An exaltation of larks—er, links

•An Arizona resident spends 4.5 months in jail, denied bail. Why? She’s a U.S. Latino citizen—and Arizona authorities have the right to deny bail to anyone they think is both an illegal immigrant and a serious felon (her felony being that she’d supposedly forged her identity documents). As the result of being locked up, she lost her home and her car because she couldn’t make payments.
•An argument that cheaters will inevitably win. I’m not sure it holds up, but it’s interesting (and her comments on the lottery fit in with my long-time interest in luck.
•A discussion of black Christian theology with one of the founders.
•An evangelical Christian argument in favor of government-provided health care.
•When companies cheat workers of their pay, it’s theft.
•Bullying bosses. Libertarians insist it doesn’t make economic sense for a boss to mistreat workers. Lawyers Guns and Money points out that some bosses will do it just because they suck. Likewise, a Tiny Revolution looks at billionaires convinced that welfare is only for losers and cheats.
•David Brooks joins in the bullshit theory (does he believe in any other kind?) that the educational system is designed to castrate boys. For my thoughts on this particular undead sexist cliche, click here and here.
•More mockery of David Brooks! I know I link to Brooks (or takedowns of him) a lot but that’s because he’s both very, very wrong and absurdly high-profile.
•A Roy Edroso column about right-bloggers on the death of Andy Griffith. They can’t make up their mind whether to salute lovably Sheriffy Andy, or castigate him as a senile fool for supporting Obamacare. And that’s not counting the bloggers who think Mayberry was lovely because it was white.
•A few weeks back I wrote an And column about hate for women. Here’s an ugly example. More on it here. I do find it amazing that someone out there thinks “bolshevik feminist Jewess” is a vicious insult to fling at another person—unfortunately, most of the shit is not at all amazing and very disgusting.
•And Muslims get plenty of shit too: A British writer recounts his experience with anti-Islamic haters.
•A bizarre collection of fundamentalist quotes. They range from the hysterical (there’s no way light can actually move so starlight hasn’t traveled for millions of years!) to the creepy (stuff about rape, child abuse, child rape …). It’s kind of grotesquely fascinating—though in fairness to the many intelligent religious people I know, I’d like to point out that you can find any group saying moronic things if you hunt around the Internet far enough (so I wouldn’t take this as proof of well, anything).
•Jokes about the Golden Rule and whether they get the point of the rule.
•Even when someone’s full of shit, that does not justify sexist comments. The case specifically cited is Jenny McCarthy’s conviction vaccines are messengers of death, and attacks that rip into her for modeling for Playboy (as if that had anything to do with her views). As I’ve said before, sexist attacks are never kosher.