Republican Senate nominee: Women don't get pregnant from "legitimate" rape (2012/08/19)
“Todd Akin believes that women’s bodies have some kind of magical mechanism to prevent pregnancy in the case of a “legitimate” rape.":http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/08/todd-akin-legitimate-rape.php
[read more...]Voter ID: How security theatre can win elections (2012/08/12)
As a number of people have observed, there is no obvious means by which taking nail clippers away from little old ladies prevents healthy young men from using weapons already secreted aboard an airplane to try to hijack it. Similarly, all the aggressive increases in ID checking seem irrelevant; none of the 9/11 hijackers were using assumed names. And yet, for the most part, people have put up with the TSA’s hijinks. Why?
[read more...]Liar, liar, pants on fire (2012/07/24)
So, there’s this long story. As always, Snopes has pretty good coverage of the whole issue.
[read more...]Idle thought: Should we mandate statistically better things? (2012/06/26)
One of the premises of much anti-gay legislation is the notion that, since a particular family structure is asserted to be “better”, that we should push everyone towards that and penalize alternatives.
[read more...]Propaganda analyzed: The threat to honest discussion about marriage (2012/06/24)
You’ve probably read some of the arguments advanced by proponents of the marriage amendment on the ballot in Minnesota this November. I want to analyze one such document for you, to show you why I conclude it is willfully dishonest – not just ignorant, or misguided, but deceitful at every level.
[read more...]The soul of the thing (2012/06/23)
Reading David Blankenhorn’s article in the New York Times, I think I have come to understand what went wrong in attempts to preserve “marriage”.
[read more...]Another way to come around to new views on gay marriage... (2012/06/22)
David Blankenhorn now supports the legal right to gay marriage.
[read more...]The role of investors and investment (2012/05/29)
One of the standard talking points of the political “right” is that scattering the wealth of very wealthy people prevents them from “creating jobs”.
[read more...]The Pinkie Pie case for gay marriage (2012/05/24)
Marriages mean weddings. Weddings mean parties, with cake! More marriages mean more weddings. More weddings mean more parties, with more cake! Allowing gay marriage means MORE CAKE and MORE PARTIES.
[read more...]The conservative case for gay marriage (2012/05/24)
It is at this point pretty obvious that, for the most part, gay marriage advocates are not particularly persuasive to the most vehement objectors. There’s some interesting differences in how people view the question. What’s most interesting is to observe that, fundamentally, people are making different categories of arguments. It’s not that the conservatives dispute the equality argument, it’s that they aren’t considering it to be particularly relevant.
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