But remember, it's Christians who suffer the real persecution

Killing gay men is OK, says British imam:

Arshad Misbahi of the Manchester Central Mosque confirmed his views in a conversation to John Casson, a local psychotherapist.

Casson said: "I asked him if the execution of gay Muslims in Iran and Iraq was an acceptable punishment in Sharia law, or the result of culture, not religion.

"He told me that in a true Islamic state, such punishments were part of Islam: If the person had had a trial, at which four witnesses testified that they had seen the actual homosexual acts."

"I asked him what would be the British Muslim view? He repeated that in an Islamic state these punishments were justified. They might result in the deaths of thousands but if this deterred millions from having sex, and spreading disease, then it was worthwhile to protect the wider community."

"I checked again that this was not a matter of tradition, culture or local prejudice. 'No,' he said, 'It is part of the central tenets of Islam: that sex outside marriage is forbidden; this is stated in the Koran and the prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) had stated that these punishments were due to such behaviours.'"

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Success!

Well, it took me all of yesterday and several hours of today, but I created a program that will automatically download pages from GoogleBooks to my hard drive. Several hours spent to be able to download three hundred pages in a matter of moments. Well, okay, I only downloaded the 188 pages of The Negro at Home that I didn't download previously, but still.

Although this will just add to the great amounts of books I don't have time to read....
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Return of the OTP

My god. Google Books has the full text of The Negro at Home. It's not in a handy PDF format, but now that I've got a copy of Adobe Acrobat, I can download all the pages and make a PDF myself.

Sure, it'll be tedious doing that for nigh-300 pages, but I already did the same for 78 pages when I downloaded Subgenation. A few hours of time versus $2750--I think I know which I'd rather spend.
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Friday Dead Racist Blogging: Woolly Edition

The negro is not the equal of the white man, much less his master, as your bill makes him; and this I can demonstrate anatomically, physically, and psychologically too, if necessary. Volumes of scientificc authority establish the fact; I might "pile Pelion on Ossa" to demonstrate it, if this were a hall of science for such discussions, or if there were time for such discussions here. All that I have opportunity to do here is in the fewest words possible to set forth scientific facts. The negro man differs more from the white man than a white man from a white woman, and the difference is essential, organic, throughout, from the crown of the head to the very sole of the feet. The negro is a different creature, with a different brain and different structural organization and in every respect inferior to the white governing man.

The very hair which crowns his head is not hair, but it is wool, wool, and wool only. He who will take the trouble to examine it through the microscope, micrometer, and microtome will see that its structure is that of wool and not of hair. The hair of a white man is cylindrical; the section under the the microscope appears perfectly circular, and provided with a medullary canal, while the wool of the negro is flattened, so that its section exhibits an elongated ellipsis, in the axis of which no medullary canal is seen. It is this lateral compression which effects the peculiar frizzling of the hair, owing to its not taking place exactly in the direction of the longitudinal axis of the hair, but ascending in spirals, so that the hair resembles a spiral spring, which always returns to its shape when drawn out. (See M. Pruner Bey, De la Chevelure comme Caracteristique des Races Humaines, Carl Voght, et alios.)

--Representative James Brooks of New York, Congressional Globe, 40th Congress, 2nd Session, appendix, page 70.
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Irony

Lawmakers recess without voting on constitutional amendment:

State lawmakers yesterday again refused to vote on a proposed ban on same-sex marriages, a move that activists on both sides said effectively killed any chance that the measure would appear on the 2008 statewide ballot.

The House and Senate, meeting in a special joint session, voted to recess before taking up a proposed amendment to the state constitution that would limit the legal definition of marriage to the union of one man and one woman. Lawmakers voted to adjourn the session until Jan. 2, the last official day of the session.

And Governor Romney's reaction?

"My options are limited," Romney said. "But we will explore any other alternatives that may exist to protect the constitutional rights of our citizens."

Good for you, Romney! Protect the constitutional rights of all your citizens to marry, regardless of the sex of their partner!

Shortly after the vote, Romney called a press conference and blasted the 109 lawmakers who voted to recess, saying "we have witnessed the triumph of arrogance over democracy."

"Today, by effectively avoiding the constitutionally required vote on same-sex marriage, 109 legislators disgraced their oath of office," Romney said, adding that it was clear the intent was to kill the measure altogether.

Mineau urged Romney to take legal action to force a vote, but the governor acknowledged that because the Legislature had recessed instead of adjourning, he was probably powerless to do anything about it.

...oh.

I guess gay people aren't citizens.
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Education at work

You think allowing ebonics as a language in the classroom is bad? Well, New Zealand is allowing 'text-speak' in exams:

New Zealand's Qualifications Authority said that it still strongly discourages students from using anything other than full English, but that credit will be given if the answer "clearly shows the required understanding," even if it contains text-speak.

The authority's deputy chief executive for qualifications, Bali Haque, said students should aim to make their answers as clear as possible.

Confident that those grading papers would understand answers written in text-speak, Haque stressed that in some exams, including English - where good language use is specifically required - text abbreviations would be penalized.

There are two notable responses to this development. One I loathe...

"I think text messaging is one of the most exciting things that has happened in a long time. It is another development in that wonderful thing we call the English language," [High School principal Denis Pyatt] said.

And one I love....

The minor United Future Party said in a statement: "Untd Futr is cncernd bout da xeptnce of txt spk 2 b allwd in ritn xams 4 NCEA (United Future is concerned about the acceptance of text speak to be allowed in written exams for NCEA)."

"Skoolz r ther 2 educ8 + raze litracy 2 certn standrds (Schools are there to educate and raise literacy to certain standards)," the statement quoted United Future legislator Judy Turner as saying. "NCEA shudnt let da standrd b decidd by informl pop cultr of da time."

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It was only a matter of time

Gay marriage opponent sets sights on no-fault divorce:

A leading supporter of the gay marriage ban approved by voters this week says it's just the first step in an effort to build a "culture of marriage" in Wisconsin.

Family Research Institute executive director Julaine Appling says the next step is "stopping the bleeding of no fault divorce."

Apparently gays aren't "the enemy"--anyone who thinks their relationship is their business and not someone else's is the enemy.
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Didn't see it like that.

Bob Harris tells us why this election was really more of a victory than is being popularly considered, despite everything else:

If the numbers stay as they are, here’s the final scoreboard, assuming I haven’t missed something:

• Not one Democratic incumbent lost in the Senate.
• Not one Democratic incumbent lost in the House of Representatives.
• Not one Democratic incumbent lost in any state Governorship.

I checked the results--he's right. In the Senate, six incumbents lost (in Missouri, Montana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Virginia), and they were all Republicans. In the House, the incumbents of the following districts lost:

• Arizona 5
• California 11
• Connecticut 2
• Connecticut 5
• Florida 22
• Indiana 2
• Indiana 8
• Indiana 9
• Iowa 2
• Kansas 2
• Kentucky 3
• Minnesota 1
• New Hampshire 1
• New Hampshire 2
• New Mexico 1
• New York 19
• New York 20
• North Carolina 11
• Pennsylvania 4
• Pennsylvania 7
• Pennsylvania 8
• Pennsylvania 10

All of them were Republicans.

And as for Governors, only the incumbent from Maryland lost, and he was a Republican.

Further, it appeared to be a great day for diversity (see Mr. Harris's post for links):

First female Speaker of the House.

First Muslim in the U.S. Congress.

More gay candidates taking office in state elections than ever before.

First black state governor in Massachusetts history (and only the second in American history).

So... not bad. Still only a start, though. But it's still worth it just to see the fundies flip.
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I'll give you a cauliflower ear!

Democrats have majority in both houses?

– Democrats completed an improbable double-barreled election sweep of Congress on Wednesday, taking control of the Senate with a victory in Virginia as they padded their day-old majority in the House.

Jim Webb's victory over Sen. George Allen in Virginia assured Democrats of 51 seats when the Senate convenes in January. That marked a gain of six in midterm elections in which the war in Iraq and President Bush were major issues.

Earlier, State Sen. Jon Tester triumphed over Republican Sen. Conrad Burns in a long, late count in Montana.

I believe this '51' includes the two Independents of the Senate, one of whom is Lieberman.

I was tickled by Bush's response, though:

"It was a thumping," Bush conceded at the White House. "It's clear the Democrat Party had a good night."

I don't know why, but I like that he used the word 'thumping'.
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Didn't see that coming

Uh, wow. The Democrats win, and already we're seeing some changes:

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, architect of an unpopular war in Iraq, intends to resign after six stormy years as secretary of defense, Republican officials said today.

Officials said Robert Gates, former head of the CIA, would replace Rumsfeld.

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