Duuuuuuudes!  Like, everyone has been down on libs for so long.  Like, harshing our mellow to the max, and all because we're like, lame and stuff.

But don't dispair mon frare...we're back baby!

'cause we totally went back in time and took over the Bible.  We're like rocken spiritual time-pirates.

You thought Bill and Ted had a great adventure?  Nu-uh!  Team lib totally went back in time and snuck the lovey-forgivy-sharey crap into the Bible! 

Uh-huh!  BAM!!  Yeah, take that, in yer face  Mr. Judgy-Mcvitriol Christian guys!

But uh-oh...Andrew Schlaffly's gonna take it back with an army of homeschool kids!  Bogus!

http://conservapedia.com/Conservative_Bible_Project

Get back in the funkey time-travel phone booth dudes!  We have to save the wimpy social gospel or we won't get to have a modern government or health care reform!

When I saw the headline "Not Holding Back: Why I didn't Redshirt My Kindergarten-Age Son"...I thought:

"Because he's too young to get eaten by a green slobbering space monster?"

"Because even though he's short, there's no guarantee that 'random surges in gravometric particle-waves' will go over his head"?

"Because Starfleet let one under-age ensign onto the bridge, and that is entirely enough?"  (BTW, Will Wheton is all grown up and is made of awesome)

Apparently, no.

Have you all heard about this?  Parents holding back their kids from starting kindergarten until age six so that they can be better at sports?

SPORTS?

ugh.

In human society, the "Wingman" courageously distracts and entertains the desierable woman's less attractive friend, so that his partner can have a chance to move in on the prize.

And the fundies say that humans are uniquly altruistic, but that's nothing when it comes to the altruism of the side-blotched lizard.

The side-blotched lizard will go out and "distract" a rival by letting the rival kick his ass.  In  the mean time, his buddy gets to enjoy the harem of females uninterrupted.

LOL!  Eat your heart out human "lounge lizards"...you got nothin' on the real thing!

(hat tip:  A Blog around the Clock)

Martians are just so NICE!  They obviously want us to "Have a nice Day"

Darned nice of them to think of us considering they have that whole "nonexsistance thing" going on.  What a bummer, and they do something thoughtful like this...

...It just sort of makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside.  I mean, when you look at that how can you even THINK that it happened by RANDOM CHANCE?!?  Obviously, it was DESIGNED...designed by a giant five-year old with a Martian Magna-Doodle.

(Hat Tip: Jason Bock)

I was just volunteering at Adventure Boy's school today, scanning in and re-shelving text-books that had been issued to students for the semester.  I finished early, and the lady I was helping out gave me some "new" (as in recently purchased) books.

I had to put an inventory number on them, stamp and date them, and then shelve them.

Guess what I found out?

Our richie-rich school district buys USED textbooks.

Now, I'm OK with that, as the books were nice and seemed just as good as new.

But it's just one more thing that irritates me when people talk about how our schools are "wasteful".              

For those of you who have been wondering if the world opened up under my feet and swallowed me whole, or if the ferocious Neo-Nazi home-decorator squad came and got me, none of the above.

I've been cutting up deer, organizing my house, cutting up piles and piles of undonatable junk clothing into quilting squares, and trying to rid the yard of fall leaves.

Also, I've been volunteering as an ESL tutor.  So far, I've been teaching a Somali woman and a Ukranian man.  I highly recommend doing ESL tutoring for anyone who thinks that immigrants are just lazy slugs coming here to drain our society.  You wouldn't believe how hard-working and appreciative they are.  They are America's greatest fans, happy to be here, and looking forward to forging a great future in the "land of opportunity".  Programs can always use more tutors.

Oh yeah, and they've added three Kung Fu classes to my teaching schedule.  I've got my two special needs classes, two classes for typical children, and an adult class.  One of my classes has 20 students!  I might have a co-teacher as soon as one of the other second degree black belts returns from hernia surgery...but I don't know.  I might be on my own from now on!

Needless to say, time has been a little tight, but this Kung Fu teaching is starting to look more and more like a job than a marginally profitable hobby.

Sure, atheists can DO math just as well as Christians.

And atheists can see the material beauty and majesty of math.

But Christian Math is just...more...ineffable.

I mean, without God, the numbers just add up...but WITH God...the numbers ADD UP. 

er sumptin'.

(double hat tip:  Pharyngula and Good Math, Bad Math)

It is unbelievable to me that we live in a country where a girl can be kicked out of school for refusing to say the Lord's Prayer at a school function, and Christians can continue to claim that prayer has been taken out of school, and that Christians are a "persecuted" minority.

Lies lies lies.  Doesn't the Bible say something about that?

You can watch the video of this girl's heinous crime here on YouTube

(Hat Tip:  Eclecticsanonymous)

Flashbacks to that one Batman movie.

Effect Measure has an article on Melemine, and the convention of adding the substance to food to boost the appearance of a high protein content.

But now there is talk of the Melamine not being that big of a deal, that there is a second chemical that reacts with a metabolite of the Melamine that has caused the crystals to form in the kidneys of the animals that have been affected.

This leaves a person wondering about the identity and source of the second chemical.

I get the feeling I should be worried about this, but for some reason my brain sticks on that scene in the Batman movie where the reporters are all wan and washed out and greasy and they are reading off the list of things to avoid mixing.  Something like: “Do not combine Shampoo with mouthwash and toothpaste”.

It DOES bother me that we’ve been eating plastic thinking that it is protein all this time.  If a US food producer did this to us, it would be called fraud.  China has some ‘splainin’ to do.

Also, note to you “anti-regulation” people out there…this is what happens when a government doesn’t regulate industry.

Oh yeah, and I'm ALSO put in mind of the sneaky and diabolical cleverness of "Famine" in the Book The Nice and Accurate Prophacies of Agnas Nutter, Witch By Neil Gaiman...where Famine is all chuffed with himself because he has anorexics starving themselves to death in the middle of plenty by binging on non-nutritious foodstuffs.  Melamine shows up in food tests as protein, but it has no nutritional value.

I just heard on MPR a lead in that was discussing a view that Virginia Tech should not have let the shooter return to school after he was hospitalized with a mental illness.

Are people really saying that employers and schools have to be held responsible for decisions to not descriminate against the mentally ill?  I couldn't listen to the broadcast, but the teaser was either repugnant, misleading or both.

If someone's behavior at work or school is threatening and dangerous, then the employer/school should be responsible for dealing with it appropriatly.  Merely knowing that they have been hospitalized does not mean that they are responsible to not allow the person on campus/hire them.

How many people have been hospitalized for mental problems and gone on to live normal, productive lives and not treaten anybody.

Ugh.  I am so sad for the victims and the families, and for the whole terrible mess.  All this over-focusing on single issues is perhaps understandable, but it is inappropriate and will not produce outcomes that will be helpful in any way.  People need time to heal before they can respond rationally.

ERV points out that "framing" is inadequate with some audiences and in some situations, such as dealing with the Discovery Institute on
"their" turf.  This is because they cheat.

If Framing is a screw driver, you can't be sucessful with it in situations that call for a hammer.

You don't engage in a "framing" debate at a Discovery Institute event where the only purpose of having a counter argument is to bring in big names to add legitamacy to the event.  No matter how well you "frame" your argument, it's not going to have much effect when you have fifteen  minutes and the Discovery Institute has a couple of days.  As ERV pointed out, a Q&A that only allows students to ask screened questions is also not helpful.

In a closed system, this would be a disaster.  However, getting those facts out to any media coverage on the event would be a good start.

That's framing.

The Discovery Institute "frames" this event as a debate.  We need to get the word out that it is a sham.  Use analogies to sporting events.  The Discovery Institute is holding a track meet, invites world class atheletes, and then only allows them to run if they agree to run while wearing fat suits.  This is so their people can "win" and say they beat world-class athletes.

When the world-class athletes turn down the invitation, the Discovery Institute can say "they're afraid" when it is the Discovery Institute that is afraid of fair competition.

John Q public is going to say "Huh.  I don't blame them.  I wouldn't go to a track meet and run in a fat suit either."

Right now, if you get into an evolution debate with a rank-and-file creationist, they spew every single Discovery Institute talking point down to the punctuation.  But when you say "Oh, the Discovery Institute" they say "who's that?"

Now, when they hear something from the Discovery Institute, they are going to say "Oh.  Those are the guys who can't handle fair competition with their ideas. " and go in search of other information.

They still might be creationists, but at least their sense of fairness won't let them use DI talking points whereas before they were unaware of even where that information was coming from.

My  apologies to those not interested in framing.

PZ Myers has reacted to a Washington Post Op/ed by Nisbet and Mooney.

Far be it from me to disagree with Prof. Myers, but on this one, I DO.  Not his principles, but his interpretation of the framing agenda.  As one of the potential targets of "framing", I gotta say, it would be helpful for me.  You know who argues with non-scientist anti-science types most often?  Non-scientist pro-science types, that's who.  I would really welcome some good tools that would help me accurately argue with people who I encounter on a dialy basis who think they "know enough" to be consumers of science, and make decisions in ignorance that they don't even realize is ignorance.  I would like a faster, better way of getting to the meat of scientific matters.

Prof. Myers seems to view it as an attempt to silence or gag atheist scientists, or sugar-coat science.

I don’t see it that way at all.  I see it as asking the science community as a whole to order their priorities, and emphasize those priorities in their explanations of their work to the general public.

Let’s say you’ve got a house with a gecko infestation.  I choose gekkos because they are inherently funny, and I am trying to lighten the mood.  Yes, it is a ridiculous analogy.  Just roll with it.  In this case, I suppose geckos are analogous to the fact that while pursuing scientific knowledge, you will encounter challenges to any faith you might happen to hold, and there may be aspects to that faith that you will abandon as a result of those challenges.

You want to sell your house, and you want to present it to the largest portion of buyers.  You know that the geckos are going to be a critical point in the sales strategy.  Some people think geckos are cute, but wouldn’t want them in the house, some people will see the inherent benefits of having a houseful of geckos (no bugs, for one) so you would be best served to “frame” your presentation of the house by emphasizing the non-gecko attributes.  It has a large kitchen, it has numerous conveniently placed bathrooms…look at that lovely skylight, and then mention the geckos at a convenient time, after the people have had a chance to get ALL the information.  You can’t deny that the house has geckos, but maybe that fact doesn’t have to be at the fore-front of the discussion.

Now pretend your neighbor wants to sell his house, and his house is gecko free because he is unscrupulous about using whatever means are necessary to have a gecko-free house.  Poison, cats, bludgeoning them with clubs, etc.

He puts up a big sign that says “I want to sell you a house.  My neighbor just wants to sell you a big load of geckos.”

So what do you do?  You could put up a big sign and say “I want to sell you a house.  My neighbor is an evil bastard who likes to slaughter innocent animals.”  That is true, and it might convince some people to hear you out.  It’s a little mean, but it’s not like the neighbor didn’t deserve it.  Problem is, you’re going to attract a bunch of people who are interested in the fight and name-calling, and people who just want to buy a house are going to keep driving.  Calling a spade a spade can be refreshing and feel good, but if your primary goal is to sell your house, it might not be the best approach.

What about “Yep!  We’ve got Geckos!  And How!”

Well, it’s honest, and you’re going to get a LOT of interest in your house from Herptaphiles…but maybe you want a bigger set of perspective buyers.

What about a sign that says “spacious kitchen, ample bathrooms, gorgeous skylight, many recent improvements that my neighbor doesn’t have because he spent all his money on the latest gecko-killing gadgets”.

Get the people in the house, show them what you’ve got.  Let them look around.  Let them shop your neighbor’s house, too.  Let them see the geckos, but for Pete’s sake get them in the door.

Sure, some percentage of them will leave with a crawling case of the heebie-jeebies and beat a path to the neighbor’s house and embrace his anti-lizard agenda…but YOU will have a LOT more perspective buyers to choose from.  You may even change some minds about whether or not it is possible to live comfortably with geckos.

From Conrad Zero I get a link to this article in the Washington Post.

A world-class violinist playing on a priceless violin, posing as a street musician, and his value is only recognized by a few people...a handful who have dabbled at being violinists, and one who recognizes the musician.

People who rushed past, perhaps flipping spare change, perhaps trying to shout over the annoying noise of this bothersom begger...what would they have done if they had realized that they were getting a free front seat at a performance that they would never get another chance at again?

What do people simply throw out as useless, meaningless, even stupid...just because they don't have a reason to really look at it's value?

How much of our "junk science" is the public policy equivilant of a virtuoso with a nearly priceless instrument being ignored by commuters too busy to bother knowing what they are missing?

[UPDATE:  Michelle gives us a link in the comments to a blog entry that expands on the "framing" aspect of the WaPo story.  She says that in order for the audience to respond to a classical musician in a street musician setting, he needs to develop skills for presenting to that audience appropriately for the kind of audience they are, and in the situation they are in rather than actually expecting them to respond to a performance just because it is good and worthy of their attention.

This is EXACTLY what I've been trying to say.  Thank you, Michelle.

Quote from the blog entry:

A busker is someone who can turn any place into a stage. Obviously, Joshua Bell needs an actual stage. As a busker one needs to interact with those around, break walls of personal space, and lure people into a collective and spontaneous group experience on the street, in the moment, with you. A bad busking act is when the performer doesn’t make an effort to connect with the audience. Like musicians who play for themselves, not acknowledging the audience, just burying their heads in their instruments.

Please inform the science-interested teenager of your choice!

http://scienceblogs.com/clock/2007/04/brain_essay_student_contest.php

Grasshopper and I are spending 1/2 hour each morning listening to our Pimsleur Mandarine Chinese language tapes.  So far, we have learned how to ask someone if they speak English, and also intimate that we "know a little Mandarin".  As you probably know, in Chinese it is important which "tone" you use.  There is a rising tone, a falling tone, and a tone that falls, then rises.  Sometimes you can have a word that ends with a rising tone, followed immediatly by a word with a falling/rising tone.

It is difficult for Western ears.  We have heard the syllable "pu" in several situations.  Grasshopper (9) was trying to explain it to Adventure Boy (a newly-minted 14) on the ride to AB's traditional birthday dinner.

"Well, you see, there are several kinds of poo.  There's poo that goes up, that's weird.  There's poo that goes down, that's normal.  And then...(he pauses ominously) there's wiggely poo."

He spent the rest of the evening in off-and-on fits of giggles.

This morning, we learned a new phrase that, the first time we heard it, sounded for all the world like "poo shot out" to our unpracticed ears.

I had to pause the CD for a few minutes for Grasshopper to collect his wits about him.

At least learning Chinese is fun for him...right?

One of my Kung Fu friends is a guy from India.  He's just started a business where he pairs up people with master's degrees in Math with students here in the U.S. for tutoring sessions.  They work online together.  The tutor in India has the books that Adventure Boy's school uses, and she can help him with whatever chapter they are on.

Adventure Boy is getting the first of three free tutoring sessions this week.

I'm not sure what to think about this.  I like the idea of getting AB a math tutor, especially for the summer.  We could most likely not afford this level of expertise and time if we went with someone here...and there is the added benefit that it is on the computer, and it is totally interactive and he seems to be haveing an easier time paying attention than a face-to-face...

...but then there is the whole outsourcing thing.

And it's my friend's business, and I would like to give him my business because I know he's a good guy and he's a fair person...and I always prefer to deal with people I know and trust.  And if I can help a friend out by giving them my business I would rather do that if I can.

Dilemmas dilemmas.

On top of that, poor Adventure Boy had a day today.  School all day, with rehersal for the musical after school (he's in the pit orchestra of The Music Man), then he went to the gym to work out, came home and watched one half hour of TV, and then had an hour of math tutoring, and now it is after his bedtime.

Kind of a busy day for a thirteen year old.

He stuck a stick into a hornet's nest, and stirred it around real good.

And now a lot of REALLYSMARThornets are all abuzz.

But I'm guessing that, instead of running away and jumping in a lake like a sensible person (even cartoon characters know that's the appropriate response to the situation), he's going to just stand there swatting ineffectually at them while they outmaneuverhim at every turn.

Or maybe he'll just whine and cry about how they are oppressing him for his religion.

Ben at EclecticsAnonymous informs me that Evolution Sunday is coming up.

I don't advocate parishoner's pressuring pastors to address a particular subject from the pulpit, and certainly not political issues.  But this is an important social issue that affects our society, and it affects people of faith.  With the attacks on science education around the country, we know that they will come for the science books again, and everyone's children will be the poorer for it.

If you would like to mention it to your pastor/rabbi/imam (as Ben says) I'm sure they would like to know they have this opportunity if they would like.

Many scientists who are people of faith have come out and publicly said that there is no reason for science and faith to be incompatable.

Religious leaders who feel the same now have an opportunity to join them publicly and conspicuously and stand for the search for truth over willfull ignorance.

Here is the website with the pertinant information.

My friend Karen has has an IM friend for three years now.  He's an Iraqi living in Iraq.  Formerly imprisioned by Saddam Hussein's government, he worked for a while for an NGO, and is now unemployed.

Here are links to a couple of the IM conversations that they had:

1 A conversation with an Iraqi   http://alenaae.blogspot.com/2007/01/1-conversation-with-iraqi.html

2 Further conversation with an Iraqi   http://alenaae.blogspot.com/2007/01/2-further-conversation-with-iraqi.html

3 Conversation with an Iraqi disclaimer   http://alenaae.blogspot.com/2007/01/3-conversation-with-iraqi-disclaimer.html

 http://alenaae.blogspot.com/2007/01/why-to-keep-church-and-state-separate.html

I just thought you might be interested.

[UPDATE:  The links, they have been fix'ed, and a fourth one added]

Eden Prairie has now made it so that students have to have 54 credits to graduate.  The number used to be 48.

What does this mean for Adventure Boy (starting High School next year)?

It means that if he wishes to remain in Band, he will incur a greater "music penalty" than students have in previous years.

84% of his classes (as opposed to the 75% previously) will be required coursework.

Band, Orchestra and Choir are "elective" courses.  Beyond that, they are what are called "skinny" courses, meaning that they only meet for 45 minutes, and are paired with a 45 minute study hall.  I just attended a meeting where the High School gifted and talented councilor was very discouraging to the parents of high achieving students about their kids proceeding in music.

Our High School only has four 90 minute class periods per day.  This allows teachers to really dig into a subject, and reduces wasted time for things like classroom changes, getting students to settle down, that wasted last five minutes of classtime when you are winding down the days business, etc.  It is a good scheme, and much more efficient.  One years worth of material is covered in a single semester and in a more intensive fashion.  Students can concentrate study time at home as well, only focusing on four subjects at a time rather than dividing available study time and scheduling between projects and study for six subjects.

But because the music classes are only 45 minutes, they are worth only half as many credits, though they essentially committ all of the student's time for electives.

This means that if Adventure Boy wants to be in band, he will have no other electives in High School.  It will also mean that he has absolutly zero "wiggle room" should he fail a class (not that I'm worried, he's never recieved an "F" yet).  If he stays in Band throughout High School, he will not be able to take any other electives, and he cannot fail a single class or he will not graduate with his class.

Since he has been relegated to the lowest possible math track, and would like to catch up, he will most likely have to spend at least one semester out of Band., so that he can take additional math courses as electives.

Most High Schools when I was growing up had disincentives for studying music as well, but this just made it worse.

I am going to look into other options, like the Community Band, private lessons, and I'm wondering if you have to be in the regular band to try out for Marching band.  I would bet not.  Because it is a priority for us, and because we are willing to spend the money and time, Adventure Boy will have a music education.

Unfortunatly for families with fewer resources, I think this is just one more step in a multi-decade trend of sqeezeing out music education in the schools.  If student utilization of the program drops, then it will be easy to cut.  It's already happened in a number of rural school districts in the state.

Adventure Boy has always had a problem with Math.  Math has always been difficult, painful, frustrating and elusive for him.

Last year, the C- he eventually scored in Math was kind of a triumph.  The first time he had gotten better than a D in math.

This year, he got an A in Algebra for the first quarter.  Indeed, his lowest grade is a B-.  He has two "A's" (Algebra and Art) and the rest are B's and B+'s.

Yesterday he shuffled up to me with a hang-dog sort of expression and  presented me with a certificate informing me that he has earned an "honor point" in his Algebra class.

"What's this?"  I asked.

"I don't know, some stupid thing, I thought you might want to see it."  He answered.

On the certificate there is a list of attributes that go into earning an honor point.  Several of them were circled, indicating that those are the traits that earned him the Honor Point:

Consistent Effort, Initiative, Helpfulness, Positive Attitude, Participation.

If you get enough honor points, you become a "Student of the Month", and your parents can get one of those smug little bumper stickers to put on their car and brag to total strangers stuck in rush-hour gridlock.

Apparently, Adventure Boy told Rocky "That's the worst thing that can possibly happen to you."

So I guess if he WERE to earn enough honor points, and became a student of the month, I would probably not say anything to anyone about it.  But you know, I think Adventure Boy was still proud of himself, and secretly proud to get the honor point certificate.

Here's a blast from the past for me and my friends, Sue and Barb.

Wade Pilloud graduated with us from Bemidji High School.  He was also in my Confirmation class and attended our church.  He was also one of the small group of students that I went with on a trip to Germany my Senior year.  I didn't know him well, and I don't have any opinions of him that would be of any particular use or interest to the general public.

Wade is the K-12 principal of a school in Indus, MN (close to International Falls) who resigned after being put on administrative leave for shooting two kittens on school grounds.  They were orphaned, and Mr. Pilloud says he wanted to prevent them from suffering from a death by starvation.

Anyone who grew up n the country knows that it's not uncommon to find burlap sacks full of drowned kittens or puppies along the road, or to hear of people shooting, gassing, or otherwise "doing in" unwanted animal offspring that they can't or won't care for to "prevent suffering".

It is a common and wholly unremarkable attitude from the time and place that we were raised.  The fact that he thought this was the best thing to do is unsurprising to me.  The fact that he seemed to think it was natural, acceptable, and right to bring a gun onto school grounds and dispatch the animals himself (rather than call animal control to have them rescued by animal welfare professionals) is also unsurprising to me, as it is a natural outgrowth of the mentality and worldview commonly held by the majority of people in the place and time that we grew up.

I happen to disagree with it, which is perhaps a hint as to why I no longer live in rural Northern Minnesota.

I guess that's all I have to say about that.

[Update:  I just heard from an extended family member that her husband was going out to "put down" their ancient family dog, who has stopped eating.  She wanted to take the dog to the vet to be put down, but as her husband has recently been laid off, and they don't know when he will get a job, they don't have the funds to do it humanely.  So he is going to shoot the dog...the most "humane" alternative.  Luckily, her husband is quite competent with firearms, and is unlikely to botch the job.  Like I said.  Pervasive attitude.]   

It's hard enough being a layman consumer of science without people like Deepak Chopra making it more difficult.

PZ Myers helps make it easier with entries like this.

See, Mr. Chopra has an MD. He's got what we ordinary folks view as science cred.  And he's got Oprah on his side, and THAT never hurts.  He's got a medical license, he's got exposure, celebrity, and a great photographer and publicist.

When Mr. Chopra talks about science, he speaks in a way that is lyrical and poetical.  He emphasises the romance of the "unknown", (though as Prof. Myers points out, some of the romantic "unknown" is only unknown to Mr. Chopra and his intended audience.)

Hey, I love the unknown as much as anybody.  The unknown is cool because it is a blank space upon which you can write anything you want to believe, as long as it sort of fits in with the known somehow along the blurry edges.  Just match up the grain, and you'll never know the difference, no matter how crazy things get towards the center of your little creation.  It's a fun little playground.  Who doesn't love science fiction, especially when it tells us that we can live healthy, happy productive lives forever?

I also enjoy the lyrical and poetical.  It is somehow rewarding when science seems to point to some great, unifying universal truth, and if you can somehow believe that you can tap into that truth and use it to make your life better...well, that's very appealing as well.

We aren't all like Prof. Myers.  We can't all be hard-nosed realists.  I would like to be, but try as I might, I fall short.  I occasionally let loose with a lyrical and poetical metaphor for how some scientific thing I read about is a great metaphor for some fluffy spiritual truth.  And I enjoy the illusion that the metaphor is an indication of some mystical connection between the two.

Which is what, I suppose, makes Mr. Chopra so successful as a writer/speaker/health expert/celebrity, and also why Prof. Myers is left laboring away as a scientist, educator, and activist.  If I had my way, I'd like to see people like Prof. Myers with the rewards of society, the million dollar homes, the expensive cars, the books with his huge picture on the front, and the even huger royalty checks...

But he would probably just blow it all on a huge laboratory filled with aquariums full of squid and zebra fish.  Oh, and booze.  He'd also probably spend a lot of the money on booze.

I guess as long as ordinary people feel the pull of the mystical/lyrical/poetical/miraculous, there will always be people like Deepak Chopra waiting in the blurry edges between the "known" and the "unknown" to use it to make a buck.

I can only hope that there will always be people like Prof. Myers to keep us from getting carried away.

Isn't it just frickin' cool that we can have something like This:

A plain-English-for-the-layman discussion of RNAi and the work done on it that won the Nobel Prize?

We live in a world where, no matter how much certain people would like to spread nothing but ignorance and superstition, knowledge on this level is out there, freely accesible to all.

Hardening of the Arteries, Softening of the Brain.

No, I'm not talking about my upcoming birthday. I'm talking about federally funded abstinence until marriage HIV and STD prevention curricula. Here, for example, is a quotation from one of these programs that was recently featured on my Minnesota AIDS Walk Web site:

The Institute of Medicine states, "...the full clinical spectrum of many STDs is still being described."...[An] example is that studies are finding chlamydia in the atherosclerotic plaque ('hardening of the arteries') that is often the cause of heart attack and strokes many Americans suffer. Some researchers are suggesting that chlamydia may actually cause this problem. Only time and good research will tell." Sexual Health Today, Slide 12, p. 24, Comments.

In fact, the research cited in the curriculum found an association between heart disease and a type of chlamyida (called Chlamydia pneumoniae) that is not sexually transmitted. This bacteria spreads from person to person through respiratory transmission and is a common cause of pneumonia among children and adolescents. It is an entierly different bacteria from Chlamydia Trachomatis, which is sexual transmitted. J.D. Muhlestein, "The Link between Chlamydia pneumoniae and Atherosclerosis." Infectious Medicine, 380 (1997). Stedman's Medical Dictionary (2004).

Keep in mind that many of the same people who are writing such curricula have also vowed their daughters will never be vaccinated against chlamydia because it would encourage them to be immoral. What is being taught is not HIV and STD prevention. What is being taught is conservative ideology and inaccurate science.

Our children have the right to accurate and complete information on how to stay sexually healthy. Their ability to make choices based on this accurate and complete information should be respected. Only then will they be able to behave responsibly.

MINNESOTA - Wake up and smell the coffee!!!! We need honest HIV prevention. And MAP needs your donations to ensure its continued presence. Please go to my Web site and make a donation.

OK, It's Teresa again.  If you would like to make a donation/pledge to the Minnesota AIDS walk...click the icon below:

Or follow this link directly to Paula's team at MAP:  http://register.mnaidsproject.org/site/TR?team_id=7430&pg=team&fr_id=1040

I am officially,

Friends with one more member of the Liberal Intellectual Elite.

Excellent work, Karen.

Give 'em hell

School libraries have to make careful choices when they decide what books to put in the library.  They have limited space and funds.  I said in the summary above that I am not in favor of banning any book from school libraries...but I say this with the realization that choices have to be made, and they should be made with due consideration for the educational value of said books, and the likely appropriateness and relevance to the kids reading them.

Be that as it may, none of these things seem to be a concern for a member of the Wichita School board.  This is the same lady that demanded that an icon of his Sublime Starchyness (The Flying Spaghetti Monster) be removed from a classroom door.

Now, she is demanding that any book that talks about suicide or deals with the topic, contains vulgar or immoral behavior, etc...should be removed from the library.

Anyway, here's the article.

Well, that leaves out the Bible.  Judas hanged himself.  Abraham fornicated with a servant girl at his wife's suggestion (open relationship).  Solomon set the world record for bigamy, and Noah got drunk off his can and passed out nekked.  Oh, and Mary Magdaline was a whore.  Oh, and Mary the mother of Jesus was a teenaged unwed mother.  King David had Urias killed so David could doink Urias' wife.  The Apostle Paul held the coats for his posse while they put the smack-down on Christians and stoned them to death (before he got apostlized)

That's just what I remember from Sunday school. 

A conservative school board member sustains and defends the sepration of Church and State!

http://www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/living/education/14331100.htm

via Pharyngula.

This is an attack on Pastafarianism.  It's just plain blatant anti-pasta hate disguised as seperation of Church and State.  Before you know it, kids won't even be allowed to bring Chef-boy-ardee in their private lunch boxes and eat it quietly in the corner of the caffeteria.

Some of us want to raise our children right, and believe that grains are an imprtant part of a healthy diet, and pasta is clearly the purest form and is endorsed for our consumption by the FSM.  Next thing you know, they will eliminate all pasta from the schools, and force our children to eat their inferior communion wafers.

I WANT VOUCHERS so I can take my kids out of this den of depravity and send them to a chef school in Italy.