Isaac Schrödinger

The Sun is Melting!

And it sure looks good.

Silky Smooth

Gorgeous depth of field in this simple photo.

The Power of the West

Unlike the last post, here one sees a beautiful view of life.

Not Pure

Sepia Mutiny:

As many readers may be aware, today there has been a terrible pair of attacks on Ahmadi mosques in Lahore, by gunman armed with grenades and automatic weapons. As of now about 70 people have been killed.

More:

That last detail is distressing: there were specific warnings published in a local newspaper? And the authorities still didn’t see fit to send in police to guard the mosques? Granted, if these guys were anything like the militants in the Mumbai attacks, even armed police may not have posed a significant deterrant. But still: it seems like a malicious kind of negligence to have left these folks to fend for themselves.

The life of a "non-Muslim" has little value in that part of the world. If anything, they're actively discriminated against. Just two examples that I've heard from Ahmadi relatives:

1. Rabwa, a city in Pakistan, is famous for its dense Ahmadi population. Sometimes, mysteriously, parts of the city lose electricity for many days. Either the authorities are causing the blackouts or they're consciously lazy in fixing the problem.
2. Ahmadis are not allowed to be buried in the same graveyards as Muslims. When people find out that an occupant of a Muslim grave is an Ahmadi, they dig the bones and throw them out like garbage. Even in death some do not find peace.

Lastly, read the screenshot of a Pakistani passport here -- Ahmadi discrimination is an integral part of the system.

Help Needed

This fellow is not young enough to be an expert.

Stupidity and Hypocrisy: Die Hard

Jeremy Irons really, deeply, passionately cares for the planet.

Launching himself as a green campaigner, Irons has revealed plans to make a documentary about sustainability and waste disposal, likening himself to Michael Moore, the controversial film maker, although “not as silly”.

Nor bloated, hopefully.

“One always returns to the fact that there are just too many of us, the population continues to rise and it’s unsustainable,” he said in an interview with The Sunday Times. “I think we have to find ways where we’re not having to scrap our effluent junk and are a really sustainable planet.”

Tucked away in the middle of the article:

Irons, who owns seven houses, including a pink castle in Co Cork, Ireland, believes a new economic vision is needed in the wake of the global financial crisis.

Seven houses! Seven! When I was growing up, my family didn't own a house -- because my dad as a foreign worker in Saudi Arabia wasn't allowed to own property. I've lived my entire life in rented facilities. So, that means that I have, like, infinite moral superiority over Irons in this arena.

Jeremy Irons is now officially silly.

Link via David Thompson.

Is Selling Your Own Kidney Wrong?

Before reading the last paragraph I realized something horrible. Greg Mankiw puts those thoughts in simple words by the end:

It might be nice if the world could work using pure altruism alone, but that seems highly unrealistic. The sad truth is that under the Ethicist's code of conduct, we have more deaths and more foreclosures than necessary, all in the name of fairness.

Question Asked, Question Answered

I like the expansion and the ocean answers.

Muslim Humor*

Jihad Watch:

Frankly, I (Marisol) find this cartoon offensive. And yet, I feel no urge to call for someone's head, burn an effigy in the street (or even a Wal-Mart Spongebob piñata, on account of the short notice), or call for the closure or legal censure of Ahlul Bayt News Agency, at whose site I found this cartoon posted under "Futurity [sic] of Insulting Islam."

* It's not funny.

Death Valley Looks Good

One day I hope to capture just a few shots that approach this one.

Yoda vs. Rand

I would love to see this movie.

Pakistan Gets Serious!

The country that tutored the Taliban bans Facebook and YouTube.

You’d think with everything going on over there that Facebook and YouTube would be lower priority than this, but I guess not.

Illiteracy, Jew-hatred, tribalism, cousin-marriages, victim mentality -- these can be dealt with later. Right now the major problem facing Pakistan is the possible exposure of badly drawn cartoons.

Respek the Mo!

A Righteous Thrashing

Classical Liberal provides this link in the comments section:

It was a scene Saudi women’s rights activists have dreamt of for years.

When a Saudi religious policeman sauntered about an amusement park in the eastern Saudi Arabian city of Al-Mubarraz looking for unmarried couples illegally socializing, he probably wasn’t expecting much opposition.

I'm truly stunned by what happened. I wish it happened more often.

Go there and read it all.

A to Z v2.0

Geeks are Sexy:

As a geek, you definitely know your ABCs, but do you know these? From A to Z, “away team” to “zork,” here is [GAS]’s take on the Geek Alphabet.

I like W. The expression on Homer's face is perfect.

Pretty and PC

Lisa Schiffren:

I see that, for the second year in a row, politics has intruded upon the Miss USA contest. After last year's tedious debacle with Carrie Prejean and the gay-marriage question, you'd think they would have learned to steer clear of hot-button social issues.

Nope.

The ultimate winner, Miss Michigan, was asked if contraception should be paid for by health insurance. She thought that it should be. She explained, "I believe that birth control is just like every other medication, even though it's a controlled substance."

Cosmetic surgery will also be provided since it's, like, a right!

Perspective and Pose

Very nicely done.

Unsmooth Criminal

Sepia Mutiny:

Last October, a Canadian Auntie from Richmond Hill— a town in the Greater Toronto Area— decided to go to the gym. She entered a parking lot, attempted to park her BMW SAV (no, that’s not a typo)…and gained international infamy for what happened next.

Aaaaieeee.

The Best T20I Ever

Cricinfo:

Michael Hussey was still taking deep breaths when he sat down shortly after the match to discuss what he had just achieved. It hadn't sunk in. Australia shouldn't have won this game, they really shouldn't have got close.

The fact they were victorious with a ball to spare was down to one man who produced something even he doubted was possible. Words like "freakish", "extraordinary" and "special" were thrown around after his 60 off 24 deliveries, but for once they weren't too far off the mark.

There was a time when on special days the Pakistani team would gel and play truly fine cricket. Those days they would win against any opposition.

But now the gulf between Pakistan and one powerful country -- Australia -- is so great that even when Pakistan fires on all cylinders, we still get an Australian victory. Though, it isn't easy; the Aussies have to fight for it. Today, they fought till the end and earned an epic victory.

They've earned the accolades. One more win and they'll be world champions.

Jew-Hatred is in the DNA of Islam II

Eternity Road:

Islam's hatred is not confined solely to the Jews. Muslims are taught from infancy to hate and shun anyone who isn't a Muslim. Such a person is regarded as innately "unclean," such that even a brushing contact with him could doom a Muslim to Hell unless he's rapidly and thoroughly "purified." Thus, Christians, Zoroastrians, Buddhists, and the like are, in the Islamic view, indistinguishable from pigs.

No wonder we're not allowed to handle a Qur'an. One and a third billion people hold to this insane creed, whose "sacred scriptures" condemn all the rest of us to dhimmitude (or worse) on Earth and Hell in the afterlife. The Muslim who dares to dissent from any of it is considered to have committed zandaka -- heresy -- and is under automatic sentence of death.

Jew-Hatred is in the DNA of Islam

Jim Hoft:

This is frightening. A Muslim Student Association (MSA) member admitted publicly during a question and answer session with conservative David Horowitz in San Diego that she supports a second Holocaust.

She is simply following the evil man behind Islam. Jew-hatred is as common as bread in Muslim societies. Muslim community leaders and politicians simply cannot maintain street-cred if they're not rabidly against the existence of Jews and, by logical extension, the state of Israel.

Ace of Spades:

I love how she starts it off with the traditional liberal pablum about dialogue and exchanging ideas. She isn't interested in exchanging ideas, she's interested in seeing Jews die at the hands of her coreligionists.

Of course. These Muslims will whine, yell and break necks over a bunch of badly drawn cartoons but refuse to utter a few words against openly genocidal terrorist groups.

Homeschooling Is Not A Crime

Vox Popoli:

I have to admit, I don't mind in the slightest when people start asking me about homeschooling in an offensive manner. Being an Award-Winning Cruelty Artist, I tend to rather enjoy seeing how speedily I can force them to retreat from a prosecutorial pose to the position of a desperate, wild-eyed defense attorney who knows his client is headed straight for the chair.

I love the way this guy utilizes words and projects imagery.

I plan on reading his most recent, uplifting book soon.

The Great Depression 2.0

Robert Samuelson via Instapundit:

A single currency could no more subsume national identities than drinking Coke could make people American. If other euro countries (Portugal, Spain, Italy) suffer Greece's fate -- lose market confidence and can't borrow at plausible rates -- there would be a wider crisis.

But the central cause is not the euro, even if it has meant Greece can't depreciate its own currency to ease the economic pain. Budget deficits and debt are the real problems; and these stem from all the welfare benefits (unemployment insurance, old-age assistance, health insurance) provided by modern governments.

Samuelson goes on to explain why this can be nearly impossible to fix.

The next few years will not be pretty.

But For Feminists, It's Always The Patriarchy

The Daily Mail via Instapundit:

at the near-genius level (an IQ of 145), brilliant men outnumber brilliant women by 8 to one. That's statistics, not sexism.

In this context, Professor Greenfield's indignation that only one in ten science professors is female doesn't seem all that bad. It also goes some way to explaining why, in almost 110 years of Nobel Prize history, only two women have ever won the Prize for physics, only four have won the Prize for chemistry and why no women at all have ever won the coveted Fields Medal for mathematics in eight decades of trying.

It's sad that mentioning such simple facts makes one a sexist.

Mean Cats

• Jack Nicholson's cat from The Shining.
• Somebody is gonna get hurt real bad.
• Okay, okay, so this is not really that mean.
• These vicious monsters can have you for lunch.

Mehndi

A few photos of this interesting decoration:

1. The red and gold look aka Iron Man's bride.
2. A different vibe than the previous one.
3. On the back (NSFW).
4. Front body (NSFW).

I like the last one.

Apocalypse Soon

The End of the World as We Know It with Mark Steyn.

• Part One.
• Part Two.
• Part Three.
• Part Four.
• Part Five.

The Acceptable Racism

Instapundit:

THEY TOLD ME IF I VOTED FOR JOHN MCCAIN WE’D HAVE OPEN RACIAL SEGREGATION IN AMERICA — AND THEY WERE RIGHT!

Martin Luther King is rolling in his grave.

In the comments there, CosmicConservative writes:

Imagine, just imagine if the principal was white and kept black children behind while white kids went to listen to a white rocket scientist.

Nobody would support such a rotten principal. So, why is this principal getting away with it? Is it because liberals expect and accept lower moral standards from blacks? Or are liberals afraid of criticizing the poor, oppressed (and thus oh so saintly) minority?

Or both!?

VAT Your Problem Is?

Greg Mankiw on the value added tax:

Although a value-added tax is just another form of a retail sales tax, a VAT has the advantage of being harder to evade. Tax experts believe that large retail sales taxes lead to compliance problems, which we can avoid by collecting the same tax along the chain of production.

True. There are, however, two problems:

1. It will not be easy for the consumer to gauge the amount of tax paid when purchasing an item with a VAT system. When the price of an item goes up; is it because of the VAT or the companies which manufactured the item or both?
2. It is unlikely that the Democrats will propose VAT as a true substitute for the current retail tax structure. The VAT will be slapped on on top of other taxes -- which I doubt will help efficiency. Of course, it'll be great for the IRS.

It's Free!

Sadly, in the end, the cost will be very high.

Hollow Morals

Mike:

When oblivion is the natural result of all ways of living, no way of living really ends up being better except in capacity to give one a good lifestyle. Therefore, compromising with totalitarians in order to maintain one's comfort and life is far more rational than putting both on the line in what may be a suicidal effort, all the while the only final outcome is still, once again, oblivion.

Isn't it the truth. One sees too many atheists who offer scathing commentary on Christianity but tend to get a limp tongue when Islam is under discussion.

That White Patriarchy Again

AlterNet:

Two weeks ago, on a Monday morning, I started to write what I thought was a very clever editorial about violence against women in Haiti. The case, I believed, was being overstated by women’s organizations in need of additional resources. Ever committed to preserving the dignity of Black men in a world which constantly stereotypes them as violent savages, I viewed this writing as yet one more opportunity to fight “the man” on behalf of my brothers. That night, before I could finish the piece, I was held on a rooftop in Haiti and raped repeatedly by one of the very men who I had spent the bulk of my life advocating for.

God doth have a sense of humor.

Link via Vox's "When rape is comedy gold".