1/1/2014::Daily Leftovers

Murder-suicide suspected in 4 California death

A man apparently killed his wife and their two children before turning the gun on himself in a Southern California home, police said Tuesday.

Officers called to the home at about 8:30 p.m. Monday found the bodies of Ramon Miranda, 38, and Silvia Miranda, 34, and their children, 12-year-old Ramon Jr. and 10-year-old Rayna, according to the San Bernardino County coroner's office.

The woman and the children had been shot several times and the man was shot once in the head, police spokeswoman Martha Guzman-Hurtado said.

US schools attempted to ban 49 books in 2013

Censorship in American schools and libraries is on the rise as more institutions attempt to ban books tackling racial and sexual issues, as well as those written by minorities, according to the anti-censorship group Kids’ Right to Read Project.

In a report by the Guardian, the KRRP stated it has dealt with 49 separate cases of book bannings across 29 states this year, up more than 50 percent compared to the previous year. November alone found the group, part of the National Coalition Against Censorship, investigating three times the typical number of book bannings in the United States.

Biola University, Grace Seminary Granted Exemption From Obamacare Abortion Pill Mandate

A federal judge appointed by Barack Obama has granted an injunction to Biola University in California and Grace College and Seminary in Indiana against he abortion pill mandate in Obamacare.

The two Christian institutions had filed suit in August 2012 with the assistance of the Alliance Defending Freedom, a faith-based legal organization headquarted in Scottsdale, Arizona. Officials representing the schools asserted that the mandate violated their core Christian principles.

Sin and Sodomy in the Dutch East Indies

The Dutch East India Company (Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie, or VOC) had many energetic and able servants in its ranks in the 17th century, but few could match the achievements of Joost Schouten. He excelled as trader, administrator, diplomat, writer and courtier. Yet when he is remembered today it is not so much for any of his accomplishments as for his trial and execution for sodomy.

These sensational events occurred in Batavia (now the Indonesian capital, Jakarta) in 1644 and from there the shock waves rippled out to other Dutch outposts. VOC justice was never famous for its leniency and Schouten’s drama-filled final days showed how high personal standing and powerful connections counted for little next to the implacable, God-fearing disgust with which homosexuality was viewed at that time.

Pope Francis Encourages Bishop to Condemn Same-Sex Parenting

He may have gathered enough liberal credibility to snag Time’s Person of the Year award, and even a citation from an LGBT magazine, but apparently Pope Francis draws a line in the sand when it comes to supporting some gay couples’ desire to adopt and raise children.

The pontiff reported himself “shocked” that the Civil Unions bill in Malta, which allows for two men or two women to marry, also allows for these couples to adopt children. At the encouragement of a pope widely touted as pro-gay enough to change the direction of the Catholic Church, Bishop Charles Scicluna delivered a heated sermon on the subject that stirred up some controversy within the Maltese congregation and around the world.

The people who challenged my atheism most were drug addicts and prostitutes

They prayed whenever they could find 15 minutes. "Preacher Man", as we called him, would read from the Bible with his tiny round glasses. It was the only book he had ever read. A dozen or so others would listen, silently praying while stroking rosaries, sitting on bare mattresses, crammed into a half-painted dorm room.

I was the outsider, a 16-year-old working on a summer custodial crew for a local college, saving money to pay for my escape from my hometown. The other employees, close to three dozen, were working to feed themselves, to feed their kids, to pay child support, to pay for the basics of life. I was the only white, everyone else was African-American.

History According to Mike Huckabee: How a Book of Political Satire Saved Christmas

I initially started writing this post with the intent of posting it on Christmas, but since we lost the war on Christmas once again this year, I had to do all that stupid Christmas stuff like buying presents and spending time with family and friends and didn't have time to finish what I was writing. Not wanting to abandon my half-written Christmas post, I decided to finish it anyway and post it as an end of year "Worst of 2013" piece. So, I hereby give my brand new "Worst Historical Hogwash of the Year" award to Mike Huckabee's "Learn Our History" video series.

The "Learn Our History" video series is Mike Huckabee's new vehicle for indoctrinating children. The videos are cartoons in which five kids with a time machine "travel together to learn the truth about the past." What the quintet of time-travelers -- named Addison, Barley, Connor, Dalia, and Simon -- learn in their travels to the past is, of course, not the truth, but a history full of Christian nationalist revisionism and right-wing political propaganda.

You Won't Believe Conservatives' Absurd Theories They Think Will Cure Poverty

According to a major new study by a group of academic researchers at Columbia University, government programs like food stamps and unemployment insurance have significantly helped the poor over the last 50 years.

But the very same study shows that America’s deregulated, capitalism-gone-wild economy has done far less to lift people out of poverty during that same period. The facts demonstrate clearly that government services have made the difference in people’s lives, while America’s economic policies have failed.

The dark side of Buddhism

On paper, Buddhism looks pretty good. It has a philosophical subtlety married to a stated devotion to tolerance that makes it stand out amongst the world religions as uniquely not awful. Even Friedrich Nietzsche, not known for pulling punches when it came to religious analysis, only said of Buddhism that it was "nihilistic", but still "a hundred times more realistic than Christianity." And we in the 21st century have largely followed his lead in sensing something a bit depressing about Buddhism, but nothing more sinister than that. But if we start looking a bit closer, at the ramifications of Buddhist belief in practice, there is a lurking darkness there, quietly stated and eloquently crafted, but every bit as profound as the Hellfires of Christianity or the rhetoric of jihad.

For nine years, I worked as a science and maths teacher at a small private Buddhist school in the United States. And it was a wonderful job working with largely wonderful people. The administration, monks, and students knew that I was an atheist and had absolutely no problem with it as long as I didn't actively proselytise (try and find a Catholic school that would hire a moderate agnostic, let alone a fully out-of-the-closet atheist). Our students were incredibly sensitive and community-conscious individuals, and are my dear friends to this day.

Texas Mom Sues After Insurance Denies Claim and Daughter Dies of Appendicitis

A Texas nurse and mother has sued her insurance company after her 6-year-old daughter died of a brain injury when appendicitis surgery allegedly went wrong while the family was on vacation in the Dominican Republic in 2012.

Marissett Tolentino alleges in a lawsuit filed Dec. 17 in Galveston County Court that Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas denied her sick daughter Isabella a medical jet that they were entitled to under their policy, which led to surgery "being performed in substandard conditions" at a local hospital.

Isabella had her appendix surgically removed at a BCBSTX-authorized facility, Hospiten Bavaro in Punta Cana, but she never came out of the anesthesia and suffered a fatal brain injury, the lawsuit alleges.

Mother of ‘Brain-Dead’ Teen Claims Hospital is Starving Her Daughter

The mother of a teenage girl who was declared brain dead following a tonsillectomy and other throat and nasal procedures is claiming that hospital officials are starving her daughter and are being insensitive in referring to her only as “the body.”

“I hate it that they refer to her as just ‘the body’ or ‘the deceased’; that is my child that they’re talking about,” Latasha Winkfield told ABC News on Tuesday. “They don’t even use her name.”

“To watch my daughter just sit there and not have food … I’m just so happy that she is kind of a thick girl so she still looks good,” she stated. “I tell her every day, ‘Jahi, you losin’ weight, girl, but you still look good.’ I just think it’s inhumane to not feed my child, to not refer to her by her name, and stop us in our tracks.”

Texas Secretary of State Steen Resigns

With the 2014 elections just underway, the state’s top election official — Texas Secretary of State John Steen Jr. — announced late Friday that he is resigning his post.

Steen, a San Antonio attorney who has served in a number of appointed state government positions, has held the job for about a year. He succeeded Hope Andrade in the position