Dude, You Have No Qur'an: The Remix

Jacob Isom, the bespectacled, rat-tailed skateboarder who stopped a Qur'an burning in Amarillo by swiping the book and saying, "Dude, you have no Qur'an!" has been Auto-Tuned. I think the result has almost as much staying power as that "Teach Me How to Dougie" song, but see for yourself below.



According to an interview with Gawker, the 23-year-old Isom's goal was to parlay his moment of glory into an appearance in High Times. Mission accomplished, sir.

Stumping for Thumpers in Aggieland

I’d hate to see someone not get elected solely because of their religious beliefs, but seeing the Republican electorate divided against itself by Mitt Romney’s religion in 2008 would be sweetly ironic.

Romney’s admonitions against not voting for him because he’s Mormon would be a lot easier to stomach if he wasn’t cloaking them in the default notion that one must publicly waggle their faith around like a giant dildo to run for national office in the first place.

The primary purpose of Mitt's phony “Kennedy moment” in College Station Thursday was to whip up support among Southern theocrats, not to dispel concerns about how religion would guide his policy decisions. Regardless of what he did as governor of Massachusetts, anyone who doesn’t recognize that a Romney presidency would be carrying water for the religious right in the form of restrictive public policy is a fool.

We Love God. How 'Bout Yew?

The Texas House voted 124-5 to add the words "under God" to the Texas pledge of allegiance early this morning. Not surprisingly, three of the five "no" votes came from Austin.

Public schoolchildren in Texas are now compelled to pledge allegiance to both the U.S. and Texas flags every morning. When I'm home from work, I can hear the principal at the school across the street leading the students through both pledges over the loudspeaker. It sounds both silly and vaguely fascist to my ears.

I'm a native Texan and I love my home state. However, if anyone tries to make me recite a pledge to the Texas flag with the words "under God" shoehorned into it by a bunch of used car salesmen for Jesus, I will turn my glaringly white hiney to the flag and walk out of the room.

Lenten Workplace Cussing Moratorium: Epilogue

My attempt to give up cussing in the workplace for Lent petered out a few weeks back. Ultimately, this noble but doomed effort at self-improvement did nothing other than demonstrate how much more I cuss in the workplace now than when I started working.

Cussing has become too engrained in my workaday muscle memory for me to just give it up in the absence of an actual threat to my livelihood. I never said "fuck" or any variations thereof, though. That's gotta count for at least a standby ticket to the kingdom, right? Answer me, goddamnit!

Lenten Workplace Cussing Moratorium: Week 2

Well, at least I started off strong this week...

Monday, February 26
NO CUSSING!

Tuesday, February 27
NO CUSSING!

Wednesday, February 28
1 shit

Thursday, March 1
2 hells, 1 damn*
*exclamatory response to being told a co-worker was bitten by a raccoon while jogging on Town Lake

Friday, March 2
Texas Independence Day - no work!

Lenten Workplace Cussing Moratorium: Week 1

Wednesday, February 21
1 hell, 1 bitch

Thursday, February 22
2 hells

Friday, February 23
NO CUSSING!*

*It should be noted that there was only one other person in my six-cube pod on Friday, which reduced my cuss triggers considerably.

Getting the Lent Out

Although I'm not Catholic, I've been trying to give up something for Lent in recent years in an effort to improve my life and rectify my sometimes-galling lack of self-discipline.

This year, I've decided to give up cussing in the workplace. I've been working in the same government office since 1995. If you find a job you can peaceably coexist with and stay there long enough, there's a very good chance you’ll eventually find it impossible to continue hiding your true self in the name of workplace decorum. My problem is that my true self likes to cuss. A lot.

Consequently, I’m rarely able to make it through the workday anymore without cussing out loud at least once. Despite a general loosening of the silk noose, it is still considered unprofessional in most non-sporting quarters to proffer such colloquial observations as, “I can’t fucking believe we have to do this shit!”

I’m pretty careful about only doing this among my closest colleagues who I know and trust, but if I don't take steps to reign myself in, I know I’ll eventually say something less-than-couth in front of someone who won’t let it slide. Therefore, at 8am this morning, I vowed not to say another cuss word at the office until Easter Sunday.

By 10am this morning, I had already broken the aforementioned vow with an inadvertent “hell.” A "bitch" followed around 3pm this afternoon. So much for self-discipline. Maybe I should just limit my commitment to words you can’t say on broadcast TV.

No, Virginia, You Can't Have A Divorce

After leading the fight for state constitutional amendments against gay marriage, Christian fundamentalists are now trying to make it harder to get divorced in Virginia.

The Family Foundation will be lobbying that state's general assembly this year to change current no-fault divorce laws for straight married couples with children. These faith-based busybodies want Virginia law to require both parties to agree to divorce before a marriage can be terminated.

Exceptions would be granted for abuse and cruelty (which is sure to lead to a spike in false claims of domestic violence). Married couples without children wouldn't be affected because marriage is really all about the children, dear. And there's nothing better for kids than one parent wanting out of a marriage while the other parent won't grant a divorce.

I chuckle profusely at the idea of those homophobic Virginians who voted to ban gay marriage not being able to leave their own marriages without their spouse's permission.

Everybody Do the Schism

Several conservative Episcopalian congregations in Virginia (the same state that made whites marrying blacks a crime until the Supreme Court made them stop in 1967) are now scampering into the arms of homophobic African dioceses to avoid having to answer to a gay bishop.

The newly-aligned churches will serve as reverse missionary outposts to bring the not-so-good news about homosexuality to Americans.

Two of these churches sit on tax-free real estate in northern Virginia worth approximately $27 million. I hope the Episcopal Church makes them pay through the nose to leave.

The Partridge Family Temple

I've heard about the Partridge Family Temple before, but this Swedish TV clip demonstrates why they're better than any of those silly old Abrahamic religions. Having topless women certainly helps (NSFW outside of Scandinavia).

Rent Boy Alleges Fling with Pastor Ted

Pastor Ted Haggard of the 14,000-member New Life Church in Colorado Springs resigned leadership of the National Association of Evangelicals today because of his alleged ongoing patronage of a male prostitute.

While Haggard denies the allegations, it would be strange for him to resign if there was nothing to the claims made to the Denver Post by former prostitute Mike Jones.

You may remember Haggard from the movie Jesus Camp. While Haggard had enough public relations sense to avoid asking children if they were ready to "die for Jesus" like the sweet-heartedly insane Pastor Becky Fischer, the fact that he has (or had) a standing weekly phone call with the President of the United States ought to scare the unholy crap out of anyone who doesn't want to live in an iron-booted theocracy.

If I was the down-low pastor of a browbeating evangelical congregation whose apparent life-or-death issue is keeping the gay folks from getting married, I think it would be wise to avoid sleeping with the same male prostitute over and over again. Sooner or later, you're bound to leave some tracks. If Ted did have a thing going on with Mr. Jones, I'll bet he now wishes he would've settled for getting sucked off through glory holes.

While I sympathize with good people who struggle with sexual identity, leaders of the religious right who sublimate their homosexual tendencies with gay-bashing sermons and legislation deserve no quarter whatsoever. May they all be exposed for the hateful hypocrites they are.