17 July Part Two

Riding notes: Olivia and I rode 8 miles on the East Peoria trail. It was a bit hot for her and she had eaten too much breakfast, so we had to scale it back a bit. At least I kept up with her this time.

Chatter from the blogs:

Elections: The Jed Report points out the difference between McCain’s money and Obama’s money:

The interesting thing about Barack’s $52 million fundraising haul in June is that the average donation was $68.

Meanwhile, the average donation to John McCain’s $62.5 million Victory Committee fundraising campaign has been $5,754.

Now in our local Congressional race between Aaron Schock and Colleen Callahan, Schock has a huge advantage and has a private fund raising event with President Bush:

Republican congressional candidate Aaron Schock raised more than $407,000 in the past three months while his Democratic opponent Colleen Callahan raised about a third of that in a race that is creeping toward the $2 million mark.

To date, Schock, a Republican state representative from Peoria, has raised about $1.5 million and has about $300,000 cash on hand while Callahan has raised about $227,000 and has $155,400 cash left to spend, according to quarterly reports filed this week with the Federal Election Commission.

But Schock’s upcoming fundraiser with President George Bush and country singer Lee Greenwood already has generated $250,000, which wasn’t included in this reporting period. Political insiders say that event is expected to gross $500,000 to $700,000.

“Our campaign is going to work very hard, as Aaron always has, to raise what it takes to be able to broadcast his unusually extensive array of accomplishments,” said Schock’s campaign manager Steve Shearer.

Believe it or not, in the Journal Star Print edition, this article had the phone number and address for whom to call to get tickets for the Bush-Schock fundraiser:

to order tickets call 693-9393; the event is at Bob and Virginia Weaver’s Angus Farms, near The Shoppes at Grand Prairie

Here is the article:

PEORIA —

Maybe it’s the fence surrounding the property. Maybe it’s the 30 acres of open, rolling grassland.

Maybe the Peoria farm resembles a Texas ranch.

Whatever the attraction, Bob and Virginia Weaver’s Angus Farms will host the president of the United States later this month. It was one of two sites listed by congressional candidate Aaron Schock for his fundraiser.

“We feel it’s an honor. I think anybody would be pleased to have the president visit them,” Bob Weaver said Tuesday, after learning his property was confirmed for a visit July 25 by President George Bush.

“It’s a nice setting and everything looks beautiful, the ground is in top shape and it just makes a nice place to hold the function.”

It’s not the first time the farms, 5806 W. U.S. Route 150, not far from The Shoppes at Grand Prairie, have played host to large-name Republican political events. Just last month, former Gov. Jim Edgar was the keynote speaker for Darin LaHood, the Republican candidate for Peoria County state’s attorney.

In August 2006, U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert campaigned there for Schock.

The mid-afternoon event will be held under a large tent, and capacity is unlimited. At least 500 tickets already have been sold to the $500-per-plate fundraiser.

Alwan & Sons confirmed they will cater the event, though a menu has not yet been decided.

Peoria County Sheriff Mike McCoy said White House advance security teams likely will be in the area over the weekend conducting preliminary security detail.

“When a major candidate comes, we work with Secret Service and Peoria City (police department) and surrounding jurisdictions to make sure it’s a safe visit,” McCoy said.

If you go to the Journal Star site that I linked to above, you can see some of the discussion.

This is a typical comment that the moronic wingnuts make:

Its amazing how all the liberals start caring whats going on politically when a republican has anything to do with it. Their own nominee is a muslim radical that has associations with terrorists and hates white people. Oh thats right, they can’t remember the Rev Wright, A white mans greed is a World in need, Pennsylvania people hiding behind their guns and religion, Rezko, no American flag pins on his lapel, his goofy wife an all the crazy crap she’s said, his muslim school upbringing, his radical muslim father, his typical white mother and grandparents. Wow, did I forget to mention the continuous flip flopping on MAJOR issues. Its funny, the Hannity show yesterday played four recordings back to back of him showing 4 totally different opinions on the war on terror. Yep, gotta agree lets worry about what Schock and the president are doing and focus less on Obama and what the real facts are.

Amazing, no? If the dumbest of the Republican backers were any dumber, they’d sprout roots!

Fortunately, though Peoria County is rather purple (essentially a tie in the 2004 general election, with Kerry getting 70 more votes than Bush out of 82,000 ballots)

Democratic Kerry 41,121 50%
Republican Bush 41,051 50%

Libertarian Badnarik
439 0%

And note that in the 2008 primary election, our results looked like:

I did some number crunching from the election statistics and found the following in Peoria County (both the City and the Coutny):

22662 people cast ballots for a Democratic candidate and 19451 for the Republican. This is interesting, given that the Republicans had a congressional contest (US Congress) that would, in effect, determine who is going to represent us in Ray LaHood’s old set (Aaron Schock won big with over 70% of the vote).

In the Democratic contest, Obama got 15066 votes for 66.5% (73% within the City of Peoria) and Clinton got 6975 votes for 30.8% (25% in the City of Peoria).

In the Republican contest, McCain won 9421 votes for 48.4%, Romney 30%, and Huckabee 15.8%.

So, it is safe to say that Obama, on the whole, is popular here, though he has his detractors.

Religion and other matters

I found an interesting blog called Breaking Spells. One of its posts is about one of the threats that PZ Myers got:

From: xxx@yyyy.com
Subject: your short life
Date: July 13, 2008 8:07:31 AM CDT

[...]

Paul,

what I would like to know is how did you even
get a job at a collage.

when you are obviously a moron.
How would you feel if nice folks starting ranting against
Fags, and atheist like yourself.

well sir, you don’t get to blaspheme and walk away from this.
You have two choices my fucked up friend, first you can quit your job for the good of the
children. Or you can get your brains beat in.

I give you till the first of the month, get that resignation in cunt

I deleted the e-mail address as there is reason to believe that the address was somehow hijacked to be used for this threat.

Breaking Spells has another interesting article:

There are more comments in the 1800Flowers.com post than any other on Breaking Spells (and I’m not ashamed to admit the Pharyngula Effect is fun while it lasts) and some of them revolve around the issue of “respecting” religious superstitions and not speaking out about nonsense and irrational ideas in favor of considering the sensibilities of the superstitious themselves.

Bullshit. I’m sorry, but that’s not how it works. You don’t get to hold or have a batshit idea that you’re willing to spread, indoctrinate, or otherwise compell others to agree with and still be protected from rational criticism or even ridicule.

Its no different than if someone held a belief that Elvis was still alive and abducting hillbillies from his UFO and not only expected others to believe it but wanted to enact laws that protected and promoted this ideology as fact. Anyone would be well within their rights to criticize this notion and ridicule would be expected.

A eucharist cracker is just flour and water. Anyone that truly believes that the mere act of consuming a cracker after a magical spell spoken over it becomes the flesh of Christ is not only ignorant and deluded, they’re batshit. Have these people ever stopped to consider that, if true, they would eventually be defecating Christ? Talk about “holy shit.”

Back to the comments.

At least one person here and several on Pharyngula and elsewhere commented that PZ shouldn’t disrespect the religious. And it’s a common response by believers, adherents, apologetics, and even sympathetic non-believers that atheists shouldn’t criticize the beliefs of others. There’s a taboo of even questioning religious doctrine in public. When critics and skeptics do question and criticize, they get accused of being “militant,” “shrill,” a part of an “anti-religious kabal,” etc.

Ok, here is where I will weigh in: I think that people should make arguments for what they think is correct. But there should be some sort of purpose; going out of your way to insult someone for the sake of trying to make them feel bad really doesn’t solve anything.

Here is what some don’t get: I do say that I think most religious ideas that involve “miracles” are, in fact, absurd and really nothing more than relics from our distant past. I’ll say so on my blog, and I’ll say so when I am asked in public.

But I am not going to go onto anyone’s blog and post these; I am not entitled to any sort of a captive audience for my ideas. And, I am certainly not going to go to someone else’s religious service and deliberately violate the existing etiquette even if I find it noxious (e. g., having women sit out to the side in Orthodox Jewish services).

And to be frank, I do find some value to some religious rituals; one of my fondest memories is when one of my running buddies invited me to her Sukkot booth and did a celebration complete with readings. I felt a friendship connection, even though I didn’t believe that there was a deity looking down at us.

Something I find ironic: we are often accused of “being haters”. Yet, we are constantly blamed for all the world’s problems:

Saudi King Abdullah spoke at a Madrid conference sponsored by the Muslim World League, and spoke against religious extremism. Good, as far as it goes.

Unfortunately, he whitewashed the role of religion in the world’s problems. According to King Abdullah, religion (especially his) is blameless, claiming that “Islam is a religion of moderation and tolerance”. Ironically, the conference apparently took place in Spain instead of Saudi Arabia, because Saudi Arabia is “the only Arab Muslim country to ban all non-Islamic religious practices on its soil, even though it has a large community of expatriates professing other faiths.”

Instead, he chose to blame the world’s problems on “secularism” and atheists: “If we wish this historic meeting to succeed, we must focus on the common denominators that unite us, namely, deep faith in God, noble principles, and lofty moral values, which constitute the essence of religion” and that the world’s problems are “a consequence of the spiritual void from which people suffer when they forget God, and God causes them to forget themselves.” Despite blaming the world’s problems on atheists, he also denied their existence, claiming that “we all believe in one God, who sent messengers for the good of humanity in this world and the hereafter”.

Did any of the 200 religious and political leaders present speak against this anti-atheist bigotry? Nope. Instead, they fell over themselves to praise King Abdulalh. Ronald Lauder, president of the World Jewish Congress, “said the conference was a ’significant and timely development.’” Catholic Cardinal Tauran called it “an act of great courage”. Jesse Jackson apparently called the speech “a distinguished one in its contents and noble message” (may not be an exact quote). Abdullah Tariq said, “It is a great beginning of a valuable call from a generous King.”

Often it appears this way to me:

One other thing: what I think about religion, deities etc. is simply what I think. I am more than willing to change my mind if I see evidence to do so; atheism is NOT a faith. It is: “I see no evidence to believe in any of the deities that I’ve heard about” and nothing more than that.

17 July 2008

Workout notes Yoga with Ms. V and then a 7 mile walk (Glen Oak/Springdale). Roughly 1:40′ish (with stops for traffic; I didn’t use my watch). Nothing fast but enough to sweat.

I had some slight pain in my right calf/lower hamstring/behind the knee

Last night I took Olivia to yoga class and afterwards Ms. V. had dinner with us.

Another sign that I am old and decrepit: blogger Evolved and Rational shows off her pendant.

And I am an old, married has been never was and never going to be.

Mind you, I never scored 4 touchdowns in a high school football game!

Update Here is a blog post that describes how to live “homeless” for less than $3000.00 per year.

You know, there is part of me that finds this appealing; I’d love to be able to sell all of my stuff and, ok, maybe I’d live in a small efficiency apartment with only a bike. I’d keep my job though.

Politics: there was a time when John McCain said that Afghanistan was the top priority and should be dealt with first.

RUSSERT: Would you have any problem expanding President Bush’s orders to the CIA to go after Osama bin Laden to include Saddam Hussein?

LIEBERMAN: Well, I leave that to the president. But as a matter of principle and morality, of course not.

RUSSERT: Senator McCain?

MCCAIN: I think Joe’s right.

And I would just like to add one additional point. I believe that we will succeed. We will endure in Afghanistan. We will take out bin Laden, and we will take out the Taliban. And then we’ve got a major challenge of a stable government, but…

RUSSERT: How long will that take?

MCCAIN: I think the longer we give the impression that we’re there for, the shorter it’ll be. Because, as you quoted from articles earlier, they think they can outlast us. I don’t think they can this time.

RUSSERT: Do you believe the American people will continue to stay with that campaign?

MCCAIN: Absolutely, and I think the president is doing a great job in leading America and making us aware of the challenge we face.

But I think the real crunch is going to come after Afghanistan is settled and then we have to address the other countries, including Iraq. That’s where the coalition may not be so strong. That’s where people like the Saudis and the French and many others may have real reservations.

And so, we’re going to have to be steadfast. And again, the president will continue and, I think, very eloquently stated, countries that harbor these terrorist organizations will be held responsible, so it’ll be their choice, not ours. It’ll be their choice.

RUSSERT: But after Afghanistan, you’d have no problem going after Saddam Hussein?
[...]

RUSSERT: Senator Lieberman, should we include Iraq as a military target in this war against terrorism?

LIEBERMAN: Well, of course, I feel that so long as Saddam Hussein is in power in Iraq, the United States is in danger. And I think if you look at the words of the president’s statement to Congress, again, the war against terrorism, it says, we’re not going to be safe until we rid the world of people who have the capacity and the intention to strike at civilians to achieve political ends.

There is some evidence to suggest that Saddam Hussein may have had contact with bin Laden and the Al Qaeda network, perhaps even involved in the September 11 attack. That raises my suspicions.

But the more important point is, we know that Saddam would like to do us the worst kind of ill. We know that he has worked on chemical and biological weapons and, in fact, has used them against his own people and against the Iranians. In my opinion, therefore, Saddam is a terrorist.

And, therefore, we should–it should be a centerpiece of our policy after we finish the business in Afghanistan and bin Laden to end that regime. It begins for me by supporting the Iraqi opposition, the people within Iraq that want to get rid of him. But then, ultimately there has to be an American and, I hope, allied military component to that. Because as long as Saddam is there, our lives are threatened.

Note: Yesterday’s jibjab video seems to be popular.
Here is the one that first made it big (Kerry-Bush 2004)

Second note I got excited when I saw that my blog hits were up; I then realized that many were merely coming here for Misty May photos.

See “eye candy” on my sidebar to be directed at a, well, “comprehensive” Misty May photo site.