I recently read this article on a website that made me lol and rofl at the same time. Perfectly describing Christianity in a strangely bizarre nutshell:

"An almighty God decided he was either bored or lonely so he creates a universe of immense size to house one small, third-rate planet where he can create beings whose purpose is to make him feel better by loving and adoring him.

Since God needed to be sure his created people would only love him because they chose to love him, he gave humans the free choice not to believe him. Unfortunately, the very first human chose to ignore this God, and this God got all pissed and put a curse on the little planet and all its future inhabitants. In fact, he even created a scenario where after the first human chose to disobey, all subsequent humans would be born automatically bound for hell unless they accepted God's bizarre get-out-of-hell-free option. Rather than simply give humans the option to die and no longer exist, this God decided he would forever burn the skin off of those who didn't choose to love and adore him.

Thus this God, in his infinite love, informed his created people that they need to either love and adore him or they'll go to the hell he created, which basically negates the idea of giving people free will. After all, most humans will make choices they would not otherwise make when someone is holding a gun to their head.

Of course, this God, knowing everything that will happen in the future, foresees that more than 95% of the people he creates (without asking us if we wanted to be created) will either not be well enough informed to get out of hell or will simply reject the idea of a need for Christian salvation. But the Christian God, knowing this in advance, still decided to create these humans even though he knew he'd end up torturing billions of them in an endless lake of fire, all so he could have a handful of the faithful to give him love and adoration.

Not yet satisfied, this God decides to create his get-out-of-hell-free card by killing his own creation or by killing his own son. First he has his followers kill and burn animals because he really got off smelling the burning blood. Then he turned his son into one of his creation so he could have him beaten and killed with his blood flowing everywhere. And to top it off, he also said that those who love and adore him should then either symbolically or literally eat the human flesh and drink the human blood of his son in order to fully love and adore this God.

This God really loves spilling blood and then making people drink it.

Finally, this God decided to tell his created people of this plan through a cryptic and hard to interpret set of books and then relied on his created people to join together to decide which of those books really came from this God and which ones did not. They couldn't do it based on evidence, however, so they just basically guessed. Because this God didn't decide to make it clear to all humans just how to get their get-out-of-hell-free card, this God allowed the obvious confusion to lead to thousands of different interpretations of this set of books, meaning many who think they have found God's get-out-of-hell-free card actually will still be tossed into the lake of fire by this loving God.

Oh, and to make it even worse, this God decides to be mute most of the time, and instead asks those who love and adore him to be his spokespeople, thus allowing all kinds of strange things to be said in his name.

Amen, and pass the plate."

From: http://elroy.net/ehr/christianity101.html

Current Mood: amused

Every year I make resolutions, and most times I keep them (barring my resolution from this year which I have yet to keep). To ensure that I am able to keep them, I will be making my resolutions easier. So, without further ado, my resolutions for 2008:

1) Work out more often

This is a real no-brainer. I have a membership to the YMCA. I should really be using it more. So, for 2008, I will. I need to get in shape for heading to Cabo in June.

2) Be a little more confident with women

I’m usually a pretty confident person. I’m comfortable with where I am in life, in addition to where I am going. So, I have to wonder why I’ve been unable to meet someone. Well, I think it’s a confidence issue. I usually don’t try because it seems like the girls I see all want frat boys with tight shirts and absolutely no brain in their heads. Maybe if I get over this it shouldn’t be so bad.

3) Bitch out anyone wearing anything bearing the image of Che Guevara

Let’s face it, most people who wear shirts with El Che on them don’t realize what a horrible despicable person he really was. Granted, his movement helped topple the dictatorship within Cuba, but it lead to the rise of Castro, which threw the country into another type of turmoil. In addition, he headed up trials with questionable legality, seemingly passing judgement on the accused before the trial. Not just leaders of the previous government, but CIVILIANS. That means he most likely executed innocent people to meet his agenda. Real freedom fighter, there. So, anytime I see someone with a Che shirt, I want to enlighten them on the finer points of the Che Guevara saga. Stop wearing these fucking shirts, people.

4) Level 70

For WoW nerds, this makes sense. I’ve got a 53 Hunter and 22 Pally. I’d like both to be 70 by at LEAST March. This should be an easy resolution, methinks.

5) Car

I needs a fucking car.

That pretty much does it. Easy resolutions to keep, and I like it that way…

Current Location: Work
Current Mood: anxious

Howdy folks. It's been a while, and for that I am sorry. Sorry mostly that you have to read my bitching again. Well, you don't really HAVE to read it, but you know... here it is...

It's been a real rollercoaster lately. I'm partially sick right now, so that isn't helping my mood an incredibly large amount. I realize how much I shoot myself in the foot. I've made a lot of mistakes in my life. I'm openly admitting that. It's not a problem saying it because I know that it's true. Call a spade a spade, so to speak. However, one thing I've always been quite proud of is my ability to not interfere with anyone else's relationship. That's not to say I haven't given input when my opinion is asked, but I'm referring to a more "hands-on" approach if you get my meaning.

When you meet a girl's significant other for the first time, you are most likely going to shake his hand; it's common courtesy, of course. What most women don't realize is that this very handshake is a pact between the two men. Not a "We're always going to be friends!" pact, but rather an unspoken pact that sets the most strict of groundrules. Now, this rule is different depending on the situation between the two men, but this iron-clad pact cannot be broken after the handshake has been made.

Now, you may be asking, "Devin, what is this rule? Why is this so important? Where are you going with this?" Well, I'll get the rule out of the way first. As a blanket rule, when a man shakes the hand of a man who is in a relationship, the "Non-fooling Pact" is formed. With this pact, the man entering the pact is agreeing that upon execution of the handshake, he will not break the following rules:

1) He will not make a pass at the other man's significant other.
2) He is not allowed to fool around with the other man's significant other, even if the significant other provokes it.
3) Any touching below the eyebrows is considered awkward at best, deathly at worst, and certainly NEVER acceptable.
4) No attempt shall be made to inhibit the growth of the relationship of the man and his significant other.
5) If the significant other wants to hang out, either her partner much be present, or the hanging out must be done in a public location with no dark corners.

These rules, though unspoken, form the basis of the male friendship. The "Non-Fooling Pact" has also been called the "Don't Fuck My wife/girlfriend Pact" or the "Look at Her the Wrong Way and I'll beat your Ass Pact". Either way, the rules remain the same.

Why do I bring this up? Why does this really matter in my life? I'm a straight arrow. I believe in the sanctity of this pact, and I have never violated ANY of these rules... until recently.

I can hear the *gasps* through the internet right now. "But Devin, WHY?!" Well, let's say that it is really quite complicated, and not quite entirely my fault, although I did manage to break 3 of these rules in one evening, with help of course.

I won't give a timeframe on this. I won't mention names. Maybe the setting has been changed. The core facts of this story remain valid, but for the sake of anonymity for those involved, I will be retooling some of this story. You won't know what has been changed and what's not. That's the beauty of it.

So, I was hanging out with some friends one evening, and as usual, it involved drinking towards the end. We decided to grab lunch together, and I met a girl and her boyfriend. I shook the boyfriend's hand (thus sealing the pact). I'd done this before with the other couple there, so far without incident. We ate, had a beer or two, and then later in the evening went on to another sporting activity; one that involves more beer. The boyfriend I mentioned earlier decided to bow out since he had a lot of work to complete at home. So, the girlfriend tagged along with the rest of us since she wasn't quite ready to turn in (after all, it was only 8 at night). So we drink, have fun, and she keeps talking about how I'm her new favorite person, and we're getting along just swimmingly.

Bear in mind, I flirt a lot. It's just something I do with everyone, really. I don't do it because I mean for anything to happen, but just for the sake of doing it, and this girl was playing along, and quite good at it, I might add. We decide to hit another bar, so when we're leaving she's talking about riding in my car, etc. Analyzing rule #5 in my mind,
and gauging the evening's events, I decided that she should probably ride with my friends. No issue.

We get to the bar, and it's a dance club. No problem. This girl had bought a pitcher earlier in the evening, so I bought us both Vodka Cranberries to repay. We chug those babies down, and then have a seat and start talking. I can't help but notice she's getting touchy feely and that some of the things she's talking about are rather risque. I chalked
it up to her personality, which she's been showing throughout the night anyway. Finally, she stands up, grabs a friend of mine by the hand and they head to the dance floor. Since they're both in a relationship and their significant others had bowed out, it was fair play. No rules violated, and it wasn't like crazy grinding/dry humping. Just dancing.
They dance (somewhat drunkenly) for a couple songs and then they come back to where I'm sitting, enjoying my drink. At this point, she grabs my hand and pulls me to the dance floor. I see nothing wrong with this given the dancing I witnessed earlier. She's just going to dance with me like she danced with my friend, right?

...Nope...

She starts grinding, touching, and getting pretty close. At this point, all hell breaks loose. After having a few drinks, I decide it's okay because I REALLY didn't want to ruin the evening, so I play along and dance, whatever. We're not screwing, and we're not doing anything I would have a SERIOUS objection to if it were my girlfriend. Objection,
probably. Serious objection, no. We head off the floor again and she's rubbing my leg and at this point I feel a little awkward. I back off a little, but it doesn't work too well. Back out to the dance floor and she's dancing with me again. She leans close to me and says, "If you want something, you have to take it.", at which point she shoves her tongue
into my mouth. Now, what was really running through my mind was my blatant violation of rule #2, but somehow I couldn't bring myself to just rip her off me. So, here we are, on the dance floor, effectively making out, and the only thought running through my head is "God, I hope my friends can't see this." After a minute or so, we head off the dance
floor to sober up (at least I did since I was driving; she kept going), and effectively pretend it never happened until we part ways. My friend was driving her home since he lived in the direction of her house. Thank god, too. I can't imagine what could have happened if she had ridden with me.

Right when I get home, I receive a text message about how she wants me to come get her because she wants me. Absolutely absurd and wrong. I wrote back and called her evil and said that her boyfriend might not like that. End of conversation. I receive a text message the next day saying she "gets a little frisky when she gets drunk", that I'm a good "partner in crime" and she will "stay in touch".

So, yeah. I feel pretty dirty. I've been ignoring the issue since it happened, but does not help that the only women I seem to attract are mentally unstable or taken. So that's all that's been going on lately. Just a bunch of normal fucked up shit... Feels good to get it off my chest, though...

Current Location: Davenport, IA
Current Mood: guilty
Current Music: Lack of Color - Death Cab for Cutie

Well, it's about time I made the leap, but I have purchased my own domain name. Yes, you, my friends, will be the first I will introduce to the outstanding bit of nothingness that is www.dctheee.com!

Seriously, I just started it, so there's not much there, but I'm adding a blog service, so I don't need Livejournal anymore! So, for all your blog needs, please direct your web browser to www.dctheee.com and click on "Blog" on the left-hand side of the page.

:-D

Once upon a time, a king gave a feast. And there came the most beautiful princesses of the realm. Now, a soldier, who was standing guard, saw the king's daughter go by. She was the most beautiful one, and he immediately fell in love with her. But what could a poor soldier do when it came to the daughter of the king? Well, finally, one day, he managed to meet her, and he told her that he could no longer live without her. The princess was so impressed by his strong feelings that she said to the soldier: "If you can wait 100 days and 100 nights under my balcony, then at the end of it, I shall be yours." The soldier immediately went there and waited one day. And two days. And ten. And then twenty. And every evening, the princess looked out of her window, but he never moved. During rain, during wind, during snow, he was always there. The birds shat on his head, and the bees stung him, but he didn't budge. After ninety nights, he had become all dried up, all white, and the tears streamed from his eyes. He couldn't hold them back. He no longer had the strength to sleep. All that time, the princess watched him. And on the 99th night, the soldier stood up, took his chair, and went away. In one more night, the princess would have been his. But she also could not possibly have kept her promise. And it would have been terrible. He would have died. This way, however, at least for 99 days, he was living under the illusion that she was there, waiting for him.

Current Location: Home
Current Mood: blank

What's that Lassie? The Pentagon is supplying terrorists with rifles intended for Iraqi security forces? Body armor too?! Say it ain't so!

http://www.rttnews.com/sp/breakingnews.asp?date=08/06/2007&item=45&vid=0

http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2007/08/pentagon-cant-a.html

This is ridiculous. Losing 30% of the supply just into thin air? At that level, we're funding terrorism, not fighting it.

Every time I lose all faith in the internet, I stumble across a gem like this:



Faith restored. Catchy music and hot babes? Oh yeaaaaa

Current Location: Home in CR
Current Mood: bouncy
Current Music: Zero Sum - Nine Inch Nails

Current Location: Home in CR
Current Mood: bitchy
Current Music: A Rose for Emily - The Zombies

I met a very nice girl named Darcelle, whom I spoke of a few posts back. She's a hostess at a club here in Cedar Rapids, insanely cute, fiesty, and intelligent. We haven't hung out lately because of her schedule, but that's okay. We keep in regular contact... and by regular contact, I mean when I'm out drinking and she happens to be working.

Anyway, I was out drinking with ex-coworkers last Friday night (which was awesome, of course), when I came upon a good friend and marine buddy of another friend of mine. He also happens to know Darcelle because he's a bouncer at Dublin City (this particular bar), so they're coworkers. I told him I'd be out that night, so he kept a couple seats open for us. Seats are in short supply at Dublin City on Friday nights, after all. So, we drank for a while, and were having a pretty good time. Darcelle picked up our table, and was being flirty as normal. She was tossing her gum in my beer, rubbing her ass on me, and such (which I don't really mind, because come on, I'm a guy, and we're supposed to like that, right?). I ignore her for the most part, partially because she has a boyfriend, and partially because I'm still kind of mad she took so long to tell me that she had a boyfriend... But I digress. Drinking, merryment, etc. etc. Finally, this buddy of mine leans over the table and says, "You know, Darcelle's a porn star, right?" I kind of laughed at this statement, and figured he was just making a sarcastic comment or something. After a good few seconds of laughing, I looked at him, and he was serious... He smiled that kind of evil smile, which told me he wasn't lying.

Intrigued, I said, "Okay, what makes you think that?" To which he replied, "Because I found out she's on this one site. Her porn name is 'Sophia'" I laughed again because it was all so absurd, but yet, he was still serious.

When I went home that evening, I found out that he was, in fact, absolutely correct. Darcelle is a porn star. Softcore stuff only, mind you, but still. It was kind of shocking. I know most guys would probably be turned on by that sort of thing, but I think it's an incredible turn-off, which is good anyway because she has her cop boyfriend to look after her.

Oh well, I suppose now I can claim to know a porn star?

If you've never heard of Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, it's understandable. However, if you've been keeping up on the hubbub over at the Justice Department and particularly Attorney General Gonzales' repeated, blantant obstructions of justice, you'll understand why Leahy is, quite frankly, one of my newest heroes on the issue.

Before congress, he gave this written opening statement:

"Three months ago, when Attorney General Gonzales last appeared before this Committee, I said that the Department of Justice was experiencing a crisis of leadership perhaps unrivaled during its history. Unfortunately, that crisis has not abated. Until there is independence, transparency and accountability, it will continue. The Attorney General has lost the confidence of the Congress and the American people. Through oversight we hope to restore balance and accountability to the Executive Branch. The Department of Justice must be restored to be worthy of its name. It should not be reduced to another political arm of the White House. The trust and confidence of the American people in federal law enforcement must be restored.

With the Department shrouded in scandal, the Deputy Attorney General has announced his resignation. The nominee to become Associate Attorney General requested that his nomination be withdrawn rather than testify under oath at a confirmation hearing. The Attorney General’s chief of staff, the Deputy Attorney General’s chief of staff, the Department’s White House liaison and the White House Political Director have all resigned, as have others. I would joke that the last one out the door should turn out the lights, but the Department of Justice is too important for that -- we need to shine more light there, not less.

The investigation into the firing for partisan purposes of United States Attorneys, who had been appointed by this President, along with an ever-growing series of controversies and scandals have revealed an Administration driven by a vision of an all-powerful Executive over our constitutional system of checks and balances, that values loyalty over judgment, secrecy over openness, and ideology over competence.

The accumulated and essentially uncontroverted evidence is that political considerations factored into the unprecedented firing of at least nine United States Attorneys last year. Testimony and documents show that the list was compiled based on input from the highest political ranks in the White House, that senior officials were apparently focused on the political impact of federal prosecutions, on whether federal prosecutors were doing enough to bring partisan voter fraud and corruption cases, and that the reasons given for these firings were contrived as part of a cover up.

What the White House stonewalling is preventing is conclusive evidence of who made the decisions to fire these federal prosecutors. We know from the testimony that it was not the President. Everyone who has testified has said that he was not involved. None of the senior officials at the Department of Justice could testify how people were added to the list or the real reasons that people were included among the federal prosecutors to be replaced. Indeed, the evidence we have been able to collect points to Karl Rove and the political operatives at the White House. The stonewalling by the White House raises the question: What is it that the White House is so desperate to hide?

The White House has asserted blanket claims of executive privilege, despite officials’ contentions that the President was not involved. They refuse to provide a factual basis for their blanket claims, have instructed former White House officials not to testify about what they know, and then instructed Harriet Miers to refuse even to appear as required by a House Judiciary Committee subpoena. Now, anonymous officials are claiming that the statutory mechanism to test White House assertions of Executive privilege no longer governs. In essence this White House asserts that its claim of privilege is the final word, that Congress may not review it, and that no court can review it. Here, again, this White House claims to be above the law.

My oath, unlike those who have apparently sworn their allegiance to this President, is to the United States Constitution. I believe in checks and balances and in the rule of law.

Despite the stonewalling and obstruction, we have learned that Todd Graves, U.S. Attorney in the Western District of Missouri was fired after he expressed reservations about a lawsuit that would have stripped many African-American voters from the rolls in Missouri. When the Attorney General replaced Mr. Graves with Bradley Schlozman, the person pushing the lawsuit, that case was filed and ultimately thrown out of court. Once in place in Missouri though, Mr. Schlozman also brought indictments on the eve of a closely contested election, despite the Justice Department policy not to do so. This is what happens when a responsible prosecutor is replaced by a “loyal Bushie” for partisan, political purposes.

Mr. Schlozman also bragged about hiring ideological soulmates. Monica Goodling likewise admitted “crossing the line” when she used a political litmus test for career prosecutors and immigration judges. Rather than keep federal law enforcement above politics, this Administration is more intent on placing its actions above the law.

The Attorney General admitted recently in a video for Justice employees that injecting politics into the Department’s hiring is unacceptable. But is he committed to corrective action and routing out the partisanship in federal law enforcement? His lack of independence and tendency to act as if he were the President’s lawyer rather than the Attorney General of the United States makes that doubtful. From the infamous torture memo, to Mr. Gonzales’ attempt to prevail on a hospitalized Attorney General Ashcroft to certify an illegal eavesdropping program, to the recent opinion seeking to justify Harriet Miers’ contemptuous refusal to appear before the House Judiciary Committee, the Justice Department has been reduced to the role of enabler for this Administration. What we need instead is genuine accountability and real independence.

We learned earlier this year of systematic misuse and abuse of National Security Letters, a powerful tool for the Government to obtain personal information without the approval of a court or prosecutor. The Attorney General has said he had no inkling of these or other problems with vastly expanded investigative powers. Now we know otherwise. Recent documents obtained through Freedom of Information Act lawsuits and reported in The Washington Post indicate that the Attorney General was receiving reports in 2005 and 2006 of violations in connection with the PATRIOT Act and abuses of National Security Letters. Yet, when the Attorney General testified under oath before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence in April 2005, he said that “[t]he track record established over the past three years has demonstrated the effectiveness of the safeguards of civil liberties put in place when the Act was passed.” Earlier this month, in responses to written questions I sent to the Attorney General about when he first learned of problems with National Security Letters, he once again failed to mention these reports of problems.

Only with the openness and honesty that brings true accountability will the Department begin to move forward and correct the problems of the last few years. Instead, we have leadership at the Department of Justice whose expressions of concern and admissions that mistakes were made only follow public revelations and amount to regrets that their excesses were uncovered.

In the wake of growing reports of abuses of National Security Letters, the Attorney General announced a new internal program. This supposed self-examination, with no involvement by the courts, no report to Congress, and no other outside check, essentially translates to “trust us.” With a history of civil liberties abuses and cover-ups, this Administration has squandered our trust. Earlier internal reviews, like the Intelligence Oversight Board and the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board have been ineffective and inactive, failing to take action on the violations reported to them. Only with a real check from outside of the Executive branch can we have any confidence that abuses will be curbed and balance restored.

A tragic dimension of the ongoing crisis of leadership at the Justice Department is the undermining of good people and the crucial work that it does. Thousands of honest, hard-working prosecutors, agents, and other civil servants labor every day to detect and prevent crime, uncover corruption, promote equality and justice, and keep us safe from terrorism. Sadly, prosecutions will now be questioned as politically-motivated and evidence will be suspected of having been obtained in violation of laws and civil liberties. Once the government shows a disregard for the independence of the justice system and the rule of law, it is very hard to restore the people’s faith. This Committee will do its best to try to restore independence, accountability, and commitment to the rule of law to the operations of the Justice Department."

Pfew... that's alot to read, but I'll be damned if this man isn't a living legend to me, and if I was Gonzales, I'd be shitting a brick right now...

Current Location: Work
Current Mood: amused