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April 30 Churchgoers Are More Likely To Support TortureAccording to a recent poll, people that are affiliated to a religion are more likely to tolerate torture as an acceptable practice. Why am I not surprised at all?
CNN highlights:
Here is the article: http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/04/30/religion.torture/index.html The company behind the poll (http://pewresearch.org/) seems to be serious, and they run a lot of polls related to race and religion. With regard to torture they sliced and diced the data to see if republicans, democrats or independents would have a bias. If there was a bias by race and so on. They found nothing except for the religious angle. Here is the report that CNN is quoting: http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1210/torture-opinion-religious-differences
April 26 Today I Talked to the PoliceI was trying to get to a high school nearby for a recycling event. I want to get rid of old batteries responsibly and avoid polluting the water I drink. The event was scheduled to last from 9am to 3pm, but around 2:30pm the entrance was closed by the police.
I parked my car down the block and walked back, event flyer on hand, and asked the police officer why the entrance was closed. He screamed back "because it closes at 3pm" as if I was a doing awful. I know from past experience there is no arguing with police (or talking, unless they're asking for money on some event), but I instinctively reached for my watch. It was 2:45pm and the flyer said, right at the top, "no entrance allowed after 3pm". So I pointed out that it was not 3pm yet. To what a really pissed small suburban-town cop replied "we have to drain the queue of cars already there".
Awesome. My wish is that everyone on his life will follow his logic. The bank branch, the restaurant, grocery store, doctor, everyone will estimate how long it would take to "drain the queue of customers already in there" and close the door on his face at random times before the closing time. Either that or that he will have to wear a badge that says "I'm paid extra to cover the event, not by hour".
Now I guess I can wait for my first automatically issued traffic ticket.
April 12 Light StuffI have been working on my backyard for the last couple of weekends and today a spring downpour washed away some of the unfinished work. Lame.
This one is worth watching, but you'll need speakers. Not as spectacular as they apparently think it is, but quite nice. I could say exactly the same thing about every movies I saw last year and to all French movies I've ever seen.
If you're interested in hiring them check http://lidorproductions.com/vocapeople/
April 08 DistractedToday I am feeling very distracted. Hard to concentrate. I will probably try to focus on mechanical tasks for the rest of the day - maybe if I do enough of them I can justify today's salary. Probably not - will have to compensate tomorrow.
How distracted am I? Well, this distracted:
April 02 CSI Las VegasI follow the CSI Las Vegas since the first episode - I watched every one of them. When Grissom (William Petersen) left I thought the series would jump the shark. They coopted Laurece Fishburn as a rookie CSI investigator and, let me tell you, he is an awesome actor. The director and writers clearly know that. The new episodes are dark, serious and entertaining. And Laurence Fishburn grills a suspect like no one. I love it.
On other hand, this season of 24 is ridiculous. If it was not enough the torture advocates contrast Jack Bauer with the FBI version of the Marx brothers, now even Jack is doing stupid stuff. After killing civilians left and right and digging a much-desired micro-chip from a corpse chest, he finds the first police officer hanging around, gives him the chip and tell him to 'deliver it to the president at the White House, and no one else'. Well done. That was so absurd that FBI's Malibu Barbie sex tension looks believable.
April 01 My April First HistoryIt was 1986 and I was 13. After a very long 16-month period where I did not spend a dime of my not-so-great, not-so-constant allowance except to buy an illustrated encyclopedia, I finally received the final volume. With each volume I received a coupon. I mailed all coupons and received a G-shock watch.
I bought the collection half because of the books, and half because of the watch. It was an awesome watch.
So, on April 1st, a couple of days after I received the watch, I was walking two blocks from my house when two guys approached. One put a knife to my back, the other to my throat. They wanted my watch and shoes, but settled on taking the watch only - after all, the shoes were too small.
I told a police officer about what happened and he told me to go away, that I could be arrested for trying to pull a prank on him. My friends reacted the same way. I went back home and cried until the next day. The next day my friends believed me, but it was too late. What I felt that day is very, very hard to explain and I won't try.
So this is my April first history.
Every year, on April first, I cannot avoid thinking about every time someone told me criminality is a function of poverty and lack of education. Those two didn't look much poorer than I was, and they were definitively much better off than half of the people I went to school with.
So on every April first I get a little pissed. But tomorrow I will be fine.
Be nice.
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