The things you find by following links

There’s a pro-Hillary Clinton website out there that is trying to prove that Barack Obama’s birth certificate is fraudulent—that it is in fact a forgery to hide the fact that he’s an Indonesian citizen.Wow.I have two reactions to this. One, though I’m no expert, from what little I know about the forensic analysis of documents (from reading textbooks and the like a number of years ago), the evidence behind this argument (as presented by its partisans) looks difficult to refute.Two, the whole idea’s completely insane.Oh, and three: whether this is in fact legitimate or (more likely) the product of the fevered brains of a small group of disappointed Hillary backers, it just goes to show how far people will go these days to try to win an election. If I had to make a prediction, I’d expect this will go the same way as most of the crazy stories I’ve read over the years. (“Did you know Bill Clinton was running drugs out of the governor’s mansion in Little Rock?” Yeah, that kind of crazy story.) Still, every once in a while, one of those stories proves out . . . if this happens to be one of them, the next couple months are going to be a real roller-coaster ride.

Cloud of belief

I took my first credo post and ran it through Wordle—this is pretty cool, I think. (Sorry it’s so small; click on it to see it bigger.) I think I’ll keep adding them in, and see how it all looks.

Edit, 6/6/21:  Wordle is defunct, so I made new ones with wordclouds.com; that site allows you to choose your shape, and I couldn’t resist playing with it.

This week’s sign that the Apocalypse is upon us

(to borrow from Sports Illustrated, since it’s an old SI writer)

I’d call this unbelievable, but that’s not strong enough; it’s been a long time, even in this culture, since I’ve seen anything this despicably dishonorable. In this year’s Georgia Class AAA high school baseball championship game, the pitcher and catcher of the losing team (Cody Martin and Matt Hill, respectively) colluded to bean the plate ump with a four-seam fastball (this just a few minutes after said ump called strike three on the pitcher’s brother, Dodgers first-round pick Ethan Martin).

I agree with Rick Reilly: What are we turning into in this country, anyway?

More things in heaven and earth, indeed

Headline you never thought you’d see: Cat turns into woman in P/Harcourt – 5 killed as cultists clash

Nigerian Tribune learnt that three cats were crossing the busy road when the okada ran over one of them which immediately turned into a woman. This strange occurrence quickly attracted people around who descended on the animals. One of them, it was learnt, was able to escape while the third one was beaten to death, still as a cat though.According to a source who witnessed what happened, the cat-woman said she and the two other cat-fellows had travelled from Abuja to Port Harcourt to kill three people. “The woman said they came to Port Harcourt from Abuja and that they came to kill three people. She said they had succeeded in killing two people, but the third person, whom I guess might be a pastor, was difficult for them and that they were preparing to go back to Abuja,” said the source.

I have absolutely no idea what to make of this; but I’m not going to rule out a priori that it might be completely real. I’ve never heard of any such thing, but I know there are many things I don’t know; and I believe in God, I believe there is a Devil, and I’ve come up against demons before, so I have no real reason to say this sort of magic couldn’t happen, given people who believed in it and were willing to give themselves over to it. There are indeed more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in most of our philosophies, after all.Still, that’s pretty weird.

On a lighter note

I don’t know how many of the folks who read this blog will care one way or the other that Paul DePodesta, special assistant for baseball operations for the San Diego Padres and former GM for the Los Angeles Dodgers, started a blog this month, but I did think even those least interested in baseball would appreciate its title: It Might Be Dangerous… You Go First. (And if you do like baseball, this promises to be a great place to read about it.)

Are we really this easy to play?

Check this out—my thanks to Jared for posting this.

Jared’s right, that’s freaky; it’s also a little scary to think that we can be manipulated that easily. I like to believe I can think for myself—but this makes me wonder what influences are shaping my thought processes without my being aware of them. (And everyone else’s, for that matter.)

Again, credit where credit is due

I didn’t give Mitt Romney enough credit: today he suspended his campaign. It will be interesting to see how this plays out. Does this, as the pundits are saying, seal the deal for John McCain? Or does Gov. Romney’s support go to Mike Huckabee and make this a national two-person race?

Either way, it will probably mean one more lesson for the political-science curricula that are sure to be written off this screwball presidential campaign.