The Word of God

When God tells people to warn airport workers that there's a bomb aboard an airplane, they are promptly taken to a mental health facility for evaluation.

On the other hand, when God tells people to run for president, those people are considered legitimate contenders for the job.

Why is that?

Dog Condemned to Death by Stoning

This "Religion, what is it good for?" story better be a joke:

JERUSALEM (AFP) – A Jerusalem rabbinical court condemned to death by stoning a dog it suspects is the reincarnation of a secular lawyer who insulted the court's judges 20 years ago, Ynet website reported Friday.

According to Ynet, the large dog made its way into the Monetary Affairs Court in the ultra-Orthodox Jewish neighbourhood of Mea Shearim in Jerusalem, frightening judges and plaintiffs.

Despite attempts to drive the dog out of the court, the hound refused to leave the premises.

One of the sitting judges then recalled a curse the court had passed down upon a secular lawyer who had insulted the judges two decades previously.

Their preferred divine retribution was for the lawyer's spirit to move into the body of a dog, an animal considered impure by traditional Judaism.

Clearly still offended, one of the judges sentenced the animal to death by stoning by local children.

The canine target, however, managed to escape.

Classy Kebab

As we all know, a kebab is a cheap type of food made out of gross meat on a stick from obscure animals, drenched in red sauce which you only eat at 3 am in the morning on your way home from the club when all your hopes of getting laid have been crushed and you don't mind reeking of onion while looking like a drunk David Hasselhoff.

Or is it?

The Food Network Chef Andy Beates created a kebab which isn't your usual 3 bucks but more like a thousand dollars. It consists out of purple violet potatoes and edible gold leafs with some nice saffron. Something tells me that some people would consider this kebab as the equivalent to sex. Dude, it's got gold leaves.

Jilted Ex-Boyfriend Puts Up Libelous Billboard, Hides Behind Free Speech

A woman consents to, all on her own pretty self, and undergoes a common, perfectly legal medical procedure. Her ex-boyfriend, vexed that the woman had the procedure against his wishes, puts up a billboard making unsupported claims about her medical history, and falsely accusing her of committing a crime.

The ex-boyfriend's attorney argues this is a First Amendment free speech issue:

ALAMOGORDO, N.M. – A New Mexico man's decision to lash out with a billboard ad saying his ex-girlfriend had an abortion against his wishes has touched off a legal debate over free speech and privacy rights.

The sign on Alamogordo's main thoroughfare shows 35-year-old Greg Fultz holding the outline of an infant. The text reads, "This Would Have Been A Picture Of My 2-Month Old Baby If The Mother Had Decided To Not KILL Our Child!"

Fultz's ex-girlfriend has taken him to court for harassment and violation of privacy. A domestic court official has recommended the billboard be removed.

But Fultz's attorney argues the order violates his client's free speech rights.

"As distasteful and offensive as the sign may be to some, for over 200 years in this country the First Amendment protects distasteful and offensive speech," Todd Holmes said.

The woman's friends say she had a miscarriage, not an abortion, according to a report in the Albuquerque Journal.

Holmes disputes that, saying his case is based on the accuracy of his client's statement.

"My argument is: What Fultz said is the truth," Holmes said.

The woman's lawyer said she had not discussed the pregnancy with her client. But for Ellen Jessen, whether her client had a miscarriage or an abortion is not the point. The central issue is her client's privacy and the fact that the billboard has caused severe emotional distress, Jessen said.

"Her private life is not a matter of public interest," she told the Alamogordo Daily News.

I am unclear on what making unsupported and false statements about a person's medical care has to do with free speech, but one thing is crystal clear.

Pregnant women should be forced to make their medical records publicly available so that we all can judge their medical decisions and let the world know how we, you know, feel about those decisions.

My Bad

"Hey ya'll. Remember the last time we told you to eat in a certain way, introducing the food pyrmaid and such? Well...as we all can see now, it didn't really turn out that well. So now we invented a new model to teach you how to eat properly. Again. Hopefully, not too many of ya'll will get obese and/or die by this new model. Enjoy!"

Introducing the new "food plate"

The Catholic Church and Convicted Sex Offenders

Admit to, and be convicted of, sexually abusing a 12-year-old boy you met at an after-school program:

• Spend six months in jail, and

• Work with kids at not one, not two, but three Catholic schools as a volunteer, while on probation.

Make a few bogus 911 calls and steal $7,700 from one of the three Catholic school where you work with children while on probation for sexually abusing a boy:

• Get sentenced to up to 10 years in jail.

Any questions?