Update: Greta Thunberg's Gaza aid ship

• DETAILS: DemocracyNow.org

Hooray for Mexico: Madam Pres. Sheinbaum

Will future President Stein fix relations with Mexico and work with Presidente Sheinbaum?

.

Claudia Sheinbaum: How Mexican women’s movement paved the way for election of first female president

(Democracy Now!) June 4, 2024: In a historic election, Jewish Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo has become the first woman elected president of Mexico (after 65 male presidents and 200 years of democracy). Pres. Elect Sheinbaum is a former climate scientist, former mayor of Mexico City, and close ally of sitting president Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO).

• The official name of Mexico is the United Mexican States (los Estados Unidos Mexicanos)

The United Mexican States: an ancient country

"She owes a lot to women's movements in Mexico," says Laura Carlsen, director of MIRA: Feminisms and Democracies.

"This is more than a symbolic victory. What it means is that there's an example for younger women that women can be leaders." Carlsen says feminist movements are hopeful Sheinbaum's administration will take on Mexico's high rates of gender-based violence and femicide.

Jill Stein for president 2024 (jillstein2024.com)

Presidente Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo

Meanwhile, to the north, senile Pres. Biden is signing an executive order today that would temporarily shut down the U.S.-Mexico border after asylum requests made by migrants [at any entry point, not just official crossings] surpass 2,500 a day, and Mexico's cooperation will be key in enforcing the measure.

We've been waiting a long time for Stein.

[Will American Pres. Jill Stein, the first Jewish female elected in the U.S., extend a hand to our southern neighbor and make a good impression? Or will prisoner Trump find a way to tweet out of prison and spoil the proceeding as we inaugurate a new era of positive relations?]

Is Mexico violent? Yes, not as much as the US, but it's the cartels feeding US drug demand causing corruption

• Latest Shows. Support: democracynow.org/donate...
• Jimmy Dore, Kurt Metzger (jimmydore.com); Amy Goodman (democracynow.org, June 4, 2024); Mexican Institute of Sound, "Mexico"; Crystal Quintero, Sheldon S., Seth Auberon (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Scientists find trigger for Mayan collapse

David Nield, HUMANS, ScienceAlert, 2/4/24; Xochitl, Crystal Q. (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Once abundant freshwater went underground, into sinkholes (cenotes), making farming difficult.

Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico: The temples of central Mayapan today (Bradley Russell).

.

Scientists say they've found the trigger for ancient Maya's collapse, and it reads like a warning

Mexico, once Mesoamerica, is in North America

Researchers peering back through 800 years of history have concluded that Mayapan – the capital of culture and politics for the Maya people of Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula (across the Gulf from the USA) in the 13th and 14th century CE – may well have been undone by drought.

That drought would have led to civil conflict, which would, in turn, have brought about political collapse, according to the researchers.

People would then have retreated to smaller and safer settlements. As well as giving us a useful insight into the history of this ancient people, the 2022 study served as a warning as well: about how shifts in climate can quickly put pressures on even the most well-established and prosperous civilizations. 

"Multiple data sources indicate that civil conflict increased significantly, and generalized linear modeling correlates strife in the city with drought conditions between 1400 and 1450 CE," wrote the researchers in their paper, published in July 2022.

"We argue that prolonged drought escalated rival factional tensions, but subsequent adaptations reveal region-scale resiliency, ensuring that Maya political and economic structures endured until European contact in the early 16th century CE."

The team already had a lot of historical records to work with, covering population change, contemporary diets, and climate conditions.

These records were augmented with a new analysis of human remains for signs of traumatic injury (pointing to conflict). More

Protesters attack Mona Lisa with soup

The NY Post, 1/28/24; DW; Seth Auberon, Crystal Q., Ashley Wells (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

What are you smirking at, B*tch? - Nothing, you see? Now my wry smile has gone away.

• What were they thinking?! Climate activists throw soup at the [bulletproof glass shied in front of the] 'Mona Lisa' (Smithsonian via MSN)

Protesters hurl soup at Da Vinci’s Mona Lisa in Paris museum

(New York Post) A pair of female climate change activists hurled bright orange pumpkin soup at the Mona Lisa on Sunday at the Louvre (pronounced \lew'vrhh/) Museum in Paris as onlookers gasped, shocking new video shows.

Due to the Mandella Effect, she's different now.

“What is more important,” the crazed activists shouted in French, “art or the right to have a healthy and sustainable food system?”

The two caring females (young and old, of two very different generations) are members of the activist group called Riposte Alimetaire, or “Food Response,” which issued a statement saying the stunt was meant to highlight the need to protect the environment.

• Activists splatter 'Mona Lisa' with soup in Louvre (MSN)

Activists throw soup at Leonardo Da Vinci's Mona Lisa in Paris | DW News

(DW News) Jan. 28, 2024: Leonardo Da Vinci's world-famous painting "The Mona Lisa" has been attacked. Two climate change protesters threw soup at the priceless artwork, which is protected by thick bulletproof glass in Paris' Louvre Museum. The attackers then called for the reforms to the French agricultural system. #Paris #MonaLisa #Louvre

We want the original back!

“Two activists from the environmental movement ‘Riposte Alimentaire’ sprayed pumpkin soup on the armored glass protecting the Mona Lisa, this Sunday, January 28, 2024, around 10:00 am,” the museum said in a statement, according to CNN.

“The Louvre’s security staff immediately intervened.” [The world famous painting was not hurt in the slightest nor, apparently, was it meant to be. It's safe and well protected.]

• Read more at: nypost.com/2024/01/28/news/pr...  #monalisa #louvre #paris

Climate chaos hypocrisy w/ Czar Kerry

Russell Brand, July 27, 2023; Seth Auberon, Sheldon S. (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

NEED ANYMORE PROOF?!

(Russell Brand) July 27, 2023. As enfeebled Joey Biden’s Climate Czar John Kerry is caught lying about owning and using a private jet, does this show everything we already thought about the Establishment’s standard of hypocrisy when it comes to the climate? It’s OK when they do it. And what about sweet but phony Greta Thunberg? What will this mean about her likely ghostwritten climate book? #climatechange #climate #global

• WATCH Brand LIVE weekdays on Rumble

Bill Gates controls the world: Vandana Shiva

Bill Gates exposed: Philanthropy to control the world with Vandana Shiva

(Stars & Destruct.) Feb. 22, 2023. Vandana Shiva discusses Bill Gates' recent acquisition of vast amounts of U.S. farmland -- becoming the country's largest landowner -- and his apparent desire to control the world's food supply through initiatives such as lab-grown foods and carbon offsetting schemes and vaccines.

Shiva argues that Gates' "philanthropic" giving is actually a form of grabbing power and taking control, raising concerns about the negative implications of his profit motive and actions for small farmers, biodiversity, and our environment.

• Subscribe to s+d.: youtube.com/@starsanddest...
• Full episode: Vandana Shiva & B...
• Philanthrocapitalism book: synergeticpress.com
• Vandana Shiva link: twitter.com/drvandanashiva
• From the makers of @bohobeautiful

Why 82% of Mexico is empty (video)

RealLifeLore, Feb. 18, 2023; Crystal Quintero, Pfc. Sandoval (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Mexican food is best.

(RealLifeLore) A large portion of the country of Mexico, or the United Mexican States as it's really named, is little populated, whereas most of its population of 128 million is squeezed into a tight band at the center. Why? And why has it been like this for so long? In looking into it, we find out a lot about the USA, too.

• Buddhism in Mexico

Subscribe to Brilliant for 20% off an annual subscription: brilliant.org/RealLifeLore. Watch more than 20 additional exclusive RealLifeLore videos on Nebula in Modern Conflicts: nebula.tv/modernconflicts. Subscribe: bit.ly/2dB7VTO​​​.

Select video clips are courtesy of Getty Images. Select video clips are courtesy of the AP Archive.  Special thanks to MapTiler/OpenStreetMap Contributors and GEOlayers 3.

"GREED is good"? (Family Guy cartoon)

Seth Auberon, Pat Macpherson, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly; Natural Born Republican Oliver Stone, Hollywood Liberal Michael Douglas; IMDB.com; Stewie and Brian (Family Guy/FOX TV)

WARNING: Extreme, graphic, animated, gratuitous loan-repayment violence! Rated NC-17!

It says so right on the new American dollar, the trusty greenback, "In Greed We Trust"

.

Gold dust day gecko (wiki)

In Oliver Stone's "Wall Street," the lead Reptilian (Naga), Gordon Gekko, explains:

"The richest one percent of this country owns half our country's wealth, five trillion dollars. One third of that comes from hard work. [The other] two thirds comes from inheritance, interest on interest accumulating to widows and idiot sons and what I do -- stock and real estate speculation. It's b-llsh-t.

Violent US football, greed, gambling, drinking

"You got 90% of the American public out there with little or no net worth. I create nothing. I own. We make the rules, pal. The news, war, peace, famine, upheaval, the price per paper clip -- we pick that rabbit out of the hat while everybody sits out there wondering how the hell we did it. Now you're not naive enough to think we're living in a democracy, are you, buddy?

It's the free market. And you're a part of it. You've got that killer instinct. Stick around, pal, I've still got a lot to teach you...." "If you need a friend, get a dog.

Titan (asura) dragon Sun Tzu, The Art of War

Bud Fox: "Sun-Tzu: If your enemy is superior, evade him. If angry, irritate him. If equally matched, fight. And if not, split and reevaluate."
 

Carl Fox: "Money's only something you need in case you don't die tomorrow..."
 

Gordon Gekko: The point is, ladies and gentlemen, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good.

 

Carl Fox: "Stop going for the easy buck, and start producing something with your life. Create instead of living off the buying and selling of others."

  

Lou Mannheim: "Man looks in the abyss; there's nothing staring back at him. At that moment, man finds his character. And that is what keeps him out of the abyss." "The main thing about money, Bud, is that it makes you do things you don't want to do.

 

Stealing on an industrial scale: Wall Street, NY, home of the brutal U.S. brand of capitalism.

.

Wake up before you're "poor"!

Gordon Gekko: [At the Teldar Paper stockholder's meeting] "Well, I appreciate the opportunity you're giving me, Mr. Cromwell, as the single largest shareholder in Teldar Paper, to speak. Well, ladies and gentlemen, we're not here to indulge in fantasy but in political and economic reality. America, America has become a second-rate power. Its trade deficit and its fiscal deficit are at nightmare proportions. Now, in the days of the free market, when our country was a top industrial power, there was accountability to the stockholder. 

Destroy us, but who cares? As long as I'm rich.

"The Carnegies, the Mellons, the men that built this great industrial empire, made sure of it because it was their money at stake. Today, management has no stake in the company! All together, these men sitting up here own less than three percent of the company. And where does Mr. Cromwell put his million-dollar salary? Not in Teldar stock; he owns less than one percent. You own the company. That's right, you, the stockholder. And you are all being royally screwed over by these, these bureaucrats, with their luncheons, their hunting and fishing trips, their corporate jets and golden parachutes."

Why feed the needy when you can feed the greedy? "End corporate welfare and maybe we can get people off welfare." Disaster capitalism means getting rich from public coffers.

  
Cromwell: "This is an outrage! You're out of line, Gekko!"

If too much is not enough, maybe more?

Gordon Gekko: Teldar Paper, Mr. Cromwell, Teldar Paper has 33 different vice presidents each earning over $200,000.00 a year. Now, I have spent the last two months analyzing what all these guys do, and I still can't figure it out. One thing I do know is that our paper company lost $110,000,000.00 last year, and I'll bet that half of that was spent in all the paperwork going back and forth between all these vice presidents. The new law of evolution in corporate America seems to be survival of the unfittest. Well, in my book you either do it right or you get eliminated. In the last seven deals that I've been involved with, there were 2.5 million stockholders who have made a pretax profit of 12 billion dollars. Thank you. I am not a destroyer of companies. I am a liberator of them! The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good.

In Benjamin I trust. It's all about the Bens!

"Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed in all of its forms -- greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge -- has marked the upward surge of mankind. And greed, you mark my words, will not only save Teldar Paper but that other malfunctioning corporation called the USA. Thank you very much."

.

Stop runaway capitalism. End the climate crisis that's killing our planet! #FloodWallStreet

.

"Fox, where the hell are you? I am losing MILLIONS! You got me into this airline, and you sure as hell better get me out or the only job you'll ever have on the Street is SWEEPING it! You hear me, Fox?"

 

Bud Fox: "You once told me, don't get emotional about stock. Don't! The bid is 16.5 and going down. As your broker, I advise you to take it."
 
Gordon Gekko: "Yeah. Well you TAKE IT! [shouting] right in the -ss, you f--king sc-mb-g c-cks-ck-r!"
 
Bud Fox: "It's two minutes to closing, Gordon. What do you want to do? Decide."
 

Gordon Gekko: [calming down] "Dump it." [Later, meeting alone together in Central Park] "Hiya, Buddy."

 

Bud Fox: [Nods as the both walk up to face one another] "Gordon."

 

Occupy Wall Street, Charlie Brown!

Gordon Gekko: [With a smirk on his face] "Sand bagged me on Bluestar, huh? I guess you think you taught the teacher a lesson that the tail can wag the dog, huh? Well, let me clue you in, pal. The ice is melting right underneath your feet." [Punches Bud and grabs him by the coattails] "Did you think you could've gotten this far this fast with anyone else, huh? That you'd be out there d-cking someone like Darien? No.

"I am the 1%." What are you?

"You'd still be cold-calling widows and dentists trying to sell them 20 shares of some dog sh-t stock. I took you in [hits him again] a NOBODY! [hits him again] I opened the doors for you! Showed you how the system works! The value of information! How to get it! Fulham Oil! Brant Resources! Geodynamics! And this is how you f-cking pay me back, you COCKROACH? [He hits him once again and Bud falls to the ground]. I GAVE you Darien. I GAVE you your manhood. I gave you EVERYTHING!"

Where's my money?

[He calms down then takes out his handkerchief and throws it to Bud to clean off the blood the way Stewie once threw a towel at Brian after beating and torturing him -- in the video above -- over a late loan payment saying, "Here, clean yourself off."]

 

Gordon Gekko: "You could've been one of the great ones, Buddy. I looked at you and saw myself. Why?"

(Showtime) Formerly Republican Oliver Stone goes good:  "Untold History of the United States," Episode 3, The Bomb

• Are you a fox or a wolf on MLK Day 2015? Don't confuse non-resistance with non-violent resistance. Resist like a ninja, like a flexible tree, like water that gives way only to come back again and again and again. "We shall overcome" as Malcolm X, SNCC, Marley and others would all agree.
• Global power project: Bilderberg Group and Int'l Monetary Fund (occupy.com)
• Canada casts global surveillance dragnet over file downloads (Glenn Greenwald)
• Middle class shrinks further as more fall out instead of climbing up
• Manufacturing TERROR: How FBI invents some plots and ignores others in their war on freedom
• Pressured by Monsanto, Europe backtracks on GMOs as food fight shifts
• London's supremacy grows as Britain's north-south economic divide widens

Scarcity? Here's my share. Don't touch it or I'll kill you! What did you get for yourself?

Earthday 2010: April 16-17, 22

OFFICIAL EARTH DAY 2010 CAMPAIGN
Forty years after the first Earth Day, the world is in greater peril than ever. While climate change is the greatest challenge of our time, it also presents the greatest opportunity -- an opportunity to build a healthy, prosperous, clean-energy economy now for the future.

Earth Day 2010 can be a turning point to advance climate policy, energy efficiency, renewable energy, and green jobs. Earth Day Network is galvanizing millions who make personal commitments to sustainability. Earth Day 2010 is a pivotal opportunity for individuals, corporations and governments to join together and create a global green economy. Join the more than one billion people in 190 countries that are taking action for Earth Day. More>>

Los Angeles Events April 16-17, 2010

• Topanga Earth Day
  Annual Los Angeles festival promoting ecological awareness
• Earthday Los Angeles
• Santa Monica Promenade
• Venice (Beach) Eco Fest

The Marvel of Science
PHYSICS 21: Science from Superheroes to Global Warming
Putting free courses online was the first step in reimagining education. For those who find ideas in Physics for Future Presidents overwhelming, Science From Superheroes to Global Warming may be a better fit. Not that there aren’t plenty of ideas in this course... Syllabus Sampler

An Open Mind - What They’re Watching - Economics Yale: My Teacher Is an Index - French Carnegie Mellon: Voilà! A Better e-Course - Music Connexions: The Music Lesson - Psychology Yale: Why We Go Cuckoo for… - History M.I.T.: Asian Culture Through a Lens - Psychology Yale: Smiles, Sex and Object Permanence - Genetics U.C.L.A.: Decoding DNA - Physics U.C. Berkeley: Atoms and Antimatter - Linear Algebra M.I.T.: The Matrix - Computer Science Stanford: They Have a Class for That - Anatomy U.C. Berkeley: The Inner Body

News of the Day: HEADLINES

U.S. is most religious in industrialized world
With 89 percent of the population religious and 62 percent highly so, the U.S. is the most religious nation in the industrialized world, according to the Bertelsmann Foundation's Religion Monitor, an international survey released this week. Religiosity remains high among all adult age groups. And large majorities of Catholics and Protestants say that their religious beliefs affect their political views. Faith plays a far less significant role in developed European countries such as Britain, France, and Germany. The Religion Monitor asked 21,000 people in 21 countries nearly 100 questions about their interest in religious topics...

Buddhist monk eyes opening kung fu world
The sacred temple where kung fu was born some 1,500 years ago to spawn centuries of undefeated masters is at last surrendering to the almighty buck. Critics were kicking and screaming in outrage yesterday over plans to sell stock in the ancient monastery and turn it into a garish tourist attraction to cash in on the sport's popularity. (According to the AP, the local government entity in charge of managing the 1,500-year-old Buddhist temple's tourism-related assets plan to join with China Travel Service in a venture that will seek to raise up to 1 billion yuan or $146.4 million).

The Rise of Robots, What Would the Buddha Think?

While the ability of inanimate objects to have a soul is common to Buddhism, other religions, especially those that insist that human beings were created in the image of God, tend to disagree with the chance of robots being equal to people. "Even if robots have intelligence, they will never have a soul. Robots will never be equal to people...(RT) The Buddha taught that all life forms exist because of relationships. He taught that consciousness arises from various interactions without an eternal, independent soul.

Dalai Lama says Obama's Nobel "a little early"
As President Barack Obama prepares to accept the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, the Dalai Lama told Sky News he believes the award is "a little early" and cautioned the U.S. president against relying too much on his advisers. The exiled Tibetan leader won the Nobel prize 20 years ago for his peaceful opposition to Chinese rule in his country.

Dalai Lama to teach "Heart Sutra" at IU

The Dalai Lama will visit Bloomington in May for the second time since he appointed Arjia Rinpoche as director of the Tibetan Mongolian Buddhist Cultural Center. He will give three teachings in the IU Auditorium. He has called the cultural center – which was established by his older brother and former IU professor, Thubten J. Norbu – the Kumbum of the West, or the religion’s monastery of the West. “People might think he only comes here because of his older brother. But even though his older brother has passed away, he’s still coming to visit the center,” Rinpoche said.

The Mystery of the Breath Nimitta

As the title suggests, there is a significant puzzle to be solved by any meditator or scholar who tries to clearly understand the qualities of experience that accompany the transition from mere attention to respiration to full immersion in jhanic consciousness... [T]here are good grounds for confusion on this matter as one traces the historical progression of the commentarial accounts...

Lindsay Lohan to seek spiritual succour in Bihar, India

Hollywood actress Lindsay Lohan will come looking for "spiritual nirvana" in Bihar. The actress, who is currently in India, is known to be "deeply inspired by Hinduism." Lohan, 23, will work on three BBC documentaries covering child trafficking. They will be shot in Bihar, sources at the BBC said. In the course of her shooting, Lohan will stay at an ashram in North Bihar -- bordering Nepal -- and will study the Hindu faith.

India's spiritual awakening
Globalization has been good for gods in the Indian subcontinent. As the region has remade itself, it has grown more devout, and its religions are becoming ever more entangled with politics.

The War Of Yoga: Bringing Our Troops To The Mat!

I posted a request from YogaforVets.com on my Facebook page the other day. It's a site founded in 2007 by Navy diver and yoga instructor Paul Zipes. He says he had the idea for the site because he wanted to support the troops and their recovery from war-related stress and injury. He says, "as a yoga teacher and a vet myself, listing free yoga classes for war vets was an easy decision."

Tibet's glaciers in danger of disappearing
Tibet's glaciers are melting at an alarming rate, scientists say. Black soot is probably responsible for as much as half of the glacial melt and greenhouse gases responsible for the rest, according to research announced Tuesday by NASA and the Chinese Academy of Sciences. "During the last 20 years, the black soot concentration has increased two- to three-fold..." a researcher from the Chinese Academy of Sciences said.

With Buddhist blessing, Van Duzer finishes 130-mile Nepal trek
"Out There Guy" reaches 17,769-foot-high Thorung La pass. My high-altitude Colorado lungs are no match for the mighty Himalayas. I never knew I'd miss oxygen so much. I'm panting like a dog with every pathetic step I take. This, coupled with the fact that I haven't eaten due to a stomach bug, is making life difficult. Skip sees that I'm destroyed and offers to take my bag. I should take his offer, but I wave him off: "I'm fine, man, couldn't be better." Confused thinking is one of the symptoms of acute mountain syndrome (AMS).

Climate summit personal for Nepalese delegate

Bhola Prasad Bhattarai traveled from his native Nepal to Denmark to see how the "big people see the little people." At the Copenhagen climate summit, Bhattarai, 33, head of an umbrella organization of 15,000 community forest user groups, has withstood a Scandanavian winter's chill, police charges, an arrest, pricey lunches -- and disappointment that ultimately, the global meeting could end up achieving little.

Maoist child soldiers to be released in Nepal
Under UN accord, almost 3,000 child soldiers who served in the Maoist rebel army during Nepal’s civil war will be released from camps and rehabilitated. The United Nations plan signed in Kathmandu yesterday. The children have spent the past three years in Maoist cantonments since the rebels laid down arms under a UN-backed peace accord in 2006 that ended the decade-long insurgency.

Archaeologist Discovers Traces of Social Networking

This find was in Ancient Greece’s Peripheral Temples. A new study has found evidence to suggest that subjects who lived in the periphery of ancient Greece built their temples in a way to strengthen their ties with mainland Greece. Ancient Greeks who lived in Sicily had their temples face the rising sun not for religious reasons, but to adhere to Greek conventions and forge a stronger bond with Greece, Alun Salt, an archaeo-astronomer with the University of Leicester, discovered in his research, cited by livescience.com.

Where the Wild Things Are

Attended by about 500, the [Bigfoot] conference mixed scientific presentations with folks hoping to make a buck off the creature’s legend. In the auditorium, American Museum of Natural History primate biologist Esteban Sarmiento lectured on great apes he’d studied in Africa, Sumatra and Borneo. National Book Award-­winning naturalist-author Peter Matthiessen described a possible Yeti encounter in Tibet and said academia needs to keep a skeptical, but open, mind on undocumented species.

Bigfoot's Museum: Loren Coleman on cryptozoology

For half a century, Loren Coleman has been obsessed with unusual animals, many of which may not exist. Loren is a cryptozoologist. He studies hidden and unknown animals and the mythology, urban legends, folklore, and culture surrounding them. Sure, Bigfoot, Yeti, and Nessie are the big names, but there are countless others -- the Jersey Devil, the Thunderbird, the Mothman. Loren has written more than a dozen books on the subject and posts daily at the Cryptomundo blog. Does he actually "believe" in Sasquatch or sea monsters? No, because belief, he has said, "belongs in the providence of religion." He just tries to keep an open mind...

Minnesota Bigfoot photo: Bigfoot or big fake
A purported Bigfoot photo taken by a trail camera in north central Minnesota has researchers and the media buzzing.Tim Kedrowski, a salesman from Rice, MN, admits to being skeptical that his motion-activated camera captured an image of the legendary creature but appears to be convinced the photo is not a hoax.

Ex-CIA official: N. Ireland peace targeted

Some former members of the Irish Republican Army -- "small in number" but "ruthless" -- are trying to undermine the agreement that ended 30 years of deadly violence in Northern Ireland, a former deputy director of the CIA said.

Theatre: "Ghetto" explores void in Christian spirituality
The play teems with hip-hop slang, boasts jokes about gold teeth and Tina Turner wigs, and enhances its dramatic sequences through rap and song. Behind the modern entertainment, though, are old-school messages: Get right with God before it's too late. Don't be a part-time Christian. Spread the word to others.

Bizarre Orb UFO seen above Wales

Many UFO hunters have started using video cameras with night vision capabilities. Consequently they are coming to the conclusion that UFOs are visiting earth much more frequently than previously thought. VIDEO

Looks may buy happiness, but only in the city
For country girls, pretty is as pretty does, study shows. Women’s magazines all spread the same message: Money may not buy you happiness, but beauty certainly will. A new study has actually proven that the women’s magazines were right — so long as you live in the city. But if you’re a country girl, it’s more of a case of “pretty is as pretty does.” Researchers have found that happiness for city women is quite dependent upon physical appearance. But in the country, looks don’t count for much...

Graphic testimony in sex-for-tickets case
"DESPERATE BLONDE NEEDS WS TIX. Diehard Phillies -- gorgeous tall buxom blond -- in desperate need of two World Series Tickets. Price negotiable -- I'm the creative type! Maybe we can help each other!" The World Series is long over, but this afternoon, the legal case against a Phillies fan who allegedly offered sex for Series tickets was just going into its second inning. Susan Finkelstein, 43, of West Philadelphia, was accused in late October of offering an undercover police officer various sex acts in return for World Series tickets.

How Pedophilia Lost Its Cool

Today’s idea: The priest sex scandals and the Roman Polanski case show a shift in American attitudes against pedophilia, an essay says — after a period in which “some enlightened folk took a considerably more relaxed view of the question of sex with youngsters.”

Religion, Culture, and Domestic Violence: Buddhism
BUFFALO, NY (WBFO Public Radio) - Thirteen women were brutally killed over the past year allegedly by the men they once loved. The domestic violence murders have stunned the community and left many asking questions. Among them, why do these women stay in such dangerous relationships? Domestic violence advocates say there are many factors making it hard for victims to break free. In at least two of the murders, there was speculation in the media that religion was a factor. Today, WBFO's Joyce Kryszak continues our series exploring the potential impact of religious traditions on domestic violence victims. She talked with Jeanette Ludwig a long-time member of the Buffalo Zen Dharma Buddhist community. Listen

• Thailand, where Santa is Jesus' Dad (CBS News)
• Foxhole Atheists vs. Christian Proselytizers in the Military (Christopher Hitchens, Vanity Fair)
• The Parable of the Garden and the Question of God (Anthony Gottlieb, More Intelligent Life)
• Facebook is for your public profile, not your private life (Julia Angwin, The Wall Street Journal)