Sen. Bernie Sanders sings the hits

“This country does in fact have a serious deficit problem,” he said to about 200 people packed in the Senate Budget Committee room.

“But the reality is that the deficit was caused by two wars — unpaid for. It was caused by huge tax breaks for the wealthiest people in this country. It was caused by a recession as result of the greed, recklessness and illegal behavior on Wall Street. And if those are the causes of the deficit, I will be damned if we’re going to balance the budget on backs of the elderly, the sick, the children, and the poor. That’s wrong.”

Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Senate Budget Committee, 11-18-2011

Thanks, Wes!

There was a #creozerg 2! Let’s celebrate by talking about Noah’s Ark!

I just finished reading PZ Myers’ breakdown of #creozerg 2, an organized trip of nonbelievers to a Creation “Museum” in Springfield, Missouri.

You can read the entire post here. You might be able to see the Creation Museum’s web site here, but at the time of this post, it appears PZ Myers’ has shut the site down via traffic from his site.

Tina and I were “lucky” enough to go to #creozerg 1, which is where I met many of my readers after tweeting and posting photos of the event.

My photos and recap are here and here.

I would like to post a good portion of the conversation PZ reportedly had with the head of the place. I need to emphasize the part about Noah’s Ark and that God killed all but 8 people, including babies and children.

Babies and children.

Worshipping baby killers is not on my todo list.

Be sure to let me know in the comments how I have taken god out of context. Here’s the conversation:

They generally seemed like very nice people, who were pleased to have this crowd packing their little place. They offered us cookies and juice. I think we made their month.

I was dismayed at one bit of conversation with Dr Rod Butterworth, head of the place. He was trying to explain how the bloody god of the Old Testament really wasn’t such a bad fellow after all.

“You don’t understand: all those people he had to kill, were horrible people. They deserved to be killed!”

To which I replied, “But that’s exactly the excuse Hitler used to murder the Jews!”

“No…” He seemed slightly nonplussed.

One of Mattir’s spawn was there, and she explained to him that it was true, that Jews were accused of blood libel, and the Nazis claimed they used Jesus’ blood in evil rituals.

“Oh, well, there probably were Jews who did that, who hated Christianity, and those Jews would have deserved it.”

You could have knocked me flat with a feather.

I pointed out that his god, according to his myth, exterminated the entire population of the planet, except for 8 people. Was he really arguing that all of those people, even the babies, were all so wretchedly evil that they deserved death?

He replied that yes, they did, because they refused to worship god, and god as their creator had every right to do with them as he will.

Gotta reblog: Cynical C, how to respond to “God opens a window” phrase

Maybe I should have written, “Godda reblog.”

Check out this great response to when someone tells you, “When God closes a door, he always opens a window:”

On the way home from our vacation/hospital-stay, Victor and I ended up traveling with a very well-meaning man who wouldn’t stop talking about how God put me in the hospital on purpose because apparently He hates me.

Stranger: Well, God doesn’t close a door without opening a window.

Victor: Well that explains why our electric bill was so high. Because God doesn’t understand how expensive air-conditioning is.

Stranger: That’s…not what that phrase means.

me: I bet Jesus has to deal with this shit all the time. God’s always leaving the windows open at home…accidentally letting Jesus’ cat out. That sort of thing.

Victor: Right? And then Jesus would be like “Dad. STOP LEAVING ALL THE WINDOWS OPEN. WERE YOU BORN IN A BARN?”

Religious stranger: *stunned silence*

Via

It’s Caturday!

We’re celebrating Caturday with a video today.

Tina caught some action of Zoe getting her face rubbed followed by the CUTEST yawn you’ll see all day.

It’s super short, so don’t feel like you’re going to waste your day on this video.