Big-Mouth Wednesday: Pat Robertson & Google Talk

See what happens when politics and religion get a little too chummy? You've got a Christian televangelist advocating assassination of a democratically elected world leader as a cheaper alternative than another $200 billion war. Then Venezuela accuses televangelist Pat Robertson of advocating terrorism, and the administration officials currently engaged in one $200 billion war can't back away from Robertson fast enough.

The fallout over Robertson's ill-timed comments dominate the blogosphere today, noted by this "terrorist" graph:



Robertson is today's leading (and burstiet) personality, followed closely by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, the guy he thinks deserves to be offed. For the first time in more than a week, in fact, anti-war protester Cindy Sheehan moves from the No. 1 to No. 5 spot among blogged-about personalities. The Robertson mouth-off captures 10 of today's most-shared news link (including seven of the top 10), six of the day's top shared links (which is also infected with blog spam; our apologies), and six of today's top 10 key phrases.

"Crazy Old Uncle Pat" opines Scott Randolph.net; Shattered offers an updated religious moment for such talk; No Right Turn wonders...Chrisitan Coalition or Christian Taleban? (sic)

Google Talkin'
Elsewhere, mouths are little more sane (yes, we said it) at Google, which this week introduced Google Talk, today's most-discussed phrase. "Pretty simple," says Makezine during a test; "uphill battle" predicts Open Loops.

More church-state mixing, with a dash of humor
Pastafarianism is what they're calling it: observance of the religion that believes in the Flying Spaghetti Mosnter as the true creator of the universe (continued staying power at No. 9 top link). Launched as a spoof of Kansas' decision to embrace intelligent design as official science curriculum, it has spawned spoofs (and contests) of its own.

Overlooking the obvious?
Couldn't help but notice today's No. 4 top link, which notes that 65 of 490 girls at a Canton-area high school are pregnant. Among the various "causes," no one mentioned (ahem) Canton-area boys.