Holy freaking crap:
ISLAMIC law has been officially adopted in Britain, with sharia courts given powers to rule on Muslim civil cases.
The government has quietly sanctioned the powers for sharia judges to rule on cases ranging from divorce and financial disputes to those involving domestic violence.
Rulings issued by a network of five sharia courts are enforceable with the full power of the judicial system, through the county courts or High Court.
That's absolutely unbelievable. Is this really what Britain has come to?
I don't think I can actually comment cogently on this. It's just too absurd, too shocking, too ridiculous. All I can say is that I can't even fathom something like it happening in the US, at least for the time being.
Absolutely unbelievable.
Holy freaking crap:
ISLAMIC law has been officially adopted in Britain, with sharia courts given powers to rule on Muslim civil cases.
The government has quietly sanctioned the powers for sharia judges to rule on cases ranging from divorce and financial disputes to those involving domestic violence.
Rulings issued by a network of five sharia courts are enforceable with the full power of the judicial system, through the county courts or High Court.
That's absolutely unbelievable. Is this really what Britain has come to?
I don't think I can actually comment cogently on this. It's just too absurd, too shocking, too ridiculous. All I can say is that I can't even fathom something like it happening in the US, at least for the time being.
Absolutely unbelievable.
This is priceless:
A Russian advertising executive who sued her boss for sexual harassment lost her case after a judge ruled that employers were obliged to make passes at female staff to ensure the survival of the human race.
The judge said he threw out the case not through lack of evidence but because the employer had acted gallantly rather than criminally.
"If we had no sexual harassment we would have no children," the judge ruled.
That's pretty unbelievable. Imagine the furor if that happened in this country. Although, if we had a declining population, who knows what madness would ensue.
This is priceless:
A Russian advertising executive who sued her boss for sexual harassment lost her case after a judge ruled that employers were obliged to make passes at female staff to ensure the survival of the human race.
The judge said he threw out the case not through lack of evidence but because the employer had acted gallantly rather than criminally.
"If we had no sexual harassment we would have no children," the judge ruled.
That's pretty unbelievable. Imagine the furor if that happened in this country. Although, if we had a declining population, who knows what madness would ensue.
Read this. It's about the motivation for keeping the spying program alive and detainees in prison despite their almost certain uselessness and innocence (respectively). I'll wait.
All done? Noam's comment:
I mean, it's just fricking grotesque. You're tempted to call it Bond villain-esque, except in this case Cheney's evil seems more banal than Bond-ian.
reminded me of Philip Zimbardo's
The Lucifer Effect. One of the key takeaways from that book was the notion of "the banality of evil", that normal people placed in terrible conditions can do terrible, evil things despite being utterly mundane, completely boring, and banal. We think that it takes some great evil power to do great evil, but in reality it just takes a bunch of normal guys in an absurd situation.
Although in this case it was self-made. I'm currently reading
The Dark Side by Jane Mayer, (buy it, buy it now), and I just finished the part about how the paranoia and fear infected the administration after 9/11, and how a few guys hijacked the national security agenda and made it into a tool for torture, just because they were convinced it was Necessary. It's all so bureaucratic, so inane, so banal, that it's infuriating. It's like watching
Generation Kill (which, by the way, you should also be doing), at times it makes you gasp with horror, and it makes your blood boil. But knowing the whole infuriating story is absolutely essential, lest we repeat this descent into madness.
Read this. It's about the motivation for keeping the spying program alive and detainees in prison despite their almost certain uselessness and innocence (respectively). I'll wait.
All done? Noam's comment:
I mean, it's just fricking grotesque. You're tempted to call it Bond villain-esque, except in this case Cheney's evil seems more banal than Bond-ian.
reminded me of Philip Zimbardo's
The Lucifer Effect. One of the key takeaways from that book was the notion of "the banality of evil", that normal people placed in terrible conditions can do terrible, evil things despite being utterly mundane, completely boring, and banal. We think that it takes some great evil power to do great evil, but in reality it just takes a bunch of normal guys in an absurd situation.
Although in this case it was self-made. I'm currently reading
The Dark Side by Jane Mayer, (buy it, buy it now), and I just finished the part about how the paranoia and fear infected the administration after 9/11, and how a few guys hijacked the national security agenda and made it into a tool for torture, just because they were convinced it was Necessary. It's all so bureaucratic, so inane, so banal, that it's infuriating. It's like watching
Generation Kill (which, by the way, you should also be doing), at times it makes you gasp with horror, and it makes your blood boil. But knowing the whole infuriating story is absolutely essential, lest we repeat this descent into madness.
Here's a great piece on
Robert Ingersoll from a NYT blog. The piece gives an overview of his life, and talks briefly about faith in public life. It is quite amazing to me that Ingersoll could be so prominent in politics while holding those views. The idea of the Republican party consulting Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, or PZ Myers is pretty laughable.
Which is too bad.
Here's a great piece on
Robert Ingersoll from a NYT blog. The piece gives an overview of his life, and talks briefly about faith in public life. It is quite amazing to me that Ingersoll could be so prominent in politics while holding those views. The idea of the Republican party consulting Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, or PZ Myers is pretty laughable.
Which is too bad.
This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever read:
"I believe 9/11 could have been prevented if we'd had a Republican president at the time," Meehan said Wednesday on CNN's "American Morning."
I wonder what kind of stupid you'd need to say that. I'm guessing a pretty severe case.
I'll let Wikipedia explain
the various failings of the Bush administration leading to 911. It's absolutely insane that just about no one knows about this.
This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever read:
"I believe 9/11 could have been prevented if we'd had a Republican president at the time," Meehan said Wednesday on CNN's "American Morning."
I wonder what kind of stupid you'd need to say that. I'm guessing a pretty severe case.
I'll let Wikipedia explain
the various failings of the Bush administration leading to 911. It's absolutely insane that just about no one knows about this.
Jonah Lehrer has a cool article on
the irrationality of voters. It's actually kind of scary, but definitely interesting.
I especially love the statement about how misguided the talking heads on the TV news channels are, as though we needed any more proof of that.
Jonah Lehrer has a cool article on
the irrationality of voters. It's actually kind of scary, but definitely interesting.
I especially love the statement about how misguided the talking heads on the TV news channels are, as though we needed any more proof of that.
Dave Weigel of Reason
the reason that the anti-gay marriage amendment is going to fail in November. This is great news, especially the survey showing humanity up 51-42.
As my old readers know, I'm a big proponent of equality in all its forms, and cannot stand any argument saying gay marriage shouldn't exist. I'm so proud that California has become the second state in the nation to allow it, and will be devastated if the amendment passes this November. It looks like it will, but this far off nothing is certain.
Except this one truth: history is progressive. Eventually, whether it's 10, 20, or 100 years from now, people will look at gay marriage like any other civil rights issue, and they will ask, "How could those people deny them their right?" I'm proud to be on the right side of this issue, and I hope
you can say the same.
Dave Weigel of Reason
the reason that the anti-gay marriage amendment is going to fail in November. This is great news, especially the survey showing humanity up 51-42.
As my old readers know, I'm a big proponent of equality in all its forms, and cannot stand any argument saying gay marriage shouldn't exist. I'm so proud that California has become the second state in the nation to allow it, and will be devastated if the amendment passes this November. It looks like it will, but this far off nothing is certain.
Except this one truth: history is progressive. Eventually, whether it's 10, 20, or 100 years from now, people will look at gay marriage like any other civil rights issue, and they will ask, "How could those people deny them their right?" I'm proud to be on the right side of this issue, and I hope
you can say the same.
Via
Zapper Z comes the news that the DOE wants to rename SLAC! The DOE wants the names of the national labs to be trademarked, but Stanford won't let them trademark anything with "Stanford" in it (which is why, I believe,
SRI International stopped being an acronym for "Stanford Research Institute").
I mentioned this to my Post Doc, whose husband works at SLAC, and apparently they're having some kind of naming contest (whether real or fake is unknown to me), and NLC, short for National Light Center (or something like that), because SLAC is starting to be used primarily as a light source, is leading the pack (NLC was the name for
one of the precursors of the ILC, so it's supposed to be a joke).
Anyway, this is just silly, I think. Lots of bureaucratic silliness, which I find incredibly annoying. I hope this rename doesn't happen, but if it does the new name had better be good.
Via
Zapper Z comes the news that the DOE wants to rename SLAC! The DOE wants the names of the national labs to be trademarked, but Stanford won't let them trademark anything with "Stanford" in it (which is why, I believe,
SRI International stopped being an acronym for "Stanford Research Institute").
I mentioned this to my Post Doc, whose husband works at SLAC, and apparently they're having some kind of naming contest (whether real or fake is unknown to me), and NLC, short for National Light Center (or something like that), because SLAC is starting to be used primarily as a light source, is leading the pack (NLC was the name for
one of the precursors of the ILC, so it's supposed to be a joke).
Anyway, this is just silly, I think. Lots of bureaucratic silliness, which I find incredibly annoying. I hope this rename doesn't happen, but if it does the new name had better be good.
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