Kirk Cameron – a mid-level actor – views himself as a strong Christian. Okay. No problem there.

But when he starts spouting dubious statistics and slanderous claims against college science professors because he wants to be the next Michael Behe or because some little-known outfit called Living Waters wants to insult college science professors using his half fame as proxy, then I have a bit of a problem.

Kirkie Cameron youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oM0oBuhTLRI

More on what Cameron and his anti-Darwin creationist buddies at Living Waters are doing can be found at InsideHigherEd. Make sure you read the comments which follow the article.

This segment still has me chuckling under my breath. She’s all ambition without any gumbo. She’s a steak’n'potato dinner… without any beef or potato.

Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show.

Pennsylvania State Track & Field Coaches Association has posted the “absolute standards” needed to qualify for the Pennsylvania High School Track & Field Championships to be held at the Penn State University Indoor T&F facility in State College. Note the different qualifying standards for flat and banked indoor tracks. Note also the requirement that performances be verifiable. A time schedule of events is included at the bottom of the page.

Note also the ban on all “electronic devices.” Punishment is banning from PSU. Soooooo, like, if I bring my cell phone and it rings, will Nittany 5-0 gimme the boot??

PIAA held its annual cross-country championship races – 4 of them – at the old Parkview Golf Course behind the Giant Sports Complex this morning. One race each for girls in AA and AAA, and one race each for boys in AA and AAA.

Full results are already available at the runhigh website – which has scooped the usually prompt folks at the penntrackxc /pa.milesplit / dyestat websites.

http://runhigh.com/2009%20WEB%20RESULTS/R110709AA.html

And photo’s of your winners are here: penntrackxc

Lindsay Kerr of Northwest Lehigh (AA) is upper left in black uniform with yellow stripe. She’s smiling.

Sara Sargeant of Pennsbury (AAA) is upper right in orange uniform.

Steven Welsh of Kutztown (AA) is in lower left in dark blue uniform.

Brandon Miles of Penn Hills (AAA) is in lower right in baby blue uniform.

Congrats all all the winners. Really enjoyed the morning competition at Hershey. Still do not understand why the course goes right next to a sewage treatment plant!! Stinky-poo!!

Well, the National Park Service has finally acted. Finally.

For months, we’ve had to read about an investigation into alleged “misconduct and criminal” activities of John Latschar, Superintendent of Gettysburg National Military Park with respect to his relationship with the Gettysburg Foundation. I won’t get into all the allegations – some of which aren’t really known despite the reports in the Washington Post – but some misconduct was found to be substantiated via Latschar’s own admissions.

3,456 pornographic images of the “most sexually explicit” variety were found on Latschar’s work computer (federally owned) after an analysis of his computer’s hard drive.

Latschar’s punishment? Job reassignment within the National Park Service. He gets to hide inside with a new desk job.

The asshat should be fired. Period.

And while the news reports states that the internal Interior Department investigation found “no criminal actions” on the part of Latschar, I feel compelled to point out that downloading 3,456 pornographic images of the “most sexually explicit” variety represents the theft of honest services by Latschar. I well imagine that it took a large chunk of time – during which Latschar was paid – to search for and download all those “most” images onto a computer owned by the taxpayer. And that does not even address those images which might be of the “lesser” variety.

John A. Latschar needs to be fired. And the Interior Department should immediately file charges against him for theft of services. No public employee should escape criminal charges for downloading pornographic images on a publicly-owned computer while being paid by the taxpayer.

Here is the Official Report but it omits reference to the pornographic images.

Here is the WaPo article that goes into detail about the internal memo which describes the pornographic images (said to be in the 10’s of thousands).

Update (sorta). Latschar has friends: boroughvent.com

At around 6:30 on Wednesday night, Meleanie Hain was on the computer using the webcam to talk to a friend. Nearby sat her backpack. Inside the backpack was her infamous Glock 26. Fully loaded.

Then her husband arrived.

The webcam friend had momentarily turned away from Meleanie Hain, only to witness Scott Hain shooting into the spot in which Meleanie Hain had just been. The friend immediately called 911.

Will the webcam footage become available to the public under pennsyltucky’s new Open Records Law? Don’t count on it.

Latest story from pennlive.

Greg Rotz, an open carry advocate, was quoted in one story as confusingly wondering if she was unarmed.

“I’m very curious to know if she happened to have her weapon on her. If she didn’t, and she would have, it might have made a difference.”

Obviously not, Greg. And that’s a problem with how some gun owners view ownership of a firearm. Ownership does not guarantee safety. Nor does the proximity of a fully-loaded weapon within close reach. Her weapon was fully-loaded and nearby. Yet, she is as dead as any unarmed person would be.

Hain often posted on the www.paopencarry.org website. Her nickname? “Shefearsnothing.” If that’s not an irony, I will never know one.

The details are unclear at this point, but one thing is certain: the woman who open carried a loaded weapon to a little kids’ soccer game at Optimists Park in Lebanon, PA, is dead.

A neighbor reported that Tyler Hain, the 9-y.o. oldest child of Meleanie Hain came screaming to his house yelling “Daddy shot mom!!”

When police arrived, the gun-toting soccer mom and her husband Scott were found dead at their residence near the intersections of South 2nd Avenue and East Grant Street, not far from the park at which Meleanie Hain was told to remove herself by a current Republican candidate for Lebanon County judge. Her firearms permit was subsequently revoked by Lebanon County Sheriff Michael DeLeo but reinstated after a hearing before a judge. She was chided for exercising poor judgment but the ruling stated that she was within her rights under the 2nd Amendment.

Interviewed after her firearms permit was revoked, Hain stated that she was concerned about her safety. She stated her husband worked in a “law enforcement related” job, which the grapevine indicated was as a parole officer in neighboring Berks County. The media stories about the shooting indicate that she and her husband were having a “marital spat” this week. It’s fairly obvious that the “marital spat” wasn’t just a recent thing and that the person who likely made her most afraid for her safety was a person who lived inside her own home.

I won’t be able to tell you any more than what the original report contains but I worry about my favorite National Park – the one mostly on Mt. Desert Island in Maine: Acadia.

Here come the VMA show, where the musical entertainers get recognized for their visual music performances.

Except that Kanye West decided to follow South Carolina Joe Wilson’s example by acting inappropriately when he climbed uninvited onto the stage to take away Taylor Swift’s moment.

Say what? Crap artists always act inappropriately! See Chris Brown if you need another recent example.

And, as with Chris Brown, Kanye’s behavior entered the category of “over the top in search of undeserved attention.”

What the hell is the matter with people these days? Did Wilson and Kanye’s mothers not pay attention to their kids in earlier days? Did their mothers not teach them about the social graces? Did their fathers not take them out back to the woodshed?

Shout-out to Pink for standing up for her fellow pennsyltuckian on The Today Show this morning. She toned down her statements but had she been on the stage when Kanye came up to upstage the winner of that award… he likely would still be digging his head of his arsehole.

Joe Wilson not only represents what is wrong with and in politics in America, he IS what is wrong in politics. He observes no decorum or any other expectation of proper behavior and farts at his mother’s Sunday dinners. Hell, if he ever went to church, he’d probably spend that hour burping and farting. Probably pulls his own finger because everyone avoids him like the plague. He’s the spawn of secessionists and is too stupid to see the symbolism of acting in the same fashion as one might expect of white slave-owning South Carolinians during the slavery debates of the mid-1800’s.

But how the *&$% did an Asshat like Joe Wilson get elected?? Are the people down around Hilton Head, South Carolina really that stupid?

I can understand that some people might not like Barack Obama or his policies, but let’s at least show some respect for the office of the President during the times when Obama addresses a joint session of congress.