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[Toughy]

Originally Posted by Corkey

Tell me about it, I'm full of expletive deleted's about this.

There is a thread about the Church and Uganda. and queers. I posted my link there also

[Kobi]

Originally Posted by Toughy

I am stunned beyond belief. This is true. The Catholic Church is in deep shit.


Pope Benedict resigned to avoid arrest, seizure of church wealth by Easter
Posted on February 13, 2013 by itccs

Diplomatic Note was issued to Vatican just prior to his resignation

New Pope and Catholic clergy face indictment and arrest as "Easter Reclamation" plan continues

A Global Media Release and Statement from The International Tribunal into Crimes of Church and State

http://itccs.org/2013/02/13/pope-ben...lth-by-easter/

On a quick search, I cannot find anything that legitimizes the ITCCS or the International Common Law Court of Justice.

What I did find was pretty much their own rhetoric on multiple website derivatives which read a lot like The National Enquirer.

Has anyone found anything that leads them to believe either of these organizations are viable? A force to be reckoned with? Has any legitimate power?

[Toughy]

I must confess I did not do my usual diligent research before posting that little tidbit. Now that I have I have to agree with you Kobi..........I'm not sure this is anything but a crack pot.

mea culpa

[Kobi]

Originally Posted by Toughy

I must confess I did not do my usual diligent research before posting that little tidbit. Now that I have I have to agree with you Kobi..........I'm not sure this is anything but a crack pot.

mea culpa

Toughy, np. Just couldnt and still cant figure out what either of these organizations might be. Was just wondering if someone found something that might shed some light on them.

[Sparkle]

I've seen these articles pop up as well.

I do not question Ratzinger's culpability, but there is no proof (so far as I am aware) that he, himself, abused a child/children.

That does not make him less culpable.

In fact I would say he is far more culpable because he has colluded and lead a widespread cover up the extent of the sexual abuse that has happened in the church for decades (and sadly, probably centuries). And this cover up not only demeans its victims but allows it to continue.

And there is considerable proof that he has had a direct hand in doing that during his tenure as Cardinal and as Pope Benedict.

Ratzinger headed up the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the organization (in the church) responsible for dealing with the sexual abuse cases.

And it is very likely he has met with the Italian President before/since announcing his resignation, but the nature of those meetings is speculative at best.

There have been multiple cases filed against the Church and against Pope Benedict IX/Cardinal Ratzinger for his role in covering up the abuse cases.

There is a significant case that was filed by the Center for Constitutional Rights a little over a year ago, and that is the legal case to watch. It was filed with the Hague as a "Crime Against Humanity" (as it should be!).
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011...-victims-abuse

But until his resignation is complete the Pope has immunity from prosecution as a the head of a sovereign state.

The question after his tenure is complete... will he leave Vatican City?

If he does leave Vatican City there is no doubt he will face legal action. But the extent to which they go after him personally, remains to be seen.

Victims, organizations supporting the victims and their litigators really want to hit the Church itself. When he ceases to be the leader of the Church, his value as a legal target is significantly reduced; both symbolically and financially.

If he does not leave the Vatican City, I am not sure if he can be successfully prosecuted. As far as I am aware Vatican City (an independent sovereign state) does not have extradition treaties with any country. As leader of the sovereign state, obviously, he was not going to approve his own extradition; but I'm pretty certain no incoming Pope would approve his extradition either if Ratzinger remained in the VC to avoid prosecution.

It will be interesting, indeed, to see how it all plays out.

[Sparkle]

My personal (conspiracy) theory is this:

I think Ratzinger's resignation is purposeful. I think the plan is for him to martyr himself for the church.

Ratzinger as Cardinal and as Pope has lead the church in dealing with the sex abuse cases, and he's done everything he can to protect the name of the Church and put the Church above the victims.

The Catholic Church is in the worst position in terms of PR, in terms of "membership" and in terms of international support -- that it ever has been in, in the entirety of it's history...and *that* is saying something because it has a long gory history of murder and theft on an international scale.

But the sex abuse cases have not been squelched, despite the Church's best efforts. The predators have, for the most part, not been brought to justice and the Church has not been made accountable in any real or substantial way; and yet the victims keep coming forward and the cases keep mounting and it is impossible for the international community to ignore.

This is a case of the masses truly turning the tide, I believe; leading a revolution really. The threat to the Church is that serious, and they know it. And they are far too clever to go down in a blaze of paparazzi flash bulbs during international tribunals.

I think Ratzinger will resign, I think he will leave the protection of VC and I think he will make himself the kingpin for the legal cases. He's 85, he's in ailing health; he is unlikely to live to see the end of legal battles of this size.
Make no mistake, the Church is still on trial, but while there is a "face" to the evil, the public will be focused on him. (and oh, he has a perfect face for this kind of thing, doesn't he? he oozes evil.)

And while Ratzinger sits it out in international court and in front of the AP; the Church distances itself from Ratzinger and all those "bad guys", and begins its own campaign, with a new puppet, to improve its image and standing in the world.

[Kobi]

*Looks at Sparkle and smiles.*

As a recovering Catholic with some knowledge of the Bible, it kind of amazes me how scandals of any sort seem to fit a familiar pattern - scandal erupts, scapegoat must be found, scapegoat must be sacrificed, the sacrificial lamb symbolicly brings atonement and justice (whatever that might be), and on and on it goes.

The process of atonement and justice is reminescent of the Roman coliseums with man against man or man against beast for the entertainment of the masses. In some weird way, the masses find justification and absolution in this process. Kind of a bizarre cleansing ritual where we feel elevated above our human flaws that make such scandals and despictable behavior possible in the first place. Kind of a holier than thou kind of thing.

I often wonder how many times we have each had to make decisions where our values and ethics were challenged by something outside of ourselves? How often does our workplace demand a loyalty and a way of doing things which compromises us? How many times do the various laws of the land put us in conflict? How many times have we done the wrong thing for what seemed at the time to be the right reasons? How many times did we have the courage to say NO and face the consequences of doing so?

It aint easy being a people. Sometimes we are spectacular. Sometimes we suck. Sometimes we even defy words or descriptions. Sometimes life seems to be a reality show.

Do we have the right to judge? To speculate? I dunno. Is more of a question day than an answer day.

[Nat]

Y'all watching the Russian meteorite stuff? Awesome Dashcam vids

[Linus]

There are a few other videos/photos here: http://zyalt.livejournal.com/722930.html?nojs=1 (may take time to load).

One of the shots shows the back end of the zinc factory and it appears that something went through it (either result of the sonic boom or physical damage from meteorite piece(s) )

[ruffryder]

MOSCOW (AP) --
A meteor streaked across the sky and exploded over Russia's Ural Mountains with the power of an atomic bomb Friday, its sonic blasts shattering countless windows and injuring nearly 1,000 people.

The spectacle deeply frightened many Russians, with some elderly women declaring that the world was coming to an end.

The meteor - estimated to be about 10 tons - entered the Earth's atmosphere at a hypersonic speed of at least 54,000 kph (33,000 mph) and shattered into pieces about 30-50 kilometers (18-32 miles) above the ground, the Russian Academy of Sciences said in a statement.

Amateur video broadcast on Russian television showed an object speeding across the sky about 9:20 a.m. local time, just after sunrise, leaving a thick white contrail and an intense flash.

Rest of story here Meteor falls in Russia

Comes as DA14 comes close to Earth later in the day today.

on.rt.com "If it were to hit the Earth, it could blast a crater with a force equivalent to hundreds of the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima.

The last time an object of a size similar to DA14 hit the earth was also in Russia, in what is known as the Tunguska event.

However, both objects pale in comparison to the 6-mile-wide asteroid that led to the extinction of the dinosaurs some 66 million years ago."

Check out Asteroid 2012 DA14 LIVE from Samford Valley Observatory in Australia here http://www.ustream.tv/nasajpl2

[maryam]

I think the most interesting thing about the news the past few days is the way the conspiracy theorists and "End of Days" crowd are tying the Pope, the comet and the meteor together. (That sounds like the beginning of a bad joke. "A Pope, a comet and a meteorite all walk into a bar"...) I am not either of the above, but I do watch them closely for two reasons. I'm fascinated by psychology of the groups (especially comparing the way the mass responds to something as opposed to the individual) and because I feel, as a member of a marginalized group, (or two!) that for the safety of my friends and loved ones, I have to keep a weather eye out for the crazy. In this, I suppose I am a prepper. I am not afraid of the end of the world, but I am concerned about the rampaging hordes reacting en mass to a perceived threat to humanity. So I make sure we have groceries and an escape route planned...

So anyway, the Pope resigns, for whatever reason (I'm kind of buying into the martyr thing, but I'm not committed to that yet. Gotta wait and see) but he was a placeholder Pope. The Church is swinging more conservative, and in some ways, he was liberal enough to get the nod from the less conservative Bishops 8 years ago. He then began appointing more conservative Bishops, who will make the next Pope. Many of the End of Days Crowd who think we've entered the Revelation, say that the second to last Pope was supposed to be preparing for the AntiChrist Pope, who then unite the nations, bring peace to the Middle East before it all goes to heck. According them, Benedict was the Second to Last Pope and the next elected Pope is the AntiChrist. Some blogs have been saying for weeks that the comet passing us today is another Sign, and the meteorite in Russia is just more proof. The end of the world is coming, folks.

This is like people watching at the mall, in a train wreck sort of way.

I don't buy any of the second paragraph above, aside from the fact that the there's more to Benedict's resignation than meets the eye. I do think he was supposed to move the Church in a more conservative direction, and that he hasn't succeeded as well as he thinks he did. I see a schism in the making. Some will claim that's a Win as the people who formally separate will make their own Church and be out of their hair, but it's a Phyrric victory at best.

[Toughy]

Somebody I know pointed out that in the movies, the President is black when some meteor (or other huge disaster) comes crashing to earth......oopppssss

Over in the 'pope kills gays' thread somebody (sorry) posted a Reuters link and another link that is on the edges of this.

I so want this to be true (nailing the Church) hence I did not check very well.......dammitt.....

[Toughy]

Where is Aj? She explains stuff really well (that was horrible english...lol). If I remember there are a whole mess of little meteors or asteroids or chunks of rocks that accompany the big daddy meteor.. and is what exploded over Russia......that is how they work I believe.

NASA swears the big daddy will not hit earth.

[Toughy]

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/

This is better than the Ustream because it has way more information. They say the meteor is unrelated to the big daddy named "2012 DA14".

[dreadgeek]

Originally Posted by Toughy

Where is Aj? She explains stuff really well (that was horrible english...lol). If I remember there are a whole mess of little meteors or asteroids or chunks of rocks that accompany the big daddy meteor.. and is what exploded over Russia......that is how they work I believe.

NASA swears the big daddy will not hit earth.

So Asteroid 2012 DA14 made its closest pass to Earth about 11:43 Pacific today. The meteor that exploded over Russia had nothing to do with the asteroid it just so happens that the two objects were in close proximity to Earth at the same time. That actually isn't all that rare.

Generally, Toughy, anything that makes it this far into the system is going to be pretty much a whole chunk, at least until it hits atmosphere. What happened with the meteor in Russia is that it did not actually hit the ground in one big chunk. As these things are measured it was pretty small (about the size of a bus and weighing about 7000 pounds) It exploded about 30 miles up and released the energy equivalent to about 20 Hiroshima sized bombs (~320 kilotons of TNT) but most of that was absorbed by the atmosphere. What actually hit the ground were smaller fragments that were left when the meteor exploded.

I think what you're thinking of is what happened when Comet Shoemaker-Levy slammed into Jupiter. That was different for a couple of reasons. The first and most important here is that Jupiter is HUGE. It would take 11 Earths lined up side-by-side to stretch across Jupiter's diameter. It would take 1321 Earths to equal the volume of Jupiter. It would take 122 Earths, flattened out, to cover the surface of Jupiter. It would take 318 Earths to equal the mass of Jupiter. It's gravity at the surface (if it had a surface which it doesn't) would be 2.5 times that of Earth. I say that because in order to understand what happened to Shoemaker-Levy you need to have a sense of scale. Jupiter quite literally tore the comet apart as it approached the big planet. It's called tidal forces. For reasons I won't get into now and even though you don't realize it, there is slightly *more* gravity pulling on your feet than on your head. You don't realize it because the difference is very slight because Earth doesn't have the mass to have strong tidal forces (this is different than the tides). Jupiter, on the other hand, has sufficient mass for tidal forces to be noticeable to something like a comet that has been captured in its orbit. So the head of the comet felt more of Jupiter's gravity than the end of the comet and it ripped the comet apart. The pieces then fell into Jupiter over the course of a few days.

The meteor that exploded over Russia did so not because of our gravity but because of our atmosphere. It hit the atmosphere doing about Mach 50 (50 times the speed of sound or 33000 miles per hour. To give you a sense of scale, the Space Shuttle would reenter at ~17500 or Mach 25. The fastest true airplane built so far is the SR-71 Blackbird which would get up to ~Mach 4). When it hit the atmosphere that fast it heated up very quickly. When things heat up, they expand. You get the idea. Typically this is the fate of most objects that enter our atmosphere.

The *really* big stuff are the rocks that actually make it through our atmosphere and hit the ground. To give you a sense of scale, the rock that exploded today was about 49 feet wide. The asteroid that passed close by was about 150 feet across. The rock that delivered the coup de grace to the dinosaurs 65 million years ago was about 6 miles across! There was enough of it when it hit the ground that it took a chunk out of what is now Eastern Mexico and vaporized it!

If anyone has other questions about either the asteroid or the meteor explosion I'll do my best to answer them.

Cheers
Aj

[Toughy]

Thank you Aj.......and yes it was that comet I was thinking of.....

[maryam]

And another meteor in California! This one didn't impact the ground, but was really bright.

http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/lo...191508391.html

[Toughy]

FreedomWorks produces a Hillary and a fake Giant Panda oral sex video. The executive VP of FreedomWorks was in this video.

http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2013...-investigation

[Greyson]

I agree with one of the comments made regarding the article. Most likely this will be spun into some plot the democrats came up with to destroy Freedomworks.

Shaking my head. If I had any allegiance with the Tea Party, I would want some explanations, take names, put great distance between these idiots and everything they stand for.

Actions like this also tell me these little dweebs are really feeling threatened and scared by a strong, articulate, intelligent woman, Hillary.

[Lady Pamela]

Mindy Mccready dies...

http://www.theboot.com/2013/02/17/mi...6pLid%3D271812





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