Thinking out loud on and off since 1995

But the president of Pakistan said that she was gorgeous. Yeehaw!

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1842627,00.html?cnn=yes

AWARE (AWAreness during REsuscitation) is a collaboration of 25 major medical centers through Europe, Canada and the U.S., and will examine some 1,500 survivors of cardiac arrest in order to explore the process of dying though analysis of out-of-body experiences.

This shit is FASCINATING and potentially paradigm shifting.  I’ll be following the shit out of this study.

Jim Rogers, the CEO of Rogers Holdings said on CNBC Europe’s “Squawk Box Europe” that “America is more communist than China is right now,” He went on to say “You can at least have a free market in housing and a lot of other things in China. And you can see that this is welfare for the rich. This is socialism for the rich. It’s bailing out the financiers, the banks, the Wall Streeters.”

Damn.  I hear that.

But he kinda has a point.  Seems like our “less government” Republicans are the ones who are pushing us more and more toward the “socialist utopia” that they accuse Obama of proposing.

That’s my beef with the GOP.  They’re a bunch of frickin’ hypocrites.  I’m not saying that the Dems are any better…but the Dems don’t come off (to me at least) as a bunch of “my way or the highway” kind of people.  The Republicans are so black and white on everything.  Life isn’t that simple.

http://businessandmedia.org/articles/2008/20080908171808.aspx

I used to think that this song was “cute” and “fun”.  Now all of a sudden, Peter Pumpkinhead isn’t so funny.

Here are the words.  Wow.  Prophetic.

____

Peter pumpkinhead came to town
Spreading wisdom and cash around
Fed the starving and housed the poor
Showed the vatican what golds for
But he made too many enemies
Of the people who would keep us on our knees
Hooray for peter pumpkin
Wholl pray for peter pumpkinhead?
Oh my!
Peter pumpkinhead pulled them all
Emptied churches and shopping malls
Where he spoke, it would raise the roof
Peter pumpkinhead told the truth
But he made too many enemies…
Peter pumpkinhead put to shame
Governments who would slur his name
Plots and sex scandals failed outright
Peter merely said
Any kind of love is alright
But he made too many enemies…
Peter pumpkinhead was too good
Had him nailed to a chunk of wood
He died grinning on live tv
Hanging there he looked a lot like you
And an awful lot like me!
But he made too many enemies…
Hooray for peter pumpkin
Wholl pray for peter pumpkin
Hooray for peter pumpkinhead
Oh my oh my oh!
Doesnt it make you want to cry oh?

____

This would be a GREAT cover…if you really do it right…especially now.  Note to self: Do not do it like the fucking Crash Test Dummies.  Sorry Shifty.  This shit needs to be called out.  It’s a very karaoke performance. (TM Simon Cowell 2001-2008)

And the fucking “base lick”?  Frreal.  Dood.

Anyway.  XTC might be my new old favorite band.

I’m listening to Dear God again right now.

Awesome.  How in the hell can anyone say anything about Obama when this frickin’ woman believes that war is God’s plan and Alaska isn’t even truly America.

WTF!!!!

If McCain wins…and then he dies…which is a 50% chance given his age (actuarily)…then SHE BECOMES PRESIDENT.  Imagine that.

Wow. I’m not sure that I want religious beliefs dictating our country’s foreign policy. Sounds a little like the Christian version of Islamic extremism to me. What’s the difference? We’re on this side of the fence?

NOT good enough.

Wow.  Leroi Moore, the sax/flute/pennywhistle/etc. player of the Dave Matthews Band, has died at the age of 47.  That sucks.  My thoughts are with his friends and family.  A tremendous loss.  He was a true talent and a hell of a guy.

(Photo ripped from dmband.com)

CNN reports that

only about 5 percent of the nation’s churches are racially integrated, and half of them are in the process of becoming all-black or all-white.

Kind of funny.  Isn’t religion supposed to be about being the same in the eyes of God?  These are the kinds of anecdotes that remind me why I have turned my back to “organized religion”.  The hypocracy is absolutely mindblowing.

I can’t even explain how spot on this is. The premise is that stop signs have not been invented yet. and that they are “being designed” by a group of marketing people from a major corporation.  Imagine me as that designer.  You can see why I am not a very good account guy.

Brillant.

Absolutely brilliant.

Found this little quote on religion in a 1964 interview with Playboy Magazine. She was asked if religion had ever offered anything of constructive value to human life.

..in the sense of blind belief, belief unsupported by, or contrary to, the facts of reality and the conclusions of reason. Faith, as such, is extremely detrimental to human life: it is the negation of reason. But you must remember that religion is an early form of philosophy, that the first attempts to explain the universe, to give a coherent frame of reference to man’s life and a code of moral values, were made by religion, before men graduated or developed enough to have philosophy. And, as philosophies, some religions have very valuable moral points. They may have a good influence or proper principles to inculcate, but in a very contradictory context and, on a very — how should I say it? — dangerous or malevolent base: on the ground of faith.

This is kinda how I see religion. It holds true to antiquated models of reality.  Since it is supposed to provide insight into the metaphysical, then shouldn’t it be updated as our knowledge base turns more of that metaphysical stuff into actual physical stuff…so to speak?  What I mean is that if religion tells me that the world is 4,000 years old…but I have reams upon reams of verifiable data which not only supports a different model but actually refutes the religious claim, then shouldn’t the religious model be updated to reflect this?

It seems sort of irresponsible to me, as a thinking, rational human being, not to explore all models of reality in search of the ultimate truth.  This is why I tend to gravitate toward models of reality which seem to align most gracefully with current scientific models of reality.

I’d prefer to take my leap of faith after I’ve exhausted what science can tell me.  There is still faith.  But its the leap that has been reduced.

Does that make any sense at all?