December 13, 2011
— andy Gabe's out doing some fancy lawyerin', so I'll be filling in for a few days.
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December 12, 2011
— Maetenloch The Collapsing Sexual Mores of Evangelicals?
Well according to a recent survey young unmarried evangelicals are apparently getting quite jiggy:
It turns out that 80 percent of unmarried evangelicals (18 to 29) are sexually active. Yes, 80 percent. For all unmarried young adults the total is 88 percent. Oh, and even as 80 percent of young unmarried evangelicals are sexually active, 76 percent of evangelicals still believe sex outside of marriage is wrong.Walter Russel Mead points out that while premarital sex may be a biblical sin, its impact on people's lives is now less than it's ever been before:
The core truth is that premarital sex is less evil today than it used to be. It remains, as moral theologians say, wrong in itself, we Christians believe, and that is a quality that does not change. But premarital sex is less of a sin against other people than it used to be.Since the human sex drive has been constant (and strong) throughout history, it's always been my assumption that young people were never quite as chaste in the past as they were made out to be - and probably not quite as libertine as we imagine them to be today.In the old days, for example, before contraception, every act of intercourse outside marriage carried a substantial possibility of ending in pregnancy. For women, the consequences of pregnancy out of wedlock were life shattering
In fact one of my favorite tidbits from David Hackett Fischer's Albion's Seed is the fact that even in puritan New England, one of the strictest societies ever in terms of morality and behavior, the sex before marriage rate was at least 4% (based on comparing publicly recorded birth dates and marriage dates for couples). And this was just for sexual contact that resulted in a pregnancy so the actual rate was probably much, much higher. Add to this the practice of "bundling" and it seems that even the Puritans were probably getting fairly jiggy as well on those cold, dark New England nights.
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— Gabriel Malor I'm not sure why, but several commenters have accused me of putting words in Governor Perry's mouth when I wrote that he proposed an amendment to allow organized prayer in schools. I say "I'm not sure why" because Perry couldn't have been proposing anything other than a return to organized prayer in schools. Under the current state of the law, students are allowed to pray in public schools, both singly and in groups. What's currently prohibited in public schools is prayer organized by the school.
WALLACE: Let me ask you, though, about the specific charge in that commercial. You say that gays can serve openly while children can't pray in school. It was the Supreme Court back in 1962 that decided and it's been upheld since then that children couldn't pray in school. Barack Obama had nothing to do with that...PERRY: Well, let me back up and say that I would support a constitutional amendment that would allow our children to pray in school any time that they would like. Right now, those activist judges like Sotomayor and Kagan that he put on the Supreme Court, they would continue to say that that is a decision that the Supreme Court should make.
I happen to believe that that would be a local decision and that's not the Supreme Court's business to be telling Americans when and how they should pray.
[...]
WALLACE: The only point I'd make about prayer in school, is that has continued under -- the ban under Republican presidents as well as Democrats, including Reagan and both of the Bushes.
PERRY: I understand that. I'm just -- I'm telling you what I believe, Chris. And I happen to believe that Americans don't agree with that decision that was made in 1962. And that if we have a constitutional amendment election in this country, allowing our children to pray in school, I would suggest to you, will pass overwhelming.
What 1962 decision are Wallace and Perry talking about that took power away from local school districts by prohibiting prayer in schools? It was Engel v. Vitale, which---get this---held unconstitutional organized school prayers.
Maybe I was giving Perry too much credit. Maybe he really thinks that students aren't allowed to pray in public schools anymore. But I doubt he could be that out of touch with reality. The reaction to Engel (and the 1963 follow-up case Abington School District v. Schempp, which declared unconstitutional school-sponsored bible readings) was exceptionally negative when it was handed down and that reaction took exactly the form that Perry is now proposing: a School Prayer Amendment, which would overturn Engel and Abington School District.
The School Prayer Amendment was introduced by Democratic Senator Byrd in 1962, 1973, 1979, 1982, 1993, 1995, and 1997. It came closest to passing in 1998, when a Republican-led effort in the House of Representatives brought about a vote 224-203 in favor. That was sixty-one votes short of the 2/3rds needed. Attempts to get the amendment off the ground in 2001 and 2006 didn't get very far.
Like I said, I'm not sure why commenters want to downplay Perry's proposed amendment, unless perhaps the idea that he wants to re-institute organized school prayer embarrasses them.
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— Ace So says Ezra "Expanding the welfare state decreases deficits" Klein.
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Via @danriehl, @jimpethokoukis, and @therickwilson. And also, I guess, @everyoneelseontheinternet
I think Jonah Goldberg linked, for some reason, this old post, containing the single greatest Daily Kos "diary" entry ever.
The hot tears, they do flow.
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— Ace I got nothin'. Except a 50% loss of penile nerves.
From Truman North, you might enjoy the Obamas' Extravagant Christmas Spectacular.
One leftwing guy groused "Stupid conservatives now criticizing Obama for celebrating Christmas too much," but that's not the point being made; it is of course that Mr. You've Made Enough Money sure seems to enjoy the good billionaire's life.
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03:57 PM
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— Ace Hope springs eternal.
ARG, after polling 600 likely Republican caucus-goers over the weekend, reports that Gingrich has fallen to 22 percent support in Iowa, while Mitt Romney and Ron Paul are tied with 17 percent, and Perry has 13 percent support among respondents.
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03:06 PM
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— Ace Livestreamed here.
If that doesn't work, Hot Air has some alternate streaming locations.
It will also be broadcast on CSPAN at 8 PM (not live). Though you might want to check that, because this site claims 6 PM.
They're discussing Iran now. Via @philipklein, Newt just made a surprising announcement:
Newt: it's a “fantasy” to think military attack could take out Iran nuke program, need to bring down regime via econ sanctions
VerumSerum notes Gingrich previously said he had no problem talking with the Iranians, "so long as they understood we planned to eliminate them," and speaking of the great need to "move very aggressively" to replace the Iranian regime-- "nonviolently if possible, with military force if necessary."
I don't know how that squares with his new "economic sanctions" position.
I am really worried that Newt Gingrich actually has wildly divergent opinions on things depending on the hour of the day.
In related news, Gingrich actually wrote a letter pledging to not cheat on his wife.
A guy tweeting @ryanbeckwith wrote:
Shorter Gingrich: "Read my lips. No new exes."
Kind of funny.
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12:39 PM
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— CAC I have questioned the true nature of Tim TR Money's disproportionately good performance in the polls just this past weekend, so by no means is this an endorsement of "electability" and I ask that you resort to just rubber bullets when you shoot the messenger.
This month's edition of the projections for the two frontrunners are below, maps again courtesy the great John E.
(Oh, and as always, maps are very, very, very large, so prepare to embiggen) more...
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12:34 PM
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— Ace You know who's a millionaire?
Obama.
Also Nancy Pelosi.
And also, I think, Harry Reid.
Thanks to DrewM.
Stupid Is Contagious: Harry Reid is probably riffing off this insipid column, making the same claim.
I’m a very rich person. As an entrepreneur and venture capitalist, I’ve started or helped get off the ground dozens of companies in industries including manufacturing, retail, medical services, the Internet and software. I founded the Internet media company aQuantive Inc., which was acquired by Microsoft Corp. in 2007 for $6.4 billion. I was also the first non-family investor in Amazon.com Inc.Even so, I’ve never been a “job creator.” I can start a business based on a great idea, and initially hire dozens or hundreds of people. But if no one can afford to buy what I have to sell, my business will soon fail and all those jobs will evaporate.
Stop the tape, stop the tape, Mr. Snerdley, as Rush Limbaugh says.
Guy says he's never created a job, and to prove that, immediately launches into a schpiel about all the dozens or hundreds of people he hires with a new project.
Then he says, well, you know, if they can't sell my product, those jobs disappear.
But you're a rich guy, according to your own self-description. That means that in a majority of your start-up ventures, you did not in fact go bankrupt, losing your original stake-money.
That means that in the majority of cases, those "dozens or hundreds" of people you hired kept their jobs.
This is remarkably stupid. This is America in the second decade of the second millennium.
I am actually moving away from the question of "Can America survive?" to "Should America survive?"
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11:47 AM
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— Ace That'll work.
Video below. Obama says "We have asked for it back [emphasis actually in the original; he stresses that word].... We'll see how the Iranians respond."
“No one returns the symbol of aggression to the party that sought secret and vital intelligence related to the national security of a country,” Salami said.
That sounds different in the original Persian, though.
Reportedly, Obama was presented with three plans to recover and/or (more likely) destroy the drone, but he rejected them all.
Because he felt this could be "perceived" as an act of war. Um, it's our property. It landed, I'm guessing, in open space (odds are -- the world is mostly open space).
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11:14 AM
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