An atheist defends religion as a bulwark of freedom. The article is a little awkward to read and it doesn't break new ground, but it's refreshing to see an atheist making the arguments. Excerpt:
[W]hich institutions did [Lenin and Stalin] single out for opprobrium? There can be only one answer: primarily, religion, and, secondarily, the family. It was no accident that the Soviets passed laws rewarding children for turning in their parents for anti-communistic activities. There is surely no better way to break up the family than this diabolical policy. And, how did they treat religion? To ask this is to answer it. Religion was made into public enemy number one, and its practitioners viciously hunted down.
Why pick on religion and the family? Because these are the two great competitors ”“ against the state ”“ for allegiance on the part of the people. The Communists were quite right, from their own evil perspective, to focus on these two institutions. All enemies of the overweening state, then, would do well to embrace religion and the family as their friends, whether they are themselves atheists or not, parents or not.
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Leno: "The Mars Lander has found traces of ice and salt on Mars. Now, it's looking for tequila."
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This kind of captures my view:
I don't work in a large office, so formal meetings are rare. But I detest the non-profit meetings: You volunteer to sit on the local Viagra Relief Agency (raising money for those who last more than the maximum-allowed four hours), and then they want to hold a bunch of meetings at 7:00 p.m. Inevitably, the following will occur: (1) The meeting will start late, (2) Someone will ramble and make more detours in his thought than a person trying to drive old Route 66, (3) Someone won't be prepared to discuss something we're supposed to discuss, (4) Someone will ramble and ramble and ramble, (5) Someone will propose that we hold more meetings, (6) Someone will ramble.
And keep in mind: I am a rambler. When I catch myself doing it, I stop. When I leave a conversation and realize I rambled, I hate myself. When my wife sees me doing it, she throws something at me. But I don't ramble during meetings. For some reason, my rambling gene turns off and I'm as laconic as a mime. Maybe my instinct tells me that it's bad to hurt one person, but to hurt a whole group is deplorable. Unfortunately, in every meeting, there's at least one person who doesn't have that instinct and seems to be wholly oblivious to the whole rambling phenomenon.
