Archives July 2006

Kent Hovind Arrested

From the
Pensacola News Journal:

Pensacola evangelist who owns the defunct Dinosaur Adventure Land in Pensacola was arrested Thursday on 58 federal charges, including failing to pay $473,818 in employee-related taxes and making threats against investigators.

Of the 58 charges, 44 were filed against Kent Hovind and his wife, Jo, for evading bank reporting requirements as they withdrew $430,500 from AmSouth Bank between July 20, 2001, and Aug. 9, 2002. […]

The indictment alleges Kent Hovind paid his employees in cash and labeled them “missionaries” to avoid payroll tax and FICA requirements. […]

The indictment also says the Hovinds’ made cash withdrawals from AmSouth Bank in a manner that evaded federal requirements for reporting cash transactions.

The withdrawals were for $9,500 or $9,600, just below the $10,000 starting point for reporting cash transactions. […]

Over Kent Hovind’s protests, the judge took away his passport and guns Hovind claimed belonged to his church.

Hovind argued that he needs his passport to continue his evangelism work. He said “thousands and thousands” are waiting to hear him preach in South Africa next month.

But Davis agreed with Assistant U.S. Attorney Michelle Heldmyer, who argued that “like-minded people” might secret Hovind away if he left the country.

Update: As of this writing, the top story at DrDino.com is “Exciting new developments at CSE”.

Fundies Have No Sense of Humor

Today’s nominee for Stupidest Person on the Planet O’ the Day is Pete from March Together for Life, for his post condemning Miss Caroline Weber for looking forward to her abortion. The only problem… let me take that back. The first obvious problem is that the article he’s criticizing is from the Onion.

(Note to Very Stupid People With No Sense Of Humor: the Onion is a satirical publication. The stories that appear in it are not true.)

Read More

Apologetics Is A Joke

A patient wakes up in a hospital and says, “Doctor! I can’t feel my legs!” The doctor replies, “Yes, we had to amputate both of your arms.” (Paraphrased from The Long Dark Tea Time of the Soul, by Douglas Adams.)

The reason this joke works is that when we read the first sentence, we build a certain mental image of the situation. But the second one, the punchline, causes us to rethink this image to make it fit not the facts that we imagined, but the facts that we are given.

What does this have to do with apologetics?
Read More

Theocrats In My Back Yard

“The ACLU has an ongoing nationwide campaign to take away the right of any citizen legislator to speak and pray according to his conscience and religious tradition,” [Indian River school] board member Reggie Helms said following that vote. “My freedom of speech is too important to compromise or risk its loss. Our court case, where we have been standing up to the ACLU, provides the opportunity for the federal court to permanently uphold my right not to be treated as a second-class citizen, or to have to move to the back of the bus.”

(Source: Newszap.com/Sussex Post.)

This isn’t happening in Alabama or Kansas, but in Delaware, practically in my back yard.

Read More

When to Optimize

The First Rule of Program Optimization:
Don’t do it.

The Second Rule of Program Optimization (for experts only!):
Don’t do it yet.

— Michael Jackson

Read More