Right now the United States has the highest teen pregnancy rate of any developed nation. Although this teen pregnancy rate has decreased dramatically since the 1970s, recent years have seen that rate become stagnant.
Indeed, as of 2004, 13 states experienced either an increase in teen birth rates or stagnant teen birth rates, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The data also showed that one in seven girls who are 14 and younger will experience an unintended pregnancy, and one in three women will have an unintended pregnancy by age 20.
Archive for the 'US' Category
For $1.3 million a year, Larry Page and Sergey Brin get to park their customized wide-body Boeing 767-200, as well as two other jets used by top Google executives, on Moffett Field, an airport run by NASA that is generally closed to private aircraft. Moffett Field is nearly adjacent to Google’s headquarters in Mountain View, Calif., and the four-mile drive between the two locations takes just seven minutes, according to Google Maps. Other Silicon Valley executives have to fight traffic to get to their large jets parked…even farther away.
Subtitled: Gravel’s Got Rocks!
Senator Mike Gravel sounds a bit like a sage Al Gore who’s been around the block a couple times and is sick and tired of the hypocrisy and weakness of potential leaders. He’s bold and old and comes across as a granddad with an opinion. Perhaps, at times, a little long-winded, he’s quickly becoming my one-to-watch of all the US Presidential candidates. I hope he’s paid due attention and supported by the people as much as he’s trying to empower them.
Three videos of his thoughts; the first is a short clip from an interview on MSNBC, the second from a speech he gave in New Hampshire: “We should be guided by Eisenhower’s warning that an inordinate emphasis on military power breeds a culture of militarism that threatens all vital areas of our society.” and the third from the debate amongst Democratic candidates for the presidency on April 26th in South Carolina.
The full transcript of the debate in South Carolina is avaible from MSNBC. More videos of Senator Gravel are avaible via Google Video
More at www.gravel2008.us
and http://www.nationalinitiative.us
As part of going on the Colbert Report on Comedy Central to promote the 11 May release of her new film ‘Georgia Rule‘, Jane Fonda managed to put host Stephen Colbert in a jam by getting far more up close and personal than he’d expected, leaving him saying “this is not how I expected this interview going!” The video, below:
“Top notch care and support of Army Families demonstrate our sincere appreciation and gratitude for their many contributions, and allow our Soldiers to fully concentrate on the fight and focus on their duties.“Effective immediately, the word ‘Families’ will be capitalized in all Army correspondence. Please ensure wide dissemination of this change. Thanks for your continued efforts to do all you can to provide steadfast support to our Army Families.”
Also, Extended Tours, Multiple Deployments, Shortened Home Leave and Other Words Will Be Capitalized From Time To Time, As Deemed Necessary. via A Kamen in Washington Post
Hunters in the annual seal massacre that has a quota for killing 270,000 seals per year in north east Canada have over the last couple days become stranded and cut off from aid because of forceful ice flows and bad weather conditions. Perhaps it’s a message to stop killing wild animals? I hate the seal cull. Plus, calling it a ‘cull’ implies that there are somehow too many seals. There aren’t too many seals. They’ve only just recovered from the brink of extinction. How many animals must we kill just to allow for human overpopulation of the planet. I think this is ridiculous.
Seal killers stranded
The Democratic Presidential candidate from Connecticut was asked about his position on gay ‘marriage’ during a talk with New Hampshire High School students. His response refers obliquely to John Rawls‘ Veil of Ignorance:
With ones own children: “They may grow up as a different sexual orientation than their parents. How would I want my child to be treated if they were of a different sexual orientation?”
Rawls’ book ‘A Theory of Justice’, one of my favorite works of political philosophy, refers to the decision making process through which a society ought to go about defining its own rules:
“no one knows his place in society, his class position or social status, nor does anyone know his fortune in the distribution of natural assets and abilities, his intelligence, strength, and the like. I shall even assume that the parties do not know their conceptions of the good or their special psychological propensities. The principles of justice are chosen behind a veil of ignorance.”
What makes Dodd’s pronouncement interesting is the fact that he is a father of two girls and, though (perhaps oddly) an opponent of gay marriage, a supporter of civil unions and their recognition on a federal level.
via Rod 2.0: Democratic Prez Hopeful Dodd: “What if Your Child Were Gay?”
and AP News: Dodd asks: What if your child were gay?
The next day, at the rally here [in Colo Iowa], Mr. Obama described the encounter for the crowd. The woman, he said, had asked if her son’s death was the result of a mistake by the government. “And I told her the service of our young men and women — the duty they show this country — that’s never a mistake,” he said.
He paused carefully as he reflected on that encounter. “It reminds you why you get into politics,” he said. “It reminds you that this isn’t a game.”
NYTimes: Two Years After Big Speech, a Lower Key for Obama
Wayne Besen, on his blog, discusses the the idea of a Southern Baptist leader Rev Albert Mohler Jr that one day, were a genetic propensity to homosexuality ever discovered, he would condone the use of anti-gay treatments to correct these traits. The idea is interesting because it comes from a man who is clearly in a position of power in his community. He’s riding high and there are few natural predators. There’s no need to watch your back, right? But what if he did have to? What if he were to consider his stated view but from the position of a Christian who is unpopular. You go to Turkey, go to China, go to Indonesia and perhaps the idea that eradicating gays might not be quite as powerful. Why? Not that these men and women who criticise everyone else’s lifestyles would have had a change of had, not that their hatred would have diminished, but in the light of threats to their own eradication and extermination perhaps they would have less haste in persecuting others. Besen says:
Before you dismiss this question as hypothetical or academic, consider that research into the origins of spirituality is a robust field of inquiry. There are currently about a dozen studies that show shared personality traits among religious people, suggesting a genetic or biological basis. …In Mohler’s world, conservative Christians are a majority and considered a paragon of virtue. However, the late singer John Lennon is not the only person who has “imagined” a world without religion and its Inquisitions and suicide bombers. Indeed, there are prominent scholars and writers who consider religion to be little more than a psychological defect - much like the Southern Baptists now consider homosexuality.
While the right in America is strong they think of their worldview as omnipotent and supreme. But their lack of humility and their absolute faith, which often equals a disregard of and lack of respect for the views of others could be a threat to themselves. Who is to say that in some future time, our increasingly laïque and secular societies will not view religion as a greater threat to humanity than ‘alternative’ sexualities? Gays don’t start wars because other people aren’t gay, we just want to be left alone. But those crazy christians are just bringing fire onto themselves. By pushing to continually persecute gays, legislating against us, protesting against us, hating against us, praying against us, shooting, stabbing and killing us, they will eventually undermine their own position of what is for now strength. Love thy neighbor flys out the window when those neighbors are both guys. Maybe they should rethink that?
Wayne Besen: Mohler’s Slippery Slope
formerly.. Just how gay is the right?
There’s a boy in the US’s Midwest who writes a blog that I’ve been reading of late. It’s an anonymous blog: he doesn’t post photos of himself, he doesn’t tell his readers where he lives or goes to University or what his real name is. He writes under the pseudonym ‘Phil’. He’s a politics student and a swimmer on the school team. He sounds like a nice guy. His parents are pretty conservative, and over the last few weeks he’s been wrestling with the process of how to come out as gay to his family. I know, it’s hard. He’s drafted a letter to his parents to give them after talking to them, he’s doubted himself and his family, he’s defended his sexuality and he’s recounted conversation with his parents. They seem like the kind of people who would be hard to convince to support an opinion they didn’t immediately believe.
On December 12th he wrote about being honest and coming out to his family. Then on December 17th he did it and wrote about it on the 18th: Coming Out to my parents, Part I, followed by the conclusion of his experience in Coming Out to my parents, Part II. It’s really worth reading because it shows the torment through which a lot of people have to go in order to be honest about their sexuality with their families, though the concept could apply to any number of ‘coming out’ problems - breakdown of a marriage, falling in love with someone from the ‘wrong’ religion… Phil’s words on the 18th:
The internal screaming took over my body and shook it. It ran up and down my spine, louder and louder. I got dizzy. I got sick to my stomach. I stared them in the eyes, waiting for a reaction. It felts like ages, years, centuries, but I know it was just a couple seconds. I saw the words hit them in the face. “There’s no going back Phil.” I thought to myself. “This is it. Be confident. Be strong.” Their facial expressions changed, and I didn’t know what to do. Run for the door, or run into a full embrace and hug?
