Star Trekking

US scientists find potentially habitable planet near Earth

US astronomers said Wednesday they have discovered an Earth-sized planet that they think might be habitable, orbiting a nearby star, and believe there could be many more planets like it in space.

Nearby in what sense? There are no stars, besides the sun, nearby. Maybe closer than other stars but in human terms they may as well be on the other side of the universe. The closest star is Proxima Centauri and it is 4.22 light-years away from Earth, that's something close to 5.88 trillion miles per year or 24.8 trillion miles away. The planet they are talking about is 20 light-years away. No one is going there any time soon. And by its description, it's not much of a planet anyway. They are just making a fuss about nothing.

I don't mean to sound down on things like this but I see it as people looking for eternity in the wrong place. It's interesting to see what is out there, no doubt, but there is no saving of the human race to come out of it. This is where we live and this is where we must work it all out. There is no escaping.

Blowing in the Wind

No to Cape Cod Wind Farms. Yes to Whaling Ships!

As John Droz. Jr., an authority on wind power points out, "Wind energy was abandoned well over a hundred years ago, as it was totally inconsistent with our burgeoning more modern needs of power, even in the late 1800s."

The people who advocate for ridding ourselves of modern conveniences and the power required to use them don't think about what it was like before we had them, the unsanitary conditions of roads without cars and the number of animals required in place of each car and truck, the food and water they require. The time needed to care for them.

What about cooking and the fuel required for that, how many trees would need to be cut down for each family? How much carbon released by each "stove" cooking with that wood, and the particulate pollution that each would release. Don't forget what would be required to heat our homes in the colder months. How much time would be required to cook and heat our homes?

That's barely scratching the surface, the effects would be far reaching and in more areas of our lives than we can imagine. We and the environment are so much better off now. We can improve, sure, and we do improve constantly, but anyone who says we should go back to living without our modern fuels and conveniences is just plain not thinking clearly at all. Or they have another agenda.

The Mob Wants Your Soul

Callie is very talented and just put out her first album, Zen Garden.



Don't let them take it away.

The Church of Pride

Good sermon. I like this guy.



Sermon by Jim O'Brien of Church of God Cincinnati and Lexington

Big Environmentalism

Fundamental Change

Obama Again Omits 'Creator' When Speaking of 'Inalienable Rights' Cited in Declaration of Independence

Just seven days after he sparked controversy by omitting the word "Creator" when he closely paraphrased the passage from the Declaration of Independence that says all men "are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights,” President Barack Obama again omitted the Creator when speaking about the "inalienable rights" that “everybody is endowed with."

Obama is fundamentally wrong for America.

Extra! Extra! Read All About It!

Guantanamo Bay rations detainees' ice cream portions

Detainees’ diets at Guantanamo Bay have been a controversial issue for some time and now the U.S. prison is said to be rationing ice cream.

The frozen dessert is allegedly being tightly measured, with only one ice cream allowed for each of its 147 detainees.

One ice cream for each detainee?!! What kind of sick, twisted people are we?!!

We Know What's Up

Doctor Zero answers Sen. Kerry's assertion that "We have an electorate that doesn't always pay that much attention to what's going on..."

We Are Paying Attention

The Tea Party is a large and growing movement that rejects the premise that a morally and intellectually superior government should be given endlessly expanding power over every aspect of our lives. We reject a media-approved narrative that holds the State blameless for its misdeeds, or gives it unlimited credit for its good intentions. We are competent and compassionate enough to manage our own lives, and address our problems through willing cooperation with our neighbors.

We're not lost in incoherent anger because we misunderstand a reality only Democrat Party leaders can see clearly. On the contrary, we realize that an insane level of willing blindness is necessary to ignore the evidence of their abject failure. You've got to be pretty stupid to think Barack Obama's only problem is that he's not superhuman enough to fix the "mess George Bush left him" two years ago.

How Will They Know She is the One to Contact?

UN to appoint Earth contact for aliens

The United Nations was set today to appoint an obscure Malaysian astrophysicist to act as Earth’s first contact for any aliens that may come visiting.

Take me to your leader first contact czar.

The Great One

Mark Levin speaking at Hillsdale College.



Wake the hell up.

Quote of the Day

We didn't understand that, however much he may love us, God allows his children to be wounded.

--Tony Woodlief, Somewhere More Holy

Hat Tip: Ann Voskamp

Tyranny Is as Tyranny Does

Speaking of religion, it occurred to me the other day that Islamics and liberals have a great deal in common. For one thing, they regard everyone who doesn’t share their beliefs as not merely mistaken or foolish, but as evil infidels. For another, both groups want their respective governments to impose and enforce their beliefs on everyone. The major difference is that only one of the groups is honest enough to call it Sharia Law.

--Burt Prelutsky

Nanny State Update

German restaurant in hot water over giant schnitzels

A German restaurant operator has run into trouble with local tax authorities because he makes larger-than-average schnitzels -- or veal cutlets -- for his customers in a working class section of Saxony.

Gerhard Kaltscheuer said his giant schnitzels are popular in the town of Hammerbruecke and he sells about 70 dishes per day. He said tax officials told him they believe he sells 200 portions daily based on the amount of raw material he purchases.

And of course they want him to pay taxes based on the higher amount. Must feed the Nanny State machine.

Netflix CEO Insults Americans and Canadians

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings knocks Americans in a Canadian interview.

Asked if Americans would notice and ask for the same discount Netflix is giving Canadians - currently $7.99, it's $8.99 in America - he replied:

How much has it been your experience that Americans follow what happens in the world? It's something we'll monitor, but Americans are somewhat self-absorbed.

On a related note: Netflix Hires Actors To Pose As Fans At PR Event

Things backfired at a Toronto street celebration after reporters discovered that actors hired by the Netflix had been given written instructions to give media interviews gushing about the video subscription service's arrival in Canada.

The actors also were urged to fill a variety of stereotypical roles, including "mothers, film buffs, tech geeks, couch potatoes," according to the one-page handout given to them.

Yeah, he thinks Canadians are stupid, too. Yes, we noticed.

Protesters, or Sheep

Common Sense Analysis of Political Correctness Run Amuck

Mollifying Muslims, and Muslifying Mollies by Mark Steyn

Take this no-name pastor from an obscure church who was threatening to burn the Koran. He didn't burn any buildings or women and children. He didn’t even burn a book. He hadn’t actually laid a finger on a Koran, and yet the mere suggestion that he might do so prompted the President of the United States to denounce him, and the Secretary of State, and the commander of US forces in Afghanistan, various G7 leaders, and golly, even Angelina Jolie. President Obama has never said a word about honor killings of Muslim women. Secretary Clinton has never said a word about female genital mutilation. General Petraeus has never said a word about the rampant buggery of pre-pubescent boys by Pushtun men in Kandahar. But let an obscure man in Florida so much as raise the possibility that he might disrespect a book – an inanimate object – and the most powerful figures in the western world feel they have to weigh in.

Aside from all that, this obscure church’s website has been shut down, its insurance policy has been canceled, its mortgage has been called in by its bankers. Why? Why? As Diana West wrote, why was it necessary or even seemly to make this pastor a non-person? Another one of Obama's famous "teaching moments"? In this case teaching us that Islamic law now applies to all? Only a couple of weeks ago, the President, at his most condescendingly ineffectual, presumed to lecture his moronic subjects about the First Amendment rights of Imam Rauf. Where's the condescending lecture on Pastor Jones' First Amendment rights?

When someone destroys a bible, US government officials don't line up to attack him. President Obama bowed lower than a fawning maitre d' before the King of Saudi Arabia, a man whose regime destroys bibles as a matter of state policy, and a man whose depraved religious police forces schoolgirls fleeing from a burning building back into the flames to die because they’d committed the sin of trying to escape without wearing their head scarves. If you show a representation of Mohammed, European commissioners and foreign ministers line up to denounce you. If you show a representation of Jesus Christ immersed in your own urine, you get a government grant for producing a widely admired work of art. Likewise, if you write a play about Jesus having gay sex with Judas Iscariot.

So just to clarify the ground rules, if you insult Christ, the media report the issue as freedom of expression: A healthy society has to have bold, brave, transgressive artists willing to question and challenge our assumptions, etc. But, if it's Mohammed, the issue is no longer freedom of expression but the need for "respect" and "sensitivity" toward Islam, and all those bold brave transgressive artists don't have a thing to say about it.

The Unseen Sea

Quote of the Day

"The State represents violence in a concentrated and organized form. The individual has a soul, but as the State is a soulless machine, it can never be weaned from violence to which it owes its very existence."

--Gandhi

Fish in a Barrel?

Not me, thank you.

The Six Million Dollar Fish

We can build whatever animal you want to eat, say scientists

"This is perhaps the most studied fish in history," he said.

"Environmentally, this is a very sustainable technology."

The company has several safeguards in place to allay concerns.

All the fish would be bred female and sterile, though a small percentage may be able to breed.

They would be bred in confined pools where the potential for escape would be very low.

Are they just taking dialog from Jurassic Park? Human beings have an uncanny ability to rationalize anything in order to get their heart's desire. Yes, scientists, too.