I'm sorry to say that this reasonable approach to Muslims shown by Jersey Governor Chris Christie (i.e., the lack of bigotry) is all too rare among Republicans. Lawrence O'Donnell reports:
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Christie's words shouldn't be inspirational, but they are in this climate of Republican bigotry.
CNN reports that the U.S. Air Force has just scrapped a long-running program that taught nuclear miss
ile launching officers that the Bible is OK with nuclear war:
The Air Force has suspended an ethics briefing for new missile launch officers after concerns were raised about the briefing's heavy focus on religion. The briefing, taught for nearly 20 years by military chaplains at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, is intended to train Air Force personnel to consider the ethics and morality of launching nuclear weapons - the ultimate doomsday machine. Many of the slides in the 43 page presentation use a Christian justification for war, displaying pictures of saints like Saint Augustine and using biblical references.This program had been taught for two decades before the recent change.
Author Julian Treasure points to a ubiquitous problem: We are losing our ability to listen, which means that we are losing our ability to connect to our world and to understand one another. He offers us five hints for better listening skills: 1. Spend three minutes a day in silence, to reset your ears. 2. In noisy places, focus on how many channels of sound are you listening to? 3. Savoring. Enjoy mundane sounds, like the the sound of machinery--they are "hidden choirs." 4. Change your listening position to what you are listening to. Active/Passive, or Critical/Empathic. 5. Use the acronym RASA: Receive, Appreciate, Summarize, Ask.
The CFPB website is now up. It contains information for consumers, and includes a link for submitting complaints about credit cards.
Have you ever heard of the "Internet Pornographers Act of 2011"? Until today, I hadn't either. Here's what this proposed law provides, according to Conor Friedersdorf of The Atlantic:
[U]nder language approved 19 to 10 by a House committee, the firm that sells you Internet access would be required to track all of your Internet activity and save it for 18 months, along with your name, the address where you live, your bank account numbers, your credit card numbers, and IP addresses you've been assigned . . . As written, The Protecting Children from Internet Pornographers Act of 2011 doesn't require that someone be under investigation on child pornography charges in order for police to access their Internet history -- being suspected of any crime is enough.No probable cause is even required. It's Big Brothers' dream come true. Now we'll watch to see whether any Congressional representative who has the willingness to oppose this bill because it violates civil liberties will be accused of approving of child pornography. That is the kind of argument that one might expect in the modern-day Congress.