Here's another neat looking funky film that'll probably never make it to theaters here in Wichita. The site doesn't work properly in Mozilla 1.4, so the trailer is here if you can't get it to pop up.

I find it hilarious that since Golf Digest wrote their article about how Vijay Singh was really the worlds best golfer currently he's missed a cut where Tiger finished T10th, finished T24 to Tiger's T7th, and gotten beat in the 2nd round by Jerry Kelly at the Match Play while Tiger wins for the 2nd straight year.

This has become a recurring theme over the past few years. Tiger doesn't play in many events the first 2 months of the season (he had played 1 when Golf Digest wrote their article), so the media start jumping on other hot golfer's bandwagons. Then Tiger comes back and sets everyone straight again. The media ought to just save themselves the embarrassment and at least wait until after Augusta before writing off Tiger.

The trailer for Casshern looks very neat. But its a Japanese movie w/o subtitles at this point, and even though the menus are in English on the official site - none of the actual info is. Anybody read Japanese and care to translate the Intro and Story portions of that website?

Dennis asked a question over here about whether someone who wasn't a believer and who maybe doesn't know the story inside and out would get anything out of seeing The Passion. I answered him in the original thread, but the response turned out to be so long I figured I'd put it here also since I'm sure there are more folks with the same questions:

I'm not sure you would get much out of it. Without already knowing the story quite well, it'd just be a 2+ hour beating with some flashbacks that'll make no sense. Granted, the beating he takes is monumental and will probably change your perception of how harsh crucifixions were, but I'm not sure thats worth $7.

The flashbacks are probably the most difficult part of this movie for somebody who doesn't already know the whole story. They aren't explained at all, and its not readily evident exactly whats going on and what it means without some quick thinking back to bible stories.

As for the 'magic' parts, the only thing in the entire movie is the resurrection, which occupies maybe 2 minutes and a healing at the very beginning which takes another 2 or so minutes. The other 2 hours and 2 minutes is just the straight story of his arrest, 'conviction' and death.

Its not a preachy movie at all though, so if you decide to go just to see the spectacle, you will not feel like the film is trying to convert you or convince you of anything.

For those of you who aren't intimately familiar with the story of Jesus death, I'd really suggest you at least try and find a condensed version of the story so that you'll know who the characters are because the movie does not introduce anybody. From the IMDB site, you'll need to know who the following people are: Mary, Mary Magdalene, Barabbas, Pontius Pilate, Peter, John, Judas, Simon and Herod. You ought to also take a glance at the stations of the cross because the screenplay is based on these 14 events.

A 3rd grader who was suspended for bringing a tiny GI Joe gun (the little 1/2 inch things) has been reinstated by the school board. While doing the right thing in this case, they still won't admit there's a problem with their rules and the way they are enforced:

"Keep in mind that we're trying to run safe schools," Shiver said. "Now sometimes the public does not like what we do to make schools secure, but at the same time we have to make sure that the children are protected."

Its pretty clear to me, and probably all of you, that a policy banning 1/2 inch plastic action figure guns isn't doint a damn thing to "make sure that the children are protected".

Over the past 2 years of really paying attention to zero tolerance policies at schools, it does appear to me that the situation is improving slightly for students. Principals and teachers tend to still go overboard in an attempt to comply with the letter of the rules, but school boards are more often overturning their decisions.

Here's one I haven't heard of before - teacher makes 5 year old boy wear yellow dress in school for talking too much. No suprise, the family has filed a lawsuit. And this may not be a 1-time thing:

Local 6 News has learned that the case may not have been an isolated incident, according to reporter Wendy Saltzman.

Saltzman said that another child told his mother that a different boy at the school had been punished in the exact same way.

"I think this is a practice that happened more than once, by more than one teacher to more than one student," Fairlamb said.

This sex party story where teens were apparently injected with tainted blood is a bit confusing. The article says that the police confiscated blood filled syringes and are testing them for HIV. Yet the article already is calling the blood 'tainted', despite not ever identifying what it was tainted with.

Remember all the hand wringing from the Left when Bush announced Marriage Protection Week on the anniversary of Matthew Sheppard's death. That wasn't just a coincidence, it was the Republican cabal's way of saying Fuck You to Sheppard's memory. Remember that?

So where's the outrage that the same day The Passion is released, the Supreme Court hands down a ruling allowing states to affirmatively discriminate against religion. I mean, thats some strange coincidence, right?

If the state of Washington decided to give special benefits for students of devotional theology (a $3000 scholarship only to people who are studying materials that are "devotional in nature or designed to induce religious faith"), that would be a sure violation of the Establishment Clause, because it would be discrimination in favor of religion. But when the state does the exact opposite, by specially excluding such students from a generally applicable program -- when it discriminates against religion -- that's now (after Locke v. Davey) completely constitutional, even though the Establishment Clause itself has long been described as barring disapproval as well as endorsement of religion, inhibition as well as promotion of religion, hostility towards as well as favoritism towards religion.

I'm still working on this review, but thought I'd stick up what I've got so far. FYI, the Wichita woman who died during the film this morning was not in the same theatre as me. I went an hour later at a different location of the same chain.

Details will follow, but Roger Friedman's review of 'The Passion' is the biggest piece of shit I've seen so far.

Many reviews I've seen also include false assumptions or statements from folks who simply don't understand whats going on. Here's a classic example:

"It made no attempt to explain why Jesus was going through this ... I think everybody walked out hardened."

Thats just not true. The opening scene of the movie is about Jesus taking of humanity's sin to himself, and as he dies he says something like 'it is done' in reference to the forgiveness of sins. As for why those that killed him were doing it - it doesn't really matter what their motivations were. Jesus says that he is laying down his life - nobody is taking his life from him. The reasons they used to kill him were irrelevant - he was letting himself be killed to forgive sins.

This movie presupposes that the audience has a good bit of knowledge of Jesus already - and why shouldn't it. Jesus is arguably the most famous person in the history of the world, and this movie was not meant to be his life story. It covers his last day on earth, and nothing more. It doesn't provide background, it doesn't introduce the characters, and its not preachy - doesn't try and persuade the audience that Jesus was right, or the Messiah, or anything. It simply lays out what happened to him on that day, what he said, and what others said to and about him.

More later...

UPDATE: No more from me. Its taken me so long to get some free time I've kind of lost interest.

Things my math teacher did last year. Understated, but funny.

Stacy went out today and bought tickets for us to see The Passion on Wednesday. I'll report back on what the film is like sometime late Wednesday - we're going to church after the film since its Ash Wednesday, the 1st day of Lent.

UPDATE: Here's Roger Ebert's review of the film.

People are still falling for the 'Hunting for Bambi' hoax. Why am I not suprised.

Ick, the Guardian appears to be severly misrepresenting a Pentagon climate change document. Here's a couple of zingers:

The document predicts that abrupt climate change could bring the planet to the edge of anarchy as countries develop a nuclear threat to defend and secure dwindling food, water and energy supplies. The threat to global stability vastly eclipses that of terrorism, say the few experts privy to its contents.

I have serious doubt whether this document predicts anything. Most likely, its a contingency planning document that presupposes abrupt climate change in order to develop a military strategy for dealing with its possibility - regardless of how slight it may be.

The findings will prove humiliating to the Bush administration, which has repeatedly denied that climate change even exists.

Bush has never denied climate change exists. What Bush (and loads of others) don't accept is that the climate change we are seeing is man-made rather than just a part of a normal temperature cycle. There's a huge distinction between those two positions and the inability of these authors to acknowledge it goes a long way towards revealing their intentions here.

Just for giggles, here's the whole list of Pentagon climate change 'predictions' according to the Guardian.

UPDATE: Um, yeah, its just like I thought. And here's the actual report in question.

UPDATE #2: Here's a snippit from the actual report:

Rather than predicting how climate change will happen, our intent is to dramatize the impact climate change could have on society if we are unprepared for it. Where we describe concrete weather conditions and implications, our aim is to further the strategic conversation rather than to accurately forecast what is likely to happen with a high degree of certainty. Even the most sophisticated models cannot predict the details of how the climate change will unfold, which regions will be impacted in which ways, and how governments and society might respond. However, there appears to be general agreement in the scientific community that an extreme case like the one depicted below is not implausible. Many scientists would regard this scenario as extreme both in how soon it develops, how large, rapid and ubiquitous the climate changes are. But history tells us that sometimes the extreme cases do occur, there is evidence that it might be and it is DOD’s job to consider such scenarios.

It took me less than a minute to read for myself that this document is not a prediction - what the hell was the Guardian reading? Also notice the talk of consensus in there again. Shame, shame, science and consensus don't mix.

Oh boy, now that Nader's running for president, the Dems are pissed.

Bill Richardson: “It’s his personal vanity because he has no movement. Nobody’s backing him,” New Mexico Democratic Gov. Bill Richardson said Sunday in advance of Nader’s announcement.

“The Greens aren’t backing him. His friends urge him not to do it. It’s all about himself,” Richardson told “Fox News Sunday.”

I've seen polls already w/ Nader in them and he's getting 2-4% nationally. Now, while thats certainly not a big number, and Nader's no threat to win, having Dems say 'nobody's backing him' and 'its all about himself' is just stupid. Near as I can tell, that attitude is exactly the reason that Nader is running.

There's a portion of the left that feels it is not represented by the Dem party - and clearly that isn't going to change w/ people like Richardson not even acknowledging their importance here when they finally stand up to be counted.

Roosh sent me a link to this Dept of Defense Talking Points on Iraq's WMD and brought my attention to the 3rd headline in it: Widespread Consensus on Saddam's Threat and how it relates to the Michael Crichton speech I posted a while back. Here's an excerpt from that Crichton speech:

I want to pause here and talk about this notion of consensus, and the rise of what has been called consensus science. I regard consensus science as an extremely pernicious development that ought to be stopped cold in its tracks. Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled. Whenever you hear the consensus of scientists agrees on something or other, reach for your wallet, because you're being had.

Thats all great, but military intelligence is not science. One can never know for sure that intelligence is 100% accurate. In science, knowing for sure is the whole point.

More military embarrassment for Russia as an ICBM goes way off course and self destructs. Perhaps trying to play it off as an 'We meant to do that' moment', Putin then talks up new systems:

Mr Putin on Wednesday announced plans for deploying a new generation of strategic weapons, which some analysts said may be weapons with warheads that zigzag on their way to a target, an idea dating to the Soviet era.

The new weapons would be 'capable of hitting targets continents away at hypersonic speed, with high precision and the ability of broad manoeuvre both in terms of altitude and direction of their flight', Mr Putin said.

I'd say they got that zigzag thing pretty much nailed at this point. The pesky 'target' part may prove to be more difficult.

Is it me, or is Roosh starting to look like Doctor Who with all that scarf action.

Lesbian gangs are harassing female students in Philly.

Girls at the Turner Middle School allege that lesbian students are harassing them with gay remarks. The straight students say lesbians are bullying, groping and harassing them in gym and in the girl's bathrooms.

"I told them, 'No.' And they kept bothering us. (They) kept coming to us asking us to become gay," said Felicia Anderson, a straight student.

Somebody needs to remind Courtney Love that she's no longer playing 'Althea Leasure' in The People vs. Larry Flynt. Because, she's still in costume.

Its a damn shame that Johnny Cash's family has blocked the use of his 'Ring of Fire' song in a hemorrhoid ad. Just thinking of the possibilities of this TV spot makes me laugh. It would have made a fantastic Superbowl ad.

I'm officially endorsing John Edwards as the Dem nominee for President. I'd like to have an election this November where I don't have to worry about who wins.

And depending on what happens between now and Nov with some of the Bush stories (National Guard, WMD, etc) Edwards is actually a Democrat I'd cross over and vote for. Kerry couldn't buy my vote.

Wake-up call for Russia? Putin watches as missle launch fails.

A technical glitch thwarted the launch of Russian ballistic missiles in the Barents Sea on Tuesday during naval maneuvers overseen by President Vladimir Putin, who watched the massive exercise while decked out in naval officer's garb aboard a nuclear submarine.

The failed launch - part of an exercise described as the largest show of Russian military might in more than 20 years - marred an event apparently aimed at playing up Putin's image as a leader attempting to restore the country's military power and global clout.

Thats just funny. But what comes next is a bit scary.

A Defense Ministry spokesman refused to comment. And Russian state-run television channels, which are lavishly covering the daily activities of Putin ahead of the election, did not report the failed launch.

How open of a democracy is Russia really? They still concern me because they aren't experiencing the type of economic growth that was expected once they ditched communism. And with a non-open media hiding military failings, I just wonder how far they are from falling back into a communist or totalitarian state. I worry that they might be just one charismatic strong leader away.

The old internet rumor that the US Post Office was going to start charging postage for email looks more and more likely everyday - sort of. It won't be the USPS charging the fee - it'll be the ISPs.

US internet service providers are coming round to the idea that they may have to start levying "postage" fees on those who send out huge amounts of commercial e-mail, because anti-spam filters have failed to keep down the growth of junk e-mail.

I suppose this could work - but I think it'll be alot more difficult than the article makes it out to be. If everybody used their ISP to send email, it might be manageable. But when you've got your ISP, free accounts, domain name mail servers etc - and then you throw in the spoofing of IPs and domains, I think this will prove to be a huge headache to enact.

Well, PETA is at it again. As if they don't already have their hands full with the whole "refuse dissection" ordeal, now they are sending out letters to the Oklahoma town of Slaughterville asking them to change their name to Veggieville. Come to find out the town's name has nothing to do with butchering animals, but was named after a man (James Slaughter) who helped found the town.

The citizens of Climax, Minnesota are no longer allowed to wear centennial T-shirts to school anymore. Apparently the slogan "Climax — More than just a feeling" is a bit too risque. I have a friend who has a house in Climax, Kansas, I think she needs one of these shirts.

Its kind of amazing that this Columbus 'sniper' hasn't received anywhere near the media coverage that the DC snipers (Mohammad & Malvo) did when they were in the midst of their run. I suppose its because this guy in Ohio has only killed one person and isn't much of a sniper as he's using a handgun rather than a rifle. But damn, he's shot at 24 people now - you'd think that might make for a decent story on the cable news channels.

The winners and losers. Gotta love the last loser:

Yankee beat writers: Say goodbye to your wife and children, fellas, your lives are over. Although there's nothing better than having something to write about every day, the 2004 Yankees will be relentless from today until the end of the World Series.

The big John Kerry sex scandal story that Drudge has gone wall-to-wall with may hurt him for a non-obvious reason. Anytime there is infidelity charges thrown at a politician, the response is typically to trot out their wife to talk thru it in the media and explain how it was a difficult period, but she's forgiven him yada yada yada.

The trouble for Kerry may be that his wife has a reputation of being a loose-lipped bitch who's not very likeable (sp?). If she has to come out and defend him, and she lives up to her billing this could be a pretty serious blow for Kerry.

Marriages keep getting stranger and stranger. Yesterday, I read about a man who married his dog for good luck (only to die 3 days later). Then today I read about a woman who married her dead boyfriend. This must be something more common in Europe, because I just read about a similar incident here.

This old interview from 1970 w/ John Kerry - in which he comes off as quite the radical - is interesting, but not much more. Unless somebody can start tying together his old radical views with some more recent actions/statements, this is just too old to mean much. 34 years is a long time.

Electablog has a summary of the very first Bush/Kerry debate. If only politics were this funny - and speedy.

Is this really the type of country we want providing advice and consent on our foreign policy via the UN? France's lower house approves of ban on kids wearing religious symbols in schools 494-36. And here I thought it was civil liberties in the USA that were being eroded as a result of 9/11. Whats France's excuse?

Want to be on T.V. and meet Paris and Nicole? If you're an "All American Family" you may have a shot at A Simple Life 2. I wonder if she'll bring her (future) hubby Nick Carter?

Oh, nostalgia. Today we bought Namco TV Games, a plug-and-play game that has several 80's clasics, including Pac-Man. God, I'm hooked again. Now I'm wondering if my parents still have my hint book (you know the one that has "maps" to show you how to score the most points) and my old album, Pac-Man Fever?

Oh, please no. Paris Hilton has a book deal.

has agreed to write "Tongue in Chic: Confessions of an Heiress" for Simon & Schuster's Fireside imprint.

Don't you hate it when you can't get a song out of your head? Unfortunately, I've got the new advertisement for Quizno's Subs stuck in my head. If you haven't had the pleasure, it's two morphed rodent-like animals singing extremely off key. Click on the Buck The System to hear a preview of their singing. I guarantee, these critters will haunt you in your sleep.

UPDATE: I've now found out that the mystery "animals" are really the Spongmonkeys.

If spam isn't invading your life enough now (this article states that 60% of your inbox is spam), just wait. Now you can start expecting spam on your cell phone.

I don't think that I really need to comment on either of these two articles except, what the hell is wrong with elementary and middle school kids these days?

Two elementary school boys charged with sexual battery while at school.

12 year old stabbed 7 times while on the school bus.

Instead of videotaping a last goodbye, now you can send your loved ones messages via e-mail. Mylastemail will send out your personalized e mail message after your death. Lastwishes lets you send messages, bank information, and last regards. They even let you set up an online journal - isn't that what blogs are for?

A 33 year-old woman has been posing as a 13 year-old Kansas boy in an attempt to recieve money, clothes, and medical services - she even tried to enroll in a middle school. The funny thing is - they are calling this whole ordeal a hoax. Her name? Birdie Jo Hoaks. Sort of ironic isn't it?

While most people in the U.S. are sending their overweight kids to fat camp, the girls of this country are being sent to a fat farm to beef them up. The article reminded me of the scene in There's Something About Mary when Pat Healy says, "You can't forget, it's a sumo culture, Ted. They pay by the pound over there. Sorta like, um, tuna."

Way too busy with work currently to post much. Stacy's gonna have to keep you entertained for a while.

If true, this'll be pretty damaging to John Kerry's credibility: White substance tests positive for Ricin in US Senate building.

John Kerry says threat of terrorism is exaggerated.

Are zero tolerance policies breeding a generation of wimps?

My 9-year-old sons burst through the door and slam down their backpacks.

Quinn storms, "Mom you won't believe it. Now we're not even allowed to play on the snow mountain at school in case we're tempted to push someone off."

I choke back a laugh. "In case they're tempted?" I always thought the whole point of a snow mountain was to push someone off. King of the Hill is a great game. So they get pushed. It's snow. It's soft.

Jonathan cuts in. "We're not allowed to do anything. The snow's too deep to run around in and we're not allowed to build forts. What are we supposed to do? You know what I call recess? Torture."

What is it with celebrities giving performances after their court appearances? We started off with Michael dancing on his SUV. Now we have Robert Blake doing his rendition (horribly, I might add) of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow." You can watch Baretta singing here.

A high school student in Illinois was yanked off his student radio duties after finishing a segment by saying "God Bless".

High school student in Florida gets 10 day suspension for circulating an anti-Confederate flag petition.