You’ve Been Warned

Canada: Eroding Freedoms

Two stories via Persecuted Church:

Hutterite colony loses battle over photo ID

Yesterday (July 24, 2009) the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that all driver’s licences in Alberta must require photo ID regardless of one’s religious beliefs. After hearing the appeal by members of the Wilson Hutterite Colony more than nine months ago, the Supreme Court of Canada delivered a close 4-3 judgment to uphold Alberta rules requiring a digital photo for all new licences. Some Hutterite sects, however, believe the second commandment forbidding idolatry prohibits them from willingly having their photograph taken.

Saskatchewan marriage commissioner loses appeal

Saskatchewan Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Janet McMurty has upheld the ruling of the human rights tribunal that marriage commissioner, Orville Nichols did not have the right to refuse to marry a same-sex couple in April 2004 on basis of his personal Christian beliefs. The tribunal had also ordered Nichols to pay the complainant (a man identified only as M.J.) $2,500 in compensation.

Nichols had appealed the May 23, 2009 ruling, arguing that his religious beliefs should be protected under Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms. McMurty dismissed his argument, however, in her 39-page ruling today, concluding that the human rights tribunal was “correct in its finding that the commission had established discrimination and that accommodation of Mr. Nichols’ religious beliefs was not required.”

The Hutterite story is of particular interest to me since their historical roots are Anabaptist, just like mine.

Now Don’t Go Making Congress Mad!

And a government cover-up is better? 😐

And…the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, decided not to make public hundreds of pages of research and warnings about the use of phones by drivers — in part, officials say, because of concerns about angering Congress.

Help me out — why would that make Congress mad?

“We’re looking at a problem that could be as bad as drunk driving, and the government has covered it up,” said Clarence Ditlow, director of the Center for Auto Safety.

Here we go again. Somebody is going to tell me I can’t carry on a conversation while I’m driving. Come to think of it, I don’t talk much while I’m driving. I don’t drink much either.

The highway safety researchers estimated that cellphone use by drivers caused around 955 fatalities and 240,000 accidents over all in 2002.

That is astounding, but how do they go about estimating such things?

The research mirrors other studies about the dangers of multitasking behind the wheel. Research shows that motorists talking on a phone are four times as likely to crash as other drivers, and are as likely to cause an accident as someone with a .08 blood alcohol content.

😯

So, just add a new dimension to DUI. Maybe something along the lines of Driving Under the Influence of Conversation.

Wait a minute — why am I wasting my time here again????!!!! 🙁

One more thing: Will the time come when we attach drunk driving stigma to distracted driving?

Read the rest of the New York Times story here: In 2003, U.S. Withheld Data Showing Cellphone Driving Risks.

Of Graphene and Bottled Water

I was winding down my computer stuff for the day when I saw two interesting headlines. Here are the introductions to the stories, under my modified headlines:

New Wonder Material, One Atom Thick

Imagine a carbon sheet that’s only one atom thick but is stronger than diamond and conducts electricity 100 times faster than the silicon in computer chips.

That’s graphene, the latest wonder material coming out of science laboratories around the world. It’s creating tremendous buzz among physicists, chemists and electronic engineers.

“It is the thinnest known material in the universe, and the strongest ever measured,” Andre Geim , a physicist at the University of Manchester, England , wrote in the June 19 issue of the journal Science.

“A few grams could cover a football field,” said Rod Ruoff , a graphene researcher at the University of Texas, Austin , in an e-mail. A gram is about 1/30th of an ounce.

Like diamond, graphene is pure carbon. It forms a six-sided mesh of atoms that, through an electron microscope, looks like a honeycomb or piece of chicken wire. Despite its strength, it’s as flexible as plastic wrap and can be bent, folded or rolled up like a scroll.

Skip the Bottled Water

Consumers know less about the water they pay dearly for in bottles than what they can drink almost for free from the tap because the two are regulated differently, congressional investigators and nonprofit researchers say in new reports.

[…]

The researchers urged Americans to make bottled water “a distant second choice” to filtered tap water because there isn’t enough information about bottled water. The working group recommends purifying tap water with a commercial filter, however.

Now I must get to bed. I volunteered to take my Dad and my aunt to the Portland (Oregon) airport early tomorrow morning. To pull that off, I need to get up at three. 😯

Pope: “Charity in Truth”

So he released his latest encyclical:

Pope Benedict on Tuesday called for a “world political authority” to manage the global economy and for more government regulation of national economies to pull the world out of the current crisis and avoid a repeat.

The pope’s call for a re-think of the way the world economy is run came in new encyclical which touched on a number of social issues but whose main connecting thread was how the current crisis has affected both rich and poor nations.

[…]

The pope said every economic decision has a moral consequence and called for “forms of redistribution” of wealth overseen by governments to help those most affected by crises.

Benedict said “there is an urgent need of a true world political authority” whose task would be “to manage the global economy; to revive economies hit by the crisis; to avoid any deterioration of the present crisis and the greater imbalances that would result.”

Such an authority would have to be “regulated by law” and “would need to be universally recognized and to be vested with the effective power to ensure security for all, regard for justice, and respect for rights.”

Global economic political authority? No, thanks!

But it’s coming anyway.

The Bible tells me so (as I recall).

This Is News?!

More importantly, is it news that the average American cares about?

And even more important than that, do you care about this?

The National Security Agency is facing renewed scrutiny over the extent of its domestic surveillance program, with critics in Congress saying its recent intercepts of the private telephone calls and e-mail messages of Americans are broader than previously acknowledged, current and former officials said.

Then there’s this later in the story:

it is unavoidable that some innocent discussions of Americans will be examined.

Do you mind if something you say or write is examined?

How about anything?

How about everything?

“Oh be careful little tongue…. Oh be careful little hands….”

Yeah, that’s part of a children’s song that I and you would be wise to follow.

Source: E-Mail Surveillance Renews Concerns in Congress

Above all, love God!
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