Genie Grants Scalia Strict Constructionist Interpretation Of Wish

WASHINGTON, DC—A genie freed from a battered oil lamp by Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia granted the conservative jurist a strict constructionist interpretation of his wish for "a hundred billion bucks" Monday. "Sim sim salabim! Your wish is my command!" the genie proclaimed amid flashes of light and purple smoke, immediately filling the Supreme Court building with a massive herd of wild male antelopes. When Justice Scalia complained that the "bucks" had razed the U.S. Supreme Court building, trampling and killing several of his clerks and bringing traffic in the nation's capital to a standstill for hours, the genie said, "Your honor, your wish is a sacred and unalterable document whose interpretation is not subject to the whims of society and changing social context."

via

fair and balanced?

i'd like to see this beach

This is a video of hydrophobic sand--it will not get wet.

WYSIWYG

After tampering with your website's code, do you get tired of waiting for your site upload to see what it looks like? Well try this real-time html editor, and see your coding instantly appear as it would on the Web. Pretty neat.

great shot

IMG_1091
Originally uploaded by mysterious chicken.

this is a sunset photo of the eyewall of Hurricane Katrina.

wow

Apparently Katrina dislodged an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico from its moorings and it drifted into a bridge over Mobile Bay.

skydiving, anyone?

right on

my local butcher's sign
Originally uploaded by ratterrell.

WWJS

Not to offend anyone, but the following are actual quotes in the Bible purportedly spoken by Jesus. I find them difficult to reconcile.

Matthew 10:34
"Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword."

Matthew 10:37
"He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me."

Matthew 19:29
"And every one who hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life."

Matthew 8:21-22
And another of his disciples said unto him, "Suffer me first to go and bury my father." But Jesus said unto him, "Follow me and let the dead bury their dead."

John 5:31
"If I testify about myself, my testimony is not valid."

contrast with:

John 8:14
"Even if I testify on my own behalf, my testimony is valid."

1 Timothy 2:11-15
"Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence."

1 Corinthians 14:34-35
"Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience, as also saith the law. And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church."

1 Timothy 2:11-14
"Let a woman learn in silence with all submissiveness. I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over men; she is to keep silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor."

James 5:14-15
"Is any sick among you? Let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord: And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up."

2 Corinthians 6:14-15
"Believers must not commune with unbelievers. What fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness, light with darkness, believers with infidels?"

and the list goes on.

interesting Boston Globe article

What Makes People Gay?

finally

Over Three Hundred Proofs of God’s Existence

ARGUMENT FROM INFINITE REGRESS
(1) Ask Atheists what caused the Big Bang.
(2) Regardless of their answer, ask how they know this.
(3) Continue process until the Atheist admits he doesn't know the answer to one of your questions.
(4) You win!
(5) Therefore, God exists.

ARGUMENT FROM BELIEF
(1) If God exists, then I should believe in Him.
(2) I believe in God.
(3) Therefore, God exists.

ARGUMENT FROM THE BIBLE
(1) [arbitrary passage from OT]
(2) [arbitrary passage from NT]
(3) Therefore, God exists.

only if only handsome men can be mayors

A district mayor in Budapest has proposed a dress code for City Hall employees under which only women with "pretty legs" can wear short skirts.

oh..

This is Not the Title of This Essay.

Meet the African driver ant

"The swarm approaches like a monstrous black tide, around 15 metres wide and containing about 100,000 sterile sisters, working mutually as a single hunting unit. A big scorpion scuttles out from beneath a log with an ant, several thousand times smaller, clamped voraciously onto a leg. It frantically tries to dislodge the passenger with well-coordinated stinger strikes, but the ant hangs on. The ant grapples at the floor with hooked feet hampering the scorpion's escape, and, undetectable to my human senses, releases a recruitment chemical from a pair of special glands. Within seconds, hundreds respond to the call, and the scorpion vanishes below a seething throng."

Everett True

Watch out, you windy corner rubber necks! The Outbursts of Everett True is a turn-of-the-century comic where Rush Limbaugh meets Kirk Douglas in Falling Down. The formula is simple: Everrett sees some social ill in action, and heads roll. The strip is as delightful for its Victorian morality as for its Seinfeld-like observations of those little things in life that, well, piss us off.

more pictures

Check out the slideshow of recent space pictures.

well done

Beautiful 360 degree panoramic pictures of the Louvre.

go though my incense upwards from this hearth

Henry David Thoreau has a blog.

my new favorite album

The Becker-Posner Blog

Two legal heavy hitters, Gary Becker and Richard Posner weigh in on affirmative action. A pretty interesting read.

new chainless mountain bike

Read about it here.

yeah right

Found on eBay: Wi-Fi Speed Spray Dramatically Increases Data Throughput.

quote of the day

"The future does not come with new technology, it comes with new ideas."

--anonymous

wow

In the event that the astronauts who traveled to the moon became stranded, Nixon's aides drafted this "Suggested Statement in Event of Crew Fatalities."

can 'Intelligent Design' explain this?

Convergent Evolution in Poison Frogs

Poison frogs can’t make their own poison—they steal it from ants. Poison frogs secrete a variety of chemicals called alkaloids to create a poisonous defense against predators. Since they can’t produce alkaloids on their own, these frogs maintain a steady diet of specific alkaloid-rich ants to keep up their defense.

nice

Introducing the next generation of bicycles.

repost: let's shoot things and photograph it

random

This is a directory of text files from 1980-1995, going from informative to weird, back to pointless and then over to shocking.

one more reason I like Alabama

that sucks

Amazing video of an octopus taking down a blue shark.