This just in... The Vatican has rejected the "Intelligent Design" view proposed by fundamentalists.

...The Genesis description of how God created the universe and Darwin's theory of evolution were "perfectly compatible" if the Bible were read correctly.

His statement was a clear attack on creationist campaigners in the US, who see evolution and the Genesis account as mutually exclusive.

"The fundamentalists want to give a scientific meaning to words that had no scientific aim," [Cardinal Paul Poupard, head of the Pontifical Council for Culture] said at a Vatican press conference. He said the real message in Genesis was that "the universe didn't make itself and had a creator".

The Catholic Church has come a long way from prosecuting the heretic that claimed that the sun didn't revolve around the earth.  Though they've had problems in the past, I think the Catholic Church is one of the strongest religions in terms of intelligent theology.  If you're ever wondering about a religious issue, check their Catechism (kinda a theological encyclopedia).  Notably, see: Science and Faith, and Science as a service of man, and the creation account.

Well, that was easy....

Even though civil rights took an expected hit here in Texas, but elsewhere....

• in Dover (home of the "Intelligent Design" controversy), "Intelligent designers on the Dover school board were swept out en masse by the city's voters. Eight sane Dems swept out eight crazy fundamentalists." 

Now I've looked at this Inteligent Design issue quite a bit and I have had mixed feelings.  I personally don't believe in evolution from one species to another species, and prefer to believe that we were created as we are - with the built in genetic ability to "evolve" within our genetic pool (not outside it).  However, all the "Intelligent Design" proponents have proposed so far is that the "missing evidence" of evolution prove their theory.  That isn't how the scientific method that we all learned in school works.  But that's not the real reason that I don't support ID.  The proponents of ID are using "textbooks" with a huge religious leaning - talks of worldwide floods without any proof, and other Biblical stories are thrown in.  That's what Sunday School (protestants) and Religious Education (Catholic) classes are for.  If they really want religion taught (probably badly by non-religious teachers) in our classrooms, most people would support adding it to a philosophy class along with other religious beliefs (like in college).

• In Maine, "an anti-gay ballot initiative actually failed. That's something you don't see every day. An anti-gay marriage amendment in Texas passed easily (even though it may hilariously invalidate every marriage)." 
  
• "In both New Jersey and Virginia Democrats gained seats in the state legislatures...California is a disaster of epic proportions for Arnold." (All four of California's Terminator-inspired proposals failed, despite him spending $60 million (in tax-payer's money?) for this...)
  
• "[Republicans] soundly defeated reform efforts in Ohio and they held on to the NYC mayorship."
  [Quotes from Daily Kos]

Most importantly, almost every Republican that Bush campained for (and even one Democrat that supported Bush last year) have lost by staggering numbers.

I had an interesting dream last night... at least that's what I remember... and about all I can remember.  It's strange waking up with the feeling you had an interesting dream but not being able to remember any of it.  After thinking about it for most of the day, I think it had something to do with music and computers.

On a completely different note, I just got to a section in "The Truth" that used a metaphore from a "hip pop-culture reference..." the Karate Kid.  By some coincidence, I happened to see that movie this past weekend (not much coincidence, my wife loves the movie).  It's a sobering book, that lives up to its name.  It takes on more serious topics than Lies and the humor sometimes seems less funny since the subject matter is usually more depressing.  But, as always, his books are full of actually accurate information, unlike the target of his books.

And on yet another completely different note... Here's what's going on in politics today...(besides almost the entire Republican party being indited/convicted/or investigated)

WHO WOULD JESUS STARVE?
In order to offset the gross overspending on the Iraq war, and the huge (but justified) cost of hurricane recovery, Congress had to do something.   And guess what that was...  removing the tax cut for the rich -- just kidding, the Republicans won't dare to ask the rich to pay for anything. They are cutting massive funding ($50 billion) to about every social program for lower class and middle class people.  Meanwhile, they are extending $70 billion or more in tax breaks for the extremely wealthy (top 0.2% of taxpayers already got an average of $103,000 in tax cuts each from the previous tax cut).  These cuts include:

• Food stamps, including removing free-lunch programs for an estimated 30,000 kids
  
• Student loans
  
• Housing Assistance
  
• Health care
  
• Nursing homes

WHO WOULD JESUS TORTURE?

Los Angeles Times

Speaking from the Senate floor, McCain said, "If necessary - and I sincerely hope it is not - I and the co-sponsors of this amendment will seek to add it to every piece of important legislation voted on in the Senate until the will of a substantial bipartisan majority in both houses of Congress prevails. Let no one doubt our determination."

The no-torture wording, which proponents say is supported by majorities in both houses of Congress, was included last month in the Senate's version of a defense spending bill. The measure's final form is being negotiated with the House, and the White House is pushing for either a rewording or deletion of the torture ban.... The Bush administration has sought to exempt the CIA from the ban.

WHO WOULD JESUS PERCECUTE?

With the proposition that is to be voted on tomorrow to add a redundant admendment to the Texas Constitiution to make anything "identical or similar to marriage" even more illegal (as if the Defence of Marriage Act wasn't enough....) here's something to amuse you.
Twelve reasons why same-sex marriage will ruin society

1. Homosexuality is not natural, much like eyeglasses, polyester, and birth control are not natural.
   
2. Heterosexual marriages are valid because they produce children. Infertile couples and old people cannot get legally married because the world needs more children. 
   
3. Obviously gay parents will raise gay children because straight parents only raise straight children. 
   
4. Straight marriage will be less meaningful, since Britney Spears's  55-hour just-for-fun marriage was meaningful.
   
5. Heterosexual marriage has been around for a long time, and it hasn't changed at all: women are property, Blacks can't marry Whites, and divorce is illegal.
   
6. Gay marriage should be decided by the people, not the courts, because the majority-elected legislatures, not courts, have historically protected the rights of minorities.
   
7. Gay marriage is not supported by religion. In a theocracy like ours, the values of one religion are always imposed on the entire country. That's why we only have one religion in America.
   
8. Gay marriage will encourage people to be gay, in the same way that hanging around tall people makes you tall.
   
9. Legalizing gay marriage will open the door to all kinds of crazy behavior. People may even wish to marry their pets because a dog has legal standing and can sign a marriage license.
   
10. Children can never succeed without both male and female role models at home. That's why single parents are forbidden to raise children.
    
11. Gay marriage will change the foundation of society. Heterosexual marriage has been around for a long time, and we could never adapt to new social norms because we haven't adapted to cars or longer lifespans.
    
12. Civil unions, providing most of the same benefits as marriage with a different name are better, because a "separate but equal" institution is always constitutional. Separate schools for African-Americans worked just as well as separate marriages will for gays & lesbians.

UPDATE: Just in case anyone doubted the outcome, the Texas anti-gay rights admendment was passed 75% to 25%... Surprise, surprise, surprise... 

Rosa Parks, the woman who is credited for starting of the modern civil rights movement (in 1955) died yesterday (Monday 10/25/2005).  Her arrest for refusing to give up her seat on a bus to a white man sparked a 381-day boycott of the bus system by Martin Luther King, Jr.  She has since worked for U.S. Representative John Conyers (who I think is one of the few Democrats that are actually active in the House).  She was given the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1996, and the Congressional Gold Medal in 1999.

I overheard this question on the radio, and I thought I'd pass it on to my readers and see if you have any good responses.  50 years after her peaceful demonstration, it is almost unbelievable that we treated humans living in our own country so badly.  What do you think people 50 years from now, looking back on our time, will wonder about our behavior?  Will they be ashamed of anything that we do today?  Will they be proud of our efforts?

Electronic voting systems "aren't likely to be sufficiently secure by the 2006 elections," CNET reports. A new GAO report says current xisting systems are "rife with problems" and include vulnerabilities "from easily-guessed administrator passwords to incorrect software installation."

(From Taegan Goddard's Political Wire)

Note to self: Don't use electronic voting when I vote next.  No telling how many votes were swapped, changed, or thrown out in Ohio last election...

As was pointed out, I haven't said much about me recently... That's because nothing much has happened.  I'm just spending my time working, and reading the news (you don't get much news from watching it).  The only thing going on at my house is that my tree that I planted earlier this summer has lost all its leaves from too much hot weather and isn't doing so well.

It's getting entertaining watching the Republican spin machine self destruct.  I've enjoyed them attacking their own over the nomination of Bush's personal (corporate) lawyer to the Supreme Court.  I'm a little surprised the Democrats haven't spoken up much more about it, but I guess they're just waiting until the Republicans finish attacking themselves.  It's also funny watching the religious right complain about how they don't know her stance on abortion.  First of all, it's pretty clear that she's extremely "pro-life" as the religious right define it.  But does that really matter?  She (like Roberts before her) is a corporate lawyer, she protects the rights of corporations over those of actual citizens.  How about putting in someone who will protect the rights of people first, no mater what his/her position on abortion is?  Oh, well, like Bush said, she was the most qualified person for the job...(within 30 feet of his office?)

UPDATE: Will wonders never cease...

A former CIA Officer and security consultant discusses the corruption that grew in part from the "misguided neoconservative agenda for Iraq", including Halliburton's overcharging our government an estimated $200 million. 

Granted, this magazine is a true conservative magazine, which has little to do with the 'Don't tax and spend anyway' corporate 'Republicans' of today.

What I saw was a cabal between the vice-president of the United States, Richard Cheney, and the secretary of defense, Donald Rumsfeld, on critical issues that made decisions that the bureaucracy did not know were being made. Now it is paying the consequences of making those decisions in secret, but far more telling to me is America is paying the consequences.
-- Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell, quoted by the Financial Times. A complete transcript is available.

Wow...this is kinda scary...even though many of us suspected as much for quite a while. 

UPDATE:

I've recently been given reference to this quote by Rush Limbaugh, the full context of it can be found in Media Matter's post here.

He said, "Since I get so few qualified Liberals calling this program, I explain to my audience what Liberals mean when they say things.  I do more than add context. I know you Liberals like every square centimeter of my naked body, and I'm able to explain what Liberals mean when they say things as well as they are."

I've listened to some of what he attributes to 'liberals' and he either has no idea what 'liberals' believe or he is just misrepresenting it on purpose.  Either way, and I'm sorry that I'm being rude, but his statement is probably true anyway - he'd be hard pressed to identify his own feet, let alone every square centimeter of his body.

UPDATE2: 

Well, Tom Delay has been indited and booked.  Unfortunately for us, this picture of his mug shot won't do very well for political ads, so I guess we'll just have to describe all of his unethical deeds.  Of course, I don't know of any other criminal that has a full-color mug-shot without the booking number on it.

UPDATE again:

I knew it wouldn't be long before fake mugshots came out...

I don't know why the media spent most of the day covering the fact that the "talk" between Bush and some troops last Thursday was rehearsed.

After all, if you just listened to it, you could tell that there was only one person who didn't rehearse for this conference...Bush.  He was more stumbly with his words then he's ever been.  The only difference is that this time we have proof.  The Daily Show tied this to many of the other fake photo-ops in its episode on Monday (partial transcript).

On another political note, I've just heard that estimates from the Iraq vote is that 99% of registered voters actually went and voted, and 90% of them voted for the constitution.  I'll wait until I make my judgements, but this seems suspiciously high numbers...expecially knowing that almost all of the Suni's were planning to vote against it.  Though I really don't think it matters if the vote was fixed (like Ohio) because if the constitution passes, we get an Iran-like theocricy in Iraq - great.  And if the vote was fixed, we get an official civil-war in Iraq, instead of the unofficial civil-war that has ben going on for years there.

On yet another political note, it seems like the inditments from the ratting out of the CIA covert agent may be coming really soon, and may go as high as Vice President Darth Dick Cheney.  And that Ambassador Joe Wilson and his wife (the CIA agent) are considering bring up a civil charge against Bush and Cheney using the Supreme Court ruling that let the Paula Jones case go through (during Clinton's sexual harrassment scandal that was summarily dismissed as groundless). 

UPDATE: I got a good reminder from Frank_The_Fish (a very humorous writer)

He reminded me that Bush's approval ratings are at 2% among black people polled in a NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.  I think they must have polled Rice for that 2% though.  And furthermore, that poll had a 3.4% margin of error, so theoretically it is possible that a negative 1.4% of blacks approve of Bush's job as president.  That would mean that more blacks disapprove of Bush then there are blacks in the country.  Before you say that this is impossible, if we are actually nearing the end times, blacks can be coming back from the dead to disapprove of Bush... Or with the pervailence of pro-lifers around, maybe they've determined that pre-born black zygotes could be disapproving of Bush.  (Tips to Stephanie Miller for the last two remarks)

More lies from our good old Texas congressman DeLay...

In a Wednesday night appearance on MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews, he said Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle never talked to him or asked him to testify.

"Never asking me to testify, never doing anything for two years," DeLay said in the interview. "And then, on the last day of his fourth or sixth grand jury, he indicts me. Why? Because his goal was to make me step down as majority leader."

.....

Dick DeGuerin, the attorney representing DeLay, said Thursday that DeLay actually was invited to appear before the grand jury, where he would have been under oath. The Houston attorney was not yet on the legal team when DeLay was asked to appear, but he said other attorneys advised him not to testify — a decision DeGuerin supports.

This is in addition to DeLay accusing Earl (the prosecutor) of being "an unabashed partisan zealot" engaging in "personal revenge" even though prosecutors can't indict, only grand juries.

Hello?  Pot?  It's Kettle for you on line 1....Says your black...

Of course Earl has presecuted 11 Democrats in his many years as a prosecutor, and only 4 Republicans.  Here's the list of the 'big' names that he's prosecuted.

Think progress has a video and summary of his own "defence" on FOX NEWS of all places.

BREAKING: TOM DELAY INDICTED

Texas grand jury on Wednesday charged Rep. Tom DeLay [Texas 22nd district] and two political associates with conspiracy in a campaign finance scheme, an indictment that could force him to step down as House majority leader....

A Travis County grand jury today indicted U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay on one count of criminal conspiracy, jeopardizing the Sugar Land Republican's leadership role as the second most powerful Texan in Washington, D.C.

The charge, a state jail felony punishable by up to two years incarceration, stems from his role with his political committee, Texans for a Republican Majority, a now-defunct organization that already had been indicted on charges of illegally using corporate money during the 2002 legislative elections.

From Taegan Goddard's Political Wire, Daily Kos, and Crooks and Liars.

DeLay is the Republican representitave for Texas's 22nd district (Houstin area I think) and is was the House majority leader.