a great historical as well as literary effect on me.  That he’s recently past away made me pause and think about what I’ve read by this great writer and thinker.

At the American Thinker, Bruce Walker has posted The Death of a Giant, which I had the opportunity to add to.  Take some time and read it.

In a quick note, Gulag: A History by Anne Applebaum is a deep exploration of the Soviet prison system which is a tearing-away of the mask of Totalitarianism and Marxism.

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