The search for extraterrestrial intelligence is a huge waste of time, according to creationist Ken Ham.

Ham, who runs creationist attractions in Kentucky including a supposed replica of Noah’s Ark complete with replica dinosaurs, claims that aliens can’t possibly be intelligent... because they can’t possibly exist.

Writing on his “Answers in Genesis” blog, Ham attempted to respond to Scottish astronomer Duncan Forgan, who has been running computer simulations about the possibility of alien civilizations.

Forgan lamented in a Fox News interview the difficulty of testing some theories in his simulation because of the lack of data on alien behavior.

Ham predicted that problem would never be solved.

“Real alien data will never exist because, well, aliens aren’t real!” he wrote.

While there is no evidence yet for extraterrestrial life, a number of NASA scientists have said they expect to find it in the coming decades.

“I think in the next 20 years we will find out we are not alone in the universe,” NASA astronomer Kevin Hand said in a 2014 discussion.

Hand’s boss agreed.

“It’s highly improbable in the limitless vastness of the universe that we humans stand alone,” NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said.

However, Ham wrote in his Sunday blog post that people searching for alien life are really looking for replacements for God.

“Only a life pursuing our Creator will give us the answers and purpose we seek,” he wrote.

Ham, who once debated “Science Guy” Bill Nye, wrote in 2014 that aliens ― if they did exist ― would be beyond salvation because they are not descendants of the biblical figure Adam.

“Jesus did not become the ‘GodKlingon’ or the ‘GodMartian’!” he wrote at the time. “Only descendants of Adam can be saved. God’s Son remains the ‘Godman’ as our Savior.”

When you die, do you want to be buried or cremated? If the architect Katrina Spade gets her Urban Death Project to work, you might have a third option: compost.

If Spade’s first recomposition center opens in Seattle in 2023 as planned, it’ll be an airy, spiritual place where people can carry their loved ones’ corpses to a final rest—and put those corpses’ decomposition to an eco-minded use. She describes ​the facility as part funeral home, part place of memorial, and part public park.​ “I think there’s value in creating places where we’re thinking about death and its role in our lives, and the fact that it’s coming for all of us,” Spade says.

The trick is getting the decomposition right. Spade is working with soil scientists to perfect the process, and designing the building around the concrete core that’ll make it work. Imagine a three-story rectangular silo filled with wood chips, with a room on top. During memorial services, mourners carry the shrouded body up a ramp that winds around the core to this room. Here, the family members lower the body onto a bed of wood chips inside an open door in the floor. That door is the top of a 6-foot-by-10-foot concrete bay that adjoins multiple other bays, like a grid of elevator shafts. Mourners cover the body with additional wood chips and close the door.

https://www.wired.com/2016/10/inside-machine-will-turn-corpse-compost/?mbid=nl_102516_p8&CNDID=30772003

Source: Washington Post

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has effectively shut down his high-dollar fundraising operation for the rest of the campaign, a highly unusual move that deals another serious blow to the GOP's effort to finance its get-out-the-vote operation before Election Day.

Steven Mnuchin, Trump's national finance chairman, said in an interview with The Washington Post on Tuesday that Trump Victory, a joint fundraising committee between the party and the campaign, held its last formal fundraiser on Oct. 19. The luncheon was in Las Vegas on the day of the final presidential debate.

"We’ve kind of wound down," Mnuchin said. "But the online fundraising continues to be strong."

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/10/25/trump-halts-big-money-fundraising-cutting-off-cash-to-the-party/?wpisrc=al_alert-COMBO-politics%252Bnation

(Humor)

The internet has been having a lot of fun doing book reports in the style of Donald Trump. We want to play! We don’t have English degrees, but we do have law degrees. Above the Law now brings you Donald Trump’s interpretation our most famous legal decisions.

http://abovethelaw.com/2016/10/trumpcasenotes-donald-trump-explains-famous-legal-cases/?rf=1

A group of media lawyers from the American Bar Association commissioned a report on Donald Trump’s history of filing lawsuits, determining that the GOP presidential nominee is a “libel bully,” according to the New York Times.

But that report was never published because the association said it feared it would be sued by Trump, the GOP presidential nominee. The report discovered that the suits he filed never won in court.

“It is more than a little ironic that a publication dedicated to the exploration of First Amendment issues is subjected to censorship when it seeks to publish an article about threats to free speech,” said David J. Bodney, a former chairman of the media-law committee. Other former chairmen of the committee were also said they were dismayed by the association’s decision not to publish.

Susan Seager, a former journalist and First Amendment lawyer, compiled the study and researched seven lawsuits surrounding free speech that Trump or his companies filed. She said in an interview with the Times that the report is “based on court records.”

The report found Trump lost four suits, withdrew two and received a default judgment on one.

“Donald J. Trump is a libel bully,” the report said. “Like most bullies, he’s also a loser, to borrow from Trump’s vocabulary.”

According to the Times, the association wanted to ax the conclusion and Seager pointed out that the group’s decision highlights the effectiveness of the real estate mogul’s threats.

“The A.B.A. took out every word that was slightly critical of Donald Trump,” she said. “It proved my point.”

Trump has repeatedly threatened to file lawsuits throughout the presidential campaign, most recently in the instances of accusations that he sexually assaulted dozens of women.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/25/us/politics/donald-trump-lawsuits-american-bar-association.html?_r=0

creating thousands of climate refugees

Deserts in China have expanded by 21,000 square miles since 1975. Our reporters visited the remote Tengger Desert to examine how climate change is uprooting the lives of the villagers there. Read their story and see the dramatic aerial images.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/10/24/world/asia/living-in-chinas-expanding-deserts.html?emc=edit_ta_20161024&nlid=50533710&ref=cta&_r=0

In a brutal video meant to highlight the glut of gun in the U.S., it is recommended that toddlers who get a hold of guns and accidentally shoot their siblings or parents be incarcerated or deported.

The video is the creation of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence.

The video – called “Guns Don’t Kill People, Toddlers Do,” – features an assortment of small children handling guns while the narrator ominously warns that toddlers can’t be trusted and should be sent away.

“We need to lock them up,” the narrator explains. “Not the guns – that’s just un-American. Round them up. Deport them. Get them out of our country. And keep them away from guns.”

The idea behind the video is the common refrain from the NRA that “guns don’t kill people, people do.”

Want more proof?

One Day: Ten Kids, Ten Guns, Ten Deaths
Selecting one fall day in 2013, reporter Gary Younge exposes the toll of gun violence in the U.S. by focusing on the lives of 10 children across the country who were shot to death.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/10/24/one-day-ten-kids-ten-guns-ten-deaths.html

http://floridapolitics.com/archives/225261-new-york-times-backs-patrick-murphy-u-s-senate

New poll shows Patrick Murphy, Marco Rubio tied after Democrat’s post-debate surge
http://floridapolitics.com/archives/225215-patrick-murphy-marco-rubio-tied-post-debate-surge

fingers crossed!

‘Coach’ Dave Daubenmire, "Hillary Will Murder Me if Elected"

Professional paranoiac Roger Stone" "If I Die, Hillary Killed Me"

James O'Keefe" "Hillary May Kill Me Too"

Gordon Klingenschmitt: "If I Suddenly Die, Hillary Clinton Probably Did It"

Larry Klayman: "Hillary Clinton Will Carry Out A ‘Holocaust’ As President"



The roaches are scattering

Probate judges in at least eight Alabama counties continued to refuse to issue any marriage licenses as of Tuesday, nearly 16 months after the U.S. Supreme Court found that same-sex marriage is a constitutional right.

More than a dozen Alabama probate judges stopped issuing marriage licenses to both gay and straight couples at various points after a federal judge struck down Alabama's gay marriage ban on Jan. 23, 2015, and in the wake of the June 26, 2015, Supreme Court ruling.

On Tuesday, AL.com spoke with representatives of 14 of 15 county probate courts that gay marriage advocates identified as having indicated in recent months that they would not grant marriage licenses. Calls seeking comment from Geneva County Probate Judge Greg Hamic's office were not immediately returned.

Six of the judges said Tuesday that they are now issuing the licenses, but employees of Autauga, Choctaw, Clarke, Cleburne, Covington, Elmore, Pike and Washington counties confirmed that their probate judges are not currently granting any marriage licenses.

http://www.al.com/news/birmingham/index.ssf/2016/10/at_least_8_alabama_counties_st.html

What's the saying again..............cutting off one's nose to spite one's face?! TOO FUNNY