Breaking News Events

[Toughy]

Originally Posted by ZimmygLrL

This caught my attention lastnight. A church in Gainesville, FL are talking of burning the Koran on 9-11. Why would a church burn a religious book?

http://www.myfoxorlando.com/dpps/new...730-gc_8937270

Not sure what you all think of this, but to me, it is a dumb move.

Zimmy

They are burning the Qur'an because, in their little minds, it is a book of Satan. It is not a religious text. Only those of us that are the spawn of Satan would think the Qur'an (or the Mormon bible) is a religious text.

Anyone not a believer in their specific version of a creator deity should and will burn in their creator's version of hell.

There are only a small number of books (written in English only) that are allowed to be read by the flock. There is only one version of their bible that should be read. They really like the Old Testament and Revelations.

Christians have been waging war on Islam since the Crusades (started in 1095.....almost a thousand years ago). It has never really stopped.

[waxnrope]

Yes, but in the beginning, the emperor sent the soldiers, then the clerics to convert those still alive. Now, the leaders send the zealots only. They do the soldiers job.

[dark_crystal]

Originally Posted by waxnrope

Yes, but in the beginning, the emperor sent the soldiers, then the clerics to convert those still alive. Now, the leaders send the zealots only. They do the soldiers job.

zealots like my terrifying neighbor John Hagee, who wants (and fund-raises to help) America to jump-start the Apocalypse by nuking Iran. In the name of Jesus, of course

http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?articleId=11541

[Nat]

Originally Posted by SuperFemme

Montana Tea Party President Condones Violence Against Gays in Facebook Post Supporting Traditional Marriage



This seems to have been posted in late July, but several people have brought it to my attention today. Tim Ravndal, the President of Montana's Big Sky Tea Party Association, expressed his views that marriage should be between a man and a woman in a Facebook posting. The post was in response to an ACLU lawsuit in Montana brought by seven gay couples who want to get married.

Then Ravndal expressed support for a commenter who (in apparent reference to the Matthew Shepard murder) said, "I think fruits are decorative. Hang up where they can be seen and appreciated. Call Wyoming for display instructions."

Answered Ravndal: "Where can I get that Wyoming printed instruction manual?"

In related news, the Montana GOP Platform calls for making homosexual acts illegal

http://www.towleroad.com/2010/09/mon...%23gay+news%29

The Montana Tea Party's reaction to this:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: September 5, 2010

Jim Walker, Board Chair of the Big Sky Tea Party Association announced today that the group’s Board of Directors voted to remove Tim Ravndal as President and member of the non-profit organization because of unacceptable comments made on his personal Facebook account.
Walker stated: “Our Board learned about the situation from an article in the Great Falls Tribune on Saturday. We immediately called an emergency meeting for the following morning. We are extremely disappointed by Mr. Ravndal’s commentary. The discussion in that Facebook conversation is entirely outside the position of the Big Sky Tea Party.

Even though Mr. Ravndal was having a personal conversation and made no reference to our group, we felt strongly that swift and decisive action was required as we can not accept that sort of behavior from within our membership, let alone from an officer of the corporation. We continually make it known that we will not tolerate bigoted dialog, behavior or messages at our functions, our meetings or within our ranks. If a person demonstrates bigotry relative to race, sex, ethnicity, etc they are not welcome in our organization. The Tea Party movement is about standing up for individual freedom for everyone.

I do believe Mr. Ravndal when he explained that he was in no way intending to promote violence and that he was not thinking about nor condoning the murder of an innocent victim in Wyoming in 1998 when he responded to some very disturbing comments made by another individual. However, no matter how we considered the commentary, it was clear to us that he was participating in conversation which was overtly bigoted and we cannot have an officer of our corporation engaging in such behavior.”

Walker indicated that as Chairman of the Board, he will oversee activities of the organization until a replacement for the office of President can be identified and approved.

[SuperFemme]

Originally Posted by Nat

The Montana Tea Party's reaction to this:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: September 5, 2010

Jim Walker, Board Chair of the Big Sky Tea Party Association announced today that the group’s Board of Directors voted to remove Tim Ravndal as President and member of the non-profit organization because of unacceptable comments made on his personal Facebook account.
Walker stated: “Our Board learned about the situation from an article in the Great Falls Tribune on Saturday. We immediately called an emergency meeting for the following morning. We are extremely disappointed by Mr. Ravndal’s commentary. The discussion in that Facebook conversation is entirely outside the position of the Big Sky Tea Party.

Even though Mr. Ravndal was having a personal conversation and made no reference to our group, we felt strongly that swift and decisive action was required as we can not accept that sort of behavior from within our membership, let alone from an officer of the corporation. We continually make it known that we will not tolerate bigoted dialog, behavior or messages at our functions, our meetings or within our ranks. If a person demonstrates bigotry relative to race, sex, ethnicity, etc they are not welcome in our organization. The Tea Party movement is about standing up for individual freedom for everyone.

I do believe Mr. Ravndal when he explained that he was in no way intending to promote violence and that he was not thinking about nor condoning the murder of an innocent victim in Wyoming in 1998 when he responded to some very disturbing comments made by another individual. However, no matter how we considered the commentary, it was clear to us that he was participating in conversation which was overtly bigoted and we cannot have an officer of our corporation engaging in such behavior.”

Walker indicated that as Chairman of the Board, he will oversee activities of the organization until a replacement for the office of President can be identified and approved.

I am not overly impressed that they let him go because their platform still calls for the "will of the people to be recognized and all homosexual acts to be deemed illegal".

[SuperFemme]

In Mexico, Vatican Likens Gay Marriage To Decaffeinated Coffee

By On Top Magazine Staff
Published: September 06, 2010

While traveling in Mexico, two Vatican prelates have criticized Mexico City's new gay marriage law.

The marriages of gay and lesbian couples are an imitation, the bishops said, Mexico's El Universal reported.

“A gay relationship is like decaffeinated coffee, you do not wake up,”

Father Gonzalo Miranda, a bioethics professor at Regina Apostolorum University, a pontifical university, said.

Miranda, along with Monsignor Elio Sgreccia, president emeritus of the Pontification Academy for Life in the Vatican, are in Mexico participating in a series of academic conferences commemorating the 20th anniversary of the founding of the School of Bioethics at the Universidad Anahuac in Huixquilucan state. The bishops criticized Mexico City's new law at a press conference held on Wednesday.

“What just happened in California is very significant,” Miranda said, referring to a recent federal judge's ruling that overturned the state's gay marriage law, Proposition 8. “On two occasions people spoke out against the legal recognition of gay marriage and twice a judge changed the popular vote with a ruling. In Mexico, I don't know well the mechanism used, but the people were not consulted, there's wasn't a referendum either.”

In December, Mexico City became the first autonomous municipality in Latin America to approve a gay marriage law. The conservative federal government challenged the law, but the nation's Supreme Court declared the law, which, for the first time, also allows gay couples to adopt, constitutional, and ruled that all Mexican states must recognize the gay marriages of the nation's capital.

Both prelates said such unions go against nature, and that gay couples adopting children cannot be considered parenthood “but a substitute that can harm the child, a grave injustice that cannot be described.”


http://www.ontopmag.com/article.aspx...=1&Category=24

[waxnrope]

They, the Catholic Church, spends more time wiggling in the "morality" and "ethics" of the people whom they deem outside of their laws, their mandates, than they do with the clerics who commit unlawful and, by their own definition, sinful acts. The hypocrisy is one of the reasons that lead me to leave that institution. There are those, who remain inside to fight it, and I admire them, but it sickens me.

The Catholic Church, once the primary religious institution in Latin-America, is steadily looking membership ... to fundamentalist churches, such as the Assembly of God. Sigh. Be careful of what you wish for

[dreadgeek]

Originally Posted by ZimmygLrL

This caught my attention lastnight. A church in Gainesville, FL are talking of burning the Koran on 9-11. Why would a church burn a religious book?

http://www.myfoxorlando.com/dpps/new...730-gc_8937270

Not sure what you all think of this, but to me, it is a dumb move.

Zimmy

Zimmy:

My first thought is that I recall other people, in another place, burning books largely on the basis of the religion THEY practiced. If I recall such subversive tracts as "Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies" (A. Einstein 1905) and General Theory of Relativity (A Einstein 1915) because they represented "Jewish Physics". I expect that at once the people at this book burning realize that Rumi and Edward Said were also Muslims their books will be joining the Koran on the pyre.

Cheers
Aj

[paposeco]

http://www.naacp.org/pages/one-nation-march

[paposeco]

I wonder what would happen, especially from the christian-right, if it was suggested that Bibles be burned, because of the of the radical and violent, even the murdering christians. Jesus taught, Love, tolerance, acceptance..etc.....what exactly is so confusing about that?!? These wolves in sheep skins, have much to answer for!
Good people of all faiths, good people of all colors, good people of all ethnic flavors, good people of all sexual identity...GOOD PEOPLE, STAND UNITED AGAINST THIS DESPICABLE EVIL. Shine the Light of Truth and Love, and show this evil for what it is! "Conquer evil with Good." Jesus.

[AtLast]

Have no idea if it is my age, but talk of book burning of any kind, really sends chills up my spine.

[SuperFemme]

burning books makes me break into panic attacks.
i am, afterall, a bibliophile who has a tactile, emotional, and neurological attachment to books.
the feel, smell, and beauty of books makes me sort of hot.

[Toughy]

In the little podunk town of 9,000 in rural New Mexico the book Silas Marner was required reading in my sophmore year (1968) in high school.

However, my English teacher (he only taught there 2 years) decided we should read Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury instead.

If you haven't read it.......it's a good book and very pertinent to the times.

[Nat]

I do love me some Silas but yes.

[Oneida]

Breaking news in Chicago today: Mayor Daley is not seeking another term


http://www.suntimes.com/news/2682566...090710.article


__________________________________________________ _____________
Excerpt: Maggie Daley’s eight-year battle against breast cancer — marred by several recent setbacks — has also been weighing on the mayor.

Maggie Daley was diagnosed with metastatic breast cancer in 2002. She has already more than tripled the average life expectancy for patients diagnosed with the disease, in which cancer cells spread beyond the breast and lymph nodes.

[Greyson]

The practice of Punishment of Death by Stoning I believe is inhumane. This particular case is not the first "Death by Stoning" sentence exposed for the entire world to become aware of such misrepresentations of "justice." On a much more mundane note, I find it alarming that this story has no significant way to identify the author or source/s of the article.

______________________________________________



Middle East

Iran suspends Controversial punishment for Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani put on hold amid "review" following international outcry. The case of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani has sparked an international outcry

Iran has suspended the punishment of death by stoning for a woman convicted of adultery, the country's foreign ministry said.

A spokesman for the ministry said on Wednesday that government officials will review the case of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, who was convicted of adultery in 2006.

"The verdict regarding the extramarital affairs has stopped and it's being reviewed," Ramin Mehmanparast told Iran's state-run English-language channel, Press TV.

Ashtiani was convicted in 2006 of having an "illicit relationship" with two men after the murder of her husband the previous year. She had also been sentenced to death following a separate conviction for playing a role in her husband's 2005 murder.

The foreign ministry said on Wednesday that her sentencing for "complicity in murder" is still in process.

"Defending a person on trial for murder should not be turned into a human rights matter," Mehmanparast said.

But Ashtiani's lawyer, Houtan Javid Kian, said she was never formally put on trial on the charge of being an accomplice to murder and was not allowed to mount a defence.

International outcry

The case of Ashtiani, a 43-year-old mother of two, has provoked international outrage and has further strained relations between Iran and the West.

The international crossfire over Iran's stoning sentence intensified on Tuesday, after Jose Manuel Barroso, the European commission president, said he was "appalled" by the news of the sentence.

"Barbaric beyond words," he said during his first state of the union address in Strasbourg, France.

Amnesty International also called on Iran to abolish what it called a "horrific practice, designed to increase the suffering" of those condemned.

Stoning is the penalty for crimes such as adultery under Iranian law.

But Amnesty said a disproportionate number of those sentenced to death by stoning were women because they were not treated equally before the law and were particularly vulnerable to unfair trials.
Iranian authorities routinely defend their legal codes and human rights standards as fully developed and in keeping with the country's traditions and values. They have widely ignored Western denunciations over the crackdowns.

Ashtiani's lawyer said he regards the next critical period coming next week. The moratorium on death sentences during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan will end, and he said he worries that an execution could be then carried out "any moment".


Source: Agencies

http://english.aljazeera.net/

[AtLast]

Originally Posted by Greyson

The practice of Punishment of Death by Stoning I believe is inhumane. This particular case is not the first "Death by Stoning" sentence exposed for the entire world to become aware of such misrepresentations of "justice." On a much more mundane note, I find it alarming that this story has no significant way to identify the author or source/s of the article.

______________________________________________



Middle East

Iran suspends Controversial punishment for Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani put on hold amid "review" following international outcry. The case of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani has sparked an international outcry

Iran has suspended the punishment of death by stoning for a woman convicted of adultery, the country's foreign ministry said.

A spokesman for the ministry said on Wednesday that government officials will review the case of Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani, who was convicted of adultery in 2006.

"The verdict regarding the extramarital affairs has stopped and it's being reviewed," Ramin Mehmanparast told Iran's state-run English-language channel, Press TV.

Ashtiani was convicted in 2006 of having an "illicit relationship" with two men after the murder of her husband the previous year. She had also been sentenced to death following a separate conviction for playing a role in her husband's 2005 murder.

The foreign ministry said on Wednesday that her sentencing for "complicity in murder" is still in process.

"Defending a person on trial for murder should not be turned into a human rights matter," Mehmanparast said.

But Ashtiani's lawyer, Houtan Javid Kian, said she was never formally put on trial on the charge of being an accomplice to murder and was not allowed to mount a defence.

International outcry

The case of Ashtiani, a 43-year-old mother of two, has provoked international outrage and has further strained relations between Iran and the West.

The international crossfire over Iran's stoning sentence intensified on Tuesday, after Jose Manuel Barroso, the European commission president, said he was "appalled" by the news of the sentence.

"Barbaric beyond words," he said during his first state of the union address in Strasbourg, France.

Amnesty International also called on Iran to abolish what it called a "horrific practice, designed to increase the suffering" of those condemned.

Stoning is the penalty for crimes such as adultery under Iranian law.

But Amnesty said a disproportionate number of those sentenced to death by stoning were women because they were not treated equally before the law and were particularly vulnerable to unfair trials.
Iranian authorities routinely defend their legal codes and human rights standards as fully developed and in keeping with the country's traditions and values. They have widely ignored Western denunciations over the crackdowns.

Ashtiani's lawyer said he regards the next critical period coming next week. The moratorium on death sentences during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan will end, and he said he worries that an execution could be then carried out "any moment".


Source: Agencies

http://english.aljazeera.net/

This is where cultural relativism and I break company. Public stoning anywhere, by anyone is ugly and cruel and barbaric. Let alone the sexism involved here.

This woman will be burried to her head in a public execution area and people will throw stones at her head until she is dead. Also, her first language is Turkish (a minority in Iran) and she was questioned in Arabic. She did not understand what she was admitting to- stoning of women for adultry requires admission of at least 4 witnesses (of which all 4 must be men).

Even in countries that continue using the death penalty (like the US, one of very few worldwide), history demonstrates the development of more humane (if you buy this) of carrying it out.

FerGoddessSakes, California has stopped executions by lethal injection due to questioning inhumane aspects!

Stoning was widely imposed in the years after the 1979 Islamic revolution, and even though Iran's judiciary still regularly hands down such sentences, they are often converted to other punishments.

The last known stoning was carried out in 2007, although the government rarely confirms that such punishments have been meted out.

Under Islamic rulings, a man is usually buried up to his waist, while a woman is buried up to her chest with her hands also buried. Those carrying out the verdict then throw stones until the condemned dies.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/s...ryId=129162333

[MsMerrick]

Whacko Preacher, wanting to hold a Burn a Koran Day, has a rather troubled past
http://www.spiegel.de/international/...716409,00.html

[Glenn]

Originally Posted by MsMerrick

Whacko Preacher, wanting to hold a Burn a Koran Day, has a rather troubled past
http://www.spiegel.de/international/...716409,00.html

Hm..wonderin if he could "love his enemies" like Jesus would tell him to do at ground zero.

[AtLast]

Originally Posted by MsMerrick

Whacko Preacher, wanting to hold a Burn a Koran Day, has a rather troubled past
http://www.spiegel.de/international/...716409,00.html

Oh yeah... after listening to a couple of his clips on MSNBC, I'm thinking burned-out guy from the 60's. Dead brain cells galore. Hey, I recognize my own era's misgivings and remnants. Can't imagine what his preaching is like (out of the back of his milk truck?)? Reminds me of even eras further back-, traveling preachers with snake oil and their bibles.

There is a part of me that thinks that this burning is just of a book because for those that hold particular theological beliefs have the meaning inside of themselves and a book is just a book (goes for the Bible, et. al., too). What is holy to some is not or sacred to some is only tangibly represented in a book for dissemination. The books I take chants, meditations, or prayers from would not leave me without them, they are now part of my memory. People of all faiths know to make this distinction because burning of holy/sacred books is nothing new. But, the fact of the matter is that this is a symbolic gesture against far more than a religion. And today, in the US, has far reaching implications and dangers.

I wonder if there will be Bible burnings in protest if this takes place on 9/11? Or, Bibles, the Book of Morman, Tanakh or Torah, Buddha-Dharma, or various Hindu scriptures (Shashtras, Vedas, or Upanishads). These are only a few of what people all over the world experience as the good book, scripture, meditations, etc.!