Shoot Me Now

25% of American adults "think" that the sun goes around the earth.

Even worse, it appears that women are less intelligent than men.
86% of men know that the earth goes around the sun, but only 66% of women know this. Add that to the 64% of Americans who think creationism should be taught in science classes and we're not winning the prize for the world's biggest smartypants. Not even close.

Thanks a lot, Kevin Drum, for making today's newsday that much more depressing.

Let's Shoot the Poor!

Wow, this is one seriously blackend soul. Neal Boortz has an interesting solution to the looting problem in New Orleans-- kill first, ask questions later.

Now I'm serious here .. not just saying this for effect. Shoot to kill. People have been victimized enough by this terrible disaster. Their grief does not have to be amplified by the actions of their lawless neighbors. If the police tolerate the looting, it is a signal to the predators that their lawlessness will be tolerated .. .and it will expand. One person told CNN "If it was wrong the police would be out there stopping it." Amazing, isn't it. This dreadlocked goon seems to believe that any behavior the police don't immediately halt is somehow OK!

First of all, the "dreadlocked goon" comment is absolutely priceless. I love how he seems to believe that the people doing the looting aren't victims of the hurricane, just the business owners are, the people who were actually able to pack up and leave town. He acts as though these "goons" descended on the city afterwards to clean out the joint. They are hurricane victims too, only they're the people who didn't have the the means to get out of town. It's not as though they were provided with a way to evacuate when the evacuation orders were made and chose to stay. Essentially, as others have pointed out elsewhere, the people without resources were left behind to fend for themselves.

While there are reports of some people who are stealing nonessential, materialistic stuff-- jewelry, electronics, etc.-- there are plenty of reports of people raiding grocery stores to get stuff like food, diapers and clothes. How can someone possibly demonize people stealing diapers? How dare they steal things like diapers and food! No, in Neal Boortz's world we should KILL POOR PEOPLE for stealing FOOD and DIAPERS. We should kill people who are trying to SURVIVE in the wake of a catastrophic natural disaster. What a truly warped sense of right and wrong.

Their city has been destroyed, it is flooded, they have no resources, there is no way to "buy" food, water or clothing, chances are they have nowhere to go. But Boortz can't rustle up a little sympathy in their direction? I have an idea, why don't we drop him and his family in the middle of New Orleans without food, clothing or shelter and see what he thinks he should do to care for himself and his family?

So, frankly, after what everyone who lives there has been through, I can hardly blame anyone for looting. I'm not saying it's right, but it is understandable. No matter what, looting is not nearly as wrong as the idea of shooting people who are trying to survive in the aftermath of a historic, devastating hurricane.

Looting really is the least of New Orlean's problems right now, well, unless you're someone who values property over human life.

Update: Know what is far more despicable than looting? People are already setting up fake charities to steal money from people who want to help Katrina's victims. Man, that is just. so. low.

Sadly, Some People Buy This

The General is having a bit of fun with Rep. Cathy McMorris. The Congresswoman's response to the General's initial inquiry--would she sponsor legislation raising the recruitment age to 45 and, once it passed, would she enlist (being below 45 herself)--was a boilerplate non-response.

What's particularly sad about the boilerplate is that Republicans probably wouldn't be sending out stuff that they didn't think at least some of their constituents would find impressive or persuasive. Yet McMorris is peddling nonsense that is either internally contradictory, long since debunked, coyly crafted to be misleading but not quite false, or some combination of the three. Examples:

If military action were not taken in Iraq, the potential threat to the United States would have increased greatly due to the precarious nature of Saddam Hussein's regime. This regime exhibited the ability to use chemical weapons as well as refusal to abandon programs that relate to these dangerous weapons.

So the regime that's there now is less precarious than Saddam's? And if Saddam was so precarious, why did it require an invasion to unseat him? Wouldn't he have fallen on his own? As for the "ability to use chemical weapons," it's either downright false or (if one generously interprets the statement to refer--illogically--not to the status quo when we invaded but to the situation in 1988) thoroughly disingenuous.

Operation Iraqi Freedom was essential on a couple of fronts: 1) transforming Iraq into a democracy that could serve as a model for the rest of the region; and 2) would prevent Iraq from becoming a safe-haven for terrorists.

Let's not quibble with the first point; concede that the jury's still out on whether Iraq will become a democracy and will serve as a model for the rest of the region. But putting that as item #1 is what Dubya calls revisionist history, especially on a list of reasons why the war was "essential" that omits the reason most strongly relied on at the time. As for #2, anyone who's been paying attention knows that there are a lot more terrorists in Iraq--included foreign terrorists--than there ever were under Saddam and that the supposed Saddam-al Qaeda link has been debunked.

In addition to the formation of the National Assembly, Iraq's security forces continue to grow stronger, and continue to persevere as they combat terrorist actions and threats. Also, hundreds of reconstruction projects are under way providing essential services like electricity and water throughout the country.

If the Iraqi army and police are growing stronger, no one (least of all the insurgents) seems to have noticed, and our own generals are telling us we're going to have to stay there in numbers for a long while because the Iraqis aren't going to be in any position to maintain security and order on their own. Reconstruction projects? Maybe it is literally true that hundreds are "under way," especially if "under way" includes "we've got plans to build a power plant there someday, once the insurgents lose the ability to kill any laborers who show up at the site." It's also literally true that Iraqi citizens have less electricity and water available to them now than they did before the invasion and that the situation has not been improving.

I believe in democracy. But that means, unfortunately, accepting the notion that if citizens don't look critically at elected officials' statements and actions, and if we reelect officials who dissemble, have no clue what's going on, or insult voters' intelligence, we deserve the government we end up with.

(By the way, McMorris's district is in a reddish part of a bluish state, namely eastern Washington).

Ouch

Not that I'll ever be in that despicable position, but...ouch.

Cucumbers and Boobs

"Cucumbers and Boobs" isn't quite "Titties and Beer," but I try.

Anyway, it's nearly the end of what the Dutch call "Cucumber time," or, as it's known in Britain, the Silly Season. With the politicians (and almost everyone else) on holiday, there's just not a lot of news to report. So the newspapers, which are desperate to fill space, run lots of fluff stories.

For example, they might run a "news" story on the effect of espresso on a famously well-endowed female celebrity's nipples. Or they might reveal the name another female celebrity gives her breasts (whatever you think of "biscuits," it's better than "harries"). Or maybe they'll do a story on a German tourist who was caught with an illegal radar detector hidden in her cleavage.

In other news, there's only one more day until September. Thank goodness.

What It Is All About

Below is the weekly post from the CFD:

Last weekend, the blog Blue Girl, Red State wrote a post about a regular blog commenter who went by the name "Shameless Hussy."

Blue Girl reports that "Shameless Hussy" went to Darfur in June as a humanitarian volunteer and was traumatized by what she saw

What she dealt with daily goes beyond the pale...beyond the nightmares of most people; Children with all four limbs hacked off right above the knee or below the elbow. Twelve year olds who died in childbirth after being gang-raped by the Janjaweed. Women who gave birth to rape-babies who were then cast out by their families for shaming the family name, leaving only one avenue of survival for themselves and their children after the camps: Prostitution.

What is f**ing her up is the desperation, and the fact that she worked herself to death for over a month, and she still didn't really save anyone. Now that she's gone, it's like she was never there. Even the ones she helped keep alive, she didn't save. You try dealing with that reality.

And women are the preponderance of victims. Men do not leave the villages to go to the countryside to gather firewood and other necessary items of sustenance. Women venture out, even though every time they leave their villages, they are at horrific risk of being beaten and raped and disfigured. The reason they go instead of the men? The women are only attacked, the men are killed.

This post receive a fair amount of attention within the blogosphere (as far as posts about Darfur go) mainly due to the fact that Kevin Drum linked to it. And while getting bloggers to pay attention to Darfur, if only for a minute, is a minor miracle, it is worth asking why it takes a post about traumatized aid workers to generate any interest in genocide.

This situation in Darfur has existed for over two years and, if people were interested, they could find accounts of death, disease, rape and torture occurring there on an almost daily basis. 400,000 people have died and nearly 3 million have been displaced and yet nobody - not politicans, not the media, not bloggers - really seem to care.

To anyone who has been paying attention, the atrocities witnessed by "Shameless Hussy" are, sadly, well-known. If her story generates concern for the people of Darfur, then for that we should be thankful. And if people who were moved by it are really interested in Darfur, then they should start reading the analyses produced by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Eric Reeves and the International Crisis Group, supporting organizations like Doctors Without Borders, Save the Children, Save Darfur and STAND, reading blogs like Passion of the Present, Sudan Watch, the Coalition for Darfur, and Sleepless in Sudan and demanding that their elected leaders do something about it.

Our thanks goes out to "Shameless Hussy" and all those who sacrifice to help those in need. But we must keep in mind that Darfur is not about them - it is about this

21st-Century Poll Tax

If you want to know more about the state of the art for disenfranchising poor and minority voters, I commend to your attention a pair of opposing op-eds from the Washington Post.

First came David Becker's piece criticizing the Justice Department's approval of Georgia's new voter ID requirements; Becker claims that the new requirements will have what the Voting Rights Act calls a "retrogressive" effect on minority voters and thus did not qualify for Justice Department "preclearance." (Sorry for the jargon, but this stuff really does matter; the preclearance provisions are the ones up for reauthorization and which there is good reason to believe Judge Roberts would find unconstitutional).

Then came Frank B. Strickland and Anne W. Lewis with an opposing viewpoint.

(It's also worth looking at longtime Democratic Party lawyer Bob Bauer's take on the issue).

Becker's response to Strickland and Lewis came on Prof. Rick Hasen's election law listserv, where election law professors and practitioners hang out and talk shop. Becker points to the key problem with Republicans' claim that harsher voter ID rules are aimed at stopping fraud: at the same time that they're making it harder to vote at the polls, they're making it easier to vote absentee and exempting absentee ballots from the new ID requirements.

Making it more likely that eligible voters will be turned away at the polls, while making it as easy as possible for absentee votes to be counted: I wonder which party's voters that helps more?

Every time they try to make it harder for poor folks to vote, GOP politicians claim that they're trying to stop fraud. Intimidation and harrassment at polling places? Just trying to keep out the fraudsters. No same-day registration? Ditto. Gutting the Help America Vote Act? You guessed it. And voter ID is the newest, bestest tool for eliminating large numbers of mostly Democratic voters at one stroke of the pen. Read Becker's response; it's worth it.

Sexual Deviance among the Axis of Weasels

As I mentioned a while back, the Mayor of Paris is gay. What I didn't realize was that the mayor of the capital of the other main Axis of Weasels country is also gay. What's more, he's refusing to apologize for welcoming an S & M festival to town this weekend.

Hello, Pat Robertson? Here's another opportunity for an incendiary comment.

Moving to Iraq to Escape Muslim Extremists?

Something about this story doesn't quite scan. I'll try to see if the vernacular press here has more details.

My Early Suspicions Confirmed

A few weeks ago I expressed concern over how much Cindy Sheehan's protest was helping and/or hurting the anti-Iraq war movement. While my sympathy goes out to her and others like her, basically I wrote that she had foolishly tarnished her protest and her image with her public ties to liberal organizations, Michael Moore, etc. Unfortunately, it appears I was right.

The survey found that 52 percent of the public says Bush should talk to Sheehan, who has repeatedly asked for a meeting with the president, while 46 percent said he should not. Fifty-three percent support what she is doing while 42 percent oppose her actions, according to the poll.
...
The survey also suggests, however, that Sheehan's anti-war vigil has failed to mobilize large numbers of Americans against the war. If anything, her opposition has done as much to drive up support for the war as ignite opponents, the survey found.

Eight in 10 Americans--including overwhelming majorities of Democrats, Republicans and political independents--say Sheehan's protest has had no impact on their attitudes toward Iraq. While one in 10 say she has made them less likely to support the war, the same proportion say she has made them more likely to back the conflict.

As I stated before, Sheehan symbolizes an incredible waste of an opportunity, and she has become a caricature of the anti-war movement itself. It looks like she is not going to be the galvanizing force we're all looking for, she does not represent the tipping point. However, fortunately, it looks like we don't really need one, as support for Bush and his war is as low as it has ever been-- with or without Cindy Sheehan. I'm not sure what it'll take to get people marching in the streets, although at this point in time I'm not sure what conventional protests accomplish anymore except to make the protestors feel united. What we really need is a massive organization effort to do what we should have done last year-- toss the bums out of office.

"Fortunately for them, there is no criminal charge for stupidity"

Picking up on Zoe's theme of idiotic miscreants, I've got to report this trio of moronic Kiwis.

First, stealing diesel fuel and putting into your gasoline-powered car is pretty dumb. But it's not newsworthy dumb.

What makes it newsworthy is when you decide to investigate why the car won't start--by examining the fuel pipe with a cigarette lighter.

Of course, smoking isn't so bright, either.

When Are We Invading?

I'm not sure what this is most: bizarre or repulsive. Whatever it is, it sure isn't democracy, it sure isn't women's rights, and it sure isn't Christian. Shouldn't we be invading?

Dazed, Anti-Semitic and Confused

As scary as this sounds, I couldn't help but smirk slightly at the overwhelming ignorance on display in this story.

Vandals burned swastikas and obscenities into the lawn of a Jewish family, splattering windows with eggs and fouling the front porch of their home [outside of Atlanta].

Two swastikas were spray-painted in the road in front of Ginger Ragans' two-story home Sunday and a third was etched onto her lawn, along with the word "Fascist" and an obscenity scrawled in the grass. Her trees were draped with toilet paper and someone had urinated and defecated on the porch.

Unless the vandals intended to sign their handiwork "Fascist" then they're more than a little bit confused about the connection between Jews and fascists.

Apparently the Jewish family believes that it was local teenagers retalitating against them for reporting their loitering activities to the neighborhood watch program. Even if it is true, that is taking what should be a minor grievance really freaking far. Why express it in swastikas when it can be said with toilet paper?

Daydreaming is Out, Coffee is In!

Last week I posted a little ditty on new research that shows that daydreaming is bad for you. Today I find that a new study shows that drinking coffee may help prevent cancer! Wahoo!

Now back to our regular optimistic news coverage...

Mob Rule

Fair and Balanced™ style.

Ode to N'Orleans

This morning I made the mistake of turning on the tv only to be greeted by none other than D. James Kennedy trying to convince his audience that "Darwinists" are just following a religion that has no evidence, that they're blind faith supporters who have turned their back on God. Since it really hurt to roll my eyes back into my head that far, I decided it was a good day for a self-imposed tv/news blackout.

So it wasn't until late afternoon when I got into my car that NPR informed me that the frightening, tragic day is in sight-- New Orleans is about to get The Hurricane. Analysts have predicted that more than one million people will likely become homeless in a single day. That's unfathomable. I couldn't help it, I started to weep a little for New Orleans and its people.

New Orleans is like no other city in the world, its truly unique cultural and historical collage, the way it celebrates the darker parts of the human condition, and lives by a bacchanalian creed. Last time I visited I was with my mother and sister, spring 2004. It was a random Tuesday in the French Quarter, the long, drunken night ended with all three of us dancing to a live jazz/zydeco fusion band at 4:30 am. I always think of New Orleans as both quintessentially American and unAmerican-- it represents a kind of freedom that proudly flaunts how much it rejects the puritanical social taboos that exist in the rest of the country.

Let's hope that this storm isn't nearly as devastating as everyone is predicting. Let's hope that she proves that she's a city that truly can't be tamed. (Personally, I also hope it stays away from my little sister, her husband, and her in-laws who all live in Alabama.)

If you'd like some more info on how to help Katrina's victims, go here.

Broken Axl?

Axl Rose of Guns n' Roses is being sued by his former bandmates, Slash and that other guy, for naming himself the only person responsible for writing/playing/producing songs by the famous band. Which of course means that Axl is the sole financial benefactor. Who knew that the band that stopped playing 10 years ago is still making $500,000 a year for copyright use alone?

Anyways, none of this is too interesting to anyone who isn't a fan of the band, but I did find this particular sentence from the lawsuit amusing.

[Axl] Rose is "suffering an apparent attack of arrogance and ego. He is no longer willing to acknowledge the contributions of his former partners and bandmates in having created some of rock's greatest hits," the suit said.

I'm not going to debate the merit of their music or popularity, but it is unfortunate that in the same sentence that they call him arrogant and egotistical they also choose to assert that they "created some of rock's greatest hits."

Tee-hee.

Genocide and Statistics

Below is the weekly post from the Coalition for Darfur:

Last week, International Studies Quarterly published a study by Matthew Krain, an Associate Professor of Political Science at the College of Wooster, examining "the effectiveness of military action on the severity of ongoing instances of genocide and polititcide."

According to the press release

The study reveals that only overt military interventions that explicitly challenge the perpetrator appear to be effective in reducing the severity of the brutal policies. Military support for targets, or in opposition to the perpetrators, alters the almost complete vulnerability of unarmed civilian targets. And these interventions that directly target the perpetrators were not, on the whole, found to make matters worse for those being attacked ... He finds that even military intervention against the perpetrator by a single country or international organization has a measurable effect in the "typical" case.

When a single international actor challenges the aggressor, the probability that the killings will escalate drops while the probability that the killings will decrease jumps. Each additional intervention by another international actor raises the chance of saving lives.

In the introduction to the study, Krain notes

Policy makers faced with situations like those in Rwanda or Bosnia, Kosovo or Darfur, are forced to rely on past experience with interventions in other types of internal conflicts, often with disastrous results. This study is a step toward a better understanding of the effectiveness of potential responses by the international community to genocides and politicides.

Krain goes on to examine various intervention methods of dealing with on-going genocides and politicides (the "impartial intervention model," the "witness model," the "bystander model," etc...) and notes that not one of them is capable of reducing the severity of such situations.

After conducting a statistical analysis of the various models, Krain concludes

Policy maker concerns that intervention on the behalf of target populations will escalate the killing appear to be unfounded.

The only overt military interventions that appear to be effective in reducing the severity of genocides or politicides are those that explicitly challenge the perpetrator

He then discusses his finding as they relate to Darfur, writing

Intervention against the Sudanese government and the Janjaweed within the first year of the genocide would likely have had a measurable effect on the severity [2003] of state-sponsored mass murder in the following year.

Kraine does not claim that military intervention is the "only" option. In fact, he notes that "policy makers have a range of options available to them in the face of an ongoing genocide or politicide" and that his study "only examines one of those options."

Keeping that in mind, it is hard to argue with Kraine's basic conclusion

If actors wish to slow or stop the killing in an ongoing instance of state-sponsored mass murder, they are more likely to be effective if they oppose the perpetrators of the brutal policy.

Amid Iraq Difficulties, Bush Calls Dial-A-Prayer

CNN reports: "In the midst of political wrangling over the delayed final draft of the Iraqi constitution, President Bush this week called (Abdul Aziz al-Hakim,) a Shiite leader, encouraging him to keep the political process open during the often-difficult negotiations ..."














I find an amusing irony here: in his hour of need, Bush calls a Shiite Muslim cleric. I wonder if Jerry Falwell and Franklin Graham are feeling a little irrelevant at the moment.

Blame It on "Moral Hazard"

In The New Yorker, author Malcolm Gladwell explores why efforts to reform the health care system in America have repeatedly been defeated. He contends that two words — moral hazard — are a large part of the reason why:

One of the great mysteries of political life in the United States is why Americans are so devoted to their health-care system.

... the United States has opted for a makeshift system of increasing complexity and dysfunction. Americans spend $5,267 per capita on health care every year, almost two and half times the industrialized world’s median of $2,193 .... Americans have fewer doctors per capita than most Western countries. We go to the doctor less than people in other Western countries. We get admitted to the hospital less frequently than people in other Western countries.

... in the past few decades a particular idea has taken hold among prominent American economists which has also been a powerful impediment to the expansion of health insurance. The idea is known as “moral hazard.”

Health economists in other Western nations do not share this obsession. Nor do most Americans. But moral hazard has profoundly shaped the way think tanks formulate policy and the way experts argue and the way health insurers structure their plans and the way legislation and regulations have been written.

... “Moral hazard” is the term economists use to describe the fact that insurance can change the behavior of the person being insured. If your office gives you and your co-workers all the free Pepsi you want — if your employer, in effect, offers universal Pepsi insurance — you’ll drink more Pepsi than you would have otherwise.

... when your insurance company requires that you make a twenty-dollar co-payment for a visit to the doctor, or when your plan includes an annual five-hundred-dollar or thousand-dollar deductible, it’s not simply an attempt to get you to pick up a larger share of your health costs. It is an attempt to make your use of the health-care system more efficient.

Making you responsible for a share of the costs, the argument runs, will reduce moral hazard: you’ll no longer grab one of those free Pepsis when you aren’t really thirsty.

... (But) it’s not as if the uninsured never go to the doctor. They spend, on average, $934 a year on medical care. A moral-hazard theorist would say that they go to the doctor when they really have to. Those of us with private insurance, by contrast, consume $2,347 worth of health care a year. If a lot of that extra $1,413 is waste, then maybe the uninsured person is the truly efficient consumer of health care.

The moral-hazard argument makes sense, however, only if we consume health care in the same way that we consume other consumer goods, and to economists like (the University of Minnesota's John) Nyman this assumption is plainly absurd. We go to the doctor grudgingly, only because we’re sick.

“Moral hazard is overblown,” the Princeton economist Uwe Reinhardt says. “You always hear that the demand for health care is unlimited. This is just not true. People who are very well insured, who are very rich, do you see them check into the hospital because it’s free? Do people really like to go to the doctor? Do they check into the hospital instead of playing golf?”

The Death of "Special Rights"?

Was the Rev. Jerry Falwell drunk when he appeared on "The Situation with Tucker Carlson" earlier this month?

[TUCKER] CARLSON: Jerry Falwell, I notice you wrote a piece supporting Mr. Roberts. Are you rethinking that? [Because of the news of Roberts's work on Romer v. Evans]

FALWELL: Oh, not at all.

You know, I—if I were an attorney, I‘d certainly fight for the right of gays or anyone else to be employed or be housed wherever they wished to be housed. I may not agree with the lifestyle. And I don‘t. But that has nothing do with the civil rights of that member of our—that part of our constituency.

John Roberts would probably have been not a very good lawyer if he had not been willing, when asked by his partners in the law firm to assist in guaranteeing the civil rights of employment and housing to any and all Americans.

CARLSON: But wait a second. I thought conservatives are always arguing against special rights for gays. And the idea is that...

FALWELL: Well, housing and employment are not special rights. I think—I think the right to live somewhere and to live where you please or to work where you please, as long as you‘re not bothering anybody else, is a basic right, not a—not a special right.
(snip)
FALWELL: But civil—civil rights for all Americans, black, white, red, yellow, the rich, poor, young, old, gay, straight, et cetera, is not a liberal or a conservative value. It‘s an American value that I would think that we pretty much all agree on.

Perhaps it just felt safe to say this on Tucker's show because Falwell knows nobody else was watching.

OK, all kidding aside, these are remarkable comments. If the Rev. Jerry Falwell is softening his harsh anti-gay stance on some basic GLBT civil rights then someone should give him a freaking medal. Seriously. (Are you listening HRC? NGLTF? PFLAG?) This is the same man who poignantly blamed gays and lesbians, feminism and liberal organizations for the tragic events on 9/11 on 9/13/01. If Falwell were to reject the "special rights" argument it could be quite a blow to the anti-gay crusade movement. Maybe Falwell learned a very valuable lesson from his good friend Tinky Winky after all?

(Unfortunately neither Jerry nor Tinky were available for comment.)

And on the 3rd Day, Winston Churchill ....

In his column in today's New York Times, David Brooks writes of a conversation he had with Peter Galbraith about recent developments in Iraq. Galbraith is the former U.S. ambassador to Croatia.

In the column, Galbraith is quoted as follows regarding efforts to create separate, autonomous states within modern-day Iraq:

"It's not a problem if a country breaks up, only if it breaks up violently. Iraq wasn't created by God. It was created by Winston Churchill."

Sexing Intelligence

By way of Atrios we learn that there is a provocative new British study that I'm sure we'll hear about ad nauseum.

Academics in the UK claim their research shows that men are more intelligent than women. A study to be published later this year in the British Journal of Psychology says that men are on average five points ahead on IQ tests.

Paul Irwing and Professor Richard Lynn claim the difference grows when the highest IQ levels are considered.

Their research was based on IQ tests given to 80,000 people and a further study of 20,000 students.

Dr Irwing, a senior lecturer in organisational psychology at Manchester University, told the Today programme on BBC Radio Four the study showed that, up to the age of 14, there was no difference between the IQs of boys and girls.

"But beyond that age and into adulthood there is a difference of five points, which is small but it can have important implications," he said.

"This is against a background of women dramatically overtaking men in educational attainment and making very rapid advances in terms of occupational achievement."

The academics used a test which is said to measure "general cognitive ability" - spatial and verbal ability.

As intelligence scores among the study group rose, the academics say they found a widening gap between the sexes.

There were twice as many men with IQ scores of 125, for example, a level said to correspond with people getting first-class degrees.

At scores of 155, associated with genius, there were 5.5 men for every woman.

Nobel prize-winners

Dr Irwing told The Times the differences "may go some way to explaining the greater numbers of men achieving distinctions of various kinds, such as chess grandmasters, Fields medallists for mathematics, Nobel prize-winners and the like".

The paper will argue that there is evidence that at the same level of IQ, women are able to achieve more than men "possibly because they are more conscientious and better adapted to sustained periods of hard work".

There are a myriad of things wrong with all of this. First of all, IQ tests themselves only measure certain things, that they are limited in measuring something as complicated as intelligence. Unfortunately I think that most people make a lot of assumptions about IQ tests, that they test innate, natural abilities and have little to do with environment or culture. I think the average person is not aware of how truly controversial they are in academia.

Putting the question of the legitimacy of IQ tests themselves aside, I also find it troublesome because of how the results are being packaged. Frankly, I'm all for people trying to understand if and how our brains are different based on sex, which would have been a perfectly acceptable way to characterize these findings. But to conclude that men are "smarter" instead of "different" strikes me as a very limited way of thinking about such a complicated matter. This leads me to wonder about the researchers themselves, because they certainly have a lot of options about the way to present their findings to the world. They don't seem to concern themselves with the possibility that these findings could be used to justify unequal treatment of men and women. In fact they seem to imply in their comments that as women "overtake" men in certain areas that the area is in danger of being weakened overall. Or perhaps they didn't realize that? Just how smart are they? What are their IQs? Lastly, is it at all a coincidence that the people who make these conclusions are men?

I suppose as a woman with an IQ above 125, I guess I should relish the fact that I'm among the minority of women who fall into this category. However, stereotypically, my IQ is not at all reflected in my mathematical abilities. (I'm studying for the GRE, so I'm acutely aware of this right now.) Although I do have a sister who is about to finish her third year of medical school and who already has a MS in genetics under her belt. (Granted her IQ easily qualifies her for a Mensa membership.) However, while we do come from the same familial environment we did not spring from the same gene pool. But we're both female, gifted in different areas. But she came from long line of people who are brilliant in science and math, whereas my family is much more verbal and inclined towards the arts. Think that might have anything to do with the differences between our IQs?

One last word, the part where they say that women "are more conscientious and better adapted to sustained periods of hard work" is pure poppycock. I find it difficult to say that either sex is better adapted to long sustained periods of hard work. Historically I think that burden has been shared pretty equally by both sexes, just in varying spheres.

(Cross-posted at Carpetbagger Report.)

Victory in Iraq

Sometimes I love Cal Thomas.

The following lyrics should be sung to the tune of "Blowin' in the Wind."

How many times can this nation draw down,
When faced with a difficult war?
Haven't we seen what retreat has produced,
Whenever we've tried it before?

With polls showing a decline in public support for the effort to establish stability and self-determination in Iraq, aging hippies from the '60s and their anti-all-war progeny have surfaced and are picketing and singing their protest songs at President Bush's ranch and at venues where he speaks.
(snip)
The president has repeatedly stated his objective in Iraq and in the wider war against terrorists. What is the objective of his critics and what is their forecast of what would occur following a precipitous U.S. withdrawal? They have an obligation to tell us, unless they are just blowing in the wind.

Um, first of all, you do know that you just used a famous anti-war protest song to mock people who protest war? You then rewrote those lyrics to be an anti-protester song? C'mon, Cal, what are the odds that in the 60s you believed that Bob Dylan was a dirty hippie? Perhaps even a commie pinko faggot?

Anyways, as for everything else Cal wrote in his column, he also touts the party line that we must stay in Iraq, "Pulling out of Iraq before the job is done is not an option. Victory is our only option." But I do have an honest, non-snarky question-- how does one truly define victory in Iraq? What is the job and how do we know when it is done? I was talking just yesterday to a friend who has three brothers in the U.S. military. (She opposes the war, her brothers are all over the map. Two of them voted for Kerry.) Over the past three years they've all been in and out of Iraq serving the long, dangerous combat tours that everyone always hears about. Recently one of her brothers told her that the one major thing that has changed since the beginning of the war is that the captured, wounded and dead were all Iraqis. But now? They're from everywhere but Iraq, he said he even "got" a Canadian once. So how far away is this inevitable victory if Iraq's borders are unguarded? Is it at all foreseeable that there is an end to the people crossing her borders to fight?

As far as I can tell, new Iraqi government or not, the fighting in Iraq could pretty much go on indefinitely. I know that a lot of pro-war folks like to think that those of us who have always opposed the Iraq war are now reveling in how badly things are going. I really don't think that's true. While I do take a small amount of pleasure in what I hope to be Bush's well-earned downfall, the whole situation depresses me because, frankly, I'm very deeply conflicted at this point. I don't believe we should stay but I also don't believe we should go-- yet. I think on some level we are morally obligated to do something other than cut and run. However, outside of establishing a new government there, no one has defined what "victory" would actually be. The same way that Bush refuses to set a timetable, he also refuses to describe how things would have to be for us to leave. I can't help but ask, what signs are we waiting for?

I'm among the ranks of people who have always feared and believed that our war will result in a civil war. Sadly, at this moment it seriously appears to be leaning that way more than ever before. I've said this time and time again, from the very beginning of the war, that the things that I fear will go wrong do not go wrong. I have perpetually hoped that somehow the neo-cons do see or know something that I don't. Sometimes I've even hoped that they'll just get lucky and things will go their way. Right now I do feel like many of us have been vindicated to a certain extent, but it is far more bitter than sweet. I think a lot of us have been hoping that we're proven wrong about the war in Iraq, although at this point I'm nearly at the end of my hope.

(Cross-posted at Carpetbagger Report.)

Cue Tom Petty

Alternative title for this post:

Abraham Lincoln* Was Right.

*Or was it P.T. Barnum?

Sudan to Be Confronted by US - Eventually

The US hasn't done much to confront Sudan over its genocide in Darfur, but the US might eventually have to confront it over this

A top US general has said al-Qaeda's leader in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, will try to relocate to the Horn of Africa if Iraq is stabilised.

Major-General Douglas Lute cited Yemen, Somalia, Sudan and Ethiopia as likely "safe havens" for jihadists.

Of course, Zarqawi isn't going to end up in Sudan until "Iraq is stabilized," so Khartoum can breathe easy knowing that it can continue its genocidal policies for several more years.

Why Does Jerry Falwell Hate the First Amendment?

The First Amendment protects a lot of things, such as the right to petition the government for redress of grievances. But three of its clauses are much more celebrated and invoked much more frequently than the rest. And Jerry Falwell doesn't seem to like any of them. It's no wonder: yesterday's unanimous defeat in the Fourth Circuit wasn't the first time the First Amendment had thwarted him in high-profile litigation.

Falwell obviously hates the Establishment Clause, which is supposed to prevent the government from imposing Christianity (or any other faith) on us. You'd think he'd like the Free Exercise Clause, being someone who likes to exercise freely, loudly, and publicly, but the problem with that clause is that it unfortunately protects the ability of heathens--particularly, these days, Muslims--to follow their twisted rituals as well.

Again, the Free Speech Clause is one that you'd figure Falwell would like, since his career is devoted to speaking out about his ideas and beliefs. Especially since he not infrequently says things that are quite outrageous. In a number of advanced democracies, his buddy Pat Robertson might have been sued or even prosecuted for his moronic "let's kill Chavez" tirade, but not in the U.S. Similarly, when Falwell and Robertson blamed 9/11 on gays and feminists and atheists, a lot of people were properly outraged and opined that F & R should just shut up; but, thanks to our Free Speech Clause, no one thought the government should shut them up or even that a family who'd lost a gay, feminist, atheist child no 9/11 should be able to sue for emotional distress.

But, again, Falwell's problem with the Free Speech Clause is that it applies to people who disagree with him. Famously, Falwell's lawsuit against Hustler went all the way to the Supreme Court, which ruled unanimously that even a remarkably offensive, stupid, and unfunny "parody" couldn't be the basis for a lawsuit.

Well, as his old pal Ronald Reagan might have said, there he goes again (pdf). Once again, Falwell is making legal history. This time, he sued the owner of fallwell.com, a site that criticizes (to put it mildly) Falwell's interpretation of the Bible and his views on homosexuality. The site gets fewer visitors than this one, so it's hardly causing the good reverend a lot of problems, but he went after it on trademark and anti-cybersquatting grounds.

And he lost. The Fourth Circuit, explicitly invoking First Amendment concerns, decided that it is not a violation of federal trademark law to use someone's trademark (or a misspelling thereof) as the URL for a website criticizing that person or (more often) company--as long as it's obvious to a visitor that the site isn't sponsored by the trademark owner. In other words, since anyone who came to the site would immediately see that Jerry Falwell couldn't possibly be endorsing the views presented by the site, there was no misuse of the trademark.

The "gripe site" issue is important these days, and, thank goodness, the clear majority of federal courts are coming down on the right side. It's not only websites, though: many thoughtful people are sounding the alarm over corporations' use of intellectual property law and libel law to silence critics in many different media. (Remember when the beef industry sued Oprah? Or when Atrios was threatened by Donald Luskin's lawyer? And, of course, when Fox went after Al Franken for violating its "fair and balanced" [sic] trademark?).

So here's something you'll rarely hear from me: three cheers for the Fourth Circuit.

A Little Help?

It has now been more than a week since Oxfam reported that the US, Brazil, India and Russia were trying to undermine a new UN agreement that "would establish a new standard and oblige the international community to act were there to be another Rwanda or a similar mass murder of civilians where the government was unwilling or unable to do anything to stop the bloodshed."

Since then, it has hardly received any press coverage, but today it was briefly mentioned, along with an apparent attempt to further undermine the International Criminal Court, in an article by Colum Lynch in the Washington Post

The proposed changes, submitted by U.S. Ambassador John R. Bolton, touch on virtually every aspect of U.N. affairs and provide a detailed look at U.S. concerns about the world body's future. They underscore U.S. efforts to impose greater oversight of U.N. spending and to eliminate any reference to the International Criminal Court. The administration also opposes language that urges the five permanent members of the Security Council not to cast vetoes to halt genocide, war crimes or ethnic cleansing.

It seems to me that these are two rather important issues that deserve some in-depth coverage.

I realize that this blog has a limited audience and that this post probably will not reach the desired targets, but I strongly urge those with access to information regarding these two issues to write and disseminate pieces explaining just what is going on (or, barring that, sending me an e-mail and pointing me toward some resources that will help me figure out just what is going on, so that I can explain it here.)

Cross-posted at the CFD.

Bastards! You Killed My Birthplace!

They just announced that they're closing Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, DC.

My parents were both working there when they met, my dad was an enlisted man and my mom was an Army nurse. I was also born at Walter Reed nearly 30 years ago. Frankly, it Walter Reed didn't exist in the early 70s I wouldn't be here.

(sniff, sniff)

Why Did We Attack Iraq Again?

I know we've been given more reasons than we can remember, but the the most prominent justification has become this-- to help spread freedom and democray in the Middle East, right?

Not surprisingly that one isn't quite true either.

Apparently our true goal was to turn a secular government into a theocratic state and set back women's rights in the country 30 years!

"The draft aborts the democratic process Iraqis hoped for and is a big victory for political Islam," said writer Adel Abdel-Amir. "Islamic law, not the people, has become the source of authority."

The draft says Islam is the official religion of the state and there can be no law that contradicts the "fixed principles of its rulings". The preamble says the constitution responds to "the call of our religious and national leaders and the insistence of our great religious authorities".

Language guaranteeing "rights and freedoms" is subordinate to the primary position given to Islam, opponents say.

"Human rights should not be linked to Islamic Sharia law at all. It should be listed separately in the constitution," said Safia Souhail, Iraq's ambassador to Egypt.

The prominent women's rights campaigner denounced wording that grants each religious sect the right to run its own family courts -- apparently doing away with previous civil codes -- as an open door to further Islamicise the legal system.

Although in practice, many Iraqis end up having recourse to religious authorities or informal tribal law, the idea of a united civil code is central to the modern state, Souhail said.

"This will lead to creating religious courts. But we should be giving priority to the law," she said.

"When we came back from exile, we thought we were going to improve rights and the position of women. But look what has happened -- we have lost all the gains we made over the last 30 years. It's a big disappointment."

I think that is putting it rather mildly. But who is this woman? We last saw her in January in the balcony during Bush's State of the Union address. She's the one Bush pointed to and said that her father was killed by Saddam Hussein's secret service. At that time Safia Souhail was very supportive of our invasion, for she believed that her country's future would be brighter and she could return to Iraq. I think it's safe to say that she's less enthusiastic about it now.

So does anyone else see democracy and the western concept of freedom spreading like wildfire in the Middle East based on Iraq's new constitution? Or will other Middle Eastern countries react more like this, "Hey, Iraq, welcome to the club! You're now more like us than you were before! Thank you America!"

(deep sigh)

By the Way...

I'm guest blogging (as well as cross-posting) over at carpetbagger report today and tomorrow. So if you come across anything newsworthy you'd like to see reach a wider audience, drop me a line and I'll see what I can do.

(Not) Blowing Hot Air

Since President Bush isn't terribly fond of working with other nations to tackle global environmental issues (cough, Kyoto, cough), some states are taking a Do-it-Yourself approach.

Officials in Connecticut and eight other Northeastern states have reached a preliminary agreement on an initiative led by New York Gov. George Pataki to freeze power plant emissions at current levels and reduce them by 10 percent by 2020, a newspaper reported Wednesday.
(snip)

Such an agreement would be the first of its kind in the nation and comes after the Bush administration decided not to regulate the greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming and rejected joining more than 150 other nations on the Kyoto anti-emissions treaty.

Pataki, a Republican who is eyeing a 2008 presidential run, has opposed the Bush administration's actions and said states should go their own way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions if the federal government would not act.

Once a final agreement is reached by negotiators, it would be subject to approval by the legislatures of the nine states.

(snip)

Pataki, a Republican who is eyeing a 2008 presidential run, has opposed the Bush administration's actions and said states should go their own way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions if the federal government would not act.

Once a final agreement is reached by negotiators, it would be subject to approval by the legislatures of the nine states.

See? That wasn't so hard. Republicans can understand the benefit of working together to protect the planet and preserve the health of its inhabitants. Rumor has it that states in the west are considering a similar pact.

Apparently Bush missed that day in kindergarten where they talked about cooperation and playing well with others. (Ok, ok, that's probably not the only day he missed.)

As far as I can see the only thing the coalition is missing is a catchy name.

Zoe's First Fatwa

I'd like to declare a special Secular-Feminist Fatwa on any American who puts together a mealy-mouthed defense of the following notion-- that under the new Iraqi government women in Iraq might have less rights now than they did under Hussein and that's okay. (It's two fatwas if you happen to be a man.) Last weekend on Meet the Press Reuel Marc Gerecht, who is described as "a former Middle East specialist for the CIA," had this to say about the future of women's rights in Iraq.

Actually, I'm not terribly worried about this. I mean, one hopes that the Iraqis protect women's social rights as much as possible. It certainly seems clear that in protecting the political rights, there's no discussion of women not having the right to vote. I think it's important to remember that in the year 1900, for example, in the United States, it was a democracy then. In 1900, women did not have the right to vote. If Iraqis could develop a democracy that resembled America in the 1900s, I think we'd all be thrilled. I mean, women's social rights are not critical to the evolution of democracy. We hope they're there. I think they will be there. But I think we need to put this into perspective. [emphasis mine]

Hey, back when women were the property of men it worked for us when we were a fledgling democracy, so why not for Iraq? Pish-posh, no big deal.

I'm sorry, but that's totally insane. We attack a country, labeled the war itself "Operation Iraqi Freedom," but then afterwards the women have less rights than they did before and that's okay because women in America used to be disenfranchised too? I suppose it should be called "Operation Iraqi Freedom-- for Men Only"?

But it's a little more interesting than that. Who is this so-called expert? Funny they don't mention on the program that he's the Director of the Middle East Initiative at the Project for the New American Century and a resident fellow at the right-wing American Enterprise Institute. Odd, that. What kind of oversight is it for Meet the Press to invite someone on their show and not bother to let the audience know that he works for a particularly controversial and prominent right-wing, neo-con think tank? Seriously, WTF?

To make matters worse, this guy makes me actually agree with Andrew Sullivan, who seems to understand how daft this idea is.

Liberating Muslim women is critical to liberating the Middle East, which in turn is critical to protecting the West from more religious terror. We may not be able to achieve this all at once. But we can try where we can. Iraq is a rare case where we have real leverage for a short period of time. History will not forgive us if we pass this opportunity by.

With Bush, Lies Come in Pairs

Yesterday's press chatter in Idaho included this Bush statement about Iraq:

... democracy is unfolding. And the reason why that's important is, is that we've had a -- we had a policy that just said, let the dictator stay there, don't worry about it.

Lie #1: This is the most flagrant of the two Bush lies -- that the policy that preceeded Bush's "just said, let [Saddam] stay there ..." And Bush knows it's a lie.

In late 2003, a Newsweek article reported that after Clinton signed the Iraqi Liberation Act into law, the U.S. government "convened a conference with the [Iraqi National Congress] and other opposition groups in London to discuss 'regime change."

Even the ultra-conservative web portal NewsMax.com would have to agree that Bush is not telling the truth. In 2004, referring to a Wall Street Journal article on Clinton administration policy toward Iraq, NewsMax.com wrote, "What the Journal didn't note was how bold Clinton officials were about their plans to topple Saddam. "

... as a result of dictatorship, and as a result of tyranny, resentment, hopelessness began to develop in that part of the world, which became the -- gave the terrorists capacity to recruit. We just cannot tolerate the status quo. We're at war. And so this is a hopeful moment.

Lie #2: Again, Bush tries to play the game that he played so well in the days leading up to the Iraq war -- confuse people by using words like "dictatorship" and "terrorists" without making it clear to which country or group you're referring. Is it Iraq? Is it al Qaeda? Is it Syria? Saudi Arabia?

Bush's statement might be true for Saudi Arabia and some other Middle East countries. But, since the context here is Iraq, Bush's words falsely suggest that Saddam Hussein's dictatorship "gave the terrorists capacity to recruit." That's utter nonsense. It was the U.S. invasion and occupation that truly gave al Qaeda and its offshoot cells the capacity to round up new recruits.

Bush may not have intended for that to happen, but a wide array of experts on terrorism and the Middle East are in agreement: the U.S. occupation has been a boon for "jihad" recruitment in and around Iraq.

Reason #652...

that Pat Robertson's name should never be anything but a punchline, sort of like "The Aristocrats." Robertson think he has found the secret to health in longevity in a pancake receipe!

Pat's Age-Defying Protein Pancakes

America loves pancakes! Pancake houses across the country are packed. But what are those syrup drenched, hot cakes doing to our bodies? Putting us on a fast track to weight gain, high cholesterol and adult onset diabetes.

But now there is hope for everyone who loves this early morning treat. Pat's very own Age-Defying Protein Pancakes! These delicious pancakes give you energy, help your heart and provide a substantial boost of muscle-building protein.

Pat's Age-Defying Protein Pancakes can:

Combat the build-up of plaque in your blood vessels and arteries

Provide complex carbohydrates to keep your system running at its best

Provide an excellent source of energy and essential fatty acids, important for good heart health

Help protect against breast, uterine and prostate cancer

And Pat shares his cooking tips along the way to help make your pancakes light and fluffy.

For pete's sake, he's a televangelist who hawks receipes for miracle pancakes that he claims will help protect people against cancer. Disease-fighting Pancakes!?!! I can't make this stuff up!

Maybe Robertson should prove that his comments about the untimely death of Hugo Chavez were misunderstood by sending Chavez his life-extending receipies as a gift!

Now You Tell Us!

A new constitution will not end all the violence in Iraq, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday, acknowledging that the continuing turbulence "has to be a heart-wrenching thing" for the families of U.S. forces still fighting insurgents there.

"The process has been delayed a bit, but democracy has never been described as speedy, efficient or perfect," Rumsfeld said during a Pentagon briefing. Earlier, Iraqi lawmakers delayed a vote on the draft constitution to give negotiators more time to persuade Sunni Arabs to accept it.

Another Admin. Analogy That Just Doesn't Work

I posted earlier today about Bush's statement, drawing this far-fetched analogy between the Iraqi constitution and America's constitutional framers. This letter to the editor in today's Washington Post refers to an equally lame, 1776-style analogy by Bush's veep:

It seemed odd that the vice president would invoke images of George Washington's Continental Army in urging us to stay the course in Iraq ["U.S. 'Will Not Relent' in Iraq, Cheney Tells Veterans Group," news story, Aug. 19].

Dick Cheney said our Revolutionary War forebears "stayed in the fight," yet in that war, it was the insurgents who prevailed after an eight-year struggle against an occupying army from overseas.

JIM BILLITER
Laurel

I Should Have Listened to James Dobson

All this fiddling around with God's plan for human reproduction is causing the collapse of Western civilization. And I apparently live at the epicenter.

John de Mol is a Dutch television magnate whose trade runs towards, shall we say, less sophisticated forms of entertainment. My first warning of the invasion of "reality" shows came when I was in the Netherlands in 2000 (was it really so recently that I lost my innocence) and saw a program in which a woman was manacled to five men and had to kick one off every day until she was left with the "winner" at the end of the week. This is de Mol's fault as much as anyone's; he invented Big Brother, which spread to other allegedly civilized countries like a plague.

Now de Mol has started a new television channel here, and after only a week on the air, he's stirred up the usual controversy. He's having a meta-reality show, in which the first episode of each of five new reality shows will be aired, and viewers will vote on which series they would like to see continue. My bet, sad to say, is on "I Want a Child from You...and Nothing Else."

(If you'd like to be a contestant for the role of sperm donor, buy your own damn copy of today's Telegraaf and find out what the e-mail address is)

James Madison Was Never Injured by a Car Bomb

Yesterday in Idaho, President Bush told reporters:

As Americans watch the constitutional process unfold (in Iraq), as we watch people work to achieve compromise and unity, we've got to remember our own history. We had trouble at our own conventions writing a constitution.

You're right, Mr. President, there were definitely some stumbling blocks when James Madison and a host of other constitutional delegates gathered for their proceedings. But I don't recall Madison and company ever encountering "trouble" like this, this or this.

Wow.

Yes, I'm totally lame, this is via Atrios. However, if there are vets in a VFW hall in Idaho who are finding creative ways to silently express their displeasure with Bush, they should be heard.


caption: Bill Moyer, 73, wears a "Bullshit Protector" flap over his ear while President George W. Bush addresses the Veterans of Foreign Wars. (AP Photo/Douglas C. Pizac)

Curiously, as far as I can tell this has only appeared in a Canadian paper.

What About the Children?

Zoe recently wrote scathingly about gays and lesbians who use homophobic laws to deny their ex-partners access to children that the two had been raising together.

The flip side of those cases are the ones in which the ex who is continuing to take care of the kids after the breakup sues for child support. The California Supreme Court--no bastion of liberalism in recent years--unanimously ruled in two cases that even if the ex has no biological relationship to the children, she has a responsibility for their care and upbringing and cannot refuse to provide at least financial support, if nothing more.

The article I linked to has the requisite quote from the "pro-family" [sic] camp decrying the decisions.

But what about the kids in these cases? Mr. Pro-Family says the ruling makes "moms and dads as a unit irrelevant when it comes to raising children." First, that's illogical; there's nothing about the rulings that affects the rights and responsibilities of parents and children in one-male-adult, one-female-adult families. It hardly makes the mother and father in that scenario "irrelevant" as a unit. The real complaint is that the ruling could undermine the social notion that such units are superior to a two-woman or two-man unit by giving kids in the latter situations the same rights as their peers in more traditional families.

And that's the larger problem with this argument: this case isn't about the rights of the adults; it's about the right of the children to be adequatlely provided for in material terms. Which is why I say kudos to the editor for finding the right headline: "High Court Protects Kids of Calif. Gays."

The fact is that in most cases like this, there is no mom-and-dad unit. The choice isn't whether to prefer that model to the one that actually exists in a particular child's life, because the traditional model simply isn't available (except in the minority of cases in which the biological parent shacks up with someone of the opposite sex in her next relationship). The choice is whether or not to give a child a better chance of having adequate food, clothing, and the other things that parents are financially obligated to provide. Maybe you think gay and lesbian couples should be prevented from having children in the first place, though that's frankly impossible as a practical matter. But when gay and lesbian couples do end up with children, whether by artificial insemination, adoption, or otherwise, should the children be denied the basic rights to which we generally think all children should be entitled? This should be a no-brainer.

The first kind of case, in which there's a custody/visitation fight, should also be a no-brainer. If you apply the normal child's-best-interest test to those cases, and it's apparent in a particular case that it's in a child's best interest to have continued visitation with the noncustodial ex-partner, why punish the child because you don't approve of the no-longer-existing relationship between the people who have been raising her? And consider this: if we're going to require the noncustodial parent to meet her financial responsibilities to the child, can we reasonably say categorically that even though she's got to continue paying, she cannot have any contact with her child?

It's a cliche that social conservatives care about children only until they are born, and I don't think it's true, generally speaking. (The policies of the Republican Party, on the other hand....). But in cases like this, the cliche sure hits the mark.

Bush Wishes All Questions Came From Fox News

Appearing with Idaho Gov. Dirk Kempthorne today, President Bush greeted reporters and took some questions. After the fourth question from a reporter, Bush concluded his answer in this interesting way:

PRESIDENT BUSH: ... we'll still be working with Iraqis. But more and more Iraqis will be in the fight.

We've got somebody from Fox here, somebody told me?

REPORTER: Yes, Mr. President, thank you.

PRESIDENT BUSH: There you are, kind of blending in.

REPORTER: Sorry about that. Does the administration's goal ....

You just know what Bush was thinking as he concluded the answer to the 4th question: "What's with all of these tough questions. Where is the nice reporter from Fox News? I need an easy question I can kind of coast right through."

In fairness, the question asked by the Fox News reporter who was there was a good one. Referring to the new Iraqi constitution, the question was: "If it's rooted in Islam, as it seems it will be, is that still -- is there still the possibility of (the constitution) honoring the rights of women?"

Bush stammered his way through the response. Read it for yourself.

Pay the Recruits More or Pay the Ad Agency?

As a follow-up to my earlier post on the Army's brand new TV ad campaign to boost recruits, I offer this completely crazy idea.

Instead of dumping tens of millions of dollars into an ad campaign that lacks much sizzle, why not use this money to raise pay and benefits for new recruits and their families?

Are there any sound arguments against paying this money directly to new recruits rather than a high-priced advertising agency? Well, perhaps one. It would mean the ad agency would have to throw a slightly less glitzy holiday party for its staff this December. Now that would make me feel guilty.

Someone Who Wasn't Intelligently Designed

In this parody of a news article, political commentator Andy Borowitz reminds us that one of the greatest flaws in the theory of "intelligent design" is George W. Bush himself.

Danny Topaz, RIP

A sad day for those of us who grew up as fans of the miserable San Diego Padres teams of the 1970s: the team's organist, Danny Topaz, has died.

There are the shared memories of those days: the Tuba Man, wandering through the nearly empty stands playing uplifting (!) music on his tuba; Jerry Coleman, famous for his malapropisms, but whose endless optimism could convince this 8-year-old that the Padres wouldn't have lost today--as they have 100 times already this season--if a couple of hard-hit balls hadn't unluckily gone straight to fielders; the chicken back when he was the KGB chicken and not the San Diego Chicken. And Danny Topaz is part of all of those memories.

I also remember meeting him. He was one of my father's patients, and a couple of times we got to visit him in his booth during ballgames. A really nice guy; pretty short, as I recall. But friendly and upbeat, as you had to be to come to the park 81 times a year in support of such a pathetic team.

I miss him.

Parents: Let the Army Finish the Job for You

"But, Dad, no one has a better eye for
picking out useful pieces of scrap metal
in an Iraqi salvage yard than I do."


Seth Stevenson of Slate.com informs us of the stellar new TV ads that the Army is hoping will help them meet future recruiting targets:

The Army has a numbers problem. Enlistment rates are falling short of where they need to be .... Time to revamp the marketing campaign.

Recently, the "Army of One" spots showed off some of the awesome, adrenaline-pumping jobs that soldiers can have — mostly jobs that don't involve being shot at.

... this new set of four ads (one of them is in Spanish) takes a quieter approach. Gone are all the choppers and night-vision goggles. They've been replaced by kitchen tables and conversations. This campaign seems aimed less at potential recruits than at their parents.

... Apparently, most kids won't enlist until they've had a serious talk with Mom and Dad (or a teacher, or a coach). These ads are meant to make that talk go down easier. Good luck.

... So, how does the Army assuage [parents'] concerns? It doesn't. It just sidesteps the improvised explosive device in the middle of the room.

In one ad, a kid yammers on about the training he'll get. In another, a son tells his mom that the Army will pay for college. OK, so what? We knew about these perks already. Job skills and money are a terrific lure in peacetime, but I don't think they outweigh the fear of getting both arms blown off. Especially in a parent's mind.

Much more interesting is the ad called "Two Things," in which a man and (presumably) his son have a talk on their porch .... They lean on the railing, shoulder to shoulder. I love the tiny moment when the kid gulps as he realizes his father's about to say something meaningful.

... [Dad] doesn't seem too worried about the risk of bodily harm to his kid (never mind the moral underpinnings of the war). He's far more interested in his son's improved handshake etiquette. The Army will mold your boy into a stand-up guy with a manly bearing, the ad seems to say, and what could be more important than that?

... The Army has at last been repositioned as a finishing school. You've done the best you can, Mom and Dad, but it's time to let the service raise him right.

Maybe they should bring back the "Army of One" tagline. At the rate that the Iraq war is going, one may be the most realistic number for Army recruiters to use for their quarterly recruiting goals.

Superior European Culture

My two Dutch-language sources for this are here and here. I refuse to link to the site that the stories are about, for reasons that I hope will become clear. If you really want to look, the link is in one of my two sources, but I won't give you any more clues than that.

It seems that an Amsterdam-based porno site is offering American soldiers free access in exhange for photos of mutilated Afghans and Iraqis. According to a Belgian newspaper, the site operates on the trade-in-kind principle a lot of the time anyway. It is set up as a group of forums, most of which are free access, and some of which you get access to by paying a small fee--or by submitting photos of your wife or girlfriend. So we're dealing with a really classy outfit.

Apparently, they've already got some war-zone pictures up. They're divided into the "General" and "Gory" categories. The latter group carries a warning: "If you get nauseated easily or have a problem with dead terrorists, don't look."

Other features include a quiz: various pictures of human entrails with the caption "Guess what this is." Other photos carry captions like "Another dead guy." There's "Cooked Iraqi," a picture of smiling marines giving the thumbs-up over a charred corpse. Or "I see red," a blood-spattered closeup of a body whose genitals have been blown off.

The webmaster describes all this as an effort "to show a picture of the war that the media has not previously shown."

I wish I could identify this guy walking around in Amsterdam. Then I could throw up on him.


Update: A colleague pointed me to a story and "photo gallery" in Salon, coincidentally published today, exemplifying the fact that grim photos of the war are in fact available from U.S. media, though the accompanying story explains why they are so infrequently published.

Pat Robertson's "Thou Shalt Not Kill" Exception

Yesterday, on his TV program "The 700 Club," televangelist Pat Robertson reminded us of the little-known petroleum disclaimer that originally accompanied the commandment "Thou shalt not kill." That is, if you are the despised leader of an oil-rich nation, murder is permissible.

During Monday's broadcast, according to MediaMatters.org, Robertson stated:

There was a popular coup that overthrew him [Chavez]. And what did the United States State Department do about it? Virtually nothing. And as a result, within about 48 hours that coup was broken ... He has destroyed the Venezuelan economy, and he's going to make that a launching pad for communist infiltration and Muslim extremism all over the continent.

You know, I don't know about this doctrine of assassination, but if [Chavez] thinks we're trying to assassinate him, I think that we really ought to go ahead and do it. It's a whole lot cheaper than starting a war. And I don't think any oil shipments will stop. But this man is a terrific danger ...

... We have the Monroe Doctrine, we have other doctrines that we have announced. And without question, this is a dangerous enemy to our south, controlling a huge pool of oil, that could hurt us very badly. We have the ability to take him out, and I think the time has come that we exercise that ability. We don't need another $200 billion war to get rid of one, you know, strong-arm dictator. It's a whole lot easier to have some of the covert operatives do the job and then get it over with.

Okay, Pat. Since you're a man of God, I guess it's okay for us to set aside that commandment in this case.

But your suggestion that we should murder Chavez has piqued my curiosity and makes me wonder if there's a market for a brand new religious-themed bumper sticker: Who would Jesus assassinate?

Feingold Supplies the Ticket, But Will Dems Use It?

The Washington Post reports today:

Democrats say a long-standing rift in the party over the Iraq war has grown increasingly raw in recent days, as stay-the-course elected leaders who voted for the war three years ago confront rising impatience from activists and strategists who want to challenge President Bush aggressively to withdraw troops.

... Although Bush's approval ratings have sunk, the Democrats have gained no ground at his expense. In a Washington Post-ABC News poll in June, just 42 percent of Americans approved of congressional Democrats, a figure even lower than Bush's.

I think there are a variety of reasons why congressional Dems aren't polling well, but I think the Post's suggestion explains part of their problem: Democrats have offered no unified alternative to the president's Iraq policy.

Sure, Dems have bitched and moaned about a mismanaged war, but they have never offered a credible, concrete suggestion for what the U.S. should do -- other than perhaps sending more troops over there. I'm not sure 25,000 more U.S. troops would produce anything but a better recruiting message for the insurgents and, thus, more dead U.S. soldiers.

The best Kerry could offer last year was that he would somehow convince European nations that were sitting on the sidelines to send troops and personnel to Iraq, and take on more of the responsibility. Yeah, right. Even I couldn't believe that would work.

I understand why Republicans won't (at least not publicly) support Senator Russ Feingold's proposed troop withdrawal. But what explains why other leading Democrats are standing on the sidelines? It has been four days since Feingold unveiled his proposal, and you have to assume he ran it by at least one or two fellow Democratic senators. Are Democratic senators and House members as tone-deaf as former Clinton press secretary Mike McCurry, who was quoted in today's Post thusly:

The smartest thing for Democrats to do is be supportive.

Supportive of administration policy that clearly isn't winning the peace in Iraq? That advice is misguided in every way -- misguided politically, misguided morally and misguided in the broader context of foreign policy.

Is Feingold's proposal really so radical? Well, let's consider the obvious line of attack.

Would such a withdrawal lead to chaos? Hardly. That adjective might apply -- I repeat, might -- if Feingold were endorsing an immediate withdrawal of all troops, but his proposal sets Dec. 31, 2006 as the date by which all U.S. troops are out. Not next month. Not next spring. We're talking one year and four months from now.

If chaos concerns you, then it's hard to imagine things getting more chaotic than they are now in Iraq. Sunni leaders who convene public meetings are gunned down as they try to encourage Sunnis to participate in the next round of voting. Shiite leaders in the South openly talk about seceding from the country.

If Dec. 31 of next year isn't enough time for U.S. troops to do the job that Bush believes they're able to do in Iraq, then Republicans should please say so. And Democrats should welcome the opportunity to force GOP leaders to come clean on this.

Let Republicans criticize Feingold's plan. Let them tell the American people that one full year and four months is not enough time for the Pentagon to adequately train Iraqi police and soldiers. (The Pentagon has already been at it for roughly two years.) That kind of attack on Feingold is likely to backfire, exhausting what little patience the public still has for the Iraqi military occupation.

Backing Feingold's plan would be one of the smartest things Democrats could do. When Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel (a Vietnam vet) compared Iraq to Vietnam this weekend, that was a powerful concession. When the White House and GOP attack the Feingold plan, Democrats should relish the chance to throw one of Hagel's quotes right back at them: "The longer we stay (in Iraq) the more problems we are going to have."

Will Dems sit out this Iraqi-exit debate and offer nothing more specific for Iraq than a bland expression of dismay? How 'bout it, Mr. Dean?

A Sprig of Parsley With Your Movie-Viewing?

The Rev. Rod Parsley is a rising star within the ranks of the Religious Right. He and his Ohio-based followers have played an instrumental role in helping to take the Buckeye State, whose political system was once relatively balanced in Dem-GOP terms, and turn it jungle red.

These days, of course, achieving full status in the political pundit, talk-show world requires a hard-hitting, tough-talkin’ book. Earlier this year, Parsley had such a book published — “Silent No More: Bringing Moral Clarity to America … while Freedom Still Rings.”

In it, Parsley has a lot to whine about. At one point, complaining about Hollywood’s vulgar values, he tells readers that there used to be something called the Hays Code, a voluntary code initiated in 1930 to ensure that immoral films didn’t make it to moviehouses. Over time, the Code was largely disregarded by movie producers.

Parsley shares several excerpts of the Hays Code and presents them as common-sense standards that would work well today if only Hollywood obeyed them. But when I reviewed a full transcript of the Hays Code, what I found was a far lengthier document than the mere excerpts that Parsley cited. The Code not only forbade all of the things that Parsley mentioned, but it also declared, for example:

The use of liquor in American life, when not required by the plot or for proper characterization, will not be shown.

and, my personal favorite:

Miscegenation (sex relationships between the white and black races) is forbidden.

Perhaps Parsley didn’t include the latter item because he didn’t want his readers to consider that when you place movies, art and other forms of expression in the hands of the Morals Police, they often draw the lines in some incredibly cruel, repressive and bigoted ways.

In this same chapter of his book, Parsley cited a long list of acclaimed U.S. movies that he said complied with the Hays Code standards. He wondered why Hollywood couldn’t simply abide by the tenets of this Code. But Parsley didn’t mention the following successful films — many of them nominated for Oscars — that never would have reached the screen in their present form if the Code had remained in force:

Gone With the Wind (1939) – Rhett Butler’s famous parting line (“Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.”) definitely violates the Code’s rule: “Obscenity in word, gesture, reference, song, joke, or by suggestion … is forbidden.”

From Here to Eternity (1953) – The passionate, horizontal, lip-lock embrace on the beach by Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr clearly runs afoul of the Code’s rule that seduction “should never be more than suggested … (and) never (be) shown by explicit method.”

Footloose (1984) – John Lithgow played the minister who fought efforts to allow a prom dance in his backward small-town community. Such a portrayal violates the Code: “No film or episode may throw ridicule on any religious faith.”

Out of Africa (1985) – This film is based on the book about Karen Blixen (played by Meryl Streep) who lived in Africa, adored the landscape but not her philandering husband, from whom she contracted syphilis. But the Code said such storylines are an absolute no-no: “Sex hygiene and venereal diseases are not subjects for motion pictures.”

Philadelphia (1993) – The Code’s declaration that “[s]ex perversion or any inference to it is forbidden” definitely disallows gay characters or relationships.

Longtime Companion (1990) – ditto.

Bush Takes His Bully Pulpit to .... Utah and Idaho?

As public support for the Bush administration's handling of Iraq dwindles, the Associated Press reports that Bush "began a five-day push Saturday to tell Americans why he thinks U.S. troops must continue the fight in Iraq."

But perhaps the best reflection of just how worried the White House is may be the president's itinerary this week. During this five-day tour, Bush will deliver speeches in the states of Utah and Idaho.

Actually, the Salt Lake City speech makes sense from a P.R. standpoint -- the VFW is holding its convention there. But why the need for a speech in Idaho on Wednesday? It's not a good sign if the administation feels it needs to shore up support for the war among the public in a solidly "red" state like Idaho.

"Ook Homo's"

The title of the post is taken from the headline of this article: "Bibliotheek leent behalve boeken ook homo's uit," or "Library lends not only books but also gays." I found it via this article in English, which goes with the only slightly less eyebrow-raising headline "Libary lends out people."

The English story pretty much covers it, though there are a couple of other tidbits from the Dutch article. One is that the library director who is implementing this scheme, Jan Krol, is in his spare time the chairman of the province's chapter of Holland's leading gay-rights organization. The other is that he got the idea from a Swedish colleague who has established a similar scheme in Malmö, where an English-language news source dubbed it the "loan a lesbian" program.

Cakewalk

"Two weekends a month and two weeks a year" my ass. And I liked this bit:

[Gen. Peter] Schoomaker's comments come amid indications from Bush administration officials and commanders in Iraq that the size of the U.S. force may be scaled back next year if certain conditions are achieved.

I suspect the principal condition is that the Republicans are doing badly in the polls in the runup to the 2006 midterm elections.

In any case, if experience is any guide, I'll listen to the generals' projections of the necessary manpower, not the administration's.

Frist's Scientific Manhood

Bill Frist continues to navigate the treacherous waters between the Scylla of keeping the fundamentalists on his side for a 2008 run and the Charybdis of looking like a complete idiot. It reminds me of Doonesbury's harsh 1980s series in which George Bush the Elder placed his political manhood in a blind trust in order to become Reagan's V.P.--suddenly supporting what he had previously called "voodoo economics," abandoning his pro-choice position, and so on.

Frist's triangulation goes on. After it became apparent that his tele-diagnosis of Terri Schiavo threatened to make him a laughingstock, he suddenly bucked the fundies on stem cell research. When the fundamentalist political leadership punished him by disinviting him from the "Justice Sunday" sequel, the message was clear: toe the line or forget about our support in 2008.

Apparently, he got the message.

Former Aide Recalls Powell's UN Performance

From CNN.com:

A former top aide to Colin Powell says his involvement in the former secretary of state's presentation to the United Nations on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction was "the lowest point" in his life.

"I wish I had not been involved in it," says Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, a longtime Powell adviser who served as his chief of staff from 2002 through 2005. "I look back on it, and I still say it was the lowest point in my life."

Wilkerson is one of several insiders interviewed for the CNN Presents documentary "Dead Wrong -- Inside an Intelligence Meltdown." The program, which airs Sunday at 8 p.m. and 11 p.m. ET, pieces together the events leading up to the mistaken WMD intelligence that was presented to the public.

A presidential commission that investigated the pre-war WMD intelligence found much of it to be "dead wrong."

A Cool Flick

I just finished seeing a movie I've been wanting to see for years: Lagaan. I recommend it highly.

It's a Bollywood-esque movie, but conoisseurs of the genre confirm that it's not really typical Bollywood. The budget was the highest in Indian history, for one thing, and it's largely in a local dialect called Bhojpuri rather than Hindi (a big risk for the producers, given the huge Hindi-speaking audience in India). But like a more usual Bollywood film, it's long (almost four hours), and there are several song-and-dance numbers. I'd recommend seeing it in a theater or on a large screen with good sound, because it is a spectacle, with lots of big crowd scenes and such.

The story is pretty simple. It's set in the late 19th century. The evil captain of the local British garrison threatens to double the province's taxes (paid in kind in grain), even though the region is in the grip of a terrible drought. Then some villagers see the Englishmen playing cricket and wonder what it is. The captain challenges the most strong-spirited of the villagers to a cricket match: if the villagers win, the whole province is freed from taxes for three years; if the Brits win, the village has to pay triple taxes (which they cannot possibly do, since they really won't have enough grain to pay even the normal amount and still feed themselves).

You can probably guess how it ends. But it's a terrific journey.

The nature of the film is probably best captured by the fact that I watched it with Dutch subtitles. My Dutch is getting better all the time, but if this was a film that required any subtlety from the viewer, it would have been hopeless.* This is a story with very clear distinctions between the good guys and the bad guys. The English resort to all kinds of trickery and violence to win, for example; meanwhile, the hero unites the village by first letting Muslims join the team, then by taking a Sikh, and last by bringing in an Untouchable as a spin bowler (everyone stalks off the field, but after one short speech about equality from our hero, the whole village immediately sees the error of its ways and welcomes the Untouchable--did I mention he is also seriously handicapped, with a withered arm--bringing tears to the poor man's eyes). The hero and heroine, who have a properly chaste Bollywood love affair and get married off-screen after the movie's end, confirm the prevailing aesthetic in which fairer skin is better, but there's no denying that they are both strikingly good-looking.

Even the Christian Spotlight on Entertainment gives it a moral rating of "better than average"--and, more to the point, a moviemaking quality rating of 4 1/2 out of 5 stars. And these are people who think Harry Potter promotes evil witchcraft. Not bad for a film where the good guys (with one exception) are Hindu and Muslim and Sikh and the bad guys (with no exceptions) are presumably Christian.

Apart from the good things I'd heard about the movie, I was looking forward to it because I'd read Balham to Bollywood, the very amusing book by Chris England, one of the English actors, about the making of the movie. Also, the movie was filmed near the town of Bhuj, in the middle of a desert in a remote part of the state of Gujarat--where Mrs. California and I, for reasons lost in the mists of time, had decided to visit as tourists (can it be nine years ago already?). There was an earthquake there in 2001, shortly after the movie came out, and the movie's star/producer, leading the rest of the group, devoted considerable effort and money to relief projects.

Really, see this movie if you get the chance. It's not the most profound work of art you'll ever witness, but it's very good at doing what it does, and you won't regret spending the time watching it.

*Like the time I went to see Dances with Wolves in Bangkok. It was OK for 15 minutes or so, after which most of the dialogue was in Lakota and the subtitles were in Thai. Still, it was the hot season, and my main reason for going was to get a couple of hours of air conditioning (I was staying in a backpacker hostel), so the show was basically a success.