An Imperial in Skyrim, pt. 1

The Asteria, a Dwemer airship

I can't say I'm a big fan of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, though I've still enjoyed it. It's a beautiful game, certainly, but I must admit to being disappointed. (Note that my previous comments on the game are here.)

Still, I played my initial character, a mage, for a long time (though only scratching the surface of what was available in the game). After a break, I started an archer character, too, but I didn't think archery was as much fun in this game as it was in Oblivion. I can't say what the difference is, though.

And I got bored doing the same things all over again at the start of the game. Well, I was never crazy about the main quest, anyway. All those 'shouts' just seemed like a way to give everyone magic powers.

So I've installed a mod called "Alternate Start - Live Another Life." This one skips that whole introductory scene and just let's you create a character, then choose any one of many different beginnings (or choose randomly, if you want).

Now, if you've never played the game, I wouldn't use this mod. But if you're thinking of starting again, this is great. For one thing, it's quick. You can even sample all of the starts available, if you want. (You can start as a vampire, as one example. That's kind of neat.) Or you can just start a new game without investing a lot of time in it first.

So that's what I've done. Normally, I plan my characters. I decide how I want to play first, and then try to make sure that everything I do is optimal. Not this time. I chose an Imperial, for no real reason other than that I'd never played one before, and I chose the shipwreck start, knowing absolutely nothing about it.

And I had no clue how I was going to play the game - as a fighter, a thief, a mage? In fact, I've been playing awhile, and I still don't know. I'm just letting things happen, trying to make a story out of whatever I get. It's kind of fun.

Willam Kingsman, shipwrecked in Skyrim

I was worried about the Skinny Horker since the moment I set foot on the ship - and I was right to worry. Well, I worried about this whole crazy plan of sailing to Skyrim, anyway. But that's all over now, because the ship rolled over before we even got there, and I lost everything I owned.

Except for my life. At that, I was luckier than everyone else, so I really can't complain, can I? Especially since I was so certain I was going to die. Given the circumstances, my survival was little short of a miracle.

I found myself in icy water, trapped inside a ship which was completely upside down, but with a tiny air pocket above me. I had to dive several times to find a way out, exploring for further air pockets as I went. At the last, I discovered a huge hole in the hull - apparently, we'd hit an iceberg - and swam up to the surface.

But as I climbed up on the overturned hull, my heart sank. I wasn't too far from a desolate shore, but the water was covered with large chunks of ice - just not large enough to walk on. The wind was howling, I was already freezing, and I had almost nothing for supplies, though I'd grabbed what I could as I made my way through the ship.

Well, there wasn't anyone around - anyone alive - and I wasn't going to last much longer, so I jumped into the icy water and swam to shore. I'm still amazed that I made it. Yeah, I was shivering like mad, frozen almost solid, but I was still breathing. Temporarily, at least. I had to find shelter fast.

Luckily, as I struggled up the ice-covered slope, I discovered a cave. It wasn't very warm inside, but at least it was out of the wind. It was also infested with undead!

My heart sank at that, too. I'm not much of a fighter. But I'm not one to give up, either, and I'd looted a corpse - one of my drowned companions - for a mace. With that, and a little magic flame I'd learned as a kid, I was able to kill the draugr which attacked me. And the ones after that.

A little while later, I encountered the ghost of a young woman - the first of many - but she also attacked me. Later, I discovered - and killed - the creepy necromancer who'd been making all those undead. In his journals, he explained how he'd been abducting young women from the nearby town, then killing them, all because he got some kind of weird sexual pleasure from their obedient ghosts.

It was really disgusting! What kind of land have I come to? But I did learn I was near a town called Dawnstar, and I was able to gather enough loot from his lair to give me a small stake (assuming I'd be able to sell it). More importantly, the necromancer had a brazier in his bedroom, so I was finally able to dry out my clothes and warm up a bit.

Nightcaller Temple, near Dawnstar

That made it even harder to step out into the roaring blizzard outside, but I had a goal now. I was determined to make it to Dawnstar, and I did - though just barely. I was on my last legs when I finally stumbled into town.

Oddly enough, no one in Dawnstar seemed to know anything about those women who'd been abducted. How old was that necromancer, anyway? [That's one of the things I dislike about Skyrim. When you get a quest, it's usually clear across the map. (This one is connected to someone in Riften, apparently, which is about as far as you can get from Dawnstar.) Why don't people have local concerns?]

But then, no one in Dawnstar seemed to be getting enough sleep, either, so maybe they just weren't thinking clearly. Apparently, they were all having horrid dreams. It didn't bother me. I slept well in their cozy - and warm! - inn, after selling the rusty old weapons I'd looted from the draugr. But I was so grateful for shelter, that I agreed to join a priest of Mara - a Dunmer - who asked for my help in fixing the problem.

Erandur, and a lovely bard, at the Windpeak Inn

It wasn't until I followed him to a dark tower nearby that I learned the real story. Erandur, this follower of Mara, had once been part of a group which worshiped Vaermina the Dreamweaver, a Daedric lord, and it was an artifact inside the Nightcaller Temple which was causing these problems.

The temple itself had been magically protected, but our entrance awoke both priests and orcs, who'd been fighting each other but now turned on us. It was a little more than I'd expected when I volunteered to help. Actually, it was a lot more than I expected.

But at the end, we were victorious, Dawnstar was saved, and Erandur volunteered to travel with me, helping me as I'd helped him.

Erandur at Nightcaller Temple

I had no particular place to go, but I wanted to get warm again (or as warm as it gets in Skyrim, at least), so I led us south. (They were nice people in Dawnstar, but how can they live in an icebox like that?)

So we took the main road south towards Whiterun - and calling it a "road" is being very generous, frankly, since it was covered by snow drifts most of the time - and came upon Ft. Dunstad, which had been overrun by bandits.

There's war in this cold land, with some of the jarls rebelling against the Empire (and fighting each other, too), but I didn't realize that it was this bad, that bandits could take over a major fort guarding the only road linking Dawnstar with the rest of the province.

Well, this wasn't my fight,... but we weren't expecting bandits at the fort until we stumbled into them. Let me tell you, I was very grateful to have Erandur with me! He's deadly in a fight. In fact, after taking out the initial ambush, we decided to go ahead and clear the rest of the fort.

After all, other innocent people were going to stumble into the same situation. And I grew up in a trading family. I have a hatred of bandits which almost matches my newfound hatred of necromancers!

Ft. Dunstad, in the snow (of course)

Luckily, they didn't know we were there, and they were quite spread out. The bandits in that initial ambush would have been smarter to let the others know that travelers had arrived, before they attacked. But then, I suppose they wanted to keep the loot to themselves. And if they'd been capable, they wouldn't have been bandits in the first place, huh?

At any rate, we were able to sneak around and take them out one or two at a time. (Note that we found the bodies of some of their victims, so I had absolutely no problem with executing these bandits in the most efficient way possible.) I felt free to help myself to their equipment, afterwards. I suppose that most of it was stolen goods, but I couldn't do anything about that.

The rest of our journey to Whiterun was uneventful. We did encounter some spiders, but my man Erandur took care of them almost before I realized we were under attack. Oh, and we met an old orc who was looking for a "good death." He wanted me to provide that, but I'm no murderer. (And, frankly, he looked pretty tough still. He wasn't that old.)

Just before Whiterun, we got out of the snow. Man, I was sure glad to see growing plants again! But it was still pretty darn cold. Isn't there anywhere warm in this whole province?

Note that I'm still playing this by ear. I started with a Flame spell, which is a very weak fire spell, and I found a mace in the wreck. The combination of the two let me survive that first encounter with undead, so that's how I've been playing the game, with a mace in one hand and a fire spell in the other.

I took a bow off one of those draugr, so I've been using that, too. Basically, I sneak everywhere, and I try to get a shot at unsuspecting foes with a bow, if I can. Then I switch to the mace and spell combination for close work. I'd be better off concentrating on one kind of attack, but I don't think I'll do that. So far, at least, I've just been concentrating on my sneaking skill.

But who knows? As I say, I'm playing this by ear. Where I go, what I do, how I end up fighting,... I'll just decide all that as I go. And I don't know how long I'll play, either. (Note that I'm further along than this, but I think this post is plenty long enough already.)

___
Note: I intend to continue with this story, at least for awhile. I'll put all the posts here.

Republican hostage negotiation

The Daily Show
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OK, the Republicans worked for this, they refuse to even hold a vote on funding the government in the House of Representatives (John Boehner claims that it wouldn't pass, but he refuses to demonstrate that), and they've been arguing strenuously that a shutdown isn't such a bad thing, anyway.

But it's the Democrats fault. Fox 'News' even calls it Obama's shutdown. Honestly, how dumb do they think we are?

But this is the clip I really wanted to post:

The Daily Show
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You have to sympathize with this woman, don't you? After all, none of the rest of us have every had to live with a "stupid law," right? We've always gotten everything we wanted. No one who isn't a Republican has ever seen laws enacted that we didn't like, have we?

I can't even imagine what that must be like. How about you? It must be difficult, not getting your own way in everything. So it's no wonder they've taken hostages and threatened to destroy the full faith and credit of the United States of America.

Heck, what were they supposed to do? Accept that they lost the fight in Congress, that they lost in the courts, that they lost in the election last year - and just vow to work harder next time? Would the Taliban do that if they lost an election? No, only sane people would do that.

Clearly, this is our fault. We forced the GOP into turning to economic terrorism, because we wouldn't give them everything they wanted. I mean, what did we expect? (You know, maybe this would work with Al-Qaeda, too. If we just gave them everything they wanted, they might stop trying to kill us.)

PS. Note, at the end of this, how Jason Jones figures out the underlying difficulty here. Tea Party Republicans hate government - even the American government (maybe even especially the American government). So where's our leverage?

One way or another, these right-wing extremists will get what they want. We'll either agree to destroy our own government, or they'll do it for us. Remember, they've been trying to "drown America in a bathtub" for decades. During the Bush years, one reason they increased spending while simultaneously cutting taxes was to deliberately bankrupt America, in order to force us to dismantle our own government.

Not all Republicans are like this, because corporate America gets rich from government spending. But the crazies are in control right now. The rest of the party went along with this for political reasons. They simply wanted to destroy the Obama presidency so they could regain the White House (and Congress) themselves.

They thought to use the Tea Party crazies for this, just as they'd thought to use the Dixiecrats when they adopted their 'Southern strategy' of deliberately appealing to white racists, just as they'd thought to use the fundamentalist Christians when they started wooing religious nuts, just as they'd thought to use the anti-immigrant hysteria they encouraged so incessantly (and now are wondering how they'll get Hispanic votes again).

In every case, their goal was simply political power. And they wanted to use that political power to benefit the wealthy, primarily. (Note what actually happened during the Bush years, not what they told their own supporters they wanted. They didn't outlaw abortion, they didn't end immigration, they didn't bring back segregation. But they did give tax cuts to the rich.)

The current situation wasn't intended by mainstream Republicans. But a funny thing happened after they filled the Republican Party with racists, fundamentalists, and other assorted crazies: the crazies took control.

The crazies weren't content with just rhetoric. They weren't content with just an occasional bone thrown their way. And since wooing the crazies bothered many sane people, the crazies became more and more important to the GOP, until now,... they control the party.

Daggerfall installer

(Daggerfall townspeople)

Of course, I was a huge fan of The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall, first released in 1994. In some ways, Bethesda Softworks took a wrong turn after that (and certainly after the third in the series, Morrowind).

The game is free these days, but it's an old game, and they don't always want to run well on modern computers. Well, it isn't new, but I just discovered this really nice Daggerfall installer. If you want a bit of nostalgia, this makes installation so easy, you really have no excuse not to give it a try. :)

Seriously, it's great! It installs the complete game, plus DosBox (with everything all set up for you), and includes not just the latest official patch, but unofficial patches and mods, too (which you can select to use or not, your choice). It's really a piece of cake - and all free, including the game.

After discovering this, I've been playing a little bit of Daggerfall again. True, I won't be playing much of it, much as I loved the game when it was first released. The game is wonderful, but we've advanced in so many ways since then.

It's not just the graphics. The primitive graphics don't bother me at all. But we've advanced when it comes to game interfaces, too. Yes, you can set up whatever key scheme you want. (It took me longer to do that than to install the game, not even close.) But movement still seems very awkward.

It is fun revisiting the game, but it won't be something I'll play for long. Still, it was well worth installing it, given how easy - and how free - it was. If you never played the game, I don't know if you'll understand why we were all blown away by it in 1994, though.

It's hard to return to those days, even when I loved them.

Why dummies shut down the government

I've missed these! This guy hasn't been posting new videos recently, so this one came as a nice surprise.

It's great, too - especially that Green Eggs and Ham bit. :)

Non-Belief, Pt. 15: I Can't Hear You

(image source)

This series has already gone on longer than I expected, but I keep finding new things to talk about. Still, this might be the last. And if it is, that would be fitting.

I got the idea from a comment by 'Grundy' (my thanks!):

Apologetics is really just the second best strategy believers have come up with to retain their beliefs when met with secular arguments. The first is holding their fingers in their ears.

That's not very kind, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized how true it is.

In previous posts, I discussed the arguments of religious apologists (usually Christian, because that's the majority culture around here - and the culture I was raised in). But people aren't Christian because of the arguments of apologists. They like the arguments of apologists because they're already Christian, almost always because that's the religion they were raised to believe.

Frankly, I wonder if anyone is convinced by the arguments of apologists. Christian apologists appeal to Christians, and Muslim apologists appeal to Muslims, but both reject the apologists of the other religion. Theists already believe. They just like those apologists who seem to give them a better excuse for believing it.

But atheists tend to see through the logical fallacies - maybe not immediately, since professional apologists have carefully developed slick arguments and a very slick presentation, but eventually. After all, most of us have been surrounded by Christian thinking our entire lives. If we haven't heard it all, we've certainly heard most of it.

On the other hand, I had a girlfriend once who was just astonished at having encountered an atheist. She seemed to think it was like meeting a werewolf - or maybe a panda, since she knew that atheists existed, just never expected to actually see one. Thankfully, we're more common now - or at least more visible.

(I remember when that young woman talked me into going to church with her one Sunday. I don't know if she expected me to burst into flames when I walked in the door, but she really seemed to be amazed that I remained an atheist afterwards. Did she think I'd never been in a church before? It seemed like it.)

Atheists in America live in an overwhelmingly Christian society. Most of us were raised Christian ourselves, but even those who weren't have likely been surrounded by Christian family, friends, and/or co-workers. (Sure, if you're of Jewish heritage, you were probably immersed in that culture, but I doubt if you could have escaped Christians and Christian ideas entirely.)

The reverse is not true, not at all. When I was a kid, I didn't know anyone who wasn't a Christian, at least as far as I knew (certainly, no one who expressed even the slightest doubts about God). It might be better now - there's the Internet, if nothing else - but I still encounter a lot of people who've apparently never heard the atheist side of things.

And they don't want to. That has always astonished me, but most Christians apparently don't want to even think about their own religion, let alone talk about it. Yeah, it's the most important thing ever, but they'd prefer not to overtax their credulity, I guess.

They may admire Christian apologists, but they don't understand the arguments and don't care to understand them. Usually, they've never even read their own holy book. It's like they deliberately avoid anything which might cause them to question what they've been taught all their life.

That's OK with me, though I'm always surprised by it. I've never really hidden my atheism, but I never advertised it, either - not until the George W. Bush administration pushed me into it, at least. And even now, I don't announce it to everyone I meet. I don't exactly go door-to-door as an 'atheist missionary,' you know. I'm sure that most people I know just assume I'm a Christian like them.

But even the Christians who do know tend to avoid religion like the plague. I may be going to Hell, but they don't want to talk about it, they don't even want to think about it. (Of course, many of them don't believe in Hell, because they're good people, and they don't want to believe in it. So they don't. Faith-based thinking is handy that way.)

But I do get emails and personal messages online sometimes, from Christians I don't know. These people actually care enough about their own religion to try to convert strangers. Normally, they'll see a comment I made on a YouTube video, for example (yeah, it's an addiction), and send me a private message.

That's fine. I'm always interested in what other people think, so I welcome such discussions. Who knows? I might learn something. But a discussion is not usually what they have in mind.

Note that I never initiate these. It's always someone else sending me a message about their religion, about their faith, about their beliefs. I always read them, think about them, and reply. I make a real point of responding to any points they make, saying whether or not I agree with them and why. I answer any questions and often ask questions of my own. I take them seriously.

And the result? Almost always they reply back. But most of the time, it's just to restate what they sent me in their first message. Did they even read the reply I sent them? Clearly, they received it, because they replied to it. But most of the time, there's no indication that they actually read it.

They just ignore my points, ignore my arguments, ignore any questions I ask. It's like they put their fingers in their ears. They can tell that I didn't agree with them, but they seem to be very careful not to hear why.

Sometimes - not as often - their reply will include a new argument to back up their beliefs. Note that they still ignore everything I said to them in my reply, but they apparently glanced at it closely enough to tell that their first argument wasn't working, so they're trying a new one.

They're still sticking their fingers in their ears, though. They don't say anything at all about any points I made in refuting theirs. They don't say whether they agree with my objections, with my argument, or not. They certainly don't answer any of my questions. They just ignore all that, while attempting a different kind of argument.

This isn't a conversation. In a conversation, you listen to what the other guys says and then respond to that. But they just ignore everything I say. It's not even clear that they read any of it, because they act like it didn't happen at all.

Note that this isn't a debate. I really don't want a debate. A debate happens when you play to an audience. A typical example is how politicians reply to questions. Usually, they ignore the question and just reply with a prepared sound bite.

Of course, they have a lot of experience at this, so you've frequently forgotten the question by the time they finish answering. And if a journalist reminds them of that, they just go off on another tangent. (No journalist persists, because otherwise they wouldn't get access at all. And the politician might call them "biased," which seems to be absolutely terrifying to the media.)

Well, these aren't politicians, and they're not playing to an audience. But they're not looking for a conversation, either, because they absolutely refuse to hear anything I say. This is how they avoid having doubts. This is how they avoid even thinking about their own religion: by not hearing what anyone else - anyone who disagrees - says.

Sometimes, one of these people will reply to something I actually said - not every point, not every question, but something. But it rarely goes any further than that. If you're the kind of person who asks questions - and then listens to the answers - you've probably already given up your religion. If you're the kind of person who actually cares about the truth of his beliefs, you're probably already an atheist.

Do you think that's harsh? I can't tell you how many times a theist has told me that he doesn't care if his beliefs are true or not, because he "wouldn't want to live" in my world (i.e. the real world). That usually happens at the end of a face-to-face discussion, where it's not so easy to ignore everything the other person says.

Online, though, it's very easy. I don't know why people send me personal messages if they don't want to hear what I'll say in return, but they do. I enjoy talking with people about this stuff, but Christians only want to talk at me. Or so it seems.

I think they're worried that atheism is catching. And you know? I think they're right. If you don't put your fingers in your ears, who knows what you'll hear.

___
Note: The rest of this series is here.

Are our parks closed? Not entirely.

There are a million Internet petitions these days, and I don't know if they do any good at all, but I thought this one was interesting, at least:

Our federal lands are being mined, drilled, logged and just about everything else you can name – but because of the Republicans’ reckless and irresponsible shutdown of the federal government, we can't be there to hike or camp, and our park rangers can't be there to respond to emergencies. We need to get our priorities straight. ...

There are about 800,000 furloughed federal employees all over the country. National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, Fish and Wildlife Service and other land management experts are at home instead of tending to trails, eliminating invasive species and protecting our wild lands from pollution. While they wait for the shutdown to end, mining, drilling and logging are going ahead.

Fossil fuel and logging companies shouldn't have special access to our federal lands while rangers, hikers and the rest of us are locked out. Sign my petition to Sally Jewell and Tom Vilsack today to say we expect the same treatment as mining and logging companies when it comes to public lands and resources that we, as Americans, own and protect for the future.

If our public lands are shut down, because House Republicans refuse to do their constitutional duty and fund the government, they should be shut down for everyone, don't you think?

Corporations traditionally support the Republican Party, and none more so than the mining, logging, and drilling companies extracting resources from our public lands. So why should they get special treatment?

If the government shutdown hurts everyone, it's more likely to end quickly. At the very least, if might get big GOP donors to think about what they're doing to the rest of us.

How's that war on women coming, Republicans?

From Twitter, via TPM:

Carla Marinucci @cmarinucci

Popular buttons at @CAGOP convention already take on @hillaryclinton #2016 in a big way... Ouch!!

8:48 PM - 5 Oct 2013

That's the California GOP convention, by the way. What do you want to bet that most of them see nothing wrong with this?

Can you imagine anything similar being said about a male candidate for president of the United States - or for any political office, for that matter?

The prefailure of apologetics

He makes a very good point, doesn't he? Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. But theists don't even attempt to provide extraordinary evidence - or any evidence at all, normally. Why not? Well, they don't have any.

The best they can do is some esoteric philosophical argument which even philosophers largely dismiss. Well, you hardly even need to point out the logical fallacies in those, because it wouldn't be anywhere near the kind of thing you need to demonstrate the truth of such an extraordinary claim anyway.

On the other hand, if 'God' actually wants people to believe that he exists, as you claim he does,... well, he's supposed to be all-knowing and all-powerful, right? So he'd know exactly what it would take to get me to believe in him, and he'd have no problem supplying the evidence. At least, if your god is even close to being how you describe him.

But that doesn't happen. Instead, we get apologetics which only convince the people who already believe. Christian apologetics only convince other Christians (if you can even use the word "convince" here, since they're not changing any minds). Note that Muslim apologetics don't convince Christians, even though it's the same kind of argument.

The Bible, Pt. 2: Genesis, Chapter 4 - 6

Note: I'm continuing my Bible study from this post (or get the whole series here).

Genesis, Chapter 4:

1 And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived, and bare Cain, and said, I have gotten a man from the LORD.

2 And she again bare his brother Abel. And Abel was a keeper of sheep, but Cain was a tiller of the ground.

OK, Adam and Eve have been kicked out of the Garden of Eden, but at least they're having sex now. Hmm,... Eve says, "I have gotten a man from the LORD." It's a good thing Adam isn't the suspicious type, isn't it?

3 And in process of time it came to pass, that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the LORD.

4 And Abel, he also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of the fat thereof. And the LORD had respect unto Abel and to his offering:

5 But unto Cain and to his offering he had not respect.

God doesn't like vegetables? (This isn't the only place in the Bible where God loves the sweet smell of burning flesh.) But this was a gift. Couldn't he have been a little more gracious? But we're not told why God rejected it.

Still, couldn't an omniscient god have seen this coming, at least?

 8 And Cain talked with Abel his brother: and it came to pass, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against Abel his brother, and slew him.

9 And the LORD said unto Cain, Where is Abel thy brother? And he said, I know not: Am I my brother's keeper?

That's a great line, isn't it? Too bad so few Christians take it seriously.

15 And the LORD said unto him, Therefore whosoever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the LORD set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him should kill him.

I realize that the Bible contradicts itself later (standard procedure, when it comes to the Bible), but God certainly seems to be against capital punishment at this point, doesn't he?

As far as I can tell, though, that "mark upon Cain" - so beloved by racists everywhere - is never said to be hereditary. In this part of the Bible, at least, it's just Cain himself who's marked, and that's actually to prevent other people from killing him. (Of course, there's only two other people in the whole world at this point - his parents.)

But this is like "Original Sin," isn't it? There's nothing in that initial Genesis story to indicate that all people are tarred with blame for the Fall. Adam and Eve are punished for what they did, but there's no indication - so far - that their descendants should also be blamed for something that happened long before they were born.

Of course, getting back to that mark of Cain, this is before God killed everyone on Earth - except for seven people - in the Great Flood. So even if the mark had been hereditary, there's no reason to think that today's ranchers, musicians, and metalworkers - who supposedly descended from Cain's sons - would bear it.

17 And Cain knew his wife; and she conceived, and bare Enoch: and he builded a city, and called the name of the city, after the name of his son, Enoch.

Apparently there were women around - nameless women, of course - from somewhere. Was this Cain's sister, not important enough to even mention? Or did God make more women from men's ribs?

But Cain builds a city? For three people - himself, his wife, and his son? That seems like overkill doesn't it? Three people wouldn't even make a village!

18 And unto Enoch was born Irad: and Irad begat Mehujael: and Mehujael begat Methusael: and Methusael begat Lamech.

19 And Lamech took unto him two wives: the name of the one was Adah, and the name of the other Zillah.

But here, women are finally worth mentioning by name. Well, two of them, at least - the first since Eve.

And here's our first mention of bigamy, too - the first of many. Yeah, for all that right-wing Christians yell about marriage being "defined by God" as one man and one woman, there are sure a lot of marriages in the Bible which are otherwise, aren't there? Haven't they even read the Bible?

25 And Adam knew his wife again; and she bare a son, and called his name Seth: For God, said she, hath appointed me another seed instead of Abel, whom Cain slew.

Eve says that God granted her another "seed," in exchange for losing Abel. Are women not "seeds," then, since her daughters are never mentioned by name? Really, this was such a patriarchal culture, it's hard to tell what's going on.

Chapter 5:

4 And the days of Adam after he had begotten Seth were eight hundred years: and he begat sons and daughters:

5 And all the days that Adam lived were nine hundred and thirty years: and he died.

Apparently, then, Adam and Eve had lots of kids - boys and girls - so I'm not sure what the significance of Seth was supposed to be. (Edit: Oh, yes, he's Noah's ancestor, huh? Duh!) None of the others are named - the women certainly aren't named - but I guess we know where Seth and Cain got their wives, huh? Their own sisters!

The rest of this chapter is just a genealogy (leading to Noah), with only one man (and no women) mentioned by name per generation. They all have exaggerated lifespans of many hundreds of years, though.

Again, it's really hard to understand how anyone can take this seriously. It's just the typical kind of storytelling from primitive cultures.

Chapter 6:

2 That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose.

...

4 There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them, the same became mighty men which were of old, men of renown.

Twice here, it's "the sons of God," but "the daughters of men." Is that just because women weren't valued? Were the men supposed to be godly, but the women just ordinary mortals? Or is there some other significance to this? Weird, isn't it?

And I wonder at "they took them wives of all which they chose." It sounds like the women didn't have any choice in the matter, doesn't it? Of course, we're reading a story from a very patriarchal culture. Women weren't valued. They were just the property of, first, their fathers, and then their husbands.

5 And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

6 And it repented the LORD that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart.

7 And the LORD said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me that I have made them.

8 But Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD.

9 These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.

10 And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

So God gets his knickers in a twist and decides to murder everyone on Earth except for the "perfect" Noah (remember that when we get to the next chapter!) and Noah's three sons (plus their unnamed wives).

He's not just going to drown every child on Earth, along with their parents, but every animal, too. Really, I don't know how the animals pissed him off. Were they "wicked," too?

17 And, behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and every thing that is in the earth shall die.

Now, that seems a little extravagant, doesn't it? God is supposed to be omniscient and omnipotent (well, he is now, but maybe not back then?), so he could have killed everyone easily enough without flooding the whole planet, even if he did think that infants were "wicked."

Anyway, he tells the "perfect" Noah exactly how to make a boat, then tells him to fill it with two of "every living thing of all flesh" (which is contradicted in the next chapter), and then to load it up with food enough for them and for all the animals. Nice trick, that, huh?

But this is enough for now. We'll get to the Flood next time.

___
Note: This whole series, such as it is, so far, is available here.

The Bible, Pt. 1: Genesis, Chapter 1 - 3

Introduction: I've always wanted to read the Bible, but... it's just so boring! Oh, I've read the Gospels, of course. And Genesis starts out great. But that doesn't last long,... so I didn't, either.

But maybe if I blog about it I'll have better luck. Or maybe not, I don't know. No guarantees.

Note that I'm not a Bible scholar, so this isn't going to be authoritative. I'll make no attempt to be either inclusive or conclusive. Check out the Skeptic's Annotated Bible, if you want that. I'm just going to comment on whatever comes to mind.

I'm not even going to read that annotated version of the Bible. Instead, I'll read the King James Version - because I like the language - in its 1769 revision, to get more modern spelling. If that's not accurate,... well, I'll let 'God' worry about that. :)

I won't read very fast, probably, since I'm commenting, too. But I might have a lot to say about some chapters, with little to say about others. I just don't know. The point is, what you get is what you get. Right now, I don't have a clue what to expect, myself.

Genesis, Chapter 1:

1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

2 And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

Neat, isn't it? Very poetic. But how can anyone read Genesis without recognizing it as a 'just-so' story of primitive mythology?

When I was a kid, I was a huge fan of ancient Greek and Roman mythology. I read Native American mythology, too, a bit. Genesis is just like that. So it's always been hard for me to understand why anyone in the 21st Century would believe that it was actually true.

Of course, most Christians don't believe that, not literally (which pretty much eliminates the whole point of Jesus Christ, but I'll get to that later), but many do. There's just a shocking number of fundamentalists in America these days. Have they never read any other mythology? I just don't get it.

6 And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.

7 And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.

8 And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

The sun, planets and angels and the firmament. Woodcut dated 1475.
- from Wikipedia

Primitive people didn't have a clue about modern cosmology (no surprise), so they invented a universe which made sense to them. (All cultures did this, not just the early Jews.) What made sense to them was a fixed ceiling, separating the waters above (from where the rain came) from the waters below.

The sun, the moon, and the stars were fixed in that firmament. (Note that rain came from above that!) Of course, since this clearly indicated that the Sun revolved around the Earth, rather than the other way around, later astronomers who discovered the truth were threatened with death for going against the Bible.

The church didn't even bother to look at Galileo's data, since he had to be wrong. After all, the Bible had to be true, right? So they threatened to burn him alive - as they'd done other heretics - until he recanted. Faith-based thinking.

Chapter 2:

4 These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens,

Suddenly, it's "the LORD God," not just "God." Starting in Chapter 2, Verse 4, we get a different (though similar) creation story, with even the name of the deity expressed differently.

Now, according to Jewish (and Christian) tradition, Moses wrote all of this (indeed, the entire Torah, the first five books of the Old Testament). But why would he suddenly switch how he referred to his own god?

Furthermore, the two stories contradict each other (for example, animals created before people in one account, afterwards in the other). This isn't just a creation myth like other creation myths, it's actually more than one myth combined into one.

Obviously, they're similar, because if they hadn't been similar, they wouldn't have been combined into one culture's holy text like this. But again, it just seems obvious that this is a primitive myth similar to what every other primitive culture invented. These were stories people told to each other, until they were eventually written down - and codified - into a more or less coherent belief system.

16 And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat:

17 But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

Oh, this is going to cause problems, isn't it? :)

But let me get this straight. God is supposed to be omniscient and omnipotent, and he can put this "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" anywhere he wanted. So why put it in the Garden of Eden, especially since he knew (he's omniscient, remember) what was going to happen? Or didn't he get all-knowing until after this?

Furthermore, how did Adam and Eve know that disobeying God was wrong before they'd eaten the fruit? Before that, they didn't have any concept of right and wrong, so why blame them for something they had no control over? (If you get a puppy, do you punish him for piddling on the floor before you've even had a chance to teach him otherwise?)

Afterwards, they knew it was wrong. But not ahead of time. (Again, God should have known that, if he had a brain at all, let alone omniscience.)

Finally, I think it's interesting that God warns Adam not to eat the fruit, but this is before he has even created Eve. In the next chapter, Eve apparently knows about this rule, but did God tell her, or just Adam? After all, if she had any sense at all, she wouldn't have necessarily believed everything a man told her. :)

Chapter 3:

3 But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.

4 And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die:

5 For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.

The serpent was telling the truth, wasn't he? It was good food, not poison. (God lied about that, since they clearly didn't die the same day they ate the fruit.) And it did give Adam and Eve knowledge (knowledge that God was apparently keeping for himself). In effect, this made human beings into people, rather than just animals.

I think it's funny, because this is basically the Prometheus myth. But, as Wikipedia notes, Prometheus "is known for his intelligence and as a champion of mankind." Of course, many primitive creation stories have similar myths, but don't most of them think that knowledge is a good thing?

6 And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.

Eve wanted to be wise. And she was right to want that, wasn't she? I wonder, is intelligence praised anywhere in the Bible? I'll have to look for that as I continue reading. Obedience is praised, yes, but obedience is for slaves. Free men and women should desire knowledge, should desire intelligence, should desire wisdom.

14 And the LORD God said unto the serpent, Because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of the field; upon thy belly shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy life:

Snakes had legs before this happened? I've heard Christians claim that this wasn't actually a talking snake, but just a mistranslation. Leaving aside the fact that the least an omniscient, omnipotent god could do is make sure his holy book was translated accurately, I'd say this passage makes it abundantly clear that it really was a snake, don't you?

16 Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.

Why does Adam get to rule over Eve? Why blame her more than him? After all, God warned Adam about eating the fruit before Eve was even around. At the very least, they should be equally to blame. (Although, as I noted, it's hard to blame either of them when they were incapable of telling right from wrong. As a myth, this one not only teaches the wrong things, it makes God seem like a dick.)

22 And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever:

23 Therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.

Speaking of acting like a dick, note how God doesn't want Adam and Eve to "become as one of us"? ("Us"? There is more than one god, then?)

They were just animals until they ate of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, but now, they're a threat, apparently. They threaten to become gods, themselves. If they ate of the tree of life, they would become gods, and 'God' apparently doesn't want the competition, so he drives them away.

Of course, he could have avoided all this if he'd just put those two trees somewhere else. That was remarkably stupid for the all-knowing creator of the universe, don't you think? And I'm still wondering about that "us." Who else was there?

But then, the people who imagined all this weren't monotheists, not as we'd define the term. They believed that multiple gods existed, but they just worshiped their own. That's why the Second Commandment says, "Thou shalt have no other gods before me." That wouldn't make sense if there were no other gods, would it?

All in all, Chapter 3 makes Adam and Eve look like real heroes, don't you think? God, as I've said, looks like a real dick. That's the kind of god you think is worth worshiping? I really don't get it.

One other thing: I don't see anything here about blaming Adam and Eve's descendants for any of this. Did I miss something?

As I've said, I don't think that even Adam and Eve were at fault, since they had no way of knowing that disobeying God was wrong. But God doesn't seem to indicate that this "original sin" (which phrase isn't used here, either) is going to affect their children (except for not growing up in the Garden of Eden, of course).

But maybe that's elsewhere in the Bible? With luck, we'll get there eventually. For now, I think this is long enough.

___
PS. This whole series - assuming that there will be one - can be found here.

Our government shuts down: two letters

(via Daily Kos)

You know how much I like Elizabeth Warren, United States senator from Massachusetts. Earlier this week, I posted a brief video of her, speaking on the floor of the U.S. Senate.

But she just sent out this email to supporters, too. It's entitled, "We are not a country of anarchists."

If you watch the anarchist tirades coming from extremist Republicans in the House, you'd think they believe that the government that governs best is a government that doesn't exist at all.

But behind all the slogans of the Tea Party – and all the thinly veiled calls for anarchy in Washington – is a reality: The American people don't want a future without government.

When was the last time the anarchy gang called for regulators to go easier on companies that put lead in children's toys? Or for inspectors to stop checking whether the meat in our grocery stores is crawling with deadly bacteria? Or for the FDA to ignore whether morning sickness drugs will cause horrible deformities in our babies?

When? Never. In fact, whenever the anarchists make any headway in their quest and cause damage to our government, the opposite happens.

After the sequester kicked in, Republicans immediately turned around and called on us to protect funding for our national defense and to keep our air traffic controllers on the job.

And now that the House Republicans have shut down the government – holding the country hostage because of some imaginary government "health care boogeyman" – Republicans almost immediately turned around and called on us to start reopening parts of our government.

Why do they do this? Because the boogeyman government in the alternate universe of their fiery political speeches isn't real. It doesn't exist.

Government is real, and it has three basic functions:

1. Provide for the national defense.
2. Put rules in place rules, like traffic lights and bank regulations, that are fair and transparent.
3. Build the things together that none of us can build alone – roads, schools, power grids – the things that give everyone a chance to succeed.

These things did not appear by magic. In each instance, we made a choice as a people to come together. We made that choice because we wanted to be a country with a foundation that would allow anyone to have a chance to succeed.

The Food and Drug Administration makes sure that the white pills we take are antibiotics and not baking soda. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration oversees crash tests to make sure our new cars have functioning brakes. The Consumer Product Safety Commission makes sure that babies' car seats don't collapse in a crash and that toasters don't explode.

We are alive, we are healthier, we are stronger because of government. Alive, healthier, stronger because of what we did together.

We are not a country of anarchists. We are not a country of pessimists and ideologues whose motto is, "I've got mine, the rest of you are on your own." We are not a country that tolerates dangerous drugs, unsafe meat, dirty air, or toxic mortgages.

We are not that nation. We have never been that nation. And we never will be that nation.

The political minority in the House that condemns government and begged for this shutdown has its day. But like all the reckless and extremist factions that have come before it, its day will pass – and the government will get back to the work we have chosen to do together.

Have I mentioned that I like her optimism, too? :)

Here's another letter, this one from the editors of Daily Kos. This one is addressed to the Republican Party:

Dear GOP,

For a crowd that loves to bray about the Constitution, it seems you have misplaced your copy. How else to explain your bizarre efforts to destroy the world unless you get your way?

You don't like the Affordable Care Act. You've made it obvious. But it was passed the correct way, in a Congress that generally doesn't pass shit. It made it through the House, and it made it through the Senate. It wasn't passed in the "dead of night", nor was it "rammed down" anyone's throat like you jokers like to claim. It passed only after an excruciating 14-months of debate and negotiations. But all your hysterical shrieking about death panels and communism couldn't stop it. Finally, the president signed it into law.

Us liberals weren't thrilled when it passed. Just relieved. We didn't get anything near what we wanted. After all, we're not in the business of fighting for Heritage Foundation-created ideas championed by the likes of Newt Gingrich and first adopted by Republican governors (the guy you nominated, in fact!). If we couldn't get single payer, we at least wanted a public option—an expansion of Medicare for all. But alas, we went to D.C. with the Congress we had, not the one we wanted. And really, given the dysfunction in D.C., it's amazing we got anything at all.

So now that the law is about to be fully implemented, you're still not happy. You're still shrieking about death panels and communism, and even the death of freedom! Yeah, yeah, we get it. The 42 (or whatever) votes in the House to repeal Obamacare have made it very clear.

But here's the thing: If you want to truly get rid of the law, you have to do it the proper way, as specified in that Constitution you pretend to cherish. Those House votes? Those are a good start! Great job! You're a third of the way there. Because you still have to get that bill passed by the Senate. And then, you have to get the president to sign it. And if the president doesn't sign it, then you have to overturn that veto which requires a two-thirds majority, which you don't have even in the House.

So what are your options? Certainly not shut down the government and threaten a national default on our debt. That's not in that Constitution (seriously, read it!). Your options are to win some elections. Hold that ill-gotten gerrymandered-fueled majority in the House. Get a simple majority in the Senate and then get rid of the filibuster. Seriously, get rid of it. I won't complain. Then win the presidency. You'll have a better shot at that if you don't nominate Ted Cruz, and you might want to broaden your appeal by being less of a bunch of assholes. But really do what you must. I'm not in the habit of giving you guys advice. Just anvils.

What I do want to do is remind you that there's a right way to get rid of laws, and the undemocratic, extra-constitutional way you are trying to do it now.

If you really truly believe that America is behind you, then you're golden. 2014 and 2016 will bear that out and you'll have all the governmental control you'll need to repeal to your heart's content. So put your trust on that American public you so fervently believe is behind you and let the chips fall where they may.

Take note of that last part, particularly. Republicans keep claiming that the American people are behind them. Why, then, did they lose the election bigtime last year?

It wasn't just the presidency they lost. Republicans also lost seats in both the Senate (where they had the advantage of defending fewer seats than the Democrats) and the House.

In fact, the Democrats received over a million more votes than the Republicans in the House of Representatives. The only reason they still control the House, and can still hold the country hostage like this, is because they've gerrymandered election districts so badly. They're a minority, still holding power only because of political shenanigans.

But hey, if you really do think that the American people are behind you, then there's a constitutional way to handle this: just start winning the next elections. This is a democracy. If you lose one election, it's not the end of the world, because there's always another one.

You don't have to hold America hostage in order to get what you want. Unless you're just lying about the American people being behind you. Unless you know that we Americans will like 'Obamacare,' if we actually get the chance to try it. Unless you've been lying all along, to us and maybe even to yourself.

False outrage on Bullshit Mountain

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
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Crazy, isn't it? Here's more from Rachel Maddow:

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

And now the Republicans are trying to blame the Democrats for shutting down the government?

Republicans couldn't get their platform through Congress, they couldn't get the Supreme Court to give them everything they wanted (although, dominated by right-wing Republicans, the Court gave them most of what they wanted), and they couldn't get their platform adopted through democratic means in last year's election (which they lost, decisively). So now they're taking hostages to force America to do what they want.

And Fox 'News' is trying to push the meme that this is the Democrats' fault? Incredible, isn't it?

"Halting State" by Charles Stross

(cover image from Amazon.com)

I've had a lot of people recommend Halting State (2007) by Charles Stross, especially since I'm a computer gamer. But frankly, I had a hard time getting into it.

I've enjoyed his books before, but this one is written in a first-person stream-of-consciousness style that I really hated. Add to that the fact that I didn't really like the main characters (at first), and that one of them has a Scottish accent which is often rendered phonetically,... well, I kept putting the book down in disgust.

But my friends were right. Eventually, the book gets so entertaining that I didn't even notice these things anymore (and I started to care what happened to at least two of the main characters).

Unlike the last book I read, this one is about my kind of games. Oh, not exactly. I don't play multiplayer fantasy games, and I'm too old to have played Dungeons & Dragons as a tabletop game, but I... get those kinds of games. I understand the appeal of them, and I'm near enough to that kind of gaming to find all of this interesting.

Because, when the book starts, a dragon and a group of orcs have robbed a bank in a multiplayer fantasy game. Now, we don't get to see that, and the police officer initially assigned to the case knows nothing about such things - and isn't particularly thrilled to have her time wasted like this. (I really don't think the book starts off well.)

However, this is a big-money crime if you think about stock manipulation. (Even today - and this is set in a near-future Scotland - the video game industry is far bigger than the movie industry, for example.) And it turns out that there's far more going on here than we think at first.

I don't want to give away spoilers, so it's hard to talk about specifics, but there are a lot of neat twists to the story. But it didn't get interesting, not to me, for nearly a hundred pages. After that, I thought it was great, and I didn't want to put it down. But it took some perseverance, at first.

The characters get more appealing as time goes on, too - two of them, especially so. And the story is fascinating. It's not really about multiplayer computer games, not exactly. If you're not a game-player, don't worry, because this is mostly about white-collar crime and even international espionage. Yet game-players are involved, and... well, it's a neat combination.

I've been playing computer games for 25 years or so, and the changes have been immense. To me, 25 years doesn't seem like much, yet the advances in game technology - in computer technology in general - have been absolutely incredible. And I don't see much sign of things slowing down.

So even a glimpse of these games of the future, potentially, is really interesting to me. And so is the future of espionage - again, potentially. This world isn't as bleak as many near-future SF tales these days, though there are still dangers. I'm not sure if I'd call it optimistic, but it isn't pessimistic.

It's just lots of fun - once you get far enough into the book, at least.

____
PS. My other book reviews are here.

Generation Opportunity

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Yeah, I'm posting a lot of videos this morning, huh? But there's just something about elderly billionaires - who don't have to worry about health care costs, themselves - trying to convince young people to stay uninsured. How stupid is that?

Are young people really dumb enough to buy this line? You don't get insurance because you expect to use it. You get insurance for those unexpected events which will be disastrous if you don't have it.

And sure, when you're young and don't have many assets, maybe you think you'll just file for bankruptcy, letting the rest of us pay for your health care. OK, you may not worry about the ethics of that, but it's not an effective way to stay healthy, either.

And if you don't make much money, your health insurance costs will be subsidized by the government (which is still cheaper for the rest of us than paying for your health care ourselves). Do you really think it makes sense to avoid a deal like that?

Remember, these are elderly billionaires trying to convince you of this. They've got a lot of money to throw around in fancy ads - filled with attractive young people, no doubt - but do you really think they've got your best interests in mind?

Here, this might help, if you're still wondering:

House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) worked with top congressional Democrats behind the scenes to preserve employer contributions for congressional staff's health care plans even as he decried those subsidies in public, Politico reported Tuesday.

Emails and documents obtained by Politico show Boehner and his aides worked with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) and House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD), among others, to find a way to maintain the long-standing employer contributions. Those documents also show that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) was aware of the behind-the-scenes talks.

In addition to those efforts, Boehner attempted to arrange a meeting with President Barack Obama to ask for help in securing the subsidies, the documents show.

Yeah, they want health insurance, just not for you.

March of the dumb

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
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The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,The Daily Show on Facebook

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,The Daily Show on Facebook

It's a crazy world, isn't it? A crazy country, at least. It's a good time to be a comedian, I suppose. For the rest of us? Not so much.

A history of the government shutdown

How did we get here? A brief review might be helpful, don't you think?

It actually began in the 1990s when Republicans developed 'Obamacare' - they didn't call it that, of course - as their alternative to the Clinton health care proposals.

Developed in a right-wing think tank as the free-market, capitalistic, insurance company-friendly alternative to the single-payer plans of other developed nations, it was widely supported in the GOP (though not pushed very hard, since it wouldn't help billionaires much).

Indeed, Mitt Romney's signature achievement as governor of Massachusetts was to get 'Romneycare' passed in his state, and he received a great deal of praise for that - yes, in his own Republican Party.

So in 2009, when the Democrats, who'd failed during the Clinton years to get health care reform past Republican opposition, decided to try again, they 'compromised' (as Democrats tend to compromise) by adopting the Republican plan lock, stock, and barrel. Surely that would be acceptable to them, wouldn't it?

Unfortunately, in January, before Barack Obama had even taken office, Republican leaders had met and vowed they'd do nothing to help America as long as our first black president was in the White House. (This is fact. Look it up. Some of them actually bragged about it.)

After all, the economy crashed on their watch. At that point, we were in the worst economic collapse since the Great Depression, and there was no end in sight. Republican priorities weren't to do all they could to help America, but to prevent Barack Obama from fixing the problem and becoming another Franklin D. Roosevelt in American eyes.

So they vowed to drag their feet all they could. And even when the Democrats adopted their own health care plan, Republicans turned against it en masse (with some arm-twisting by their leaders, admittedly).

But this is still a democracy, and Democrats were able to pass the Affordable Care Act through both houses of Congress (just barely squeaking by the now-inevitable filibuster which Senate Republicans were doing to pretty much everything). And it was signed into law by the president.

So it's a done deal. This is the law of the land, according to the Constitution of the United States.

Still, opponents fought on. They took it to the Supreme Court, which is dominated, 5 to 4, by right-wing Republicans. But 'Obamacare' was declared to be constitutional - by a Supreme Court dominated by Republicans.

They still didn't give up. 'Obamacare' wasn't scheduled to go into effect immediately, and there was another presidential election in 2012, so Republicans made repealing the Affordable Care Act a big part of their campaign,... and they lost bigtime.

They lost the presidency. (I hear Republicans claiming that they won the popular vote, but that's not even close to being true. Look it up.) They lost seats in the Senate (even though the Democrats had more seats to defend than they did) and they lost seats in the House of Representatives.

They still control the House, though, because Republicans in state legislatures have gerrymandered election districts to guarantee Republican control. In the House, Democrats received over a million more votes than Republicans, but Republicans still dominate, thanks to that gerrymandering. We have a minority party in control, even though they lost the popular vote, thanks to political shenanigans.

As I say, in most of those districts, Republicans are pretty much guaranteed a win. So they don't have to worry about the general election, only about the primary. And in the Republican Party these days, you have to be batshit crazy to get through the primary without an extremist challenger.

Anyway, after all this, you'd think Republicans would change course, wouldn't you? I mean, this is a democracy. And they did just take a shellacking at the ballot box, unable to convince a majority of Americans that their ideas were the best (despite a massive amount of money from anonymous billionaires and corporations).

But no, since they couldn't convince America they were right, they're now trying to force us to accept everything they wanted, anyway.

They claim that Democrats aren't willing to compromise,... but compromise about what? The Affordable Care Act is the law of the land, passed by both houses of Congress, signed by the president, even reviewed by the Supreme Court. And it's already started signing people up for health insurance.

The American people voted Democratic last year, despite Republican campaigning against this very law. But Republicans expect the Democrats to 'compromise' by abandoning the law? Even when the American people have just rejected Republican demands in a democratic vote?

Since democracy didn't work for them, Republicans are now taking hostages and threatening to shoot. Indeed, they've already shut down the government. For how long? Who knows?

This is economic terrorism. These terrorists couldn't get what they wanted in Congress, they couldn't get what they wanted in the courts, and they couldn't get what they wanted in democratic elections. So they've turned to force.

And it's not just about 'Obamacare' (again, their own health care plan!), either. Republicans have created a laundry list of demands before they'll raise the debt ceiling, too - and that's coming up very soon.

Yes, they're threatening to destroy the full faith and credit of the United States of America unless they get everything they couldn't persuade Americans to go for in the election just last fall:

House Republicans said they would agree to increase the debt limit to avert a mid-October default only if Democrats accepted a list of Republican priorities, including a one-year delay of the health care law, a tax overhaul and a broad rollback of environmental regulations. ...

President Obama, who has faced three years of down-to-the-wire standoffs that have nearly ended in default or shutdowns a half-dozen times, fired back with a broadside of his own.

“No Congress before this one has ever, ever, in history been irresponsible enough to threaten default, to threaten an economic shutdown, to suggest America not pay its bills, just to try to blackmail a president into giving them some concessions on issues that have nothing to do with a budget,” Mr. Obama said before a friendly audience in suburban Washington. ...

But in their efforts to unify restive Republicans, House leaders were only widening the partisan divisions. Behind closed doors on Thursday, they laid out their demands for a debt ceiling increase that include the health law delay, fast-track authority to overhaul the tax code, construction of the Keystone XL oil pipeline, offshore oil and gas production and more permitting of energy exploration on federal lands.

The legislation would also roll back regulations on coal ash, block new Environmental Protection Agency regulations on greenhouse gas production, eliminate a $23 billion fund to ensure the orderly dissolution of failed major banks, eliminate mandatory contributions to the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, limit medical malpractice lawsuits and increase means testing for Medicare, among other provisions.

Even with that legislative Christmas tree, many Republican backbenchers balked. ...

Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, the No. 2 Democrat, derided the proposal. “The House is attaching the Republican Party platform to the debt ceiling,” he said. “In a week full of absurdities, this one takes the cake.” ...

Economists of all political persuasions have warned that a failure to raise the debt ceiling by the Treasury’s deadline of Oct. 17 could be catastrophic. The world economy’s faith in the safety of Treasury debt would be shaken for years. Interest rates could shoot up, and stock prices worldwide would most likely plummet.

“Defaulting on any obligation of the U.S. government would be a dangerous gamble,” Doug Elmendorf, the director of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, told the House Budget Committee on Thursday. “In a very uncertain world, the one thing everyone has been able to count on is that the U.S. government will pay its bills on time.”

Republicans lost the election last year, but now they're trying to force us to accept the Republican Party platform anyway! It's just incredible, isn't it?

But some people will just never accept a black man as president. This is the result of the GOP's 'Southern strategy' of deliberately wooing white racists. In recent decades, it's given them the power to do whatever they wanted (mostly, to give tax cuts to the rich). But putting all the crazies into one political party has a downside, too.

And the election of our first black president has driven them to hysterics. They seem to be willing to destroy America if they don't get their own way. Well, they've tried it before, haven't they? Let's hope this doesn't end up in another bloody Civil War.

Two competing visions of America

That's Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts. Great, isn't she?

"These threats may continue, but they are not working. And they will never work, because this is a democracy. And in a democracy, hostage tactics are the last resort for those who can't win their fights through elections, can't win their fights in Congress, can't win their fights for the presidency, and can't win their fights in the courts. For this right-wing minority, hostage taking is all they have left, a last gasp of those who cannot cope with the realities of our democracy."

Now, here's the other side:



There, fair and balanced. (You know it's fair and balanced, because I just told you so. If you repeat it often enough, it must be true, right?)

Non-Belief, Pt. 14: What Happened?

One of the most common explanations I hear for atheism is that something must have turned us away from God. Did we have a bad experience in church? Was our pastor mean, boring, or uncaring? Did we lose a loved one to a horrible disease? What was it?

Christians (pretty much the only theists I know) like this idea, because it means there's nothing fundamentally wrong with their faith. And this way, atheists don't really disbelieve in magic. We're just reacting emotionally to a bad experience.

This article*, written by a Christian apologist in The Atlantic, is a good example. He interviews young (college-age) atheists and discovers things which "startled" him - that they were just reacting against Christianity, that they acted out of emotion, that there was some trigger which caused them to reject what they'd been taught all their life.

He's probably right, at least in part. When you've been taught since infancy to believe in magic, it's not easy to let it go. (Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny go easily; 'eternal life,' not so much.) Most atheists have doubts for a long time, before they're finally willing to admit, even to themselves, that they don't believe. It's not easy for most people (not as easy as I had it, certainly), so why wouldn't you think that an emotional trigger would help?

And he's interviewing young people, many of whom are still trying to find their way in the world. If you asked them about anything where they disagreed with their parents, you'd probably find a similar response, in many cases. We go from just believing what we're told to questioning it to rebelling, sometimes, against what we think is wrong. What's unusual about that?

I've heard, too, that many young people are turning away from Christianity because of the right-wing politics associated with it these days. That might be true. I hope so. All we atheists really need is a foot in the door.

Once people actually start thinking about their own religion, they become good candidates for atheism. It's the mindless believers who don't think at all, the people who tell me they don't care if what they believe is true or not, who are impossible to reach.

But the thing is, if you have a bad experience in church, there are other churches. If you reject right-wing politics, there are liberal churches you can join. When it comes to religion, you can believe - quite literally - anything you want to believe, since it's all based on faith, not evidence.

Even just within Christianity, churches are night and day in their beliefs. If you don't want to believe something, you don't have to. That's the whole point of faith. And here in America, jumping from church to church to find exactly what you want is very, very common. Most people don't think anything of it (while they'd likely be shocked if you became an atheist).

Larry Alex Taunton, who wrote that article in The Atlantic, profiles a couple of the students he interviewed, and I have no reason to doubt him (though I suspect that he cherry-picked these examples for his own purposes). You see, the only thing we atheists have in common is that we don't believe in gods. Everything else,... well, we're all over the place.

We atheists don't have a dogma. We don't have popes or priests. We don't have holy books. The media might identify "four horsemen of new atheism", but what does that mean to me? We atheists admire clear thinkers who can express themselves in books and/or debates, but there's nothing official about it. There are many well-known atheists, and I can, and do, disagree with them, sometimes.

Theists have official holy books - many different holy books, in fact. But even within a single religion, you have to wonder how an omniscient, omnipotent god could write a Bible or a Koran, or even just inspire it, and still have believers disagreeing so vociferously about what it means. How incompetent is your god, anyway?

And, inevitably, theists claim that their god is necessary for ethical behavior,... and then have to explain why that doesn't work for so many of them.

We atheists aren't like that. I wish every atheist were a good person. I wish every atheist were rational and intelligent. I wish every atheist had a good reason for his atheism. I'm an atheist because I'm a skeptic, but you can believe in homeopathy, Bigfoot, and dowsing, and still be an atheist. We atheists - as atheists - don't make any claims. We just don't believe in the claims of theists, that's all.

So Taunton talks about 'Phil':

"Church became all about ceremony, handholding, and kumbaya," Phil said with a look of disgust. "I missed my old youth pastor. He actually knew the Bible." ...

Phil was once the president of his Methodist church's youth group. He loved his church ("they weren't just going through the motions"), his pastor ("a rock star trapped in a pastor's body"), and, most of all, his youth leader, Jim ("a passionate man"). Jim's Bible studies were particularly meaningful to him. He admired the fact that Jim didn't dodge the tough chapters or the tough questions: "He didn't always have satisfying answers or answers at all, but he didn't run away from the questions either. The way he taught the Bible made me feel smart."

Fine, but so what? Taunton wants us to believe that Phil became an atheist because his "rock star" of a pastor was replaced by "Savannah, an attractive twenty-something who, according to Phil, 'didn't know a thing about the Bible.'"

But, come on. If you don't like your pastor, you just switch congregations. Or maybe you leave organized religion entirely, but remain 'spiritual' - meaning that you still believe in God (the Christian God, inevitably, here in America) or at least in Jesus (which lets you ignore the nasty stuff in the Old Testament).

OK, an extended aside here:  I hear many people say they dislike religion, but remain 'spiritual.' Ironically, I like religion better than I like believing in things without good evidence they exist.

Religion is a social activity, and we're social animals. We can do great harm in groups (mobs have a particularly bad reputation, and deservedly so), but we can do great good in them, too. And most people enjoy social activities. As I say, we're social animals.

What I dislike about religion is simply that it's not true - or, to put it the best way I can, theists make claims which they have no good reason to believe are true. I reject those claims, because no theist has convinced me that he knows what he's talking about. But believing in some nebulous spirit isn't any better. (It can be better, in a practical sense, if your magic spirit doesn't make any demands. But that doesn't make it any more true.)

If you belong to a religion, at least you have a holy book to explain away. If you just believe in some nebulous spirit or non-denominational 'God,' that gets you even further away from reality, in a sense.

And if you just "follow Jesus," as I've heard people say, well, first of all, we have no real reason to believe that Jesus even existed. If he did (and I suspect that there was a historical Jesus of some kind), he was almost certainly illiterate, but that doesn't matter, because we don't have anything he ever wrote, anyway. And we don't have anything he ever said - or ever did - related by anyone who ever heard it or saw it.

The Bible is just stories told by anonymous people, who supposedly heard them from other anonymous people, later written down by still other anonymous people, and then edited by yet more anonymous people for their own purposes. No one who wrote the Bible had ever even met Jesus. So it's kind of hard to "follow Jesus" when you don't have a clue what he really said, what he really did, or even if he existed at all, don't you think?

OK, sorry. I'm back. My point, before I veered off into that extended digression, was that you don't become an atheist just because you're unhappy with your church, since it's a piece of cake to switch churches or simply become an unaffiliated believer, one of those 'God is love' people.

This may indeed have been the trigger for 'Phil' to admit his disbelief to himself, but his doubts undoubtedly came first. And maybe he would have stayed with the church, doubts and all, if they hadn't fired his favorite pastor. It's not easy admitting that you don't believe what you've been taught all your life, that you don't believe what you'd really, really like to believe. (Who, after all, really wants to die - and to know that their loved ones are going to die, too.)

I must admit to some skepticism about this article, just because most atheists don't care what the Bible says, since we realize that things written in a book aren't necessarily true. The Bible can't be evidence for itself, obviously, and there's no more evidence outside the Bible for the magic stuff it claims than there is for the supernatural claims in the Illiad and the Odyssey. Or in the Harry Potter books, for that matter.

But it doesn't matter if it's true or not. How one person came by his atheism, what one atheist believes,... none of that has anything to do with the rest of us. We atheists don't necessarily have anything in common, other than a disbelief in gods.

Still, theists really, really want to believe, apparently, that we weren't thinking clearly when we abandoned religion, that it was an emotional reaction to some trauma, that it wasn't the lack of evidence backing up religious claims, or the complete lack of consensus among believers themselves, or anything else they'd have trouble explaining away.

What happened? I can't speak for anyone else, but you just never showed me any good evidence to back up your claims. You never showed me even one good reason to think that your claims were actually true.

You never convinced me that what you believe is more than just delusion and wishful-thinking, almost always believed only because you were raised to believe it.

___
* My thanks to Jim Harris for the link. (Note: The rest of this series is here.)