This Time For Sure

United Nations Human Rights Council Is An Unfunny Joke

The UN has issued an urgent call for Saudi Arabia to halt the execution of a young man who faces imminent beheading and crucifixion for crimes he reportedly committed as a child.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/

Interesting that the United Nations makes no reference to the United Nations Human Rights Council when it calls on the Saudi Arabian leadership to halt the human rights abuses in their country. 

Why is that?

Well Saudi Arabia is a member of the United Nations Human Rights Council.

And if you cannot see the problem with that situation then the United Nations thanks you for your silence. It thrives on your ignorance.

http://www.ohchr.org/EN/HRBodies/HRC/Pages/CurrentMembers.aspx

The End Is Near

If you are a Christian then consider this:

When you reach the end of your life and look back, you will realize that not one of your religious predictions came true. There was no antichrist, no sign of the beast, no rapture, no armageddon, no second coming of Jesus. Not one hit. Not one.

That has been the case for every single Christian who has ever lived during the last 2,000 years. Multiple billions of them who have always been wrong, wrong, wrong.

And your name will be just one more added to that stupendously long list of losers.

They Died For What !?

At least 717 people have been crushed to death in a stampede outside Mecca and more than 850 injured in the deadliest disaster on the annual hajj pilgrimage in a quarter of a century.

Panic broke out when two groups of pilgrims preparing for one of the last major rites of their trip collided at the intersection of two narrow streets. Within minutes the tarmac was a macabre jumble of dishevelled, partially clothed bodies.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/24/mecca-crush

They were heading towards Mina where they intended to throw stones at the Devil. Seriously. These 21st century human beings were going to throw stones at the Devil - and now they are dead. How pointless.

Capitalism Has Checks and Balances Just A Shame None Of Them Work

VW invented some software that recognised when a government test computer had been plugged into a car. When that happened all the emission controls were turned on, and the car gave a low reading that complied with government regulations.

Then, as soon as the government computer was unplugged, the VW computer turned off all the emission controls and the car spent the rest of its  life spewing out forty times more than the expected amount of emissions.

Chief executive Martin Winterkorn said on Sunday, 

"We do not and will not tolerate violations of any kind of our internal rules or of the law."

Except on those many occasions when they tolerated multiple violations involving 11 million cars over the last seven or eight years!

http://www.iol.co.za/motoring/cars/volkswagen/

My prediction: Not one person from VW will jailed for any of the felonies that have been committed since 2008. Politicians will be paid huge bribes to look the other way and most charges will be dropped as long as VW management promises not to do it again.

Also, no matter if the investigations lasts for decades, we will never find out anything about the software. At the end of the investigation VW will be saying they can't understand where it came from, who wrote it, why they wrote it, when they wrote it, or how it got onto their cars. In fact VW might even try to claim that they were victims of commercial sabotage. They won't be able to sustain that idea, but they'll give it a go anyway.

-----

My favourite memory of VW was that time in 1998 when they bought the Rolls Royce Motor Company for hundreds of millions of dollars and then discovered that the sale didn't include the naming rights, so they were still unable to build Rolls Royce cars.

http://www.nytimes.com/1998/07/29/news/29iht-rolls.t.html

Remember This Clown ?

 

Rollen Stewart is a ratbag Christian who started attending sporting events in 1977. He wore the rainbow wig and the John 3:16 t-shirt and always managed to make a pest of himself by sidling into camera shot at every opportunity.

Do you know where he is now?

He's in jail serving three life sentences for kidnap as well as various terrorist offences. Been there since 1992.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rollen_Stewart

I wonder where this guy will be in forty years from now? He suffers from the same religious mania.

Tim Tebow

A Question For Proper Christians

This question is for proper Christians only. 

It's not for members of ratbag cults who live in secret compounds where children are taught that creationism is true and all science is wrong.

It's not for members of the Catholic Church who put their children in care of pedophile priests - and when the priests are caught fucking their children the bishop sends those rapist priests on a trip to a South American country where they can avoid the prying eyes of the law. [OK, the sex abuse problem still exists but at least the victims are brown now, instead of white - so that's a start.]
see more at the bottom of this post

It's not for members of the Jehovah Witnesses who know that a simple trip to the doctor will save their ill child, but instead they just sit and watch while the child dies in screaming agony with nothing more than a damp cloth on the forehead to ease the pain. And then they have the cheek to strut into Kingdom Hall under the admiring gaze of their peers as if they are the brave little soldiers in the army of the Lord. [Shame about the kid but hey, collateral damage, what can you do?]

No, this question is for proper Christians only. Middle of the road Christians. Salt of the earth Christians. Christians who have never read the bible and never intend to read it but still think they know everything that's in it. They know about John 3:16 of course, because they've seen that during live telecasts of sports events, but their biblical knowledge does not get far beyond that point. Most of the time they are just guessing. They assume that Jesus probably agrees with nearly everything they agree with and he disagrees with nearly everything they disagree with - which proves that they really are proper Christians after all.

So here's the question: If you have such a casual attitude toward your religion. If your knowledge of Christianity is so mediocre, so pathetic, then why in hell do you bother to accept the bits that make you look like an idiot. Surely it is enough that Jesus' dad is the Lord and Master of the Universe, but no; you want his mum to be a virgin as well! You're not satisfied with a Jesus who can quell a storm, you want him walking on water while he's doing it! You're not content with a Jesus that came back from dead and walked around Jerusalem, you also want graves opening up and rotting corpses climbing out of their graves and joining old JC in his perambulations!

So why do you do that? You know fuck all about your religion. You just make stuff up about it whenever it suits you, but for some reason you latch onto all the really weird stories and accept them as true.

Why?

As long as you keep chucking money at the preacher he is going to tell everyone that you are truly a godly person - no matter how little you know about your religion. So I ask again. Why?

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Pedophile Catholic Priest, Father Jan Van Dael, was sent to Brazil after he was caught fucking children in Belgium but the church allowed him to still work with children. Here he is down a back alley playing with the hair of one of his potential victims. Do you think his intentions are honorable? Are you worried about what might have happened to the boy since this picture was taken? Well there's a sure sign that you will never be a real Catholic. Real Catholics forgive their priests every sin - and as long he's fucking only brown kids in Brazil (not blue eyed blondes in Belgium) well then it's really hard for a Catholic to see what the fuss is all about.

http://www.pri.org/stories/2015-09-18/

A Man Too Easily Convinced

A Filmmaker has made a journey of faith to prove if the Exodus story as described in the Bible was a real historical event.

Christian Today reports that skeptics have questioned if the Exodus story was a real historical event for years. The story of the Israelites' escape from slavery in Egypt, march through the Red Sea, and eventual settling of the Promised Land in Canaan does read like a story that is larger than life.

Tim Mahoney, however, is now convinced of its historical truth.

“What started out as a crisis of my own faith led to an incredible journey of discovery,” Mahoney stated.

http://www.christianheadlines.com/blog/filmmaker

I think he is too easily convinced...

Remember that bit about Moses and Aaron turning all the water into blood - not just the water in the rivers and the lakes but also the water in the wooden tubs and stone jars. (Exodus 7:19)

Remember what happened next: the Egyptian magicians did the same things by their secret arts (Exodus 7:22)

As the authors of the Foote and Ball Bible Handbook wrote more than a hundred years ago: "Moses and Aaron cleverly transmuted all the water there was, but their opponents still more cleverly transmuted all the water there wasn't." I'll be a bit more blunt - the whole story is complete and utter bullshit.

Then there was the plague where god killed all the animals owned by the Egyptians (Exodus 9:6)

But the animals must have been resurrected because Exodus 9:25 says that all the Egyptians and all of their animals were later struck down by a hail storm.

Then there was a second resurrection because, at an even later time, god not only killed the first born of humans, he also killed the first born of all the cattle as well! (Exodus 11:5)

And then came a third resurrection (of the horses this time) because when the Israelites headed for the Red Sea they were followed by the Egyptian Pharaoh and all his soldiers, all his chariots, and all their drivers. (Exodus 14:9)

Somehow Tim Mahoney missed all that and says he "is now convinced of its historical truth."

So gullible. Poor man.

Or is he just another shyster Christian making easy money by telling his Christian audience what he thinks they they want to hear?

Come On And Shout Now

"Shout" was written and performed by the Isley Brothers in 1959, and while their original version cannot be faulted, this cover version by Australia's Johnny O'Keefe just has to be the best I've ever heard.

Original video here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlyswOKoYtQ

Vocal backup group was the Delltones. The tall guy on the left is the bass singer known as Pee Wee Wilson. Noel Widerberg is third from the left. He was killed in a car accident a few years later.

Pee Wee revived the Delltones in the 1980s. There have been many changes to line-up but Pee Wee is always there and the group is still performing today.

Johnny died at the age of 43 in 1978.

I Love Being Retired

Today I woke up at seven-o-clock but I didn't know if it was morning or night. Had to switch on the computer and check the desktop clock (which has an am/pm indicator). Turns out it's 7am. (I wonder what day it is.)

Angels Have A Dark Side

Christians usually think of angels as rather pretty little creatures flitting about the earth delivering messages from god to his chosen people. In Luke 1:26-32, for example, we discover that the angel Gabriel told Mary that she was about to become the mother of the Saviour of the World.

Here's a picture of Gabriel 

(He really is pretty, isn't he?)

But the angels are more than just messengers from god. They actually go out of their way to protect god's chosen people from any problems that might arise. For example, in Acts 5:17-19, the Saducees have the apostles thrown  into jail and bugger me if an angel doesn't get them out again!

during the night an angel of the Lord opened the doors of the jail and brought them out. (Acts 5:17-19)

It all sounds so cutesy-poo doesn't it? Pretty little angels with lovely white wings politely delivering important messages and performing good deeds wherever they go. But the angels also have a dark side. According to the bible they can be real bastards if they want to: 

And that night the angel of the Lord went out and struck down 185,000 in the camp of the Assyrians. (2 Kings 19:35)

That's three times more than the Germans got on the first day of the Battle of the Somme in 1916 - and the Germans had machine guns!

Fuck The Truth; Give Me Spin

The College of Policing (UK) 

"sets high professional standards to help forces cut crime and protect the public."
https://www.app.college.police.uk/about-app/

In its advice about Missing Persons cases the college includes a warning about consultations with psychics:

High-profile missing person investigations nearly always attract the interest of psychics and others, such as witches and clairvoyants, stating that they possess extrasensory perception. Any information received from psychics should be evaluated in the context of the case, and should never become a distraction to the overall investigation and search strategy unless it can be verified. These contacts usually come from well-intentioned people, but the motive of the individual should always be ascertained, especially where financial gain is included. The person’s methods should be asked for, including the circumstances in which they received the information and any accredited successes.

https://www.app.college.police.uk/consultation/missing-persons

It's pretty clear what those words mean. Psychics are publicity seeking money grabbers who have a tendency latch onto missing persons cases in an effort to boost their own reputation. So police are advised to treat them with suspicion; to ask questions about their intentions and their methods, and if there is no evidence supporting their claims, to tell them to piss off out of it.

But...

If you take isolated words and phrases out of context you can make the warning say exactly the opposite:

The Independent

Detectives investigating missing persons cases 'should consider the advice of psychics', says College of Policing

Detectives investigating missing persons cases should consider tips from people claiming to have supernatural abilities, according to new proposals from the College of Policing.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/

The Telegraph

Psychics' help finding missing people should not be ruled out, police officers told

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/

Belfast Telegraph

Help of psychics should be evaluated in missing people cases: Police guidance

Police officers searching for missing people should not rule out the help of psychics, according to suggested guidelines for the profession.

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/

Washington Times

British police advised to consult psychics in missing person cases: report

British law enforcement are now being advised to seek the help of clairvoyants when investigating a missing person case.

A new proposal from the College of Policing advises law enforcement to consult people claiming to have supernatural abilities.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/aug/28/

Every reporter who covered that story knew they were lying about what the College of Policing had said, and every single one of those reporters said "Fuck the truth, all I want is a headline that will put me on the front page."

Welcome to world of 21st century journalism.