but he's not there

only 1% of people think of god as female, with 62% considering god to be male, the online survey conducted earlier this month of 1,050 adults in britain found.1

i remember sometime during the last millenium catching part of a documentary about christians in korea or some such topic and the one clip that stayed with me was an interview of a korean man saying that not only did he believe in jesus christ, son of god, but he also believed that christ was a caucasian with blond hair and blue eyes.

i immediately thought: "how horrible!" — this pathetic person had built himself a mountain that he could never scale.

most theists and deists with an anthropomorphic vision of their diety create one in their own image and posit themselves as the "chosen people" of that god, yet here was a person submitting to a god that he could never claim kin to, no matter how hard he prays, no matter what he sacrifices.

it seems that instead of enjoying the ego-boost most religions give their faithful, this person was basically condemning himself to a permanent inferiority complex. and if god is white, blond and blue-eyed, how could this person ever have any kind of relationship with any white, blond and blue-eyed human being in which he wasn't automatically inferior (perhaps even inferior to any caucasian nonbeliever as well), all the way down to his corpuscles?

watching that guy declare his strange faith just seemed so heartbreakingly tragic.

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¹ hat tip to p.z. myers @ pharyngula. from commenter greta christina:

the zombies' song "she's not there" keeps coming to mind. with a little tweaking, it makes an excellent atheist song. well, let me tell you 'bout the way he looks the way he acts and the color of his hair his voice is soft and cool his eyes are clear and bright but he's not there!

coalition of the wilting

courtesy of thinkprogress.org:

the defeated
country	leader	electoral fate
albania	f. nano	voted out, 7/05
australia	j. howard	voted out, 11/07
dom. rep.	h. mejia d.	voted out, 5/04
hungary	p. medgyessy	voted out, 8/04
italy	s. berlusconi	voted out, 4/06
norway	k.m. bondevik	voted out, 9/05
romania	a, năstase	voted out, 11/04
spain	j.m. aznar	voted out, 3/04

the departed
country	leader	electoral fate
britain	t. blair	bowed out, 6/07
el salvador	f.f. perez	timed out, 3/04
japan	j. koizumi	bowed out, 9/06
poland	a. kwaśniewski	timed out, 12/05

the dead-enders
country	leader	commitment
denmark	a.f. rasmussen	headed out, 2/07
s. korea	r. moo-hyun	chillin' out

what so proudly we hide

... at least until president bush is finished making the world safer:

associated press: frankfurt, germany — the official team bus to be used by the united states during the world cup will not bear a flag for security reasons. the 32 official buses were presented thursday in frankfurt and the other 31 buses have large national flags of the their teams painted on rear sides. ... at the 2002 world cup, the united states was among the most heavily guarded teams. when the americans arrived at incheon international airport, about 500 police formed a corridor the players walked through as they came out of customs, with swat team commandos mixed in. when the team's charter flight landed at daegu airport before a game against south korea, two tanks were on the runway. metal detectors were placed at the entrance of the team hotel throughout the team's stay.

(hat tip to think progress.)

our worst fears

elizabeth dole is afraid. very afraid. the country is headed toward disaster.

as in a terrorist attack? another katrina-sized storm? an incurable pandemic? financial collapse?

not exactly — but the enemies are at the gates.

as in osama? zarqawi? iran? north korea?

not exactly —

associated press: washington — the head of the senate republican committee paints a dire picture of democratic congressional control, warning that the opposition party would "put the war on terrorism on the back-burner" and maybe even impeach president bush. in a fundraising appeal this week, sen. elizabeth dole, r-n.c., asks for immediate financial help "to prevent the most left-wing democrat party in history from seizing control of the united states senate" in the november elections. ... in the fundraising letter, dole rails against liberal democrats in the senate and warns that if they prevail, "our worst fears" will be realized. she argues that empowered democrats would "increase your taxes, call for endless investigations, congressional censure and maybe even impeachment of president bush, put the war on terrorism on the back-burner" and "take over the white house in 2008!" she assured the recipients of the fundraising letter that she was working around the clock "to help our country avoid this disaster."

all hyperbole aside, while the country might not be on the edge of extinction, senate republicans most certainly are, and who would know better than their own nervous staffers, whose continued well-being depends wholly on their bosses' uninterrupted incumbency, as related by one purported congressional insider:

as many of you know, when congress is in session, most of my working days are spent on the hill. i have contacts on both sides of the hill and both sides of the aisle on both sides, people i have known for years and chat with. the republicans on both sides of capitol hill are running scared right now. very scared. the staffers i know on more than one committee have been told that if the republicans lose the majority in november, they will lose their jobs, so now is the time to start making connections with representatives and senators in safe seats, republican organizations, friendly lobbyists and the like and putting together resumes. there is a mood of despondency in republican circles, and the conventional wisdom in some of those circles is that loss of at least one house is inevitable. the conventional wisdom is also that loss of one chamber will be disastrous because the resulting investigations will bring the whole house of cards crashing down around the party's ankles.

if i were looking at not just unemployment, but probes and trials and sentences, i'd be scared too. come november, a lot of republicans may be grabbing their ankles.