Archives for December 2015

Once again another year has come to a close. And, just like the rest, it featured joy and sadness, birth and death. For some people the end of the year holidays are a maudlin time where they dwell on opportunities missed, and loved ones lost. Others take the time to wipe the slate clean and plan for a better future. Whichever path you choose I would like to advise you to tread lightly. The past is gone and can not be changed. Gnashing your teeth over what might have been accomplishes nothing. The future, while within your control to some degree, is not a given to any of us. Just because you want to be a famous whatever doesn’t mean it’s going to happen. What is given is the here and now. Do the best you can with that and the rest will work itself out. You don’t need a self help book to tell you that, you know it inherently. I have a friend, a priest, who always says “God gives us many gifts. It’s up to us to use them wisely.” That is good to remember no matter the date on the calendar. Control what you can, do your best, and let life sort itself out. Trust me, you’ll be fine.

Still, this is the day when people are expected to do SOMETHING GOD DAMNIT! so I’m here to help. If kissing strange drunks isn’t your thing, here are a few alternatives you can try.

Oliver Wheaton, at Metro (UK), takes us around the world to look at some holiday traditions.

In Romania…
Romanians try to heal their ill farmyard animals by whispering into their ears.

If they are successful it spells good fortune for the coming year (also, they apparently discover a magical ability they have).

In Venice…
Venice is one of the most romantic cities in the world, which might be why they take the old ‘midnight NYE kiss’ to a whole new level.

‘Mass kissing’ events are held in the piazza of St Mark’s square, where hundreds of passionate Italians and tourists have a smooch under the fireworks.

In Ecuador…
This is a weird one – people in Ecuador take their empty suitcases for a walk around the neighbourhood on New Years Day.

In Michigan…
Folks in the northern states of the USA are a hardy bunch, which might be why this happens in Lake Michigan.

(P)eople punch through the ice and swim around in the sub-zero waters. Looks like fun.

In Spain…
People in Spain probably have to take it easy on the Champagne, as they need space in their bellies for grapes.

An old tradition in the country sees people eat a grape for each time the bell strikes at midnight – meaning they see off 12 grapes in almost as many seconds.

In South Africa…
For South African scavengers January 1st is also shopping day.

We’re not sure if this is a ‘tradition’ or just good sense, but New Year’s Day is also a sort of ‘throw out your old furniture day’ in South Africa.

People from Johannesburg especially get involved in the practice, however be careful as tradition dictates that you throw your old beds and sofas out of a window.

Try not to get them mixed up. God knows what you’d tell the cops if you got caught kissing your goat while walking your suitcase.

All we can ask of you is that you be safe and come back to read more weirdness in 2016.

Happy New Year!

BTW, if you end up doing something like this, please send pics.

Lil' Luna in Toy Beach Party A-Go-Go (NSFW) from FML Photography on Vimeo.

Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.
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I’m a big fan of the Internet. I use it every day for checking up on sports talk, looking up facts, conversing with friends, and all sorts of fun stuff. Essentially, to me, the Internet is a great public library. Something that rivals the legendary Library of Alexandria. But, unlike a traditional library, the Internet allows anyone to share their thoughts, hopes, dreams, and aspirations. That can be a good thing. Or it can be a nightmare. I’ve written before about various and sundry hoaxes that permeate the online ether. Most seemed self evident to me, I’m pretty sure there are no 19 year old Russian girls hot for my bod, but, based on the responses I got, it seems a lot of people needed the memo and were helped. In fact a young lady who works in a retirement village printed it out and posted it in the lounge where they have communal wi-fi. She said it was a great help to the residents. That makes me feel a little better about myself. But there are still stories flopping out of my monitor on a regular basis that, even with the most rudimentary fact checking, are easy to disprove. Today I’m going to tackle a few of those.

First off, and this one at least comes with the benefit of being well meaning, Muslims did not write the King James Bible. Certainly there were Muslim scribes in the King James court, and some of them probably did the grunt work when it came time to memorialize the translations, but the actual authorship of the bible is well documented. Fifty-four scholars were tasked with coming up with a complete, and non-annotated, version of the Old and New Testaments that would be devoid of any political commentary (which was common at the time). Forty-seven of them accepted.

Translation Committees

• First Westminster Company, translating from Genesis to 2 Kings:

Lancelot Andrewes, John Overall, Hadrian à Saravia, Richard Clarke, John Layfield, Robert Tighe, Francis Burleigh, Geoffrey King, Richard Thomson,William Bedwell;

• First Cambridge Company, translated from 1 Chronicles to the Song of Solomon:

Edward Lively, John Richardson, Lawrence Chaderton, Francis Dillingham, Roger Andrewes, Thomas Harrison, Robert Spaulding, Andrew Bing;

• First Oxford Company, translated from Isaiah to Malachi:

John Harding, John Rainolds (or Reynolds), Thomas Holland, Richard Kilby, Miles Smith, Richard Brett, Daniel Fairclough, William Thorne;

• Second Oxford Company, translated the Gospels, Acts of the Apostles, and the Book of Revelation:

Thomas Ravis, George Abbot, Richard Eedes, Giles Tomson, Sir Henry Savile, John Peryn, Ralph Ravens, John Harmar, John Aglionby, Leonard Hutten;

• Second Westminster Company, translated the Epistles:

William Barlow, John Spenser, Roger Fenton, Ralph Hutchinson, William Dakins, Michael Rabbet, Thomas Sanderson (a/k/a Archdeacon of Rochester);

• Second Cambridge Company, translated the Apocrypha:

John Duport, William Branthwaite, Jeremiah Radcliffe, Samuel Ward, Andrew Downes, John Bois, Robert Ward, Thomas Bilson, Richard Bancroft.

That list was written in 1609 and, as noted, was well documented by numerous sources. The Holy Qu’Ran, the text for all Muslims, was used as source material since it held accurate translations from the Old and New Testaments. But it did not color the King James version. The authors also referred to every other biblical text, including the unabashedly Papist Geneva Bible, to make sure they didn’t miss anything. Even so, they did not author a bible that demanded an end to the monarchy either.

Next on our list is a new version of an old saw; NASA is hiding aliens from us. This time around it comes with the additional weight of having an Excel spreadsheet as proof. Since many people view Excel as magyk, you can see the problem. So let’s sort it out. A nice man named Gary McKinnon hacked into NASA’s database from February 2001 to March of 2002. He was looking for proof that there were aliens hidden in Area 51 or anything at all do to with alien contact. He didn’t find anything. What he did find, however, was a spreadsheet that listed the names and ranks of people who are helming an armada that is hovering above earth protecting us from …. well, something. The problem is the spreadsheet lists names that don’t exist, anywhere, and accounts for a trillion or so dollars worth of gear.

Anyone who’s paid any attention to how the current Congress treats NASA knows there are no trillions to spend.

Anyway, NASA tried to have Gary arrested and extradited to the U.S. He’s an English citizen. I’ll let Karl Thomas fill you in on how all that went.

Following his arrest in 2002, Mr McKinnon was subject to a lengthy and divisive legal quarrel concerning his extradition to the US, where prosecutors wanted him to stand trial for the data breach.

If convicted, he would have likely faced up to 60 years behind bars. However, in 2012, Theresa May, the UK’s home secretary, said that he would not be sent to the US, justifying this decision on human rights grounds.

She said at the time: : “Mr McKinnon is accused of serious crimes. But there is also no doubt that he is seriously ill. He has Asperger’s syndrome, and suffers from depressive illness.

The legal question before me is now whether the extent of that illness is sufficient to preclude extradition.

After careful consideration of all of the relevant material, I have concluded that Mr McKinnon’s extradition would give rise to such a high risk of him ending his life that a decision to extradite would be incompatible with Mr McKinnon’s human rights.”

People I know who’ve seen the spreadsheet in question all say that it’s identical to the ones used by the Department of Defense for its war games scenarios. In other words “What would we do if we were attacked by aliens, using existing technology.” That’s nowhere near the same as actually building it.

This next one is so easy to debunk I’m not going to waste much time on it. Did President Carter quarantine and/or deport all Iranians in 1979? No. Did he check student visas and deport anyone who was here illegally? Yes. We were in a state of war with Iran at the time and that is standard operating procedure. It had also been the law for well over a century then and still is now. Even so, opponents of the Ayatollah were given safe haven here as political refugees.

Not the same as what Trump proposed by any stretch of the imagination.

By the way, I’d like to add this little bon mot to the above.

When experience is not retained, as among savages, infancy is perpetual. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. – George Santayana

As a country we have treated, in some order, Chinese, Irish, Italian, Jewish, Polish, Mexican, Japanese, and Indian immigrants with varying degrees of disdain. We also didn’t do very well with the natives we found here. I think it’s high time we grew up and started acting like adults. Hiding under your bed and screaming “BOOGIE MAN” every time someone different than you arrives accomplishes nothing. Pointing guns at shadows doesn’t make you safer, it just makes you weak.

I don’t have the time or energy to deal with the crap that came out after the Paris attacks. Fortunately NBC has a well paid staff who did. Click here to kill nine common memes in one sitting.

Additionally, you can stop showing how smart you are by posting that old quote from Trump saying he would run as a Republican because Republicans are stupid. He never said it.

Trust me, the stuff he does say is bad enough, you don’t need to make shit up.

By the way, did Antonin Scalia really say “Blacks need slower schools?” Kind of. It was part of a very nuanced argument about the benefits of Affirmative Action which is currently in front of the Supreme Court.

Here’s the an edited version of the quote.

Scalia, who has previously opposed of affirmative action, claimed that helping minorities who don’t excel at high school get into top colleges “does not benefit African-Americans” because “they’re being pushed into schools that are too advanced for them.”

“Most of the black scientists in this country do not come from the most advanced schools,” Scalia said, referencing information from a friend-of-the-court or amicus curiae brief filed in connection with the case. “They come from lesser schools where they do not feel that they’re being pushed ahead in classes that are too fast for them.”

Scalia contended that minorities would benefit from attending “less advanced” or “slower track” schools, “where they do well,” which elicited murmurings in the courtroom.

Agree or disagree, he was clearly trying to offer real world solutions to a nagging problem. He was not saying black kids are stupid.

I could go on and on but I think this is a good start. A couple of pieces of advice, for anything to do with politics, hit up FactCheck.org. It doesn’t matter which political party says something, if it’s false they’ll call it out. Another good resource is Snopes.com. That’s a family run site that benefits from being able to admit what they don’t know. If the facts don’t tilt one way or the other they’ll mark the rumor “Unsure.”

Just FYI, the little girl asking for Christmas cards because her whole family was killed in a fire? That one’s true. You can get her address via the link.

Lies :: Astroglider :: Music Video from Astroglider on Vimeo.

Listen to Bill McCormick on WBIG (FOX! Sports) every Friday around 9:10 AM.
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The story I’m about to tell is only tangentially related to the rest of the blog, but it’s worth sharing given the atmosphere of hate that’s permeated the American media as of late. Almost every Friday I do a radio show on WBIG called The Big Wake Up Call. You can use the first link to stream live and the second to listen to recordings in case you miss it. Anyway, I got a call today from a nice man. He’d emailed me and asked if we could talk. He got my number simply because I sent it to him. He was hesitant to talk at first, I have that effect on people, but finally told me why he contacted me. About a year and a half ago a friend of mine got a job working on Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. During one episode I mentioned that, during a rare a break in production schedules, she and her wife were finally able to take their honeymoon. That’s it. That’s all I said. But to this man it was an earth shattering revelation. You see, he and his boyfriend at the time had just come out to their parents and they were not well received. They were told how society would shun them forever. And yet, on this silly little radio show I do, here were a couple of, annoyingly straight, dudes calmly talking about superheros and lesbians and being much more interested in the superheros. It hit them they were normal too. That their relationship was no big deal. Sure there were, and are, very important things people cared about, like whether or not Ben Affleck was going to be a good Batman, or whether Gal Gadot was going to honor the heritage of Wonder Woman. Yes to both, by the way. But on that list of very super really fucking important things, whether or not two people loved each other didn’t make the rankings. Inspired by this, I guess not everything needs to be a Facebook meme to inspire someone, they said “fuck it” and got married. They hope their families will see them for what they are; a happy, committed, couple. But, if not, it’s no longer their concern. They’ve staked a claim to their own lives and are going to do the best they can.

I’m leaving their names out since they still have family issues and it’s not my job to cause them grief. Even so, it’s nice to know that sometimes, once in a while, doing what I do doesn’t suck.

So let’s move on. This week, because only pretending to be a fascist wasn’t good enough any more, Donald Trump proposed the, gloriously unconstitutional, idea of exiling all Muslims who are currently abroad for any reason and then doing something – camps, ID badges, anything – to the rest until he and his cowardly minions felt safe.

Ignoring, for a moment, how this idea is even less possible than his Mexican wall, what would be the ramifications? Closest to home it would mean my buddies Akmed, Rahan & Dayan wouldn’t be having morning coffee with me any more. Since Trump is an idiot I also imagine my Coptic and Hindu friends would be rounded up and trucked off to God knows where. But even more broadly than that, what if his fever dream came true? A world without Muslims.

It would be a shitty planet, I can tell you that.

The nice people over at Islam Web were kind enough to share a brief overview of some of the contributions Muslims have provided our little planet.

Let us do a brief review of the contribution of Islam to civilization as we know it.

Trigonometry, Sine, Tangent, Co-Tangent

The Arabs developed these functions in trigonometry and Ibn Moosaa’s work Hisaab-Al Jab-Wal Muqaabala (The Calculation of Integration and Equation) presented 800 examples in the 8^th century CE. His work was translated from Arabic into Latin and until the 16th century CE, it wasEurope’s main textbook on the subject.

Algebra and Geometry

Muhammad bin Moosaa Al-Khawaarizmi is considered to be one of the founders of Algebra. The word ‘Algorithm’ or ‘Algorizm’ is a corruption of his name or the name of the town Khwaarizm (Kheva), in what is now Uzbekistan, where he was born. He adopted the use of ‘cipher’ (zero), that was devised in India some centuries earlier, a numeral of fundamental importance, leading up to the so-called arithmetic of positions and the decimal system. The very word ‘zero’ is a derivative of the Arabic ‘sifr’ or ‘cipher’. His pioneering work on the system of numerals is well known as “Algorithm,” or “Algorizm.” In addition to introducing the Arabic numerals, he developed several arithmetical procedures, including operations on fractions.

Another great mathematician was Omar Khayyaam, who offered to the world geometric and algebraic solutions of the second degree. Naseeruddeen wrote the treatise on quadrilateral trigonometry, as well as plain and spherical geometry.

Physics and Chemistry

Kamaaluddeen examined the refraction of sunlight in raindrops and offered an explanation of the genesis of primary and secondary rainbows. The story of the invention of the pendulum and the presentation of a water clock to Emperor Charlemagne by Haaroon Ar-Rasheed is well known.

The great historian Gibbons wrote in his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Volume 5) that the science of chemistry owes its origin and improvements to the Muslims.

Science of Mechanics

The development of the science of mechanics in Islam is an act of genius. Moosaa bin Shaakir described one hundred pieces of mechanical equipment in his book of artifices. Other outstanding Muslim treatises included Al Kitaab Fi Ma`rifat Al-Hiya Al-Handasiyyah (The Book of the Knowledge of Ingenious Geometrical Contrivances) by Abul Fiaz bin Al Raz and Al Kitaab Meezanal-Hikmah (The Book of Balance and Wisdom) by Al-Khazini. He also did work on accurate weighing, and determination of the specific gravity of substances.

Camera Obscura

In the field of optics, Camera Obscura was invented by Ibn Haytham in 1038 CE.

Theory of Relativity

Qaadhi Abu Bakr had developed the theory of relativity in the 8^th century CE in terms of time and space by means of mathematical equations and astrophysics. Imagine, Einstein was not even born in the Western world, who propounded the same theory of relativity much later in the 20^thcentury CE.

Geography

As far as geography was concerned, Muslim scientists established that the world was round in the 9^th century CE, and the first map of the globe was made during the Caliphate of Ma’moon.

Paper Making

This was one of the earliest skills attained by the Muslims. As early as the 8^th century CE, high quality paper was being manufactured in Samarqand.Egypt was known to have its first paper mill in the year 900 CE. The earliest Arabic manuscript written on paper that has been discovered is theGhareeb Al Hadeeth by Abu ‘Ubayed, dated 837 CE. It can be seen inHolland preserved in the library at the University of Leyden.

Advances in Industry

Under Islamic rule, Spain was an industrial center. It was one of the wealthiest and most thickly populated of the European countries. Muslims were leading in weaving wool, producing silk, pottery, jewelry, leather and perfume industry. In the Middle Ages, world trade was commanded by Muslims and Baghdad, Bukhaara and Samarqand remained centers for world fairs until the 16^th century CE. The Bayt Al-Hikmah at Cairocontained two million books, the library at Tripoli contained some three million, but this library was burned down by the Christians during the first Crusade.

 Miracles of the Quran

Let us consider the hundreds of scientific facts mentioned in the Holy Quran. For example, the fact that the earth was previously a part of the sun and after its separation, it became a habitable place for humankind, as mentioned in chapter 21, verse 30. That matter is made up of sub-atomic particles (chapter 10, verse 61). That the embryo in the mother’s womb in enclosed by three epithelial coverings (chapter 39, verse 6). That each human being has a unique fingerprint (chapter 75, verse 4) etc. There are thousands of other scientific facts in the Holy Quran.

Keep in mind the Holy Quran was written in 650 AD so some of its science is a hair off. However, Islam allows for science to correct itself. An Imam might have thought the world flat but, when proven that such a belief is fundamentally wrong, that Imam changed his beliefs.

As in Buddhism facts are facts and are not open to opinions. And all those accomplishments came about because of that fact.

Go ahead and read that list again and think about when Islam began to spread. When Europeans were trying to figure out how to grow stable crops, before the English language was invented, while ignorance of proper hygiene allowed a horrible plague to spread, Muslims were laying the bedrock for all the world’s scientific and mathematical knowledge.

Did they get some of that knowledge from the Greeks? Yes. The Romans and Chinese too. But they missed the whole “hexes and omens” culture so they didn’t fear any of it. They studied it, corrected it, added to it, and shared their results with everyone else.

Are there bad people in the world? Of course. There are bad people everywhere. I’ve already broken down what Daesh’s, a/k/a ISIS’, a/k/a ISIL’s, actual military threat is. It’s nowhere near what you think. All they can really do is cause fear.

Something the cowards seem very willing to let them do.

Look at it this way, we didn’t throw out all the accomplishments of Christianity, and lock all its adherents in camps, when the KKK claimed they were God’s chosen. Don’t let yourself be conned into thinking the violent assholes of the world are any worse, or any different, than the ones we grew here at home.

You’re better than that.

Playing For Change | "War/No More Trouble" – Song Around The World from Concord Music Group on Vimeo.

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