Atheist Survives Black Magic Attack

The New Age? It's just the old age stuck in a microwave oven for fifteen seconds.
James Randi

On March 3rd a Indian television show took an unexpected turn as guest Sanal Edamaruku, a famous atheist, challenged one of India's most "powerful" tantrik masterlords (or whatever they're called) to try out his supposed "powers" on Edamaruku. He did this after the tantrik had professed that he could kill a man in just three minutes, using only witchcraft. "Amazingly" Edamaruku is still alive today.

The witchcraft-session started out as being just a three minute thing, however, since the tantrik failed to kill Edamaruku in three minutes, the session continued. The show was extended, and all other programming on the channel was cancelled. The tantrik tried wawing his arms, throwing water on Edamaruku and even flashing a knife in his face. Nothing worked. The tantrik then proclaimed that his subject must have a very powerful god protecting him, Edamaruku quickly replied "I doubt it, I'm an atheist".

In the end the tantrik gave up, but said that he knew of one method that would definitely kill Edamaruku, but it had to be done outside and at night. The television show said "ok", and scheduled an airing that same night. After jamming away all night with almost exactly the same methods, Edamaruku was still alive. The tantrik masterlords hold a great deal of power over people in India, but at least some of that illusion was shattered that night.

Hopefully this, and countless other similar examples, will soon sink into the minds of people who believe that any supernatural entity exists. No matter if its god, muhammed or the supposed "powers" of everybody from psychics to tantrik masterlords.

Faux Election

It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established authorities are wrong.
Voltaire

Mcmoogol has over the past week enjoyed a relaxing vacation in the land where the future of the world will be decided this coming fall. In the midst of last week's sex scandals, pastor-problems and hooker-revalations, I have tried to make sense of the disturbing feelings I'm left with after my trip. I feel like this country doesn't deserve to decide the future of my world.

I've visited the U.S. numerous times before, but the state of the Union have never concerned me more than it does now. An historic election is coming up, but the only ones who seem to be doing the "electing" is the media (and maybe the preachers in the congregations where people actually show up on sunday). Polls and news story go hand in hand. If Fox News runs a story for no more than two days in a row as their maintopic on The Factor, Hannity and Colmes and On the Record. That WILL shift the polls. It did. Early last week they decided that it was time to start attacking Obama about the whole pastor-situation, and it worked. After just two days, many surveys showed that Obama had lost as much as 20 points on Clinton.

This while all the other news channels (which nobody watches, so it doesn't really matter) kept running more stories on no-brain-hollywood-sluts who's lost their dog, fucked a papparazzi or better yet bleached their anus. They have left the country home alone with Rupert Murdoch, and he has naughty intentions. This election will be decided by the media, and America will end up with another Republican president. No doubt.

Not there is necessarily anything wrong with John McCain. As long as he doesn't completely fistfuck the right, and especially the religious-right, he could be a decent president. That fact that the likes of Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh urged republicans to vote for Hillary over McCain, makes him ok in my book. Just don't think that "President McCain" was your choice America, because it wasn't.

The Christians Ruined My Day of Shopping!

Business is the salt of life.
Voltaire

Ok, so I'm back from the land of the free and the home of the (not so?) religious. Mcmoogol is a bit jetlagged right now, so he will give you the full rundown of the trip tomorrow. I will, however, point to something interesting I found out on my little easter getaway.

When christians remember the resurrection of their lord and saviour (Mcmoogol vaguely remembers his name as starting with a "J" and ending a "sus"), they like to do it while shopping. Sunday was our last day in the americas, and being as we probably are the least religious people on this planet, we figured we would have a nice relaxing last day of shopping. Earlier in the week we had visited the same shopping mall, and found it to be quite busy. Seeing as we then thought sunday would be a day of worship for what we thought was a very religious people, we decided to come back then. No such luck was granted to us. The place was packed! Probably more packed than I've ever seen a shopping mall. There wasn't a parking space in sight, and to just get into a store you had to at least elbow three elderly women, and a couple of snot-nosed kids. It was awful.

So I guess being religious in America means the same on easter sunday as it does on every other day of the year - being a pain in my ass.

It's Easter!

You know, a long time ago being crazy meant something. Nowadays everybody's crazy.
Charles Manson

It's (almost) easter, a time for remembering Charles Manson...eh...Jesus. I always get those two mixed up. It's a common mistake I guess. Both beard-faced lunatics, with schizophrenic tendencies and a small cult of followers. Both carpenters, and both were sentenced to death (only one of them was smart enough to get out of it, though...)

Anyway, because of this Manson/Jesus-celebration, Mcmoogol is taking a week off. He's off investigating the primary-situation in Florida (ok, so I'm really just taking a vacation, but "investigating" sounds a lot better).

Check back monday, 24th March.

Videos for the non-believer

I don't believe in afterlife, although I am bringing a change of underwear.
Getting Even

Today Mcmoogol presents his top five videos for the non-believer. Being a non-believer myself, I think I can speak for the whole "team" when I say we as a group just love watching people with a certain supernatural belief being beaten both intellectually and with humour. All the videos will be linked from youtube. Atheist/anti-theistic/agnostic/skeptic pleasure is just a click away!

5. Derren Brown - "Astrology"
Illusionist Derren Brown convinces five people in London, LA and Barcelona that he has "psychic powers". He asks them all to draw the outline of their hand on piece of paper, and put a personal item in brown envolope. He then takes the envolope and the drawing in to a separate room, where he is to write a detailed evaluation of their personalities. When he hands them back to the participants, almost all of them say he's got them "dead on", with a personality match most of the times reaching over 90% accuracy. The funny part comes when he asks them all to compare each others evaluations...

Similar videos - Criss Angel does the same trick, except he does it in a "psychic booth".

4. Hitchens and Boteach Debate God
One of Hitchens best debates. Be aware, though, this is the full version of exchange, and it's quite long (1 hour and 30 min.). If you don't wan't to sit through the whole thing, there's also a smaller excerpt-version.

3. David Cross on Religion
David Cross is a standup comedian who is most definitely an atheist. Crude and crass, but also extremely funny. He does swear alot, though, so weak souls might want to steer away from this one.

2. Ricky Gervais - Creationism
Ricky Gervais does standup. However, he doesn't need to come up with original material. He can just read from the bible, and people will laugh hysterically. He proves that in this clip.

1. Christopher Hitchens on the Death of Jerry Falwell
Hitchens goes on Fox News' "Hannity and Colmes" to defend his comments about Jerry Falwell upon his death. He completely slaughters his opponents in what quickly transforms into an intellectual-knockout.

It's 3 a.m. and Hillary is Still Making Bad Decisions

All styles are good except the tiresome kind.
Voltaire

There's been so many spoofs on Hillary Clinton's 3 a.m. ad that I was scared to attempt one myself. This CNN news story sums up the situation pretty well. If you wan't to find any of the parodies, just try a youtube search with the words "Hillary" and "3am". There's alot of them, so you might stumble onto quite a few bad ones before your quest is rewarded with some quality comedy.

I'm still not sure on the main point - who I'd want answering the phone at 3 a.m. in the White House. Probably a unfortunate secretary who's been stuck with the night shift (and hopefully a pot full of coffee). There's one thing I am sure about, though. I would want the President to be fast asleep. He/she has probably got a pretty (fucking) busy day coming up.

However, if disaster did strike and Hillary got herself elected, I sure as hell wouldn't want her to be up in the middle of the night (pants-suit and all), answering phones. The ad was, of course, ridiculous, and little miss Clinton knows that now. What's interesting, though, is that she apparently didn't when she approved it. You know how the candidates have to approve every ad they run with that silly "I'm..., and I approve this message". How could she not have realized how dumb (and let's not forget patronising) this ad was. It's almost become a theme of the campaign - the fact that Obama can just sit back and wait for Hillary to do something stupid that brings him more votes.

Because while Barack's got Obama-girl, Hillary has got her husband and his mildly racist comments. While Obama has got the "Yes, we can"-song, Hillary has the "3 a.m."-ad. What she needs to do is just shut up and continue to model the pants-suit collection. It may at least get the menopause-vote back...

I'm Mcmoogol, and I approve this message.

Sex Scandals - Right and Left

Men use thought only to justify their wrong doings, and employ speech only to conceal their thoughts.
Voltaire

Ok, so maybe I can't pin today's big sex scandal on Hillary (I still want to, though). I saw a couple of international newspapers doing it earlier today. Probably because nobody in the international community had the faintest idea of who Eliot Spitzer is, until now (and also because it's fun to come up with adjectives when the story concerns the Clintons and sex scandals). If you haven't caught the story I'm talking about yet (you live in a fucking cave!), I'll lay it out for you.

The Governor of New York, Eliot Spitzer, have been listed by police as part of a high-class prostitution ring today. He is now under pressure to resign his post. Spitzer is a Democrat, and a well known supporter of Hillary Clinton for President. The ironic thing about him being caught as part of a prostitution ring is the fact that the NY gov. is known for being an ardent "fighter" against (you guessed it...) - prostitution. He especially devoted much of his time to this issue while holding the office of NY attorney general.

Seeing as today's political sex scandal was that of Democrat's, I started thinking about something else that is ironic. Namely the fact that everytime a Republican is involved in such a scandal, he always seems to be found down on his knees in a men's room somewhere. However, when a Democrat finally makes the news for his saucy behaviour, he's involved in HIGH-CLASS prostitution ring. Shouldn't it be the other way around?

The Republican party has in later years come to be known as the gathering of the filthy (non-philanthropistic) rich-, gay bashing-morons. A group one would suspect had quite a few members who dabbled in the areas of society where one might find high-class prostitution rings. On the other hand, the Democrats have become increasingly accepting of the gay-lifestyle, and let's not forget; more and more concerned with the issue of poverty. A party who's members one might find in a men's bathroom with a penis in their mouth.

So even if we can't give Hillary grief for today's sex scandal, at least we can find humour in the ironic element each scandal brings with it. (And btw) I'm sure we can get little miss Clinton on something tomorrow.