It bears repeating that…

… fundamentalists do not respect secular authority.  They do not recognize the government of man as legitimate, only the government of God.  It’s something to keep in mind while watching how the State Department and Obama’s foreign policy team deal with the attack on US embassies in the Middle East.  It’s unlikely that secular authorities in those countries could use too much force without provoking even more backlash and is why Hillary Clinton has been careful to not put too much emphasis on the governmental authorities to handle it.  The responsible authorities and reasonable people that must use persuasion to bring some order to the chaos are the religious leaders.

It’s a tricky situation.  Whoever made and released that video knew what they were doing.

Roger Ebert is also pondering what I’m pondering.  Here is his post on the subject of inflammatory films and their mysterious makers.

Thursday: Charity, a question and a poll

Well, that didn’t last long.  My car is making unpleasant noises and is hard to steer.  Not sure what’s going on but I know who’s going to make it right so off I go back to the garage this morning.

In the meantime, Seth Andrews of The Thinking Atheist, is setting out to prove that secular people can be as generous and caring and humanitarian as religious people.  He has found two charities that are worthy of your attention. You *can* do good without God. Take a look:

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The Question: In less than a year, we have seen marches for the 99% by Occupy Wall Street, Rallies on the Mall for Secular people and even vigils of hoodied people for Trayvon Martin.

Where the f^&* are the women???  Why isn’t NOW, NARAL, the Feminist Majority, etc, planning a massive jillion woman march in Washington?  I am completely baffled by our lack of a presence.  We should be out there with big signs that say, “I’m female and I vote”.  The best I’ve seen so far is the protest in Virginia, while well attended, is hardly the national presence we need sitting down in Washington.  Yeah, they’re tearing up the Mall right now for renovations but c’mon, this is just inexcusable.

Side question: has anyone other than me noticed that NOW seems to have mission creep?  I know that marriage equality, racism and Trayvon Martin are important issues but maybe it would be better to just stick to the basics for awhile and stop trying to be all things to all people.  The site is starting to remind me too much of the all suffering, sacrificing mother who can’t say no to all the demands on her and neglects her own interests.

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The Poll:  Atrios is getting down to the final wankers for the lead up to The Wanker of the Decade.  Who is it going to be?