To be, or not to be, a #GnuAtheist #Grinch

I have been thinking more and more about Tom Flynn of the Center for Inquiry and his Gnu Atheist Grinch post.

In a nutshell, Flynn says atheists should not celebrate Christmas, no way, no how, not even in its secularized form in modern America. 

Flynn could see this as a great way to write about science, as I did, from astronomy and celestial mechanics down to human evolutionary biology, as well as celebrating someone who was some sort of humanist.

But, nooo ... we get another Gnu Atheist proving himself to be a village idiot atheist.

The man sounds like a Gnu Atheist Scrooge! And, it got me wondering just what else he might want to forgo because it has a religious connotation.

So, Tom, will you refuse to eat kosher food, simply because it's been killed in a certain style for religious reasons? Will you stop eating Easter eggs, because of their Christian background which in turn came from pagan fertility thoughts? Likewise, will you stop eating the chocolate Easter bunny?

Do you refuse to say Gesundheit because it derives from superstition? 

Even worse? He's so pedantic to dislike the current calendar because of its pagan-god names for days and months. No, really:

As I’ve written elsewhere, I got kind of psyched for the French Republican calendar when Madalyn O’Hair tried to bring it back in American Atheist magazine some years ago. (Happy first of Ventose, by the way.) But it would be seriously deficient for adoption today. For one thing, it has the same problem as a calendar that the Winter Solstice has as a holiday: it’s not applicable to today’s global society. The month names are tied to the climate in the northern temperate zones. For example, the current month, Ventose, means “snowy.” One of the summer months is Fructidor, which means “fruitful.” Good luck getting the folks in Rio to embrace that!

Wow. (He got his Revolutionary French months screwed up, but later corrected that.) Anyway, even the godless Communists, in their Russky incarnation, still kept religious names for days of the week when they made a new calendar.

More seriously, and tying to ideas I often go into in more depth at my other blog, will you stop listening not only to "Silent Night," but also the "Messiah," or Mozart's "Requiem"? What about Alfred Schnittke's "Requiem," written by an apparent unbeliever in the Soviet Union?

The first time I heard "Messiah" live was when I was either a junior or senior in high school, and it was also my intro to a major symphonic group, as the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, under principal guest conductor Raymond Leppard, was playing it.

Well, I think the night before the performance I went to, he was interviewed on St. Louis' classical radio station. And the announcer asked him a question along the lines of, "How can/do you, a secularist, perform this piece?"

And Leppard said something about "the human spirit."

And, in hindsight (which I certainly didn't have at the time) that epitomizes the secular humanist vs. the stereotypical Gnu Atheist.

At the time, I didn't get it.

The son of a minister who had just gone back to seminary for his doctorate of theology, in the main conservative denomination within Lutheranism, I just didn't get it.

It took a bit after I made my journey to atheism more than a decade later, in fact, to get it. While I wasn't a GnuAtheist type, nonetheless, I couldn't see how one could appreciate the "human spirit" of a clearly religious work, from a secularist angle.

But, even before reading the likes of a Scott Atran or a Pascal Boyer on the evolutionary biology of religious belief, eventually my atheist thinking matured and I did "get it."

So, whether it's "Messiah," Bach's "Magnificat," or a requiem, either by Mozart, Schnittke or Brahms, I can appreciate the human spirit which dealt with serious matters of life and death through magnificent musical works, or also works of art.

And, to the degree I feel these creators had the wrong answers, I can nonetheless sympathize with their drive, even empathize, and also feel a bit ... pensive? poignant? about that all.

Perry loses AGAIN on women's health — as does state

In Waco, US District Judge Walter S. Smith has just ruled that the US Department of Health and Human Services can indeed stop sending money to Texas if Gov. Rick Perry and his GOP numbnuts keep trying to put Planned Parenthood out of business, essentially, by changing how it operates the Women's Health Program.

It's a sad turn of events. But, the legal ruling is certainly expected.

Perry and Greg Abbott will of course appeal.

I assume they'll lose at the appellate level, and then SCOTUS will refuse to grant cert.

So, soon enough, we'll be at eyeball-blink time. What will Tricky Ricky do?

Answer? If the Lege is still in session, he'll stay the course, and won't go back to previous funding. He doesn't want a tea party firestorm. If we're after the end of May, who knows.

Texas to lose its oil perch?

Fracking has expanded production in the Permian Basin, and gone on to open the Eagle Ford play for oil as well as gas. That, combined with the decline of the North Slope in Alaska, moved Texas back into the No. 1 slot among oil states a few years back.

But, the same modern techniques may make that perch short-lived. And, no, it's not North Dakota that's threatening.

Instead, the Golden State may be the new kingpin for black gold.

A shale play near Monterey, Calif., could have double the reserves of Eagle Ford plus North Dakota's Bakken combined.

Of course, as the story notes, Californai has strong environmental  laws. How much that will affect Monterey production, I don't know.

But, with California's population and refineries, you know oil companies are just itching to get at this.

At the same time, this has to be another concern for global warming issues. It certainly means that oil prices won't go so high as to discourage too much SUV use in the US, or the growth of car ownership in China and India.

Adjusting for inflation, if the Monterey play starts development any time soon, I'd say oil will stay below $110/bbl for the rest of the decade.

But, that's a big if. The Center for Biological Diversity has already annouced plans to sue. That area is also the home of wine grapes, strawberries, Gilroy-area garlic, and more. That alone will slow development.

And, it's also the home of earthquakes. Given that fracking already seems pretty well connected to some small earthquakes, fracking in close proximity to the San Andreas Fault sounds scary as hell. It also will be challenging, I'm sure.

Also, even if this bonanza leads us to meeting all our oil needs domestically, that still doesn't insulate the US from world oil issues.

The real Obama - he was always there

Obama's latest sellout reminded me of some of my photoshopping from a few years back. I did this on Shepard Fairey's own iconic photoshopping. It has a 2012 campaign companion photo here.

No, I'm not being too harsh on Obama. Wake up, folks. Vernon Jordan took him on a dog-and-pony show before a bunch of Wall Streeters way back in 2003 for their USDA Prime seal of approval. (He got it.)

You Obamiac types are still "projecting" your wish fulfillment on him. You "my Democrats right or wrong," as I've said before, are "enabling" Obama like a spouse or lover enables an alcoholic or addict.

So, stop posting your Daily Kos and Salon links on Facebook. If you want any chance of stopping Obama's Social Security sellout, the only way is by dealing with the Republican devil.

Yeah,  I know, he's actually a genius. Secret plan to end the war, too, and all that.

Of course, exactly two years ago, he was a genius in the same situation, right? Only it wasn't even the same situation, because the GOP didn't yet control the House. Yet, somehow, Dear Leader managed to turn the Bush tax cuts into the Obama tax cuts with almost nothing  of note in return.

Bummed over #OBummer and Social Security? A modest solution

I love that Democratic friends of mine on Facebook are saying "call your Congressman" over Dear Leader's proposed cuts to Social Security. (This doesn't mention a possible increase in the Medicare retirement age, or whatever else is in his magic box of rocks, either now, or in 2014 when Fiscal Cliff Part Deux hits the shitscreen.)

Now, why would I do that?

O'Bummer is surely already leaning on Hairy Reed, aka Harry Reid, to take back any hint of possible opposition he has expressed to this idea.

You want to try to stop this effing train wreck?

If you're a Democrat, whether "Democrats always, right or wrong," an independent-minded Democrat, an independent-minded left-liberal of sorts like me, or whatever, there is a Plan B.

Especially if, like me, you live in a red state.

DO call your Republican Congresscritter or Senator.

Tell him (it's very unlikely to be a her) that you oppose this deal because it's not good enough. For example, if you're here in Texas? Tell John Cornyn, Lamar Smith, even Gohmert Pyle if you have the stomach, to hold out for more. Tell them to buck John Boehner.

That's the only way this gets stopped.

Of course, there's a hell of a risk.

And, if you aren't still wearing rose-colored glasses, you know that risk.

It's that O'Bummer finds even more stores to give away.

And, it is a real risk.

Why?

Because he's a liar. He's telling a tacit lie that Social Security has something to do with the deficit.

That's not just me saying that.

Ronald Reagan (and remember how much Obama likes him?) says so too:

The GOP — Plan B vs. Plan B

So, here's your GOP cheat sheet, as Carrot Face, John Boehner, pushes a "Plan B" to avoid a fiscal non-cliff. Plan B is fine when it imposes deficit austerity and screws the poor and middle class. Plan B is horrible when it's a birth control pill to prevent tragically unwanted effects of screwing among the poor and middle class.

It's all about who's been screwed, when, where and why.