The Sound of Tim La Haye jerking off

I was sitting in Rosie's Tavern tonight, enjoying a drink with a birthday girl, and Wolf Blitzer's Situation Room was on. This was the head line:

"End Times?"

This, of course, was followed by the usual biblical "evidence" from the Book of Revelations, and I became really sad, because there are some who are actually cheerleading this bullshit, for their own selfish reasons:

"'America needs to stand with Israel according to the word of God, and for victory,' Gwen Resser said. 'I mean, it's for victory. It's not a time for concessions'.

'If you support Israel, you will be blessed, and if you don't support Israel, you will be cursed', Dean Resser added. "

These people make me sad, because they are misinformed, mislead, and they have misread their own holy books:

"'The thing that's different about Israel is that Israel is the only nation in the world created by the hand of God', Hagee said".

Well, not exactly...I think the British and the U.S., with a U.N. sanction, created Israel, at least in the material sense...but anyway...

"Hagee explored this from a political standpoint in his interpretation of scripture, 'Jerusalem Countdown', which has sold more than 600,000 copies. The book's geopolitics are very precise, beginning with an alliance between Russia and the Islamic world.

Russia is going to get in that position and they are literally, with all that massive military force, going to attack Israel," Hagee said. 'This is recorded in Ezekiel 38 and 39. God himself is literally going to destroy that army. Decimate it'.

And he said that will be followed by a Chinese army of 200 million coming to the city of Armageddon where they will meet British and U.S. forces in the Battle of Armageddon.

'At that point, Jesus Christ returns to Earth and sets up his eternal kingdom in the city of Jerusalem and there's 1,000 years of peace', Hagee said. 'The Jewish people are going to see the supernatural hand of God preserve them and deliver them while the enemies of Israel are crushed. That's the end-time story'.

Except, of course, that the Jews all die in the end. Heartwarming.

The Passion of the Tequila

I really don't give a hot fuck about celebrities, but this piece from the L.A. Times got me wondering: Maybe Mel Gibson is as unhinged as he was portrayed on South Park.

Post-Constitutional

To Protect and Serve? Who?

Via Covington

50 Missions?!?

The Catch 22 of Iraq and the Continued Rotation of the Human Being Lawnmower.

To all my friends over there, and anybody else's, for that matter: "I'm sorry. Hang On. Be Safe".

Minimum Wage

The House Republicans, in all their magnanimity, are trying to raise the Federal Minimum Wage.

Now, before you have images of the Grinch's heart suddenly bursting with Christmas Cheer:

"They announced they had tacked it onto a 180-page bill that would cut the estate tax and extend a host of temporary tax cuts [...]".

Nice.

Bill Clinton: Gay?

With Lance Bass coming out, I guess anything is possible...

Eminent Domain: Not Immanent

All of a sudden, sanity breaks out. It's nice when that happens:

"COLUMBUS, Ohio - The Ohio Supreme Court ruled unanimously on Wednesday that a Cincinnati suburb cannot take private property by eminent domain for a $125 million project of offices, shops and restaurants

The case was the first challenge of property rights laws to reach a state high court since the
U.S. Supreme Court last summer allowed municipalities to seize homes for use by a private developer.

The case involves the city of Norwood, which used its power of eminent domain to seize properties holding out against private development in an area considered to be deteriorating.
The court found that economic development isn't a sufficient reason under the state constitution to justify taking homes.

In the ruling, Justice Maureen O'Connor said cities may consider economic benefits but that courts deciding such cases in the future must 'apply heightened scrutiny' to assure private citizens' property rights.

'For the individual property owner, the appropriation is not simply the seizure of a house', she wrote. 'It is the taking of a home — the place where ancestors toiled, where families were raised, where memories were made,'

Targeting property because it is in a deteriorating area also is unconstitutional because the term is too vague and requires speculation, the court found.

O'Connor wrote that the court attempted in its decision to balance 'two competing interests of great import in American democracy: the individual's rights in the possession and security of property, and the sovereign's power to take private property for the benefit of the community'."

Congratulations on keeping your homes!!!

via Covington