Link roundup for 8 August 2009

Have you checked your roof recently?

Here's a whaling video with a twist (scroll down a bit).

Murdoch follows AP into self-immolation (found via Counting Cats in Zanzibar).

"Fight tyranny" by shouting down people who disagree with you. And by making threats. Oh, and by silly analogies too.

This must be the most flagrantly dishonest argument yet against health-care reform.

Medical insurance denies a claim on the grounds of a pre-existing condition -- in a newborn baby.

Obama's getting it -- bipartisanship on health-care reform is not likely to work.

We already have a form of socialized medicine -- it's just a very inefficient one.

If this is true, it's one of the scariest Bush stories yet.

Here's an interesting discussion of Romney's chances in the 2012 Presidential race. Me, I'm betting the Christian Right Republican "base" just won't support a Mormon.

It's dangerous to make morality arbitrary.

Good riddance to bad rubbish.

Residents of a plague-stricken Chinese town flee quarantine.

The Group News Blog is unimpressed with the new food-safety legislation.

Here's more evidence that Americans aren't as religious as we think.

New images reveal the roiling face of a short-lived giant.

Computer technology is helping to analyze the still-undeciphered writing of one of the world's first civilizations (found via Mendip).

Australian scientists are working to resurrect an extinct species.

Growing a new heart from your own stem cells is years away yet, but growing new teeth is much closer.