Author: Jeff Milner

Yesterday I discovered a link to the moon and today I read about the background of the project. It started as a birthday wish on a post-it note.

A Colorado congressman by the name of Tom Tancredo suggested bombing Mecca, as what his spokesman called a “hypothetical” response to a future Islamist terror attack on US soil.

Talk show host Pat Campbell asked the Littleton Republican how the country should respond if terrorists struck several U.S. cities with nuclear weapons.

“Well, what if you said something like — if this happens in the United States, and we determine that it is the result of extremist, fundamentalist Muslims, you know, you could take out their holy sites,” Tancredo answered.

“You’re talking about bombing Mecca,” Campbell said.

“Yeah,” Tancredo responded.

It’s pretty much a given that this guy is a complete asshole, but questions that remain in my head are how does someone like this rise to congress and how many “good Americans” actually have the audacity to think like this?

Previous to the brave new world we now find ourselves in – post September 11th, 2001 – I would have thought a comment like this was so outrageous that it would be a waste of time to even think about it. With the asinine comments that a congressmen from the United States is willing to make about this kind of “hypothetical situation”, I’m forced to believe this kind of thinking is widespread.

Here’s a hypothetical scenario for Tom Tancredo, what if there were a horrific terrorist attack worse than any other in history and on US soil, that was carried out, not by an extremist Muslim, but by an equally fanatic Christian in the name of the Catholic Church? Hypothetically would you consider bombing The Vatican? It’s the exact same thing!

Sometimes reading the news makes me so mad.

I went to see the Fantastic Four movie yesterday. I was warned that it was a pretty terrible movie but as is often the case when you have bad expectations for a movie, I thought it was pretty good.

The part of the movie that made me the happiest, though, was seeing someone that I knew in the movie! I knew him from my one week stint, back in April, as a production assistant in Vancouver. The photo above is a screen shot I got from apple.com trailers – he’s the one in the truck.

Remember the folks that brought you the election parody cartoon “This Land” last year? Well here is the follow up: Second Term.

This Superman Animated Short by Chris Appelhans wasn’t really what I expected, but all the same, I think it’s great.

I just heard the news that the American border is once again open to Canadian cattle. This will make a lot of Canadian cattle ranchers very happy, but it raises some questions in my mind.

First of all, I’d just like to say that it seems kind of ridiculous that the border was ever closed in the first place because with as much cattle trading that happens between American and Canadian ranchers, it’s not like their cows have any less risk of Mad Cow compared to ours anyway.

Now with the border reopening, it doesn’t mean the threat of Mad Cow is any less than it was before (and don’t get me wrong, I don’t believe it’s a particularly big threat, just that the problem hasn’t actually been dealt with). With all the billions of dollars in government aid, I would have liked to see (or heard about anyway) what advances have been made in solving the actual problem of BSE (Mad Cow) instead of focusing all attention on the closed US border. What is going to happen in the way of reducing Mad Cow now that trade has resumed? Ironically the resumption of trade will probably be less, rather than more, of an incentive to find a permanent BSE solution.

Or lack thereof. The BBC reports that a recent study shows patients undergoing heart operations were no more likely to survive if they were prayed for than if they weren’t.

“[The] study found those who were prayed for were as likely to have a setback in hospital, be re-admitted, or die within six months as those not prayed for.

I can already hear the apologist viewpoint that of course the study isn’t going to prove the power of prayer – God wouldn’t allow THAT to happen because it would throw faith right out the window. To which I might reply, “that God person sure is tricky.”

Of course previous smaller studies have had different conclusions which evidentally God wasn’t worried about allowing our faith to be tampered with. (unrelated note: I find it interesting that the BBC uses the same stock photo for both articles).

Vlogging: like regular blogging but with more video. Check out Rocketboom.com for some great (if irreverent) video blog news.

Video blogs can be downloaded with podcasts! Wired has an article about the budding technology.

Google now lets your have a personalized google homepage. Some of the options available to personalize the page are:

• Your Gmail Messages
• The Stock Market
• The New York Times
• The BBC News
• Google News
• Your Weather
• Wired News
• Slashdot
• Movies
• Driving Directions
• Quote of the Day
• Word of the Day

You have to be logged in to Google to see the page, and I haven’t had much time to try it out, but at first glance I think it’s kind of neat.

Here is a list of interesting links I’ve stumbled upon lately (in no particular order):

• UBUWEB::365 Days Project (an MP3 for every day of the year)
• Tetris Final in Japan (video)
• Goggle Maps Globetrotting (photos)
• Sheep Dash! (reflex game)
• Watermelon Carvings (photos)
• BBC’s Step-by-Step Guide to Charisma (article)
• Chaos Theory (game)
• Good Experience Games (list of games)
• Crazy Ebay Mom (personal story w/ photos)
• Steve Jobs 2005 Commencement Address
• Will Ferrell: Class Day Speech
• Jon Stewart’s Commencement Address

I hope you enjoy some of these links.