Daily Archives: March 18, 2009

“There must be an easier way”: Kevin Roose Spent a Semester at Jerry Falwell’s Orwellian Named “Liberty University” and Wrote a Book About It

Kevin Roose pretended to be a fundamentalist Christian, and got himself admitted into Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University. He spent a semester there taking classes in young earth creationism and evangelism and wrote a book about his experience (which included a week … Continue reading

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Bearing Witness to the Holocaust: Anne Frank and Margo Frank in a Purim Holiday Photo with Other Jewish Children, February, 1934, and an Image from Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp, Where Anne and Margo Died

Anne Frank is the little girl to the left (in a dress in the front row). Margo Frank, Anne’s older sister, is with the taller kids in the back row, and is wearing a dress similar to her sister’s. Margo … Continue reading

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Bearing Witness to the Holocaust: A Color Photo, Made by an American Soldier in 1945, of Prisoner Clothing Hung Before the Crematoria Doors at Dachau

The photograph was taken by American Colonel Alexander Zabin in May, 1945. According to the U.S Holocaust Museum archive description of the photo, Col. Zabin “had landed in Normandy on the day after D-day and moved with the Third Army … Continue reading

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Nearly One Third of Americans Say to the Clergy: Don’t Marry Me. Don’t Bury Me.

In the Guardian of London (and reposted at AlterNet), Michelle Goldberg has an essay on secularism in America. Money quote: [N]o religious group in the United States is growing as fast as those who profess no religion at all. The … Continue reading

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The New York Times on the PSA: Maybe Prostate Cancer Screening Doesn’t Matter Too Much

If you’re a male, and a Woody Allen-like hypochondriac (like me), perhaps you feel anxiety each year when you go to get your PSA blood test. Today the NY Times reports on a big study that suggests that all that … Continue reading

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Emerging from the Conformist Psychological Pain of the 1950s: See Here People Trying to Get Themselves Free by Shaking Their Bodies and Screaming at the Beatles

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Peak Oil: Has It Already Happened, or Are We Still a Couple of Years Away from It Happening?

We’ve long unveiled our Earth Mother, and easily stolen her oily milk and fruits. Maybe that’s over.           Most of the professional energy watchers at TheOilDrum.com think we passed the “peak oil” threshold in 2008, and that oil supplies are now … Continue reading

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Most Professional Contributors to TheOilDrum.com Think the World Reached PEAK OIL in 2008

The very smart collection of professional energy watchers at TheOilDrum.com have arrived at something pretty close to a consensus: Oil “peaked” in 2008. Here’s the chart they present: And here’s what they say: As everyone knows, there is never a post on … Continue reading

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Quote of the Day: Winston Churchill

“The era of procrastination, of half-measures, of soothing and baffling expedients, of delays, is coming to a close. In its place we are entering a period of consequences…”                                                                 —Winston Churchill, November 1936

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Help!

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Don’t Question or Mock Authority? Jeff Zucker Responds to Jon Stewart by Sounding Like the Pope

Speak truth to power. NBC’s Chief Executive, Jeff Zucker, is pissed at Jon Stewart for mocking CNBC “authority” on matters of business. So reports Reuters: “Just because someone who mocks authority says something doesn’t make it so,” Zucker said, describing the … Continue reading

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Who Made the First Agnostic Statement in Recorded History?

Probably the 5th century BCE pre-socratic Greek philosopher, Protagorus, who said (at the beginning of his treatise on the gods): Regarding the gods, I am not capable of knowing whether they exist or whether they do not exist, or what … Continue reading

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