My comment on (e:ejtower)'s latest post - by the way dude your new user pic is far superior to the earlier one.

Since people are commenting for me more than EJ, sadly, I will offer a second comment.

It was not my argument that achievements have been made FOR God, on God's behalf, or because of God. In no way did I ever imply it, either. The point was, Religion is not a hindrance to advancing as a people scientifically, intellectually, or otherwise. To state otherwise is patently false and ignores the totality of human existence.

(duhjay) - your "commentary" here is only a poorly veiled attempt at Christian bashing. You are the guy who defended media reports of the Indian caste system by saying "Well well well, the Christians are only helping because they want to convert people!" Very poor. Go back to sleep.

About war - I think simply saying "Well wars between people of different religion have been waged, therefore it's God's fault" is a horribly short sighted way of looking at things. It has always been, even up until today, about racial superiority and the acquisition of land and other resources. Not to mention, numerous wars (I would argue, the largest and deadliest wars of this centry as well) were/are waged with Religion having nothing to do with it. I'm not saying Religion is a non-factor - but instead saying it is only one component of a far more sinister and complex problem. Would any of you actually put forth the notion that if there were no Religion there would be no war? We do evil to each other based on every single possible way of dividing ourselves.

Saying God believers are fools, or using shaming, harassing, or humiliating language always makes me sad. Why? That is the language of Falwell. That is the language of Robertson. That is the language of the Imams and every other son of a bitch who thinks they are better than someone else for X, Y, or Z reason. It is exactly the same destructive force that has left us in ruin over and over again. Fundie atheists are no better than fundie religious types. My atheist father taught me this. The cycle continues.

I guess I'm the only person confident enough in my beliefs to not have to do that. Saying "I believe in God" has never hindered me in any way, and it never will, and there isn't an argument or any evidence to make it true. All anyone can do to me is a pathetic attempt to humiliate me, which only reveals the person as ignorant, hateful, and prejudiced.

There isn't anyone alive who can say with any matter of truth or authority God is real or not. That is a truly eye-rolling thing to consider. We shouldn't make the mistake of thinking we know more than we do - whether it is about God, about whether or not my wife is cheating on me, or whether the Yankees are going to win the World Series again. What are my lucky lottery numbers? You get the point. None of us will know for sure until we pass, and everyone would be a lot better of if it was left at that.

Anyway, that's about all I have to say on the topic of God, at least on estrip.

Just joking, Joshy, I will not be sharing my venom-pointed wisdom with the rest of the strip.

I wanted to share my beauty with the strip, but I can't find my web cam. Oh well! I don't much feel like smiling anyway.

Dart league started up again and we got SMOKED (and not in the good way) by these two chicks. We got beat 6 games to 1, and it was all because Jerry and I tapped into that Dominican rum Joshy got on a work trip. Sorry you had to find out about it this way Josh! Don't worry, there is plenty left. At any rate, people were like damn Jay you got smoked by these two chicks, what's up with that? They were GOOD. They played really well, so who cares if they each wore a set of tits? I just wish we wouldn't have gotten bombed beforehand so we could have put up a fight.

I have a lot of free time on my hands now. I've thought of the best solution for the dreaded V-Day celebration.

On V-Day, all you single e-strip ladies are invited to 750 for the inaugural "Love Jason Fest" - you can all come over, sip wine, eat food, and drape yourselves on Jason like he was a coatrack. Oh, it would be great if you girls could each chip in and bring over the wine and the food.

Jason

Edit: I am 99% sure (e:Salvatore) referred to the title of the new Strokes album in his latest journal entry. I've listened to it once through already, but so far I like it!

O ye who believe! seek help with patient perseverance and prayer; for Allah is with those who patiently persevere.

And say not of those who are slain in the way of Allah. "They are dead." Nay, they are living, though ye perceive it not.

Be sure we shall test you with something of fear and hunger, some loss in goods or lives or the fruits of your toil, but give glad tidings to those who patiently persevere,

Who say, when afflicted with calamity: "To Allah We belong, and to Him is our return".

They are those on whom (Descend) blessings from Allah, and Mercy, and they are the ones that receive guidance.

On no soul doth Allah Place a burden greater than it can bear. It gets every good that it earns, and it suffers every ill that it earns. (Pray:) "Our Lord! Condemn us not if we forget or fall into error; our Lord! Lay not on us a burden Like that which Thou didst lay on those before us; Our Lord! Lay not on us a burden greater than we have strength to bear. Blot out our sins, and grant us forgiveness. Have mercy on us. Thou art our Protector; Help us against those who stand against faith."

Okay I lied, I'm posting again but I have a reason - I'm too lazy to thank everyone personally. Thanks to those who have written to me privately and on the site, but my decision is final. And no I won't be coming to the Snow Party. I hope everyone has a good time.

Food for thought.......interesting and scary:

It is obvious to me that it is not tolerable for someone like me to speak politically here without being goated into hateful speech by the peanut gallery. I post mostly when I am upset about something and want to talk about it, rarely when I am happy and in a good mood. In a way it is therapeutic to get your thoughts out. However I will never accept being compared to murderers and killers of innocent people. That drove me over the edge, caused me to burn with intense anger and ruined my day. Although very funny in many ways I am not proud of my last journal entry so I erased the words. I let the hostility and thoughtlessness of others control me and from now on I refuse to let that happen. I have a mental illness and I have an extremely hard time controlling my emotions, and when someone takes advantage of it I am left helpless.

My journal doesn't reflect what I think about most of the time. You guys would probably think I'm even weirder than you do already if you knew some of my new agey outlook on life.

Call me an islamofascist, call me a pussy, call me brainwashed, call me whatever you want it does not matter anymore. I know it is all bullshit and that's good enough.

It is not healthy for me to be journaling anymore. Libs you have achieved it, you have silenced my speech. Good bye, friends!

Jason

Yes, dear reader, it is time to once again talk about Gender, which you know is one of my favorite topics. I'll try to be concise, but I can't make any promises! If you are easiliy offended by men who have a firm opinion and aren't afraid to express it you aren't going to be happy with me today, so you can kindly move on back to your bubble world and stay out of my fucking blog. Otherwise, read on!

Some of you may be familiar with Are Men Necessary? - the Maureen Dowd book concerning (loosely) the battle of the sexes. One of the central themes of the book deals with male attitudes toward successful (or powerful) women. Dowd claims that men don't want intelligent, successful women - in fact according to her we prefer bimbo sex kittens without a brain.

Let me set the record straight. It's not that we don't want the successful women, it's that they don't want us. It doesn't matter whether or not she makes $0 or $100,000 - a woman wants to be taken care of financially by her man. As women become more successful they do not expect to be the bread winner of the family. As this desire intensifies, their dating pool becomes much more shallow and narrowly defined, resulting in much tougher competition for the top X percent of men. Then as they get leathery and saggy they pout to each other, "Where are all the good mensfolk at?" It's not that men don't desire them - it is instead that successful women have essentially stated that most of the male population isn't good enough for them. Women are increasingly accepting singlehood in favor of a "sub-standard" man. Hope you got a solid warrantee with that Jackrabbit!

Then there is the case of Debra LeFave, and I know some of you are wondering why I haven't posted about this sooner. Miss fucking child rapist got off (pun not intended) and will not have to serve a single day of jail time. I don't care if she looks hot in a bikini - she is a rapist, a criminal, utter filth who like any other person who takes advantage of kids should be behind bars. Let her vag get pounded into submission in the clink - I don't feel bad for her at all. This is yet again another example of our system of inequality and social injustice. Are you a beautiful white girl? Well then you can get away with just about anything, including statutory rape! I hear a lot of talk around here about "protecting the weak and the vulnerable in our society" but I don't hear a damn peep when it comes to protecting the most weak and vulnerable among us, our children. Where is the outrage? The media and most of the population seem to not care at all when it comes to little boys. Let me give you all some necessary legal knowledge - a 14 year old cannot legally consent! I hope I'm not alone on this issue.

I recall at Dart League recently a team we played consisted of a guy and his very hot girlfriend - she requested he get her a bowl of lemons and some water. He came back with some water and she was all "Where are my lemons? Go back and get them!" I don't care how hot a girl is, or how much of a good lay she is - no guy should ever be so feminized or emasculated that they accept this kind of treatment from their girlfriend. I see so many feminized men out there and it seems we have been driven by the media to become this way. Put on that guy makeup! Get those eyebrows waxed! Shave your chest! Look, act, dress and smell such and such a way so you can please your woman! By the way, do you all notice that nobody ever wants women to do things to please their men? It's always about what the woman wants and needs. Yep, that's right, guys don't have any wants or needs - we are here for your entertainment purposes only! Relationships only go one way you know - if he acts up you can always just get rid of him and latch on to one of the guys you have on the backburner! Sorry, but this mindset just depresses the hell out of me. It's a wonder anybody has a functional relationship nowadays.

Jason

Here's some food for thought for you America hating, military hating, free speech hating, granola eating, tin foil cap wearing leftists out there:



Time for you guys to start taking terror seriously if you want to win elections!

Here's the CNN link from their front page:

"Poll: Most doubt Bush has plan for Iraq victory"


Yet...hidden in the text is this gem:

"The poll conducted Wednesday does not directly reflect how Americans are reacting to Bush's speech, because only 10 percent of the 606 adult Americans polled had seen it live and two-thirds had not even heard or read news coverage about it."

Oh, okay, okay CNN....you put this on your front page and you readily admit a majority of the people polled hadn't seen or heard anything about Bush's speech. How then can you say this is an accurate result? How can you put this on your front page?

But but but but JASON there isn't any media bias! Our media is owned by BushCo, for reallyz mang!

I really should start a company that manufactures quality tin foil hats. I would be on a far away island drinking rum runners right now had I thought of it a year ago. Maybe if I can pull this off I'll invite (e:Ajay) to come along so he can help me score some chix. =D

Since our media ignores any positive reports from Iraq (But but but we SWEAR it isn't biased!! Really!!!! *puts on tinfoil cap*) I thought I would provide Lieberman's speech for you.

---

I have just returned from my fourth trip to Iraq in the past 17 months and can report real progress there. More work needs to be done, of course, but the Iraqi people are in reach of a watershed transformation from the primitive, killing tyranny of Saddam to modern, self-governing, self-securing nationhood--unless the great American military that has given them and us this unexpected opportunity is prematurely withdrawn.
Progress is visible and practical. In the Kurdish North, there is continuing security and growing prosperity. The primarily Shiite South remains largely free of terrorism, receives much more electric power and other public services than it did under Saddam, and is experiencing greater economic activity. The Sunni triangle, geographically defined by Baghdad to the east, Tikrit to the north and Ramadi to the west, is where most of the terrorist enemy attacks occur. And yet here, too, there is progress.

There are many more cars on the streets, satellite television dishes on the roofs, and literally millions more cell phones in Iraqi hands than before. All of that says the Iraqi economy is growing. And Sunni candidates are actively campaigning for seats in the National Assembly. People are working their way toward a functioning society and economy in the midst of a very brutal, inhumane, sustained terrorist war against the civilian population and the Iraqi and American military there to protect it.

It is a war between 27 million and 10,000; 27 million Iraqis who want to live lives of freedom, opportunity and prosperity and roughly 10,000 terrorists who are either Saddam revanchists, Iraqi Islamic extremists or al Qaeda foreign fighters who know their wretched causes will be set back if Iraq becomes free and modern. The terrorists are intent on stopping this by instigating a civil war to produce the chaos that will allow Iraq to replace Afghanistan as the base for their fanatical war-making. We are fighting on the side of the 27 million because the outcome of this war is critically important to the security and freedom of America. If the terrorists win, they will be emboldened to strike us directly again and to further undermine the growing stability and progress in the Middle East, which has long been a major American national and economic security priority.

Before going to Iraq last week, I visited Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Israel has been the only genuine democracy in the region, but it is now getting some welcome company from the Iraqis and Palestinians who are in the midst of robust national legislative election campaigns, the Lebanese who have risen up in proud self-determination after the Hariri assassination to eject their Syrian occupiers (the Syrian- and Iranian-backed Hezbollah militias should be next), and the Kuwaitis, Egyptians and Saudis who have taken steps to open up their governments more broadly to their people. In my meeting with the thoughtful prime minister of Iraq, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, he declared with justifiable pride that his country now has the most open, democratic political system in the Arab world. He is right.
In the face of terrorist threats and escalating violence, eight million Iraqis voted for their interim national government in January, almost 10 million participated in the referendum on their new constitution in October, and even more than that are expected to vote in the elections for a full-term government on Dec. 15. Every time the 27 million Iraqis have been given the chance since Saddam was overthrown, they have voted for self-government and hope over the violence and hatred the 10,000 terrorists offer them. Most encouraging has been the behavior of the Sunni community, which, when disappointed by the proposed constitution, registered to vote and went to the polls instead of taking up arms and going to the streets. Last week, I was thrilled to see a vigorous political campaign, and a large number of independent television stations and newspapers covering it.

None of these remarkable changes would have happened without the coalition forces led by the U.S. And, I am convinced, almost all of the progress in Iraq and throughout the Middle East will be lost if those forces are withdrawn faster than the Iraqi military is capable of securing the country.

The leaders of Iraq's duly elected government understand this, and they asked me for reassurance about America's commitment. The question is whether the American people and enough of their representatives in Congress from both parties understand this. I am disappointed by Democrats who are more focused on how President Bush took America into the war in Iraq almost three years ago, and by Republicans who are more worried about whether the war will bring them down in next November's elections, than they are concerned about how we continue the progress in Iraq in the months and years ahead.

Here is an ironic finding I brought back from Iraq. While U.S. public opinion polls show serious declines in support for the war and increasing pessimism about how it will end, polls conducted by Iraqis for Iraqi universities show increasing optimism. Two-thirds say they are better off than they were under Saddam, and a resounding 82% are confident their lives in Iraq will be better a year from now than they are today. What a colossal mistake it would be for America's bipartisan political leadership to choose this moment in history to lose its will and, in the famous phrase, to seize defeat from the jaws of the coming victory.

The leaders of America's military and diplomatic forces in Iraq, Gen. George Casey and Ambassador Zal Khalilzad, have a clear and compelling vision of our mission there. It is to create the environment in which Iraqi democracy, security and prosperity can take hold and the Iraqis themselves can defend their political progress against those 10,000 terrorists who would take it from them.

Does America have a good plan for doing this, a strategy for victory in Iraq? Yes we do. And it is important to make it clear to the American people that the plan has not remained stubbornly still but has changed over the years. Mistakes, some of them big, were made after Saddam was removed, and no one who supports the war should hesitate to admit that; but we have learned from those mistakes and, in characteristic American fashion, from what has worked and not worked on the ground. The administration's recent use of the banner "clear, hold and build" accurately describes the strategy as I saw it being implemented last week.
We are now embedding a core of coalition forces in every Iraqi fighting unit, which makes each unit more effective and acts as a multiplier of our forces. Progress in "clearing" and "holding" is being made. The Sixth Infantry Division of the Iraqi Security Forces now controls and polices more than one-third of Baghdad on its own. Coalition and Iraqi forces have together cleared the previously terrorist-controlled cities of Fallujah, Mosul and Tal Afar, and most of the border with Syria. Those areas are now being "held" secure by the Iraqi military themselves. Iraqi and coalition forces are jointly carrying out a mission to clear Ramadi, now the most dangerous city in Al-Anbar province at the west end of the Sunni Triangle.

Nationwide, American military leaders estimate that about one-third of the approximately 100,000 members of the Iraqi military are able to "lead the fight" themselves with logistical support from the U.S., and that that number should double by next year. If that happens, American military forces could begin a drawdown in numbers proportional to the increasing self-sufficiency of the Iraqi forces in 2006. If all goes well, I believe we can have a much smaller American military presence there by the end of 2006 or in 2007, but it is also likely that our presence will need to be significant in Iraq or nearby for years to come.

The economic reconstruction of Iraq has gone slower than it should have, and too much money has been wasted or stolen. Ambassador Khalilzad is now implementing reform that has worked in Afghanistan--Provincial Reconstruction Teams, composed of American economic and political experts, working in partnership in each of Iraq's 18 provinces with its elected leadership, civil service and the private sector. That is the "build" part of the "clear, hold and build" strategy, and so is the work American and international teams are doing to professionalize national and provincial governmental agencies in Iraq.

These are new ideas that are working and changing the reality on the ground, which is undoubtedly why the Iraqi people are optimistic about their future--and why the American people should be, too.

I cannot say enough about the U.S. Army and Marines who are carrying most of the fight for us in Iraq. They are courageous, smart, effective, innovative, very honorable and very proud. After a Thanksgiving meal with a great group of Marines at Camp Fallujah in western Iraq, I asked their commander whether the morale of his troops had been hurt by the growing public dissent in America over the war in Iraq. His answer was insightful, instructive and inspirational: "I would guess that if the opposition and division at home go on a lot longer and get a lot deeper it might have some effect, but, Senator, my Marines are motivated by their devotion to each other and the cause, not by political debates."

Thank you, General. That is a powerful, needed message for the rest of America and its political leadership at this critical moment in our nation's history. Semper Fi.