Is Duck, Duck, Goose Next?

Oh for crying out loud! Maybe they should just abolish fun altogether and get it over with!

Critiquing the Religious Left

This thought provoking article talks about transforming the religious left, currently not very organized and lacking a cohesive philosophy other than expressing a desire to "help," into a force for action on "...political, social and economic justice..."

Wiccan Soldier Denied Memorial

"Correct me if I’m mistaken, but I believe this soldier gave his life in part to protect and defend religious freedoms"

Blessed be!

Heavily Armed and Trained Aryan Racists

Where have I heard this before?

We employ neo-Nazis and skinheads as armed emissaries of a country that went to war in the 40s to defeat the terrible threat of those with a like philosophy? What price will we pay when we become more like those my father's generation fought in Europe?

North Korean missile tests

Believe me, I'm concerned about North Korea having nuclear weapons, and I hope I don't underestimate the danger to those countries closer to North Korea. But if I understand the situation correctly (which is by no means a given), North Korea and the United States at least are well-matched in terms of the missile tests. North Korea has long-range missiles that don't work, and the U.S. has a missile defense system that doesn't work either.

Ann Coulter

Why does anyone pay any attention to this woman and continue to encourage her to spread her philosophy of hate? If we ignore her, won't she eventually go away?

Bill Moyers on Faith & Reason II

I really enjoyed the interview with Jeanette Winterson this week! What a warm, articulate, funny and honest woman. What she spoke about and how she spoke were quite intriguing.

"...since the Enlightenment in the 18th Century, we have privileged reason, logos, the empirical sense, finding proofs for things, discovering things that can be touched, and tested in the universe. Absolute rationality has seemed to be the key to our advancements. And in many ways this Enlightenment, this rationality, this dependency on logic and reason, has freed us from many cruel superstitions, many nameless terrors. It also brought us technological advancements, of civilized advancements. But it's not sufficient."

"And the Greeks, for instance, who were a very rational set of people, still knew that there were two ways of arriving at truth. And it's Plato who makes the distinction between mythos and logos. That there is a mythic truth, which is an imaginative truth, and emotional truth, a way of understanding the world which is not about the facts and the figures, but which is never the less, valid. And we need to have kind of a balance. So, things need to be held in balance. And you wouldn't want to use mythic truth to tell you how to mend your washing machine, for instance."

The rapper/playwright Will Power was also interviewed, primarily about his hip-hop version of Aeschylus' play, Seven Against Thebes, the continuing story of Oedipus' sons. Once again, it was the first interview, with Jeanette, that really got to me.