Linkee-poo is blowing in the wind

Tobias Buckell's latest novel, Artic Rising is reviewed by Alan Cheuse on NPR's All Things Considered. Well done, Tobias. Congrats.

Ezra Klien on the submerged welfare state. A social study that most people who benefit from a government program don't realize they have benefited from the government largess. With how those programs reach to the top income levels. Lot of good statistics to show just where the problem lies. Tax expenditures. (Grokked from Patrick Nielsen Hayden on Making Light)

Well, that didn't take long. Yep, we wouldn't have these school shootings only if we had a prayer first. What is incredibly sad is there are many who will nod their heads at this non sequitur argument as if it wasn't the deep pile of horse shit that it is. (Grokked from Vince)

Here's an editorial on CNN about why evangelicals love Ricky Santorum and hated JFK. But I was struck by this quote from JFK's famous speech. "I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute, where no Catholic prelate would tell the president -- should he be Catholic -- how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote, where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference, and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the president who might appoint him, or the people who might elect him." So, how do we stand on that? Let's see, we now have ministers violating their tax-free status to advocate for political candidates (and even more so for party votes) from the pulpit. Check. We now have wide spread voucher programs than funnel public money to private religious schools. And we've removed the barriers for churches to get public funds for their (what used to be called ministerial) outreach programs and to help rebuild "historic" churches. Check. And do I need to remind anybody of Mitt Romney and his Mormonism (or the "ZOMG, Obama attends a 'radical' church)? Check. So, for four basic precepts we now have gone past incorporating 3 of them into public life. Only that first one, that a Catholic prelate would tell a President how to act, is left to be broken. (Grokked from Jay Lake)