Poll: Majority Says Don't Deport Children, Contra Obama And GOP

Most Americans say unaccompanied minors arriving at the U.S.-Mexico border should be allowed to stay at least for a while, according to a new Reuters/... Read more

Huckabee Clarifies He 'Never' Said Obama Should Be Impeached

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee (R) on Saturday clarified that he never called for President Obama to be impeached. Last week, he told Iowa radio ... Read more

Karl Rove: Hillary Wants To Be 'The Goldilocks Of Foreign Policy'

GOP strategist Karl Rove on Monday compared Hillary Clinton to "Goldilocks" in responding to the former secretary of state's latest interview on forei... Read more

TIL in 1975 Australia had a government shutdown.

In the end, all the members of Parliament were fired and then elections were held to restart from scratch. They haven't had another shutdown since....Read more

As Missiles Halt, Thousands Of Palestinians Find Themselves Homeless

More than 100,000 people are without homes now in the Gaza Strip.The post As Missiles Halt, Thousands Of Palestinians Find ... Read more

This Bus May Be Coming To Fight Abortion Restrictions In Your Town

Grassroots activists are hitting the road to lobby for rolling back anti-abortion laws that harm low-income women. The post ... Read more

American Banks Just Posted Their Second-Highest Quarterly Profit On Record

The $40.24 billion in combined quarterly profits that U.S. banks reported from April to May is just a rounding error short of ... Read more

Wind Farm Powering A Million Homes Nears Approval Deep In Coal Country

A missive wind farm is getting closer to being built in Carbon County, Wyoming.The post Wind Farm Powering A Million Homes ... Read more

I'm back.

Flood cleanup had me busy full time, but the big stuff is done and I'm back to a more normal life, so the posts on this blog will be coming back to normal.  Thank you for your patience during my recent absence.

Ku Klux Klan Seizing On Anti-Immigrant Sentiment To Draw New Members

The Ku Klux Klan is trying to unite Americans around demonizing undocumented immigrants. The post Ku Klux Klan Seizing On ... Read more

Religious Discrimination 101

"...Bottom line: The First Amendment protects your right as an American to the free exercise of your religion. It does not protect your right to use your religion as an excuse to discriminate against other Americans..."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rev-susan-russell/religious-discrimination_b_5662632.html

From peyote to sex: Religious liberty fight recast

"...Cathleen Kaveny, a Boston College professor of law and theology, said many Americans perceive reactions like these, and demands for exemptions, as an attempt by “losers in the culture war to hold onto a position” that broader society has generally rejected..."

 http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/religion/from-peyote-to-sex-religious-liberty-fight-recast/2014/08/09/8a82a216-1fdf-11e4-9b6c-12e30cbe86a3_story.html

The Amazing Ways The Google Car Will Change the World

Read more

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Predatory Lending (HBO)

Payday loans put a staggering amount of Americans in debt. They prey on the elderly and military service members. They’re awful, and nearly impossible to regulate. We’ve recruited Sarah Silverman to help spread the word about how to avoid falling into their clutches.

Read more

97 Year-Old Woman Denied The Right To Vote Because Of Voter ID

And voter fraud at the polls is still only slightly more common than unicorns.The post 97 Year-Old Woman Denied The Right To ... Read more

Android Users Flip Out Over New Facebook Messenger Privacy Rules

Facebook says stipulations in Messenger app's terms of service that allow it to "call phone numbers without user intervention" ... Read more

Are Christians persecuted in the United States?

"...Publius cites five primary examples, six secondary examples, and three examples that he characterizes as "vignettes".  I looked at every one of these and, unsurprisingly, they do not support the conclusion.  Of Publius's fourteen examples, only one is even a legitimate example of harassment of any sort.  ..."

http://blog.rongarret.info/2014/08/are-christians-persecuted-in-united.html

Jesus, God, or Nothing? (Skepticality)

This week Derek speaks with Raphael Lataster, a secular PhD researcher in religious studies who focuses on philosophy of religion, Christian origins, logic, Bayesian reasoning, and the social impacts of atheism. His Master's thesis dealt with Jesus mythicism, concluding that historical and Bayesian reasoning justifies a skeptical position in regards to any form of 'historical Jesus'. His work led him to write his new book, 'There Was No Jesus, There Is No God'. Derek decided to sit down and talk with Raphael and find out more about how the ideas contained in the book came about and how they fit when so many prominent, modern, religious scholars tend to keep making statements as to the historical certainty of a Jesus figure.

 

Interview:

http://www.skepticality.com/jesus-god-nothing/

 

 

Live From NECSS With Lawrence Krauss (Rationally Speaking RS106)

Rationally Speaking returns to NECSS for a live show with Lawrence Krauss, theoretical physicist and author of best selling books like The Physics of Star Trek and A Universe from Nothing. Julia and Massimo chat with Lawrence about whether the laws of the universe demand some kind of explanation, whether string theory should be deemed a failure, and how he ended up featured in a geocentrist documentary.

Interview:
http://rationallyspeakingpodcast.org/show/rs106-live-from-necss-with-lawrence-krauss.html

All items below this point...

... can be browsed in user-selected layouts at DNSpeak2.