Sorry but I didn't bash anyone.

I reported actually events.

Events I find just a bit curious and alarming.

So, I have to ask, how would you feel if you found out some member of your family had been baptized into a religion without their consent?

Maybe a dead child, spouse or parent? I know many of us are baptized by our parents without our consent but...parents...well, that decision is in their job description.

Maybe that Catholic myth still has a hold on me because well I would find that personally rather disquieting. You know...your immortal soul and all that neat stuff?

Mark me down as not caring what you don't care about please.

As for the joke you could cross out Mormon and insert the name of just about any other organized religion.

You can be you all you want...right up until you injure me,trample my rights to be me or incite someone else to do so.

Your personal choice to be you ends there.

Oh...and can I point out that many so called conservative had no problems at all trying or actually imposing their choices on me.

HAH

That is my sincere assessment of what is wrong. A country full of the ignorant, the intellectually lazy, the willfully blind along the easily distracted. Hatred, hypocrisy, fear,ignorance and prejudice are rampant...heck they cultivated and even celebrated in state halls and from the pulpit.

Interesting comment, "This sounds like something from Yagodas NKVD handbook.." haha I suppose you had to say something in response to my post...even something that makes little or no sense.

Define luck?

Okay all of you...what do you know about this?

It's 5a.m. and I don't feel like staying up.

I am not asking for related rants (now I am sure I will get them haha )just information specific to this kid and his story.

Anyone?

Patriot Act Being Used Against a 16 Year Old Boy & its Own Citizens !

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9zGhYSIAP8&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.infowars.com%2Fwral-5-news-report-on-boy-arrested-under-the-patriot-act%2F&feature=player_embedded

Patriot Act being used against its own citizens ! Granville County, NC -- On March 5 at about 10:00 PM, ten heavily armed FBI agents, accompanied by three local police officers, stormed into the ho...

FARK!

Try REDDIT if you love FARK!

Ah well Thomas3474, since you have taken the liberty of personally addressing me I will return the favor.

I find your reply somewhat interesting. It doesn't address the issue in the original post but given your inconsistency in past in addressing the OP I will let that pass. I to am guilty of going off on a tangent or two.

I have to ask....

Haven't you, when addressing me and others, asked that all Christians not be lumped together? Seems to me you are doing some lumping.

I am sure you are aware, there are issues and conflict between Christians? The Evangelicals in the country and the Mormons have beaten each other up a bit.

But I am not telling you something you don't already know...

(Ask Mitt Romney)

Surely Sir, you are aware that "Christians" are quite divided regrading the Mormon faith with some mainstream Christians calling Mormonism a cult?

So, close ranks to vilify me because you perceive me as anti-Christian. It only confirms my view that many embrace religion for reasons that have nothing to do with God.

I will confess I will be hurt if you no longer read or reply to my posts. Your input is always interesting to me and I value your presence.

Well you know...

Here comes the inevitable boot or suspension but...there are more idiots than a legion could shake a stick at...here and in the larger world. (You know...the non-Minglers?)

Those who condemn others...let's see...let's start with those who condemn people with educations while they themselves couldn't write a readable sentence if their lives depended on it.

Does that bother any of you? Do you remember when getting an education, whether it be in stone masonry or mathematics and making a success of your life based on pursuing educational goals was a cornerstone of the American dream and not something that made you a "nerd" or an "elitists"? Some people understand this. Sadly they seem to be people in foreign nations who are more than willing to be scientists, engineers and the like.

Those that harp about "The Founders" who couldn't tell you what the Federalist Papers are and who certainly never read them.

Those who spout $hit about religion, both in their personal lives and in the public square, who act in ways so repugnant that I have to wonder when encountering them why they bother?

You know, the preachers who entrench themselves in trappings of wealth while their flocks starve, the ones who preach family values while having affairs both homo and hetero sexual, the Christians who advocate killing those who they see as un-Christian, the ones who cheat on their taxes...they are walking talking examples of an affront to the scriptures...but they don't care...they pick and choose among what they say are God's words. They don't need God...they have already decided to judge in God's stead.

Those who rail about justices "legislating from the bench" when had they inquired, would have found those justices they were vilifying are the ones now defending their rights.

I could go on but I won't.

I have seen people on this site saying neat stuff that makes me wonder how they made it through elementary school.

We are increasingly an ignorant and arrogant nation. That works though...sit in front of the television. Post inane crap...rumors and ravings called fact. (I guess those people at least pretend interest are a little better than those who don't bother to have an opinion...maybe) Make pundits your truth tellers, be fed your truths, hate, fear, make villains of strangers who have different skin colors, spy on your neighbors, line up like cattle to move around, want a chip under your skin (what do you have to fear if you do nothing wrong)....fight among yourselves...because you are easier to control.

Stupidity is rampant...look at these posts.

That's alright though? After all, don't teach English...it might offend minorities.

(Waits for applause)

Don't teach science! It might interfere with Christian myth!

(Waits to be burned on a cross)

Don't teach children to question authority! It might...

You see where I am going?

Somehow I doubt it!

Idiots abound, idiots who cannot write a basic sentence let alone conduct an inquiry or stand on their own two feet.

They are all around you.

They embrace ignorance and myth in the name of the own prejudices, religions, fears that lead the way to our mutual demise...each time labeling them with proud brand able names tied to things associated with religion and tradition.

fear not...in the end...in our last uttered whisper one of us surly ignorant bastards will like whisper with his or her dying breath,..."I was right!"

So...All Hail Ignorance! It really is so much easier for most people right?

This is something I have known about since about 1975 when my then future mother in law told me that her mother in law made her a Mormon without her knowledge or consent.

Did you know that can be done and is done folks? What is even more alarming is that the Mormons (not unlike the Monty Python song about the Catholics who want you before you are born) will baptize you after you die.

Part of this, my mother in law joked was about the fact that Mormon's need more women. Both living and dead...you think the Muslim 72 virgins is worthy of contempt? Well, here is this nifty tidbit, "after his death, another 335 women were sealed to him, many of whom he did not know."

Maybe the Mormons are attempting to increase returns in order to lure men if only in the afterlife? (One can only speculate)

So, while you are all pointing fingers and vilifying others...

My ex mother in law is a great woman and one who gave no quarter. She vigorously pursued having her name removed...oh...but not before she was apparently "married" to at least one Mormon man.

If she ends up in his house in the afterlife (assuming what might happen is a mixed bag of all religions) the Mormon man who took her to wife un-consented...well...good luck to him.

So, ladies and gentlemen...you might want to check. You or your forbears might be Mormons...without their or your knowledge or consent. You might want to check it out.

Oh, here's some good new if you want to know. The Mormons keep an extensive genealogy that is available to the general public. Have a peek!

What is funny is this "serious breach stuff" like it is surprising? The practice of baptizing dead people, even those with nearly no affiliation it the Mormons, is common. It has been common since my mother in law looked into it in the mid-70's. But...I am sure there is some deniability there...we all know multiple marriage doesn't happen either. /smirk

It's like that scene from Casablanca, "I am shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mormon Church investigates baptism of Obama's mother

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is investigating the posthumous "baptism" of President Barack Obama's mother, Stanley Ann Dunham, as a "serious breach" of religious code, a spokeswoman said.

Church records published by a liberal blog, Americablog, show that Dunham, who died in 1995, was baptised last June 4 in Provo, Utah, and received endowment, another sacrament, a week later.

"The offering of baptism to our deceased ancestors is a sacred practice to us and it is counter to Church policy for a Church member to submit names for baptism for persons to whom they are not related," said spokeswoman Kim Farah in an emailed statement. "The Church is looking into the circumstances of how this happened and does not yet have all the facts. However, this is a serious matter and we are treating it as such."

Mormons believe that souls cannot enter heaven without undergoing baptism and other sacraments, and that those sacraments can be given by proxy after death. The practice of posthumous baptism by proxy has caused controversy in the past, as when Jewish groups raised objections to the baptism of victims of the Holocaust.

According to "doctrinal background" provided by an LDS spokesman, "well-meaning Church members sometimes bypass this instruction and submit the names of non-relatives for temple baptism. Others — perhaps pranksters or careless persons — have submitted the names of unrelated famous or infamous people, or even wholly fictitious names. These rare acts are contrary to Church policy and sometimes cause pain and embarrassment."

A little consumer heads up for you all. I have been getting calls from these people despite being on a no call list. They have been reported.

This is a scam. Don't do business with these folks.

From http://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/8i4e7/cnn_is_airing_commercials_during_every_break_for/

madmax_br5 2 points 2 hours ago* [-]

Flipped on CNN this afternoon to dumb myself down a little, and every commercial break they are airing ads for US fidelis along with another differently branded but actually the same company in disguise car warranty service. How can CNN be this irresponsible a week after the today show piece ran?

More info: http://www.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/comments/8hvo4/the_your_cars_warranty_is_about_to_expire_calls/

http://consumerist.com/5234396/car-warranty-racket-exposed-on-today-show

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22425001/vp/30364192#30364192

http://www.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/comments/8dcfk/this_is_the_second_notice_that_your_factory/

http://www.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/comments/8hvo4/the_your_cars_warranty_is_about_to_expire_calls/c09cinv


greginnj 6 points 1 hour ago[+] (0 children)

greginnj 6 points 1 hour ago[-]

to answer your final question -- ad runs are sold, and advertisements are created, well in advance of a week before airing. And CNN probably doesn't have someone specifically in charge of "watching all newsmagazine shows to make sure none of our 100s of advertisers are being exposed as fradulent."

Even if they did, US Fidelis has a contract, and absent some sort of injunction against them advertising, CNN is obligated to air the ads. US Fidelis could sue them for breach of contract if they didn't. Nor is CNN obligated to vouch for the accuracy of the commercials they're paid to air. In practice, the liability for what's said in the commercial falls on US Fidelis, not CNN.

This story has it all. Abuse of authority, piracy, robbery, intimidation, judicial misconduct...can we shoot these pirates too?


TENAHA, Texas (CNN) -- Roderick Daniels was traveling through East Texas in October 2007 when, he says, he was the victim of a highway robbery.
Police in the small East Texas town of Tenaha are accused of unjustly taking valuables from motorists.

Police in the small East Texas town of Tenaha are accused of unjustly taking valuables from motorists.

The Tennessee man says he was ordered to pull his car over and surrender his jewelry and $8,500 in cash that he had with him to buy a new car.

But Daniels couldn't go to the police to report the incident.

The men who stopped him were the police.

Daniels was stopped on U.S. Highway 59 outside Tenaha, near the Louisiana state line. Police said he was driving 37 mph in a 35 mph zone. They hauled him off to jail and threatened him with money-laundering charges -- but offered to release him if he signed papers forfeiting his property.

"I actually thought this was a joke," Daniels told CNN.

But he signed.

"To be honest, I was five, six hundred miles from home," he said. "I was petrified." Video available at http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/05/05/texas.police.seizures/index.html?iref=mpstoryview

Now Daniels and other motorists who have been stopped by Tenaha police are part of a lawsuit seeking to end what plaintiff's lawyer David Guillory calls a systematic fleecing of drivers passing through the town of about 1,000.

Highway Robbery?
Out of the blue, drivers are pulled over. Their valuables taken ... hundreds of thousands of dollars worth. And you won't believe who's behind it all.

"I believe it is a shakedown. I believe it's a piracy operation," Guillory said.

George Bowers, Tenaha's longtime mayor, says his police follow the law. And through her lawyers, Shelby County District Attorney Lynda Russell denied any impropriety.

Texas law allows police to confiscate drug money and other personal property they believe are used in the commission of a crime. If no charges are filed or the person is acquitted, the property has to be returned. But Guillory's lawsuit states that Tenaha and surrounding Shelby County don't bother to return much of what they confiscate.

Jennifer Boatright and Ron Henderson said they agreed to forfeit their property after Russell threatened to have their children taken away.

Like Daniels, the couple says they were carrying a large amount of cash --- about $6,000 -- to buy a car. When they were stopped in Tenaha in 2007, Boatright said, Russell came to the Tenaha police station to berate her and threaten to separate the family.

"I said, 'If it's the money you want, you can take it, if that's what it takes to keep my children with me and not separate them from us. Take the money,' " she said.

The document Henderson signed, which bears Russell's signature, states that in exchange for forfeiting the cash, "no criminal charges shall be filed ... and our children shall not be turned over" to the state's child protective services agency.

Maryland resident Amanee Busbee said she also was threatened with losing custody of her child after being stopped in Tenaha with her fiancé and his business partner. They were headed to Houston with $50,000 to complete the purchase of a restaurant, she said.

"The police officer would say things to me like, 'Your son is going to child protective services because you are not saying what we need to hear,' " Busbee said.

Guillory, who practices in nearby Nacogdoches, Texas, estimates authorities in Tenaha seized $3 million between 2006 and 2008, and in about 150 cases -- virtually all of which involved African-American or Latino motorists -- the seizures were improper.

"They are disproportionately going after racial minorities," he said. "My take on the matter is that the police in Tenaha, Texas, were picking on and preying on people that were least likely to fight back."

Daniels told CNN that one of the officers who stopped him tried on some of his jewelry in front of him.

"They asked me, 'What you are doing with this ring on?' I said I had bought that ring. I paid good money for that ring," Daniels said. "He took the ring off my finger and put it on his finger and told me how did it look. He put on my jewelry."

Texas law states that the proceeds of any seizures can be used only for "official purposes" of district attorney offices and "for law-enforcement purposes" by police departments. According to public records obtained by CNN using open-records laws, an account funded by property forfeitures in Russell's office included $524 for a popcorn machine, $195 for candy for a poultry festival, and $400 for catering.

In addition, Russell donated money to the local chamber of commerce and a youth baseball league. A local Baptist church received two checks totaling $6,000.

And one check for $10,000 went to Barry Washington, a Tenaha police officer whose name has come up in several complaints by stopped motorists. The money was paid for "investigative costs," the records state.

Washington would not comment for this report but has denied all allegations in his answer to Guillory's lawsuit.

"This is under litigation. This is a lawsuit," he told CNN.

Russell refused requests for interviews at her office and at a fundraiser for a volunteer fire department in a nearby town, where she also sang. But in a written statement, her lawyers said she "has denied and continues to deny all substantive allegations set forth."

Russell "has used and continues to use prosecutorial discretion ... and is in compliance with Texas law, the Texas constitution, and the United States Constitution," the statement said.

Bowers, who has been Tenaha's mayor for 54 years, is also named in the lawsuit. But he said his employees "will follow the law."

"We try to hire the very best, best-trained, and we keep them up to date on the training," he said.

The attention paid to Tenaha has led to an effort by Texas lawmakers to tighten the state's forfeiture laws. A bill sponsored by state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, would bar authorities from using the kind of waivers Daniels, Henderson and Busbee were told to sign.

"To have law enforcement and the district attorney essentially be crooks, in my judgment, should infuriate and does infuriate everyone," Whitmire said. His bill has passed the Senate, where he is the longest-serving member, and is currently before the House of Representatives.
advertisement

Busbee, Boatright and Henderson were able to reclaim their property after hiring lawyers. But Daniels is still out his $8,500.

"To this day, I don't understand why they took my belongings off me," he said.

If someone is killed during the commission of a felony murder charges can be brought up in most places. Hey? Remember all the discussions on different charges and why they are necessary? *cough*

At any rate.

Say a man is robbing a bank. The security guard fires at the robber missing him but striking a teller killing the teller. The bank robber can be charged in her death even though he didn't shoot her. But for the felony bank robbery he committed she would still be alive.

I am not sure that I agree with deadly force in this case but that's another issue.

Sadly the ACLU also defends people like you Thomas3474.

That article as Boo points out leaves out things and slants other things making this appear something it is not.

But...not like Focus on the Family has ever done anything like that before.

Think I will go throw up now.

Wanna dodge your taxes?

Relocate!

A five-story building in the Cayman Islands serves as the corporate address for 18,857 small companies like Coca-Cola and Oracle, so they can avoid paying higher U.S. taxes. Maybe they have room for you too? heh


Coca-Cola, Oracle, Intel Use Cayman Islands to Avoid U.S. Taxes
May 5 (Bloomberg) -- Seagate Technology, the world’s largest maker of hard disk drives, is headquartered in Scotts Valley, California. Yet the documents it files with the Securities and Exchange Commission list its address on South Church Street in George Town, the capital of the Cayman Islands.

Seagate is just one of the companies that may be affected by President Barack Obama’s proposal yesterday to raise about $190 billion over the next decade by outlawing techniques used by U.S. companies in offshore locations to avoid paying taxes. While the U.S. corporate tax rate is 35 percent, Seagate paid an effective tax rate of 5 percent in the year ended June 2008, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

The Caymans have no corporate income tax for companies incorporated there. The Caribbean island has helped scores of U.S. companies, including Coca-Cola Co. and Oracle Corp., to legally avoid billions in tax payments to the U.S. government, says U.S. Senator Byron Dorgan.

“Our Main Street businesses are working hard during this economic downturn to pay their fair share of taxes,” says Dorgan, 66, a North Dakota Democrat. “Some of the country’s largest corporations are using these loopholes to avoid paying their fair share of taxes. It is my hope that the Congress will quickly take action to pull the plug on tax breaks that subsidize runaway plants that move U.S. jobs overseas.”

Largest Companies

One quarter of the 100 largest contractors with the U.S. federal government, including Altria Group Inc. and Tyco International Ltd have had subsidiaries in the Caymans, according to a study by the Government Accountability Office. At least 10 of the 30 companies listed in the Dow Jones Industrial Average have had units with addresses in the Caymans.

As of November 2007, 378 U.S. publicly traded companies had at least one significant subsidiary in the Cayman Islands, a GAO study found. Altria, Tyco, Coke and Oracle still have subsidiaries in the Caymans, according to their most recent SEC filings. Seagate lists its headquarters in Grand Cayman.

One of the Dow 30 companies using offshore sites to reduce its U.S. taxes is Santa Clara, California-based Intel Corp., the world’s largest chipmaker.

Intel’s then vice president of tax, licensing and customs, Robert Perlman told the U.S. Senate Finance Committee in March 1999 that Intel would have been better off incorporating in the Cayman Islands when it was founded in 1968.

“Our tax code competitively disadvantages multinationals simply because the parent is a U.S. corporation,” Perlman testified.

‘The Details’

Intel spokesman Chuck Mulloy said yesterday his company is rethinking its tax strategy. “We’re studying the Obama proposal,” Mulloy said. “Particularly with taxes, the devil’s in the details.”

Seagate spokesman Brian Ziel said yesterday that his company incorporated in the Caymans to reduce its taxes. “The competitive benefits relate both to taxes saved on certain income earned outside of the United States and the ability to efficiently deploy assets around the globe to remain competitive,” he said.

Eighty-five percent of Seagate’s employees work outside the U.S. and more than 70 percent of the company’s revenue comes from sales overseas, Ziel said.

“Officially, our administrative headquarters is in the Caymans,” Ziel said. “That’s how it’s listed in our annual report.”

18,857 Cayman Corporations

Altria spokesman Bill Phelps said his company is in the process of dissolving its Cayman subsidiary. Coke spokeswoman Kerry Kerr said, “We don’t comment on tax strategies, for competitive purposes.”

Tyco’s Paul Fitzhenry and Oracle spokeswoman Karen Tillman didn’t return calls requesting comment.

A five-story office building on South Church Street in the Caymans serves as the official address for 18,857 corporations. That building, called Ugland House, is listed in SEC filings as Seagate’s headquarters. About half those Cayman companies had billing addresses in the U.S., according to a 2008 GAO study.

President Obama referred to Ugland House yesterday.

“On the campaign, I used to talk about the outrage of a building in the Cayman Islands that had over 12,000 businesses claim this building as their headquarters,” Obama said. “And I’ve said before, either this is the largest building in the world or the largest tax scam. And I think the American people know which it is: The kind of tax scam that we need to end.”

Maples and Calder, the law firm that occupies all of Ugland House in Grand Cayman, said Obama is mistaken.

No Financial Misconduct

“I’m sorry to disappoint anyone, but our office is neither the largest building in the world nor a center of financial misconduct,” said Charles Jennings, joint managing partner of Maples and Calder.

“Having a registered office address in the Cayman Islands is driven by commercial considerations, not by tax avoidance,” Jennings said. “It allows companies to raise capital and conduct global business.”

The firm, which provides services for the corporations that use its address, has incorporated more than 6,000 new companies over the past five years. Back in 2004, the building served as home to 12,748 companies using the same address in the Caymans, a British crown colony 150 miles south of Cuba.

Del Monte Fresh Produce Inc., whose corporate headquarters is in Coral Gables, Florida, lists another address -- Walker House on Mary Street in George Town, Grand Cayman -- in its SEC filings. That’s around the corner from Ugland House.

Del Monte’s effective tax rate for 2008 was 3 percent, up from 1 percent the year before. Del Monte spokeswoman Vidya Samsundar had no immediate comment on why the company is incorporated in the Caymans.

Editor: Jonathan Neumann, Laura Colby

To contact the reporter on this story: David Evans in Los Angeles at davidevans@bloomberg.net

Over zealous prosecutors are nothing new. They are mostly out to appease some interest group or to attempt to make the resume look good with an aggressive record. Especially when they can play the moral angle but geez...this is crazy.

Watch out Grandma and Grandpa. You might be a pornographer!

From Reason on-line.

Grandma Arrested for Child Porn

Radley Balko | May 4, 2009, 11:39am

Back in 2005, a WalMart worker in Pennsylvania reported 59-year-old Donna Dull to local authorities after Dull dropped off some film that included shots of her three-year-old granddaughter in and just out of the bath. Dull was arrested—roughly, she says—and charged with producing and distributing child pornography. The charges were dropped 15 months later when a Pennsylvania special prosecutor overruled the local DA. Only Dull, her attorney, and police and prosecutors have apparently seen the photos, which are now under seal. She's now suing.

In this follow-up article from the York Daily Record, state officials seem to be trying to reassure parents and grandparents that they have nothing to worry about—that you needn't fret about having your life ruined and reputation destroyed by false child porn charges for taking nude pictures of your infant or toddler. Problem is, their reassurances aren't very convincing.

Christopher Moore, a special prosecutor in the York County District Attorney's Office, is after "perverts, not parents."

Moore was commenting on the "gray area" between the typical family picture of the 2-year-old getting a bath in the kitchen sink and a picture a pedophile may enjoy.

It can be the same picture, Moore said.

But, Moore added, that is not a reason for parents and grandparents to avoid taking those pictures...

"It's not what the (child protection) law was designed for. Your rights are not restricted in any form by the law."

But it appears that's precisely what Dull was arrested for. And the DA in Dull's case insists he was right. Or at least he's pretty sure he was:

[District Attorney] Rebert said in Dull's case, "What made them offensive was their graphic nature. A little girl with her bare butt showing, kind of looking over her shoulder.

"It's a difficult distinction to make. What's a cute butt and what's pornographic?

"I think what she (Dull) did was stupid and in very poor judgment. It was an interesting case and I think we did the right thing."

So because the photo could have been interpreted as pornographic by someone who was looking for child porn, arresting the woman and ruining her life (or at least severely disrupting it) was the "right thing" to do. From the description, we aren't talking about splayed legs or exposed genitalia, here. It's a kid's butt, and a playful peer over the shoulder. I'm glad Special Prosecutor Moore overruled District Attorney Rebert, but that Dull was arrested in the first place puts the lie to Moore's assertion that this sort of hysteria "is not a reason for parents and grandparents to avoid taking those pictures." It most certainly is. Or at least getting them printed somewhere outside your home. Unless you consider an arrest and 15 months under the label of "accused child pornographer" to be harmless.

It only gets more confusing from there. Here's the prosecutor who initially approved the charges against Dull:

David Cook, now in private practice . . . declined to say if he disagreed with Rebert's decision to dismiss the charges.

He did say, "There was no legitimate purpose for those photographs. I would never pose my daughter or my step-daughter like that.

"It kind of boils down to a gut feeling. If it feels wrong, it probably is."

That sounds . . . ambiguous. How are Pennsylvania residents supposed to follow the law if the state's prosecutors can't even agree on its application?

Here, once again, is Special Prosecutor Moore, again trying to alleviate fears of parents, and again coming up short:

"It's a subjective versus objective standard," Moore said. "You think it's cute. Someone else might think different. That doesn't make it a crime.

"Lots of sexual offenders use the Sears catalog to get off. That doesn't make (the catalog) illegal."

"It's a reasonable person standard with the reasonable person being a juror," Boyles said.

"And reasonable people can disagree," Moore said. "That's the gray area. That's when it comes to us."

Boyles and Moore also agreed that parents don't need to worry unnecessarily.

"Family pictures are family pictures," Boyles said.

"But if more of your pictures of your kids are of them naked rather than clothed, you might have a problem."

So in sum, if you don't want to get arrested and charged for taking nude photos of your infant or toddler, make sure you know what criteria your local prosecutor uses when navigating that "gray area" between a cute butt and a criminally alluring one (note: you probably don't want to actually pose this question to him). Also, if you find yourself under investigation after dropping off a roll of film at the CVS, you might want to bake the prosecutor some cookies, since it appears that his "gut" will be the final arbiter of whether you're a doting parent or an accused child pornographer.

Finally, even if the nude photos you've taken of your kids pass the clear-as-mud "cute butt," "gut feeling," and "reasonable people can disagree/that's when it comes to us" tests, and are deemed innocent as a basket of puppies, you could still be in violation of the law if the state determines that the clothed to unclothed-but-innocent ratio in your family photo albums is inappropriate.

Got all that? Good.

Because they promise, you really have nothing to worry about.

Questions Condi Rice. I love it!

4th-Grader Questions Rice on Waterboarding
Ex-Secretary of State Stresses Legality

In her first Washington appearance since leaving office, Condoleezza Rice speaks to students at the Jewish Primary Day School of the Nation's Capital.
In her first Washington appearance since leaving office, Condoleezza Rice speaks to students at the Jewish Primary Day School of the Nation's Capital.

By Alec MacGillis
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, May 4, 2009

Days after telling students at Stanford University that waterboarding was legal "by definition if it was authorized by the president," former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice was pressed again on the subject yesterday by a fourth-grader at a Washington school.

Rice, in her first appearance in Washington since leaving government, was at the Jewish Primary Day School of the Nation's Capital before giving an evening lecture at the Sixth & I Historic Synagogue. She held forth amiably before a few dozen students about her love of Israel, travel abroad and the importance of learning languages, then opened the floor to their questions.

The questions had been developed beforehand by students with their teachers and had not been screened by Rice. At first, they were innocuous: What was it like growing up in segregated Birmingham, Ala.? What skill did she want to be best known for?

Then Misha Lerner, a student from Bethesda, asked: What did Rice think about the things President Obama's administration was saying about the methods the Bush administration had used to get information from detainees?

Rice took the question in stride. saying that she was reluctant to criticize Obama, then getting to the heart of the matter.

"Let me just say that President Bush was very clear that he wanted to do everything he could to protect the country. After September 11, we wanted to protect the country," she said. "But he was also very clear that we would do nothing, nothing, that was against the law or against our obligations internationally. So the president was only willing to authorize policies that were legal in order to protect the country."

She added: "I hope you understand that it was a very difficult time. We were all so terrified of another attack on the country. September 11 was the worst day of my life in government, watching 3,000 Americans die. . . . Even under those most difficult circumstances, the president was not prepared to do something illegal, and I hope people understand that we were trying to protect the country."
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Misha's mother, Inna Lerner, said the question her son had initially come up with was even tougher: "If you would work for Obama's administration, would you push for torture?"

"They wanted him to soften it and take out the word 'torture.' But the essence of it was the same," Lerner said.

Rice touched off a firestorm last week when she told students at Stanford that "we did not torture anyone."

"The president instructed us that nothing we would do would be outside of our obligations, legal obligations, under the Convention Against Torture," Rice said at Stanford, before adding: "And so, by definition, if it was authorized by the president, it did not violate our obligations under the Convention Against Torture."

Critics said the remark bore echoes of former president Richard M. Nixon's notorious statement, "When the president does it, that means it is not illegal."

Rice did not seem to hold Lerner's boldness against him. Because he missed the group photo she took with his classmates, she posed for a couple of solo shots with him -- and chatted briefly with him about Russia, the land where his parents are from and the one that Rice, a Russia expert by training, had told the students was her favorite abroad.

Looks like the poor dear is going to lose her Miss CA crown. Seems she has not honored her obligations to the CA pageant and has failed to make appearance that come with the crown and chosen instead to make appearances as a pro marriage representative. But fear not, when she looses the crown she will be able to add that to her "poor me victimized by the liberal media" resume.

The OP called this an Islamic practice clearly to vilify the religion.

Female circumcision is not an Islamic practice but a cultural one.

I am going to caution you all now...I hate to do it but...beware of throwing the first stone.

There are some pretty disgusting things done in this country in the name of religion. Fostering ignorance, marrying young girls to older men...

We all know...

How many times have I posted things about the evangelical right here only to be berated about generalizing?

Still...you seem not just willing but hungry to generalize about others.

Female circumcision is an obscene practice from my stand point.

But...while we are throwing stones...maybe we ought to take a minute or two to think.

Women...

In this country...the good ole U.S.A. we have people from all political spectrum's who think women shouldn't be able to vote, who requite women to wear long dresses and sleeves (how different from veils is this) and who think it is perfectly fine to marry multiple wives some of them teens.

Let's be clear I am not endorsing or excusing this horrendous practice of female circumcision still...how would you feel if Warren Jeffs aged 49 marriage to a child aged 15 was put up on tv as an example of the Christian United States?

Let's stop this shocking videos bull and start actually learning about one another.

The really awful truth is Christian and Islamic fundamentalist have more in common with each other than I do with either group

Here is some funny $hit.

When?

When you embrace ignorance, when you sit on you ass, when you look to the federal government as the cause of or the solution to all your problems (with apologies to the Simpson's writers nad beer),when you think you have some moral higher ground because you were spit out on US soil or because you profess to follow some random god at the expense of your nation (this works in reverse too. Render onto Caesar right?), when Christian myth stops people from learning and exploring math and science, when you would rather vilify your fellow citizens than work towards a common good, when we tear each other down from within because of political ideologies when we should be supporting each other, when....heh shall I go on?

Winx is quite correct when she identifies this horror as cultural and not religious.

Not that the facts matter.