Saturday, 17 April 2010

FDA Approves Depressant Drug For The Annoyingly Cheerful

Photographs of the Icelandic volcano @ Flickr

(Thanx Stan!)

coseyfannitutti

Sad to see that the original horn used on Hamburger Lady has been sold by GPO on eBay :-( 10 minutes ago via Twitterrific

Pornography makes it hard to stay celibate, bishop says

A prominent Roman Catholic bishop in Mexico blamed eroticism on television and internet pornography for child abuse by priests, in the latest incendiary comments on sex scandals in the church.

"With so much invasion of eroticism, sometimes it's not easy to stay celibate or to respect children," Bishop Felipe Arizmendi said during an annual meeting of Mexican bishops near Mexico City on Thursday (local time).

"If on television and on the internet and in so many media outlets there is pornography, it is very difficult to stay pure and chaste," said Bishop Arizmendi, an influential bishop from the colonial town of San Cristobal de las Casas in southern Mexico.

The timing of his comments comes as Pope Benedict turned 83 on Friday and the Catholic hierarchy has been rattled by revelations of sexual abuse scandals in parishes around the world.

It also follows several controversial comments made by Catholic clergy, including on Monday when the Vatican's secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, said priest paedophilia was linked to homosexuality not celibacy.

"Many psychologists and psychiatrists have shown that there is no link between celibacy and paedophilia, but many others have shown, I have recently been told, that there is a relationship between homosexuality and paedophilia," he told a news conference in Santiago, Chile.

Mexico is home to the world's second-largest Roman Catholic population after Brazil and the country has been rocked by its own share of allegations against Catholic leaders.

@'ABC'

Planes or volcano?

(Click to enlarge)

@'Information is Beautiful'

Ex-Blackwater Prez Indicted On Weapons Charges

Tabloid bait

London hosts "Last Night of Mephedrone" party [FB link]

Today a UK-wide ban on the drug Mephedrone, otherwise known as Meow Meow, becomes law, meaning a potential five year prison term for those caught possessing the substance. But several police forces are saying that they will operate a week-long amnesty while others are saying they will target dealers rather than seeking out users. London's biggest meph-heads are gathering tomorrow night to use up their stash in one final blowout, and according to them a "Central London club has offered us their venue for free and is even supplying Philip Starck brushed aluminium tables and Tiffany silver keyfobs from which to do our bumps of Meph". Apparently "one of the biggest DJs on the M-CAT scene is doing a set of specially sped-up meph sounds for at least 16 hours" and they're inviting requests - from "Love Cats" to "Stray Cat Strut".

@'MetaFilter'

WTF??? (yet again)

!CAUTION!

Meanwhile, federal law enforcement agencies mounted a massive operation across Arizona Thursday targeting van operators allegedly involved in smuggling undocumented migrants from Mexico. Nearly fifty people were arrested, and more than 800 federal agents were involved in the bust, that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency is touting as its largest-ever human smuggling case.

HERE