"Lying for Jesus"

So the creationists behind a new movie called "Expelled," purporting to document the shameful censorship of courageous academics who only want to teach students that there are 2 sides to the evolution "controversy" (hey, I guess there's 2 sides to the "controversy" over whether the Holocaust really happened, right?), held a screening in Minneapolis, which people could attend if they registered via a Web site.

PZ Myers , a biologist who is featured in the movie, and thanked in the credits, tried to get in to see the movie he had been told (prior to being interviewed) was going to be a movie called "Crossroads," examining the relationship between science and religion -- they didn't tell him it was a creationist hit piece on "evolutionists" like him. (They're now claiming "Crossroads" was merely the working title of the film, but it turns out they registered the Internet domain name for "Expelled" before they interviewed Myers and never did register a domain name for a movie called "Crossroads.")

But while he was in line, someone at the screening recognized either his name or his face, and a security guard approached him and told him he wasn't welcome at the movie he'd registered to see, and he'd be arrested unless he left. In short, he was expelled from "Expelled."
So he left, but the people running the screening were nice enough to let in his family, and his invited guest -- who turned out to be Richard Dawkins.

Here's Myers' take on the expulsion (more here), and Dawkins' take on the movie itself, and a New York Times article desperately trying to be even-handed about it without coming out and calling the creationists liars as they desperately try to spin the situation.

And here's a video of Myers and Dawkins discussing the event afterward .
And here are a bunch more links on the affair.

Another one bites the dust

Sigh. Another blogger has a baby. First it was Bridget (who gave up blogging altogether), and later Meg and Jason, and most recently Maggie, and now Gael is the latest entry in the bloggers-with-babies crowd.

I wouldn't mind, really, except that bloggers who have babies almost always end up either a) not blogging as much, or b) blogging about baby stuff, which just bores me to tears (plus I've never seen a baby as cute as even a middling Lolcat).

So, where's the next generation of good bloggers? I've been reading the "early A-list" blogs for the last 9 or 10 years, and I'm not all that good at seeking out and finding newer blogs (unless I discover them through the older ones, like Miss Doxie via Jason).

Oh well, at least I can be reasonably sure Chuck won't be having a baby anytime soon, unless he changes his mind about the sexual-orientation thing. Thanks, Chuck!

OK, so it's been a while ...

I guess I just couldn't get enthusiastic about blogging into (probably) absolutely nowhere, but now that we're getting all community-minded where I work, that may change. The "blog" I have at work doesn't let me put links in the text, but this one does, so I'll probably post here and direct people from there. Maybe some people will actually pay attention to it. Maybe.

So I guess I should try updating this thing a bit more often. And in that spirit ...

I'll be out of town for the next 2 weeks, and probably won't have much time to blog. My wife and I are headed up to Canada, partly for sheer driving fun in Cape Breton, and partly to visit her family in the nearby vicinity.

I may be able to post some pics and stories from the road, but we'll have to see.

Maybe if I get a nice enough pic, I'll swap out my profile pic to show my new (to me) Miata, instead of the old blue one.

The Colbert rapport (or lack thereof)

In all the back-and-forth about Stephen Colbert's appearance at the White House Correspondents' Dinner, why hasn't anyone made the obvious comparison to his former colleague Jon Stewart's appearance on "Crossfire"?

Both appearances were less than knee-slapping hilarious, yet both were terrific examples of speaking truth (or "truthiness") to power. Both demonstrated courage (OK, not getting-your-ass-shot-off-in-Iraq courage, but still) that was remarkable mainly for how unusual it was to see even such a small amount of courage and real truth-telling in the public discourse today.

Michael S. Cox is a spammer.

The two kinds of bad drivers

Let me preface this remark by saying that I really don't want this to turn into a traffic blog, or a driving blog (although I love to drive my Miata, and I live in New Jersey, so traffic is always an issue). I have lots of somewhat interesting ideas and insights, about all sorts of things, not just driving. It's just that lately everything I think of to put here seems to involve traffic. I hope it's an aberration. Anyway ...

There are two kinds of bad drivers. OK, there are many specific kinds of bad drivers, but when you get right down to it, there are basically two kinds: Idiots and assholes.

The guy who cuts you off in traffic because he didn't see you in his blind spot? He's an idiot. The guy who sees your car, and cuts you off anyway? Asshole.

Perhaps this applies to many aspects of life, not just driving. Indeed, you might say that when you've been wronged, the important thing is to figure out whether the person who wronged you was being an asshole, or just an idiot. As they say, never attribute to evil what can be explained by incompetence.

And yes, I myself have been an idiot and/or an asshole on more than one occasion.

A New Jersey resident, but not a native

Here's how you can tell if you're a resident of New Jersey, but not a native:

You're coming up on an intersection, and the light turns yellow, with more than enough time for you to slow safely down and stop. But you're sick and tired of getting nailed by every SINGLE freakin' red light, so you hit the gas instead of the brake.

The light turns red well before you get to the intersection, but that doesn't even faze you, you just barrel right through the red light. And you think to yourself, "wow, that was close, I was really pushing the envelope there."

And then you look in your rear-view mirror, and see the 2 cars that followed you through. THOSE guys are natives.