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Raging Pencils by Mike "Stone Cold" Stanfill

Robert Peary's tongue.



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Raging Pencils is a chilly conceit of:

Mike Stanfill, Private Hand
Mike Stanfill, Private Hand
IllustrationFlash AnimationWeb Design

www.privatehand.com



Today's mystery web comic is:
SIMULATED COMIC PRODUCT


start rant

It's Magic, Man

(It's late. Need sleep. I'll let Mr. Jillette do all the talking for me today. =mike=)

penn gillette Penn Jillette: "What I believe."
Morning Edition, November 21, 2005:

I believe that there is no God. I'm beyond Atheism. Atheism is not believing in God. Not believing in God is easy -- you can't prove a negative, so there's no work to do. You can't prove that there isn't an elephant inside the trunk of my car. You sure? How about now? Maybe he was just hiding before. Check again. Did I mention that my personal heartfelt definition of the word "elephant" includes mystery, order, goodness, love and a spare tire?

So, anyone with a love for truth outside of herself has to start with no belief in God and then look for evidence of God. She needs to search for some objective evidence of a supernatural power. All the people I write e-mails to often are still stuck at this searching stage. The Atheism part is easy.

But, this "This I Believe" thing seems to demand something more personal, some leap of faith that helps one see life's big picture, some rules to live by. So, I'm saying, "This I believe: I believe there is no God."

Having taken that step, it informs every moment of my life. I'm not greedy. I have love, blue skies, rainbows and Hallmark cards, and that has to be enough. It has to be enough, but it's everything in the world and everything in the world is plenty for me. It seems just rude to beg the invisible for more. Just the love of my family that raised me and the family I'm raising now is enough that I don't need heaven. I won the huge genetic lottery and I get joy every day.

Believing there's no God means I can't really be forgiven except by kindness and faulty memories. That's good; it makes me want to be more thoughtful. I have to try to treat people right the first time around.

Believing there's no God stops me from being solipsistic. I can read ideas from all different people from all different cultures. Without God, we can agree on reality, and I can keep learning where I'm wrong. We can all keep adjusting, so we can really communicate. I don't travel in circles where people say, "I have faith, I believe this in my heart and nothing you can say or do can shake my faith." That's just a long-winded religious way to say, "shut up," or another two words that the FCC likes less. But all obscenity is less insulting than, "How I was brought up and my imaginary friend means more to me than anything you can ever say or do." So, believing there is no God lets me be proven wrong and that's always fun. It means I'm learning something.

Believing there is no God means the suffering I've seen in my family, and indeed all the suffering in the world, isn't caused by an omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent force that isn't bothered to help or is just testing us, but rather something we all may be able to help others with in the future. No God means the possibility of less suffering in the future.

Believing there is no God gives me more room for belief in family, people, love, truth, beauty, sex, Jell-o and all the other things I can prove and that make this life the best life I will ever have.


end rant


Bonus Enlightenment
Did you know... that George W. Bush never added the cost of the
Iraq/Afghanistan wars to his insanely inflated national debt?


Extra Deluxe Revealing Bonus Fabulousness

debt vs. GDP
Republicans? Fiscal conservatives?
BWAHHHHHHHH-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-haaaaaaa!


Still hungry for real news and analysis? Try our selection of progressive nosh:
DailykosCrooks and LiarsThink ProgressTalking Points Memo

Today's Google Chow.
Tourist group around North Pole sign: "This is said to be Robert Peary's own tongue but, for some reason, he would never talk about it."