JUSIPER
Monday, December 25, 2006
Fuzzy math kills neocons
Via Brad DeLong, Jonathan Chait:
Neoconservatives had been gung-ho for years on the idea of invading Iraq, establishing a democracy and watching the transformative power of liberty work its magic. It is indeed curious how and why Bush let the neocons sucker him.
But fewer people seemed to have noticed that the reverse is also true: Bush suckered the neocons. [...]
It's probably too late to make a difference in Iraq. Bush may have come to believe in the neoconservative mission for the nation's military. But he never accepted the corollary about increasing the military. So he ended up pursuing Dick Cheney's foreign policy with Bill Clinton's army.
In hindsight, we can see that the neocons made two huge blunders. The first was to go along with Bush's enormous tax cuts. When Bush took office in 2001, any halfway honest budget analyst would tell you that he was making a lot of promises that didn't add up. The neocons calculated that, if they supported the tax cuts like good party soldiers, Bush would grant them their defense budget increases later on.
So the Standard enthusiastically boosted the tax cuts. Neoconservative defense hawk Frank Gaffney concurred in a fawning open letter to Bush. "Those of us who look forward to helping you succeed in your efforts to rebuild our defense posture appreciate that your success in reducing taxes is a first and highly synergistic step toward that goal," he wrote. "Consequently, you can count on us in the national security community to support you in both of these important endeavors."
Whoops. It turned out there wasn't any money left over for a big troop increase, an eventuality nobody could have foreseen unless they knew how to add and subtract. Enraged at the lack of a defense hike, the Standard published an editorial calling on then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, and his deputy, Paul Wolfowitz, to resign in protest of "the impending evisceration of the military."
The Standard lamented its own gullibility. "Those of us who expressed concern about the Bush administration's shorting of the military were told not to worry," the editors wrote. "Bush had to pass his tax cut first. Then the damage would be repaired in the [fiscal year] 2002 and FY 2003 budgets. But that's not the way things have turned out."
Let me translate this passage: We thought Bush was just lying to the American public, but now we discover he was lying to us also!
Let me quote one more passage from that editorial, because it's really incredible. The Standard warned that Bush's budget would make an invasion of Iraq all but impossible: "In practice, assembling a heavy armored force of even four divisions to defeat Saddam's army and then occupy Iraq would require every heavy unit based in Korea, Europe and the United States." Yet, just a few months later, the neocons demanded the very war that they said would be impossible, to be waged by that same eviscerated military.
But if they had only withdrawn their support earlier, before the big tax cut and before Bush invaded with too small of an army to win, the United States would be in much better shape today — and so would the neocons.
2:30 AM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Archbishop Akinola
He's an American conservative's dream; their love for non-elected black leaders is, after all, well known. But the thing to note about African Christian leaders' obsessive homophobia is that it has a whole lot more to do with fear of Islam than fear of gays.
One of Archbishop Akinola’s principal arguments, often heard from other conservatives as well, is that Christianity in Nigeria, a country where religious violence has killed tens of thousands in the past decade, must guard its flank lest Islam overtake it. “The church is in the midst of Islam,” he said. “Should the church in this country begin to teach that it is appropriate, that it is right to have same sex unions and all that, the church will simply die.”
In short, Christianity must become more Islam in order to survive in repressive countries. Our own evangelicals, too, wish to become more like Islam, as Jesus Camp bears witness. Much like their theological ancestors' love for slavery, evangelicals' homophobia is rooted in a spiritual negativity and emptiness that doesn't even have competition as an excuse.
Merry Christmas!
1:11 AM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Sunday, December 24, 2006
Lindsey Graham hits one out of the park
Himself a victim of homophobia during the 2002 campaign, our favorite Log Cabiner takes on Virgil Goode.
8:48 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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2010 Reapportionment
For now, TX would gain 2, while AZ, FL, GA, NV, UT would gain one. LA, IA, MA, MO, NY, OH and PA would lose one each.
On the presidential level, all these changes really indicate is the continued centrality of Florida and Ohio. And demographic changes in FL, NV and even AZ are the stuff of Republican nightmares.
These numbers also change little on the congressional level. The bottom line is the same: the 2010 governor and state house races will be crucial to the next Congress. And the fatigue caused by sixteen continuous years of Republican rule (and, potentially, the reaction from Mexican-Americans to nutty legislation) could make Texas a very interesting place to watch if Democrats play their cards right.
"On the border we tend to be social conservatives," says [Democratic state representative Aaron] Peña, who keeps close tabs on attitudes about immigration-related issues. Hispanics are split on whether to tighten or loosen immigration policy.
"But we tend to be very close, generationally, to poverty," he explains. "Since our parents and grandparents were poor, we understand the immigrants' struggle." [...]
"Not by their own efforts, but by the missteps of the Republicans, Democrats made short-term gains here because there is now a feeling that the Republican Party is hostile to our community," Peña says, largely because of the overblown anti-immigrant rhetoric and support of border-wall legislation.
Reggie Gonzales, a Houston schoolteacher who heads Texas' Republican Hispanic National Assembly, seems to agree.
"It is one thing to say illegal immigrants should not be here and that they should not break the law," Gonzales told the Rio Grande Guardian, an online political newsletter. "It's another thing to say they stink and carry disease."
8:45 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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MONICA GETS HER MASTER'S
Congratulations!
As Jeralyn says:
Her thesis topic was: In Search of the Impartial Juror: An Exploration of the Third Person Effect and Pre-Trial Publicity."
You Go. Girl. More power to you. I spent years on tv night after night sticking up for you (and trashing Linda Tripp) and I'm glad it turned out so well for you. Your mother may have gotten the rawest deal of all, getting called to a grand jury to disclose mother-daughter secrets, but she was there for you. Your parents got you good lawyers, once you got past the Ginsberg guy who wanted to be on every sunday news show every Sunday.
You
I expect we'll be reading more about you in the years to come. Kudos for rising above the media nastiness and going to a better place with a stronger sense of self. Good luck to you in the future.
8:25 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Webb: WH behind party leak
Go figure:
Q: You have seen President Bush, with whom you had a famously tense exchange at a White House reception shortly after the election.
A: I think that was vastly overblown.
Q: Bush, according to the story, asked you about your son, a marine serving in Iraq. You replied that you’d like to get the troops out of Iraq, prompting Bush to say: “I didn’t ask you that. How’s your boy?”
A: I think what I said was appropriate.
Q: Yes. I was surprised that it erupted into a national debate about manners and etiquette, which seems so trivial compared with the issue of ending the war.
A: This was something that emanated from the White House. I did not say anything about this for two weeks. I said nothing publicly at all.
Q: Why would the White House release the information so long after the event?
A: Probably as an attempt to try to define me between the election and the beginning of the Congress. And that’s all I am going to say.
4:14 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Concord Monitor poll
Obama tied with Clinton for first in New Hampshire with 21% and 22% respectively, Edwards at 16%, Gore at 10%. GOP: Giuliani 26%, McCain 25%, Romney 10%. Only 8% undecided among Democrats. But in a close race, independents will decide it.
And here's something interesting: McCain's hypocrisy is turning off moderate Republicans in New Hampshire:
On the Republican side, Giuliani appeals to tough-on-terrorism social moderates, Ali said. "They've turned off of McCain because of his visits to Jerry Falwell," Ali added. During his 2000 White House bid, McCain called Falwell, a prominent evangelical, one of the "agents of intolerance." McCain has since met with Falwell, and recently delivered the commencement address at Falwell's Liberty University.
The challenge for Giuliani, who is pro-choice, will come after New Hampshire, political observers said. "I wouldn't be shocked if Giuliani won New Hampshire," Ali said. But "what's going to happen when he goes to South Carolina?" [...]
"McCain can't take New Hampshire for granted the way he counted on them six years ago," said Dante Scala, a political scientist at St. Anselm College. "If Giuliani could break through anywhere, it would be in New Hampshire, with a large number of independents and a large number of relatively moderate Republicans. He has the opportunity to cause John McCain a lot of grief."
This time around, McCain can no longer rely on being a fresh face, said Edward Mosca, a former chairman of the Manchester Republican Committee. "You've got a limited shelf life in politics, and he's been out there for a while," Mosca said. "I think McCain's biggest obstacle in the primary is that he has the highest expectations."
The article is thin on numbers for general election contests, but these numbers mirror Iowa.
Although Clinton commands considerable support among likely Democratic primary voters, she struggles in general election match-ups, according to the poll. If the contest were held today, both Arizona Sen. John McCain and former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani would prevail over Clinton. Obama, in contrast, would eke out a slight win over both Republican candidates. Former Democratic vice presidential nominee John Edwards is neck-and-neck with the Republicans.
"There are a lot of independents. These are the same people who loathe Bush, loathe the Iraq war," said Del Ali, president of Research 2000, the Maryland-based nonpartisan polling firm that conducted the poll for the Monitor last Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. "But deep down, they don't like Hillary Clinton."
These numbers suggest that independents will gravitate towards Obama, Giuliani and possibly Edwards. That is bad news for Clinton and McCain.
Meanwhile, given McCain and Giuliani's dominance, it's hard to see how any conservative Republican can win here. That is rather interesting, because the Southern Heritage candidate has yet to emerge. Should this unknown candidate win the GOP nomination, New Hampshire will be once again safely Democratic, and the Democrats will pick up yet another Senate seat.
1:25 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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The ugly truth
And the reason Democrats will not be held responsible for Iraq even after taking over Congress: this war is inextricably tied to the GOP.
One thing BushCo did and did well was in branding this war an exclusively Republican War and cutting Democrats out of what they thought was going to be the credit for it. So, my guess would be the public is already not going to buy any whining excuses that the media/hippies/bloggers/tree huggers lost the glorious GOP War. [...]
Nevertheless, it wouldn't hurt to remind people every chance we get -- especially as revelations of fraud or profiteering come to light, more Americans die, and even politicians with a purple stain on their finger run away screaming from Bush and his war over the next year -- that this is a Republican War started by a Republican President managed by a Republican Cabinet enabled by a Rubber-stamp Republican Congress and cheered on by Republican media operatives. In short: Republicans Lost The War.
1:08 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Big poll out of Iowa
KCCI-TV has Edwards and Obama tied in first place with 22% each and Clinton in fourthwith just 10%, behind her alleged stalking horse Tom Vilsack.
McCain leads among Republicans with 27%, Giuliani in second with 26%. Romney is third with just 9%.
I have my doubts about the screen on this poll--"likely voters" rather than "likely caucusgoers," but regardless, it looks like the Dems have a race between two likeable candidates and Hillary. Meanwhile, on the Republican side, it looks like the religious right doesn't have a candidate. Interesting.
Iowa went to Bush very narrowly in 2004, and to Gore narrowly in 2000. So these head to head numbers are pretty interesting:
If the 2008 presidential race were held today, Obama would lead McCain with 42 percent of respondents' approval versus 39 percent.
Along party lines, 73 percent of Democratic respondents would pick Obama and 73 percent of Republicans would pick McCain.
Edwards edged out McCain with 42 percent of respondents overall saying they would pick him versus 39 percent. Among Democratic respondents, 72 percent said they would vote for Edwards and 73 percent of Republicans said they would pick McCain.
McCain beat out Clinton in the poll. Forty-three percent of respondents said they would choose McCain, and 37 percent said they would pick Clinton. Independents leaned toward McCain at 45 percent. Along party lines, 69 percent of Democrats picked Clinton and 75 percent of Republicans picked McCain.
The gap was narrower in results between Giuliani and Clinton. Thirty-nine percent of overall respondents picked Giuliani, and 35 percent picked Clinton.
More men, or 43 percent, said they'd pick Giuliani, and 39 percent of women said they would vote for Clinton. Most independents, or 40 percent, said they would vote for Giuliani.
If the race were between Obama and Giuliani, 43 percent of respondents said they would pick Obama and 38 percent said they would pick Giuliani.
Along party lines, 73 percent of Democrats said they would choose Obama and 75 percent said they would pick Giuliani.
Edwards beat out Giuliani overall with 42 percent of the vote versus 38 percent. More men picked Giuliani at 43 percent, and more women picked Edwards at 46 percent.
And then, of course, there's the war:
Respondents largely across the board think that it was not worth it to go to war with Iraq for the sake of a regime change.
Sixty-four percent of those polled said it was not worth it.
Along party lines, 86 percent of Democrats said the war was not worth it and 59 percent of Republicans said it was not worth it. Among Independents, 72 percent said the war was not worth it.
Iowa is now a bellweather state; it's good to see Edwards and Obama ahead of the GOP's two best known candidates. If either of them wins the Democratic nod and someone to the right of McCain or Giuliani captures the Republican nomination, Iowa, Minnesota and Wisconsin may not be competitive at all. And if the same is true for Ohio, the party of Southern Heritage may find itself without a strategy for victory.
3:33 AM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Friday, December 22, 2006
Krugman
On a debate the country needs to have:
Now that the Democrats have regained some power, they have to decide what to do. One of the biggest questions is whether the party should return to Rubinomics -- the doctrine, associated with former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin, that placed a very high priority on reducing the budget deficit. The answer, I believe, is no. Mr. Rubin was one of the ablest Treasury secretaries in American history. But it's now clear that while Rubinomics made sense in terms of pure economics, it failed to take account of the ugly realities of contemporary American politics. And the lesson of the last six years is that the Democrats shouldn't spend political capital trying to bring the deficit down. They should refrain from actions that make the deficit worse. But given a choice between cutting the deficit and spending more on good things like health care reform, they should choose the spending. [...] And under Mr. Rubin, the huge deficits of the Reagan-Bush years were transformed into an impressive surplus.
But the realities of American politics ensured that it was all for naught. The second President Bush quickly squandered the surplus on tax cuts that heavily favored the wealthy, then plunged the budget deep into deficit by cutting taxes on dividends and capital gains even as he took the country into a disastrous war. And you can even argue that Mr. Rubin's surplus was a bad thing, because it greased the rails for Mr. Bush's irresponsibility.
As Brad DeLong, a Berkeley economist who served in the Clinton administration, recently wrote on his influential blog: "Rubin and us spearcarriers moved heaven and earth to restore fiscal balance to the American government in order to raise the rate of economic growth. But what we turned out to have done, in the end, was to enable George W. Bush's right-wing class war: his push for greater after-tax income inequality.%" My only quibble with Mr. DeLong's characterization is that this wasn't just one man's class war: the whole conservative movement shared Mr. Bush' squanderlust, his urge to run off with the money so carefully saved under Mr. Rubin's leadership.
With the benefit of hindsight, it's clear that conservatives who claimed to care about deficits when Democrats were in power never meant it. Let's not forget how Alan Greenspan, who posed as the high priest of fiscal rectitude as long as Bill Clinton was in the White House, became an apologist for tax cuts -- even in the face of budget deficits -- once a Republican took up residence.
Now the Democrats are back in control of Congress. They've pledged not to be as irresponsible as their predecessors: Nancy Pelosi, the incoming House speaker, has promised to restore the "pay-as-you-go" rule that the Republicans tossed aside in the Bush years. This rule would basically prevent Congress from passing budgets that increase the deficit. I'm for pay-as-you-go. The question, however, is whether to go further. Suppose the Democrats can free up some money by fixing the Medicare drug program, by ending the Iraq war and/or clamping down on war profiteering, or by rolling back some of the Bush tax cuts. Should they use the reclaimed revenue to reduce the deficit, or spend it on other things?
The answer, I now think, is to spend the money -- while taking great care to ensure that it is spent well, not squandered -- and let the deficit be. By spending money well, Democrats can both improve Americans' lives and, more broadly, offer a demonstration of the benefits of good government. Deficit reduction, on the other hand, might just end up playing into the hands of the next irresponsible president.
In the long run, something will have to be done about the deficit. But given the state of our politics, now is not the time.
The terms of debate have shifted among serious economists. The question now becomes this: given the continual possibility of Republican political leadership, is it worthwhile for Democrats to reduce spending and save if the price is a return to Republican profligacy?
And if the answer is no, will our economy survive?
1:59 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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China, idealistic as ever
From Foreign Policy's top ten missed stories of 2006:
The debt-relief deal struck at last year’s Group of Eight (G8) summit, where rich countries promised to forgive about $40 billion in debts owed by poor countries, was supposed to be a turning point in Africa’s development, a chance to wipe its economic slate clean. Then came China. The rapidly industrializing country has emerged as a top lender to poor African countries, and that has many international development organizations worried that years of campaigning for debt relief will be set back by a new wave of bad loans.
The World Bank estimates that Chinese loans for African infrastructure already total more than $12.5 billion. In November, Chinese President Hu Jintao promised to provide another $5 billion in loans to Africa by 2009. Many of these deals are believed to be similar to commercial loans rather than the low-interest, long-term credits extended by multilateral development banks. It’s hard to know the full extent of the risk because China usually refuses to divulge the terms of the deals. Development experts now fear that aggressive lending by Chinese banks will land Africa back where it started—in the red.
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What happened to Jessica
Let's hope the video is released someday:
Simpson had learned the song and rehearsed but "was also shooting a movie which was consuming a lot of her time, 'Blonde Ambition,' " the rep said. She then tried out the Jessica-was-overcome-with-emotion- because-Dolly-has-always-been-an-idol line that's been the Simpson camp's standard response since her Kennedy Center meltdown.
Simpson, you might recall, kept one arm clenched around her chest while singing the Parton standard. As if that wasn't strange enough, after the song she said to the audience -- including Parton, Steven Spielberg, Smokey Robinson, Zubin Mehta, Andrew Lloyd Webber and the president of the United States -- "Dolly, you make me so nervous, I can't even sing the words right." Which seemed odd, considering she's been performing professionally for about 15 years.
Then, in one of those uncomfortable moments that make even live-to-tape TV so riveting, Simpson stood frozen onstage like a deer caught in headlights for a brief minute that played like an eternity, after which she bounced offstage like a jackrabbit. Really, she bounded -- it was very strange.
According to The Washington Post's Reliable Source column, Simpson was a mess backstage before she performed, crying during the tribute to Parton and pacing nervously while others performed their Parton songs. Those singers -- Carrie Underwood, Kenny Rogers, Alison Krauss and Shania Twain -- got through their songs without incident.
After the show, Stevens invited Simpson to re-shoot her song while the rest of the group had dinner out in the Kennedy Center lobby, and she did.
"After reviewing the tape of the 're-do' performance that was filmed after the live event, Jessica felt it was not what she had hoped to achieve," Stevens said in a statement. "As a result, she and the producers agreed that it would not be included in the CBS broadcast. We appreciate the time and energy Ms. Simpson put into this event and respect the high standards she has for herself and that of the Kennedy Center Honors."
1:16 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Zogby race poll
Interesting:
More than half (55 percent) of whites classified Obama as biracial after being told that Obama’s mother is white and his Kenyan father is black. Likewise, 61 percent of Hispanics also saw Obama as biracial, the Williams Identity Survey conducted by Zogby International shows. The Zogby Interactive survey polled 2,155 adults from Nov. 1-2, 2006. The poll contained a margin of error of +/- 2.2 percentage points.
For blacks, the Obama candidacy is viewed differently as the Illinois Democrat cannot escape the nation’s past racial history. Sixty-six percent of blacks that responded to the interactive poll classified Obama as black.
Williams warned, “Even though we’ve come a long way, we’ve not completely moved beyond the ‘One Drop Rule,’ the segregation-era notion that even a tiny percentage of non-white ancestry (‘one drop of non-white blood’) classified a person as ‘colored’. ”
Obama, the son of a Kenyan father and white mother, is entering the national stage at a time when the United States is undergoing rapid demographic change. Whites, especially, seem desirous to put the nation’s contorted racial past behind them. Overall, the vast majority (63%) say that racial identity should not be an issue anymore -- that figure grows to 70% among whites.
“Obama’s potential entry into Presidential politics is fortuitous, as it coincides with this changing demography,” explained John Kenneth White, professor of political science at The Catholic University of America, in his analysis of the Williams Identity Survey results. “To be sure, the future face of America is a blurred one whose skin tone is some form of beige. The question of racial self-identification is hardly new, as evidenced by the U.S. Census, and the implications many.”
Williams says Obama’s heritage offers him the rare opportunity for a perfect political “trifecta”: Obama is a reflection of changing American demographics, a non-threatening, accomplished figure with broad appeal like former Secretary of State Colin Powell, and a symbol of black pride and progress, all rolled into one, if he can mange to hold together the delicate balance that will be required of him.
5:36 AM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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A historical reevaluation of Victim of Love
Surely as arcane a review as one ever sees in an ostensibly serious musical publication. Closing with a savvy and very funny paragraph one would need to hear at least ten Elton John albums to appreciate:
Better than the Gary Osborne records, not quite as good as Rock of the Westies or ‘Songs from the West Coast’. But it still should’ve sold more than 11 copies. To make up the slack I will recommend this to a) anyone who absolutely must hear a disco version of “Johny B. Goode” – shout out to Judas Priest! - with a BASS SOLO, and b) anyone who, like myself, is collecting any record ever made featuring the godlike Keith Forsey!
1:26 AM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Thursday, December 21, 2006
"Can you open your grandson please"
TSA news:
A 56-year-old grandmother and apparently inexperienced traveler placed her month-old grandson into a plastic bin and sent him into the X-ray machine used to screen carry-on luggage at Los Angeles International Airport last weekend.
The Los Angeles Times, which describes the incident today as “bizarre but not unprecedented,” suggested that the incident sheds light on overtaxed airport security workers, who somehow didn’t notice what was unfolding until after the child was inside the machine and being exposed to a hefty dose of X-rays. (The child got a clean bill of health after being examined at a local hospital.)
“The screeners are still reporting that they’re being pushed,” Brian Sullivan, a retired Federal Aviation Administration security agent, told The Times. “If a baby can get through, what the hell else can get through?”
10:48 AM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Wednesday, December 20, 2006
Sex education in China
Challenging:
Sex has long been taboo in China, where sex is considered a dirty thing.
Mothers are likely to tell their children they are born from stone in response to questions about where babies come from.
Even teachers themselves are embarrassed when talking about it.
A survey quoted by the Southern Daily found most Chinese students learned about sex through books and the media but seldom in the classroom, media report said.
"The government hands out lots of brochures on AIDS prevention. But teachers, especially primary school teachers, are not willing to teach this information to students and avoid it by tearing some pages out of the book," Hu said during an interview with the Southern Weekly.
10:11 PM | Post or Read Comments (1)
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Wondering where your officemate is?
He might be Republican Party's next model entrepreneur:
8e6 Technologies, a security company dedicated to Internet filtering and reporting, today announced the results of a recent competition to find the most outlandish Internet usage by employees. The results reveal that an increasing number of corporate employees are abusing the Internet for personal gain and putting their organizations at risk of legal liability. The contest sought out stories about the most extreme employee abuse of the Internet during work hours. Of the more than 500 respondents, the winning story went to a computer programmer who discovered one of the employees was using company bandwidth to run his own porn site from the office. Not only was the employee using corporate resources, but after hours he would sneak models into the office and have them pose on the office furniture, including his boss’s office.
“The increased incidence of employee Internet abuse is continuing to cause widespread IT and legal hurdles for many organizations,” commented Eric Lundbohm, vice president of marketing for 8e6. “Without a proper Acceptable Use Policy and effective monitoring tools in place, organizations will continue to see extensive abuse from some of their most trusted assets – their employees.”
Second prize went to a technology manager who discovered an employee who had downloaded a huge amount of prohibited content such as videos, MP3 files and movies to his workstation. He then set up an internal media server to the rest of the company in order to “save” bandwidth. When he was caught, he said, “I was just trying to help.” Third prize was awarded to a network support manager who discovered a male employee who closed his door to run his personal online live sex show during work hours, putting the organization at risk of sexual harassment claims. Other anecdotes can be found on the 8e6 Web site at www.8e6.com.
8:48 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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9 of 10 Americans have had premarital sex
Older ones too!
More than nine out of 10 Americans, men and women alike, have had premarital sex, a new study says. The high rates extend even to women born in the 1940s, challenging perceptions that people were more chaste in the past.
"This is reality-check research," said the study's author, Lawrence Finer. "Premarital sex is normal behavior for the vast majority of Americans, and has been for decades."
Finer is a research director at the Guttmacher Institute, a private New York-based think tank that studies sexual and reproductive issues. It disagrees with government-funded programs that rely primarily on abstinence-only teachings.
The study, released Tuesday, appears in the new issue of Public Health Reports. It examines how sexual behavior before marriage has changed. Data came from interviews conducted with more than 38,000 people--about 33,000 of them women--in 1982, 1988, 1995 and 2002.
According to Finer's analysis, 99 percent of respondents had had sex by age 44, and 95 percent had done so before marriage.
Even among those who abstained until at least age 20, four-fifths had had premarital sex by 44, the study found.
Among women born between 1950 and 1978, at least 91 percent had had premarital sex by age 30, Finer said, while among those born in the 1940s, 88 percent had done so by age 44.
Wade Horn, an assistant secretary at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, defended the abstinence-only approach. "The longer one delays, the fewer lifetime sex partners they have, and the less the risk of contracting . . . disease."
8:45 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Amen
From a TPM reader:
Am I the only one who is bothered by the way the pundits continually point out that Edwards’s or Obama’s lack of foreign policy experience is a genuine weakness, while Guiliani’s lack of foreign policy experience is never mentioned? Unlike Guiliani, at least Edwards and Obama have served in a national office.
6:12 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Political video of the year
And the best epitaph ever.
The new Beyoncé video is sweeping the nation, lifting Americans' spirits with hopes for a brighter future and a better president.
Amen.
12:45 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Tuesday, December 19, 2006
Sunday, December 17, 2006
Indian Sniper kills Osama bin Laden
A much needed shot in the arm for the Bush adminisration. Doesn't that war in Iraq seem totally justified now? Hat tip to Aswatthama of the Mahabharata.
4:11 AM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Saturday, December 16, 2006
High risk, high reward
Edwards to announce in New Orleans, allegedly later this month.
11:31 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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The Internets
Wikipedia:
Internets had been used as a shorthand expression, to imply that a person or group was clueless about the Internet or about technology in general, but is often used today in reference to U.S. President George W. Bush who referred to the "Internets" in the 2nd Presidential Debate with U.S. Senator John Kerry on October 8, 2004. The exchange is reproduced below:
AUDIENCE QUESTION: Mr. President, since we continue to police the world, how do you intend to maintain a military presence without re-instituting a draft?
BUSH: Yes, great question. Thanks. I hear there's rumors on the uh (pause) Internets that we're going to have a draft. We're not going to have a draft, period. The all-volunteer Army works...
In a similar verbal slip-up, President Bush referred to “the Google” in an interview with CNBC's Maria Bartiromo on October 26, 2006
Video here, in case you've repressed it.
6:53 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Billboard critics: Modern Times is album of the year
Billboard being Billboard, the news come with some indispensable chart trivia:
Bob Dylan's "Modern Times" (Columbia) has won the 2006 Billboard Critics' Choice poll, which rounds up top 10 lists from 48 of the magazine's staff and freelance writers. Dylan was mentioned on a leading eight lists, including one No. 1 and three No. 2 finishes.
"Modern Times" earned the artist his first No. 1 on The Billboard 200 since 1976's "Desire." It was also his highest debuting album and his best sales week since Nielsen SoundScan began tracking data in 1991.
An inverse point system -- where 10 points were given to a title listed at No. 1, and one point given to a No. 10 entry -- was used to determine the rankings. Dylan's labelmate labelmate Bruce Springsteen's "We Shall Overcome -- The Seeger Sessions" and Gnarls Barkley's debut album, "St. Elsewhere" (Downtown/Atlantic) finished second and third, respectively.
6:32 PM | Post or Read Comments (5)
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The state of comedy today
Amen.
For the most part, I agree with Mr. Perpetua’s statement that there exists a certain conservatism in the indie rock subculture (which I blame entirely for my burnout) and that it’s almost surely a reflection of modern society. If you look at other areas of entertainment, most notably stand-up comedy, you see the same thing happening: Carlos Mencia, Jeff Foxworthy, Dan Whitney, Bill Engvall, and Ron White never have to work again because their brand of ignorance, racism, and fart jokes are the modus operandi of American humour. Comedian Dane Cook, whose humor appeals to conservative frat boys and their subsequent skanks, has released the most popular comedy album since 1978 despite the fact that he doesn’t actually tell jokes. As Bryan Curtis notes in his October 6th article for Slate Magazine, Cook is an “undangerous comedian posing as a dangerous one”: he may be crude, but he’s familiar and inoffensive, and that’s what society (or at least the very large subsection that’s big into hand gestures and “me-tooism”) wants.
Dave Chappelle, R.I.P.
4:02 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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George Will: Democrats will win in 2008
No matter who wins the nomination.
From an piece on why Obama should run:
[T]he odds favor the Democratic nominee in 2008 because for 50 years it has been rare for a presidential nominee to extend his party's hold on the presidency beyond eight years…Only the first President Bush, in 1988, succeeded, perhaps because the country desired a third term for the incumbent, which will not be the case in 2008. So the odds favor a Democrat winning in 2008 and, if he or she is reelected, the Democrat nominated in 2016 losing.
3:08 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Buying for Equality 2007
The HRC's new buying guide. Go figure: Heinz gets 15, one of the worst ratings in the Food and Beverage category, while Coors gets 100.
2:54 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Keating keeps mulling
As does Gilmore. And why shouldn't they? There isn't a heavy duty Southern conservative in the race yet. Which is surprising for what is now essentially the party of white Southerners.
12:40 AM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Amazing statistics
America: Mormons are as bad as gays... but a Bush Cabinet member is worse.
From the Wall Street Journal:
Americans assert their readiness for new kinds of presidential wannabes.
In new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, eight in 10 Americans would be “comfortable” or “enthusiastic” about an African-American or woman running for president. That apparent openness — reflected across race, region and age groups — is encouraging news for leading 2008 Democrats Clinton and Obama.
Though just 19% would have “some reservations” or be “very uncomfortable” about a Jewish candidate, 53% would about a Mormon seeking the White House. Misgivings are higher among conservatives and evangelicals, underscoring need for Massachusetts Gov. Romney to address the issue the way JFK defused concerns about Catholicism in 1960.
More Americans express doubts about a candidate who served in Bush’s cabinet (59%) than one who is gay or lesbian (53%).
DEMOCRATS BENEFIT from post-election good feeling.
Some 46% of Americans give Democrats a positive rating, up from 36% in January. Just 29% rate the party negatively, down from 35% in January. A 46%-33% plurality rates Republicans negatively.
Americans remain “grouchy” toward Republicans, says Republican pollster Bill McInturff, who conducts the poll with Democratic counterpart Peter Hart. The strongest sign: though Americans identified themselves with the two parties in equal proportions on Election Day 2004, Democrats now boast a robust 44%-31% edge. Next six months will be critical, McInturff says, in determining whether that edge persists into 2008.
12:35 AM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Friday, December 15, 2006
Jeb suspends executions
Because, you know, it's inhumane for the state to take a citizen's life if it takes 34 minutes rather than a Christianly twenty.
6:07 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Atlantic Records Story
Atlantic Records' contributions to 20th century music are so vast that the blogosphere is encountering a bit of difficulty eulogizing Ahmet Ertegun in the way he deserves. Perhaps the best way to do it to say what Atlantic meant to oneself, and here the The Stepfather of Soul delivers. And Red Kelly promises a farewell soon.
5:47 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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"Don't you wanna go... YEAH!"
An affectionate tribute to Smokey's "
Going to a Go Go. I'm guessing the Funk Brothers had a lot to do with the much-praised intro.
5:31 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Thursday, December 14, 2006
Slamming Dreamgirls' music
A.O. Scott:
But without the right soundtrack, only half the story is being told. The performances are gratifyingly spirited, but what this movie most obviously lacks is soul.
The great Motown songwriters — Smokey Robinson, Marvin Gaye, the trio of geniuses known to posterity as Holland-Dozier-Holland — turned out great pop songs by the dozen, cutting bolts of blues, gospel and rock ’n’ roll into clean, trim, shiny garments. It is vain to imagine that Mr. Krieger and Mr. Eyen, who died in 1991, could replicate the Motown sound in all its variety, but as it is, the film barely acknowledges its existence.
As the cushioned blasts of overorchestrated thunder assaulted my ears, I would have given anything for a crisp horn chart, a clean drum line, a chattering rhythm guitar or even a memorably witty or catchy verse. Periodically, a character — Curtis, James or Effie’s songwriter brother C. C. (Keith Robinson) — will announce the arrival of a “new sound.” But even though the chronology and the costumes march from doo-wop to disco, everything in “Dreamgirls” sounds more or less the same, as the splashy imperatives of show-tune composing overwhelm everything in their path.
The music has the effect of compromising one of the crucial ambitions of the film: to refract the recent history of black America (and, by implication, America itself) through the prism of popular culture. Part of Curtis’s dream is to cross over and in the process permanently redefine the mainstream, and you hear a lot of talk about what kind of music will appeal to black or white ears. [...]
The decades are marked by the progression of hairstyles, lapels, jewelry and dresses; after a while the experience starts to feel like a long, noisy guided tour through a museum.
Except of course that the dioramas occasionally spring to life when the singers transcend the limitations of the songs. This happens, most memorably, twice: when Ms. Hudson lays claim to “And I Am Telling You,” and when Ms. Knowles, late in the movie, lets loose in a recording booth on “Listen,” one of a handful of new songs written for the film.
11:26 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Ahmet Ertegun 1923-2006
Otis Redding called him Omelette. Farewell to a legend who changed our nation in profound ways.
Here's a Slate interview from last year.
8:21 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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New Jersey votes for civil unions
The margin was 3-1 in the House and 2-1 in the Senate.
While the Legislature could not fall short of full equality in the list of benefits it extended, social conservatives lobbied to reserve the word “marriage” to heterosexuals. Gay rights organizations lobbied just as hard for applying the term to all legal unions.
Same-sex marriage supporters in the Legislature conceded that they could not have pushed through a full marriage bill by the Supreme Court’s deadline in late April.
“Give us two to five years,” said Wilfredo Caraballo, who sponsored the civil union measure in the Assembly. “In a year and a half or two years we’ll see that the world hasn’t collapsed, heterosexuals are still getting married and God hasn’t thrown fire and brimstone on us.”
Like many gay marriage advocates, Mr. Caraballo noted that just three years ago, it was a struggle to enact domestic partnerships, a very limited package of rights and benefits for same-sex couples. “We had to twist arms to get 41 votes,” he said.
8:15 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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BIg news from Iowa
A poll of 602 definite or probable caucusgoers suggests that Edwards' advantage there has solidified over the last six months:
Edwards, a former senator from North Carolina and the second-place finisher in the 2004 caucuses, was picked as the early preference of 36 percent of likely caucusgoers in the survey.
Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York came in second with 16 percent.
Third was Sen. Barack Obama with 13 percent, and Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack trailed in fourth place at 9 percent.
So Vilsack's going to get no cash. And the alleged Clinton strategy of using him as a stalking horse for Hilary will have failed. If Hillary wants to be president, she will have to make a serious run in Iowa. And so will Obama.
A second poll produced even more shocking results:
Among these Iowans most involved in party politics, the poll found even more enthusiasm for Edwards and a stronger sentiment for Vilsack.
That poll said 40 percent of county party leaders preferred Edwards, with Vilsack in second place at 15 percent, Obama with 11 percent and Clinton with just 8 percent.
Compared to the Des Moine Register's summer poll (in which Obama was not a factor),
1. Edwards is up by 6
2. Clinton is down by 10
3. Kerry is down by 6 (half his support has evaporated)
Looks like we've got a real race.
4:04 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Worst Christmas song ever?
Quite possibly. But that's what happens when Republicans take the Christ out of Christmas.
3:42 AM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Is God a Republican?
Republicans must be jumping for joy at the thought of a 50-50 Senate. Tim Johnson wasn't even on JUSIPER's danger list (Akaka, Reid and Byrd). If his stroke proves fatal, Republican Mike "Ban All Abortions" Rounds, a governor who, like George W. Bush, is dearly loved by Jesus, will name the temporary replacement.
On the bright side, Stephanie Herseth (or possibly Tom Daschle) would have a decent shot at holding the seat for Democrats. Supporting a president with a 31% approval rating may be a tough sell in a state where Senate races were won by a single percentage point in 2002 and 2004--when Bush was at 70% approval.
UPDATE: Freepers have come to the same conclusion:
Politically, I can't help but wonder what impact this will have. Unless the stroke is so bad that he is physically unable to do his job, I'm imagining he'll hang on till the end of his term, but it'll make it much more likely that he'll retire in 2008. If that's the case, that might actually be bad for Republicans, because I think Johnson is easier to beat then Herseth would be.
Further, Rounds' replacement for Johnson would only be in office until a special election, within 90 days of the vacancy.
UPDATE #2: Another Freeper points out (same discussion, post #336):
While the governor of South Dakota is a Republican and could tip the balance in the Senate to a 50-50 tie, don't forget that Senator Thomas of Wyoming, a Republican, is currently undergoing treatment for leukemia. If Thomas has to resign, the governor of Wyoming, a Democrat, would appoint his replacement and that would blow everything wide open.
UPDATE #3: Rounds' approval rating is at 70 as of mid-November, but Bush is down to 42. It may be Bush's 16th best state, but he's hardly popular. Tim Johnson is the 9th most popular senator in the country. The state's Republican senator, John Thune, is popular, but his approval rating is about 10 points lower than Johnson's.
UPDATE #4: Rumors of aneurysm, critical condition, brain surgery for several hours. Election law may in fact give Rounds a shot at appointing the successor through 2008. If Johnson is temporarily incapacitated, however, Senate precedent suggests he may return to his duties at any point during the remainder of his term, leaving Democrats with a 50-49 majority (assuming Lieberman).
3:22 AM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Video of the day
A step removed from Dolly. Her biggest pop hit (under her own name) was "Islands in the Stream," a duet she recorded with Kenny Rogers and the song's author's, The Bee Gees, who appear today in the bizarrely entitled "Fanny (Be Tender with my Love)."
12:35 AM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Wednesday, December 13, 2006
"He was dumb as a stump"
Said Christopher Hitchens in a moment of lucidity.
He was responsible for any number of horrendous turns in American domestic and foreign policy (not to mention our courts) that we are still paying the price for.
Today an ahistorical nation calls him the best president since 1969.
11:31 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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Left and right agree
Candidate John Courage McCain is pathetic.
Red State.
Kos.
The last six years have proven that there are few things more dangerous than a leader who has to prove he's something he is not. Let's not make the same mistake again.
10:10 PM | Post or Read Comments (0)
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