Moratorium

On using out-of-context Biblical passages or events to bash or deify President Obama.

Enough already.

This might unsettle the throngs of Left Behind devotees, but POTUS is not the rider of the white horse in Rev 6, though Anna (below) might be.

“I can even save Charlie Weis’ job”

Nor is President Obama the rider of a different white horse in Rev 19, I’m looking at you Spike Lee. This does raise the question: If POTUS got inked up, what would he go with?

Psalm 2:1-2?

Diversianity Has its Limits

Vigilantism is not encouraged by most of Western society. Which is odd considering how well movies about vigilantes (i.e. “The Dark Knight”) rake at the box office.

Speaking of Batman, the next story features a boat that looks like something the Caped Crusader might con:

Pictured: The bullet-proof ‘Batmobile’ set to wreak havoc on the Japanese whaling fleets

Who is “The Sea Shepherd Society”? Nothing more than a group of concerned citizens that has waged a jihad (“Now batting for Allah, Gaia!”) against Japanese whalers.

One of the vigilantes activists is none other than Daryl Hannah who I guess is just getting back to her roots (right)?

Whaling is part of Japanese culture. How integral? I don’t know, but who are we to tell them what they can or can’t do in international waters?

Incidents between the “Sea Shepherds” and Japanese whalers in the past have resulted in people getting hurt.

These Hollywood types are really something else. They seem to pontificate about how there is no right and wrong, yet there are plenty of things they seem to find “wrong”. So much so that they take extreme measures to battle whatever they deem as “wrong”, multiculturalism be damned.

Much closer to home, why aren’t they protesting the ritual slaughter of lambs by Muslims and Jews? You wouldn’t need a bulletproof Bat Boat to do it either, but for sure it’d upset the apple cart much more than protesting a distant nation’s customs.

To paraphrase a fictional Politburo member: “Where are the cultural relativists here!?!”

“Tibet will Rise Again”?

I have observed with no small degree of fascination, the obsession people have with “freeing” Tibet. I’ve wondered if the same people who vehemently oppose war would oppose it if the goal was “liberating” the region from China.

Having spoken with a Chinese co-worker in the past, he conveyed to me that the Western press oversimplifies things and that Westerners have no business meddling in Chinese internal affairs. Needless to say, he’s not the world’s biggest Dalai Lama fan.

The Dalai Lama, of course, is the exiled leader of the Tibetan people. The current one is referred to as “His Holiness”. How a Buddhist is addressed with such a moniker is puzzling, given the fact that Buddhism, to my limited knowledge, doesn’t deal in “holiness” but I digress.

Why do I bring this up? Because the Chinese government has done something which will not endear it to either the “Free Tibet” crowd or much anyone else in the good ol’ U.S. of A.

They went out on a limb and made the following analogy,

Lincoln:Secessionist South::China:Tibet under the Dalai Lama

No they didn’t, well actually yes they did. Check it out here.

How long before the following composite makes its way to the streets of Dixieland?

Disputable Matters

Carrie Prejean (below), the much despised/admired former Miss California recently sat down with Christianity Today a for a Q&A.

Truth be told, reading the interview won’t change your view of this polarizing woman. If you disliked her you’ll dislike her more after reading it. If you were shaking the Carrie pom-poms before, you’ll continue to spirit sprinkle yourself until your fingers fall off. Both camps are represented in the comments section of the article.

The interviewer lobbed more softballs than any pitcher that patrols the mounds of your local beer league. Softball guy is a post all unto himself, but I digress.

There was one question which will surely catch anyone’s attention,

You wrote that you don’t regret getting breast implants. Have you ever wondered whether it might be incompatible with your Christian faith?

Here’s Prejean’s answer:

No, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with getting breast implants as a Christian. I think it’s a personal decision. I don’t see anywhere in the Bible where it says you shouldn’t get breast implants.

St. Paul couldn’t have possibly imagined boob jobs would be in play when he told the Romans not to “pass judgement on disputable matters”.

Begs the question: Do boob jobs fall under “disputable matters”?

What about skin-whitening creams?

Let the Church Bells Ring

From Christian Lander, a prophet for our troubled times,

An interesting fact about white people is that they firmly believe that all of the world’s problems can be solved through “awareness.” Meaning the process of making other people aware of problems, and then magically someone else like the government will fix it.

As a call to action on global warming, churches throughout our fair planet will ring their bells on December 13, which just happens to be the date of the Copenhagen climate change summit.

“Church bells to ring out warning on climate change”

What’s next a synod against the sun for its role in global warmingt?

What all this hand-wringing bell-ringing is going to actually accomplish, I can’t really surmise. Perhaps the World Council of Churches was influenced by Christopher Walken’s Bruce Dickinson on SNL (below),

“Guess what? The planet has a fevah, and the only prescription is more church bell”

Institutionalized

Believe what you want. These walls are funny. First you hate ‘em, then you get used to ‘em. After long enough, you get so you depend on ‘em. That’s “institutionalized.” — Ellis Boyd “Red” Redding (below)

I’ve never been in prison, but Red’s words can’t be far off the mark. Confinement will have some effect on the confined. Red was referring to humans but I think the same can be said of wild animals who are put in zoos.

A zoo, for all the wonder it generates in children, is nothing more than a prison for our furry, scaly, or feathered friends. Now, I’m not going to go as far as some and suggest that they be outlawed, but last time I visited one, it was depressing.

Check out this vid taken at the National Zoo in Washington D.C.

In the wild, this deer would be lunch for this lioness. Yet, because she’s been fed like a house cat and not allowed to chase live prey, this lioness can’t even put an end to Bambi and thus enjoy her first kill in who knows how long. The deer did eventually die from its wounds, but I doubt that the carcass was fed to the real-life Naala.

You can hear the crowd cheering for the deer but if yours truly had been there, I would have been the only one rooting for the lioness.

About the only thing “wild” that lives on in this lioness is the reluctance to jump into deep water.

Like Brooks, who Red is describing, it’s safe to say this magnificent lioness has been institutionalized.

Here’s the story the vid came from:

Tragic end for the zoo deer who leapt into a lion enclosure

Taylor Swift Takes a Picture with the Son of Toth

Confession:   I can’t name a single Taylor Swift song.

I knew who she was (the country singer who always looks like she’s about to sneeze) before Kanye West humiliated the poor girl before a national television audience. Kanye’s act that night, though earning him Presidential scorn, catapulted the man into “legend” status, particularly among the Swift Haters. Predictably his showmanship went viral, see here.

Well now, potentially, it is the affable Ms. Swift who might be in some hot water:

Taylor Swift in racism row after posing with fan wearing swastika daubed on shirt

And because we’re not exempt here at Last Row from succumbing to the occasional viral campaign (it is flu season), like a Yankee batter facing Cliff Lee, I just couldn’t lay off:

The New Kryptonite

That’s right, Vicks VapoRub will do to toenail fungus what kryptonite does to the Man of Steel. What Will Muschamp does to offenses throughout the land, but I digress…

According to this piece in the New York Times, rubbing your infected toenail(s) once or twice a day with Vicks VapoRub will em, rub Digger(below) out of your life.

That screen shot is one of the greatest moments in the history of television advertising.

Sister Octomom and Her Minions

Just when you think the Octomom circus cannot get any more bizarre, Halloween strikes early at the Suleman household:

Yes, Nadya “Octomom” Suleman dressed up not only as a nun, but a pregnant nun. As if that weren’t enough, she decked out her brood in “devil” costumes. Because nothing says love more than making your child look like the spawn of Satan*. The only thing missing was this woman carrying a sign saying, “I’m carrying Rosemary’s baby”.

This whole thing reminds me of the first time I attended a “harvest festival” at a church. Biblical character costumes were in abundance. For example, you had a few Samsons, Davids et al, but strangely enough, no Jezebels or Whores of Babylon. Comic book heroes were strongly represented as well, but perhaps the most disconcerting was the kid rocking the costume represented to the right.

That’s right, at a church “harvest festival” someone dressed their kid up as Lucifer*.

I’m not here to hand-wring over the wisdom/folly of these festivals but if you are going to attend one of these “Non-Halloween Celebrations That Just So Happen To Fall on Halloween”, you might want to leave the pitchfork at home, no?

I guess one could make the case that Satan is a Biblical character?

*Yes I know that in all likelihood the prince of this world looks nothing like what pop culture thinks he looks like. For this, I must quote CS Lewis

I know someone will ask me, “Do you really mean, at this time of day, to reintroduce our old friend the devil-hoofs and horns and all?” Well, what the time of day has to do with it I do not know. And I am not particular about the hoofs and horns. But in other respects my answer is “Yes, I do.”

I do not claim to know anything about his personal appearance. If anybody really wants to know him better I would say to that person, “Don’t worry. If you really want to, you will Whether you’ll like it when you do is another question.”

Conservatives Try to Stave Off Invaders

No, not because of a sudden rash of xenophobia but rather because of a sudden bout of sentiments to make Sen. McCarthy proud.

Who are these invaders? Take a look:

[photo credit: Aggie horticulture, what did you expect?]

That’s a Chinese tallow tree and for the life of me I can’t imagine why conservatives are campaigning door-to-door to eliminate these trees.

It’s not like the trees are communist are they? Better dead than red?

For the story behind this sordid affair, click here.