Those Bitter Small-Town People are at it Again…

Senator Barack Obama’s words regarding small-town people,

And it’s not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.

The following story,
3 small-town jr. high kids suspended for sitting during pledge,
perhaps indicates that the good Senator might have missed one other thing that small-town people cling to.

On a related/unrelated note, why is it that Americans cannot show patriotism without them being called,
a) racist
b) arrogant
c) imperialists
d) all of the above

Whereas when say, Mexicans, show love for our country it is never identified with any of these?

How many Hail Gaias for an Apple Core?

Though I don’t fancy myself a Captain Planet type, it does bother me when people litter. Whether it’s a cigarette butt or the remains of a fast food meal being ceremoniously dumped out a moving vehicle, I can’t comprehend what compels people to do this. (Actually I do, for back when I was hitting the cancer sticks, I’d thoughtlessly do this and do it out of sheer laziness.)

I understand that there are some who would have such offenders pilloried and sent to Al Gore to say a few Hail Gaias.

While the man in the following story did not have to meet the movement’s High Priest, he was given the 3rd degree for allegedly dropping an apple core,
Man spends 18 hours in police cell and has his DNA taken for ‘dropping an apple core’

One can only wonder how different this goes down had Mr. Hirst dropped something that is not biodegradable?

Environmentalist Seers and Their Predictions

A treatise on whether anthropogenic global warming is fact or simply a reason for rich folks to get richer by selling 21st century indulgences, is not the intention of this post. What we can all agree on is that whatever degree of global warming exists can be blamed on the Sun so maybe we can ask it to purchase indulgences carbon credits.

Whatever the case, I did think the following column by Prof. Walter E. Williams of George Mason University interesting,
Environmentalists’ Wild Predictions

A sample,

At the first Earth Day celebration, in 1969, environmentalist Nigel Calder warned, “The threat of a new ice age must now stand alongside nuclear war as a likely source of wholesale death and misery for mankind.” C.C. Wallen of the World Meteorological Organization said, “The cooling since 1940 has been large enough and consistent enough that it will not soon be reversed.”

Right, next thing you know we’ll be told that the global warming will be death of us all, oh wait a minute…

Super Mario Cake takes the em, Cake…

My wife, with the limited time she has, has made some wonderful cakes which have been not only aesthetically pleasing but very kind to the palate. Here’s an example,

I really believe that if my wife dedicated herself solely to cake-making she could replicate or even create a masterpiece such as this,

H/t: Geekologie (check out more pics of this cake here)

Lastrow, Population: 666

This blog now has the distinction of having the same number of inhabitants as the town of Monson, Maine (as of the 2000 census). That the blog is populated by posts and Monson by people is but an irrelevancy.

This often misunderstood digit makes its only appearance in Scripture here,

Here is wisdom Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for the number is that of a man; and his number is six hundred and sixty-six. - Revelation 13:18

I say misunderstood because many (myself formerly included) mistake it to be the number of Satan. The Apocalypse given to John begs to differ, it is actually the number of Satan’s man, the antichrist. Six is man’s number, it falls one short of the number of completeness, 7. Some say the triple 6 is a mockery of the Trinity, because three times it falls short of completeness, as each Person in the Trinity is totally complete.

This reflects the fallen state we are all born into (Augustine of Hippo dubbed it “original sin”) because of Adam’s rebellion in the Garden. As the oft-quoted statement reads,

We are not sinners because we sin, we sin because we are sinners

You Flash, You Crash, Case #5408

When I was a lad and first learned to ride a bike hands-free, I was proud of myself for the ‘accomplishment’. So much so in fact, that I thought it a good idea to let my dad know as he washed the car.

Of course as he looked up, I lost my balance and ate it in a pretty spectacular fashion.

I remembered that experience after reading the following story,

Police: Motorcyclist flipped bird, popped wheelie, crashed

It’s a good thing this guy didn’t die, otherwise he might have been up for a Darwin.

Brass Monkey - those chunky Monkeys!

Besides my mod to a classic Beastie Boys lyric, this post’s title also applies to this portly primate,

The shot is from the following story,
“Pictured: The chunky monkeys who have been put on a diet after being overfed by tourists”

Apparently the weight gain is due to the overzealous generosity of tourists.

One of the comments left by a reader merits mention,

Their weight gain has nothing at all to do with their eating habits!—–they have a “faulty” gene!

The excuse works for some humans why shouldn’t it work with macaques?

God Loves Sinners

Paul wrote to the church in Rome,

But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

Humbling words to be sure, what is more, the Truth therein is one more glorious testimony of the love of God who sent His Son to die for creatures whose best efforts are, according to Isaiah, like a “filthy garment” (the Hebrew being a bit more specific).

I recently downloaded some of the lectures from the 2008 T4G conference and have been listening to them on the way to work.

Ligon Duncan’s treatise, Sound Doctrine, is not only riveting but much needed salve in an age where it seems that doctrine is deemed a hobby (at best) or irrelevant (at worst).

At around minute 45, Duncan hit a raw nerve. He’s explaining how doctrine is for our assurance. He exposits John 15 and settles on this part of Jesus’ words to His Apostles,

You did not choose Me but I chose you

He expounds on why Jesus thought it necessary to teach the 11 (Judas had left already) about election. Duncan’s conclusion is that because Jesus knew that every last one of them would desert Him later that night. Then Dr. Duncan ties it together with these words,

And if they’re going to have one shred of assurance left in them it is not going to be based on the fact that they have chosen Him because everything about their actions will be screaming to their hearts and consciences that they have no part of Him unless they hear the Master say, “Dear child, dear friend, I knew everything in you and I chose you anyway.”

“I knew everything in you and I chose you anyway”, those words shattered whatever self-righteousness I carried with me this morning. Shattered whatever thoughts I might have had that somehow I had been elected based on something inherently good within. Shattered the illusion that maybe, just maybe, there is some shred of good in me apart from Christ.

My eyes watered in a mix of contrition and gratitude. The former for my arrogance and the latter for the power and extent of God’s love, that even one such as I can be reconciled to Him.

The Puli

I have a soft spot for Chows (blogged about it here), but I’m not a dog lover. Like mentioned in the aforementioned post, my fondness for Chows stems from actually having known one.

The same cannot be said of my fondness for the Puli (below) since I have not had the privilege of having known one.

AP

This one is from a recent dog show in Germany.

My first exposure to this breed was in the album notes of Bush’s Sixteen Stone. Lead singer Gavin Rossdale’s puli (below) was featured within.

Splash

The Associated Press and Mitochondrial DNA

Caught the following piece on the AP,
“Study says near extinction threatened people 70,000 years ago”

Interesting findings to be sure, but one thing in the article caught my attention,

Previous studies using mitochondrial DNA — which is passed down through mothers — have traced modern humans to a single “mitochondrial Eve,” who lived in Africa about 200,000 years ago.

Which is passed down through the mothers? Yes that is true but is not exclusively true. It has been long believed that mtDNA is only passed down through the mother, it’s in biology books and it is what was taught to me during college. The problem is that there is a couple of papers in the literature that say otherwise, there is paternal transmission of mtDNA.

This from a paper in the journal Science 286:2524 (1999),

The assumption that human mitochondrial DNA is inherited from one parent only and therefore does not recombine is questionable…

This assumption has been used extensively to date events in human prehistory, including the age of our last common female ancestor, “Eve”, and the spread of Homo Sapiens in Asia and Europe

In fact one of the paper’s authors, respected biologist John Maynard Smith, “is frustrated but not surprised that the establishment chooses to ignore these findings.” New Scientist 178:48 (2000).

Ok, that’s just one paper, well then there was this one in the New England Journal of Medicine 347:576-579 (2002) titled “Paternal Inheritance of Mitochondrial DNA” which states,

We determined that the mtDNA harboring the mutation was paternal in origin and accounted for 90 percent of the patient’s male mtDNA

It seems that Maynard Smith was correct in his frustration, and one has to wonder why the establishment has not really accepted mt DNA recombination?

Could it be because of the impact it might have on the models (i.e. mitochondrial Eve) which are based in large part on the ASSUMPTION that mtDNA is only inherited from the mother? Or what about the industry (genealogical DNA testing) that is built on this assumption?

Things that make you go hmmm…