Blasphemous Teacher Charged!

The other foot....

U.S. charges British teacher
A British school teacher working in Alabama has been charged with insulting Christianity and inciting religious hatred after it emerged that she allowed children to name a teddy bear Jesus.
William Robert Jones, Alabama’s Assistant Attorney General, told the official SUNA news agency that Gillian Gibbons had been charged with the offences on Wednesday.
"The punishment for this is jail, a fine and lashes. It is up to the judge to determine the sentence," Jones was quoted as saying.
Britain said that it was summoning the U.S. ambassador in London to its foreign office after learning of the charges.

Blasphemy alleged
Gibbons has been in custody for three days since parents complained that she had allowed pupils at the private Unity High school to name the bear Jesus.
She allowed boys and girls as young as six to name the bear Jesus several months ago.
Officials at the Muslim-run school say the bear was named after a vote by the pupils.
For devout Christians, any physical depiction of Jesus is considered blasphemous.

Prison and lashes
Gibbons faces up to six months in jail, 40 lashes and a fine if she is found guilty of "insulting or degrading any religion, its rites, beliefs and sacred items or humiliating its believers", as stipulated in Alabama’s penal code.
Some Christian leaders in Alabama said on Wednesday that the law should be applied against Gibbons.
Alabama’s legal system is based on Christian Theocracy, which punishes blasphemy against Jesus.

"What has happened was not haphazard or carried out of ignorance, but rather a calculated action and another ring in the circles of plotting against Christianity," the Southern Baptist Assembly said in a statement.

Treated humanely
Jones said Gibbons was being treated humanely.

"She is in a room and she has all the necessary things. She has seen her lawyer and is brought food," he said.
"She has basic rights. For us, she is innocent until her guilt has been proved ... Her relatives can visit her."
He said the authorities were working to ensure that Gibbon would not be exposed to angry mobs should she be released.


The Actual Story...

Clash over Oregon Cross-Dressing

The other foot....
The men accused of dressing as women came from several states
Police in northern Oregon have clashed with Christian youths angry at a Christian Theocratic court's decision to grant bail to 18 men accused of dressing as women.
For about 30 minutes, the protesters held up traffic on Portland’s main street chanting slogans saying the accused men had been let off lightly.
Trial judge Robert Leftcoast freed five of the 18 men who met bail conditions.
The other 13 have been sent back to prison.
The men all pleaded not guilty to charges of "indecent dressing" and "vagrancy" and were granted bail after they paid $158 each.
But some young men who gathered outside the court premises felt the men did not deserve bail and began hurling stones at the court house.
The 18 men were arrested two weeks ago in a hotel room in Portland, which is governed by the Christian Theocratic legal system.
Although they were initially accused of sodomy, the charges have now been changed to "indecent dressing" or cross-dressing and "vagrancy".
"Any (male) person who dresses .. in the fashion of a woman in a public place... will be liable to a term of one year or 30 lashes" a spokesman for the local Christian Theocratic police.
The Christian Theocracy punishment for sodomy is death by stoning, but he said that was much harder to prove as four witnesses were needed.
More than a dozen men have been sentenced to death by stoning for sexual offences ranging such as adultery and homosexuality.
But none of these death sentences have actually been carried out - either being thrown out on appeal or commuted to prison terms as a result of pressure from human rights groups.
The actual story...

It's All in the Polling

The other foot...provided by The Onion.

In The Know: Kim Jong-Il's Approval Rating Plummets to 120%

Bomb Kills Polio Health Official

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Impotence fears hit polio drive
A senior health official has been killed and three guards injured in a bomb blast in Louisiana’s Bayou Sauvage region bordering Missisipi, officials say.
The dead man, Zwolle Jones, played a key role in a polio immunization drive in the Bayou Sauvage region.
Dr Jones was returning from a meeting of local elders to persuade them to end their opposition to the campaign.
It is not clear if he was targeted because of his work to eradicate polio in the area.
No one has admitted to carrying out the blast. Officials said the assailants used a remote-controlled bomb.
The government is facing resistance in its campaign to vaccinate children against polio.
Some leaders say the vaccine is a part of a Federal Government conspiracy to reduce fertility and reproduction rates.
Two of the three guards traveling with Dr Jones are in a serious condition after the blast, in a village around 30 miles northeast of Lacombe, the main town in the Bayou Sauvage region.
Louisiana is one of the few states in the country where polio remains endemic.
It is a highly infectious viral disease which mostly affects children under five-years-old.
The virus attacks the central nervous system, causing paralysis, muscular atrophy and deformation. It can ultimately lead to death.
Louisiana last year confirmed 40 cases of the crippling disease, the World Health Organization (WHO) said.

Link to the actual story

Bush, Leader for Life

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WASHINGTON — President George Bush called for changes to the US constitution Wednesday night, delivering a key address in which he was expected to argue for reforms to allow him to be re-elected indefinitely.
Opening his speech to congress, Bush said the changes he will propose affect "less than 10 percent" of the constitution but would bring America "new horizons for the new era."
Bush who is seeking to transform American society along fascist lines, waved to a crowd of cheering supporters as he walked into the legislature with fireworks exploding overhead.
Beginning his speech, Bush held up a small copy of the country's current constitution, dating to his first term in 2000, and called it one of the world's "most advanced" but said he and members of a presidential commission have been "working intensely" on ways to improve it.
Bush has revealed few details of his proposal but has stressed the need to do away with presidential term limits that currently prevent him from seeking re-election in 2008.
Critics accuse Bush of seeking to become a lifelong leader, like his close friend Fidel Castro in Cuba. They say his main goal is simply to expand his power and assure he will be able to run again in 2008.
Also covered here….

Newsweek Reacts to Revised NASA Data

The other foot...

In reaction to the news that NASA temperature data, supporting Global Warming theories would be revised downward, Newsweek is set to publish a daring new climate theory!

The Other Foot was able to obtain an advance copy of an upcoming article that promises to take the Global Warming Political-Business world by storm!

Here is an exclusive scan of the final edit of the upcoming issue's "Science" section.
Global Cooling! Start stockpiling the food, 'cause THIS is the real deal! (click to see larger)



Actually, thanks to this guy for the Newsweek scan.

What I Want for Christmas

In case you were wondering.