Month: November 2010

Jesse Bering penetrates the evolutionary advantage of premature ejaculation:

[M]ale rhesus macaque monkeys often engage in marathon mounting sessions, where sex with a female can be drawn out for over an hour at a time (including many breaks and therefore non-continuous thrusting).

That may sound great, but libidinous anthropomorphizers beware: macaque sex is a chaotic and violent affair, largely because the duration of the act often draws hostile attention from other competitive males. By contrast, primate species whose males evolved to ejaculate rapidly would have largely avoided such internecine violence, or at least minimized it to a considerable degree.

Click the image to enlarge:

James Rydberg's survey suggests – contra the media's obsession with political sex scandals – that "embezzling money or cheating on their taxes is the worst thing a candidate can do; followed closely by lack of competence." Another illuminating finding:

The average Republican views being an atheist or Muslim candidate about how the typical American views a candidate who frequents prostitutes. Similarly, Republicans view a homosexual candidate like most Americans view a [candidate] who has been convicted of drunk driving.

Mitt Romney watchers: note that being Mormon is close to neutral, according to the survey, and in the same ballpark as being gay. Of course, voters are terrible at explaining why they vote the way they vote, so these responses should be taken with a generous dash of salt.

Some useful reality checks from Scott Horton:

Critics on the right have already started recriminations against the Obama administration, saying that this proves that cases like Ghailani should go to a military commission. But such claims are long on hot air and short on facts. The statistics suggest (PDF) that the conviction and sentence rates for military commissions are no higher than in civilian courts—indeed by present count, they lag behind. Moreover, the Ghailani case faced other problems, because it relates to the 1998 embassy bombings and not conduct post-9/11. The U.S. determination of a “war” dates to 9/11, which would make it a ridiculous stretch to include the embassy bombings cases—aspects of which had already been tried, successfully, in federal court. So even if we accept military commissions as a suitable vehicle, Ghailani is a more than problematic candidate.

Chait falls for another deficit reduction plan:

This plan, by Alice Rivlin and Pete Domenici of the Bipartisan Policy Center, looks a lot more solid [than Simpson-Bowles]. None of the crazy unenforceable caps and wild plans to slash the federal workforce without reducing its responsibilities. It's actually a balanced proposal to distribute pain. It also sensibly includes a short-term payroll tax holiday to address the economic crisis. And the tax reform, while lowering the corporate and top income tax rates to 27%, which is below the lowest point Ronald Reagan cut them to, also makes the overall burden more progressive.

I was impressed too, especially by the front-loaded payroll tax cut. Gleckman's analysis:

Recognizing the continued slow economic recovery, this deficit reduction plan actually starts with a tax cut—a 2011 payroll tax holiday. The fun starts after that. The BPC would eliminate nearly all itemized deductions and kill or scale back most other targeted tax breaks. Among the ideas: It would restructure credits for low-income households by repealing the earned income credit and the child credit, while replacing them with a new child credit and a separate earnings credit. It would gradually eliminate the exclusion for employer-sponsored health insurance. And it would tax capital gains and dividends as ordinary income, except for a very modest exclusion ($1,000 for couples) for long-term gains.

The plan would create a new 15 percent refundable tax credit for charitable gifts and replace the mortgage deduction with a 15 percent refundable credit for up to $25,000 in interest. People could still contribute to tax-advantaged retirement savings accounts, but workers and their employers could only kick in an annual combined maximum of $20,000.

A reader writes:

You write, "The idea that we should all abide by rules that Palin herself freely violates – her family 'privacy' my ass – is surrender to her double standards." I don't know about you, but I abide by all kinds of rules that Palin herself freely violates, including rules about honesty, revenge and incitement to hatred. I don't consider living by my own standards to be a surrender to anyone. (And yes, my standards include not making a national issue out of a sixteen-year-old's stupid slurs.)

Another writes:

I accept wholeheartedly the refrain from judgment upon high schooler Willow Palin for her casual caustic remarks to a peer on some message board. But let's be serious and say that we all know where this is headed. First Bristol – who is in the public spotlight she sought, and is NOT a high schooler – defended her sister with some salty language and mean-spritedness instinctively and immediately.

Bristol, it should be noted, is not just a quasi-"celeb" due to her DWTS participation, but some form of national spokesperson for an abstinence forum, as well as a highly-compensated guest speaker on a "lecture" circuit. Even this is not enough to declare open season on her younger sister however.

But what is unquestionably coming, and sooner than later, is the rinse-repeat reaction of her mother, who will conspire with her inner-circle to form the most advantageously-worded condemnation of "elites" and the left "dragging families (!!) into their criticism unfairly" while reminding again that children should be out of bounds and family attacks are indefensible. Then, in the predictable aftermath, she will place the trials of what her family is being put through front and center in her eternal narrative of taking on the evil forces of the left and the persecution of her loved ones. Can hauling Willow out like a prop on the lecture circuit be far behind?

No, it surely cannot.

A reader writes:

As a reformed Dittohead (hey, it was the '90s, I was young), the line "kill people and break things" used by Bryan Fisher struck a familiar chord. It was one of Limbaugh's stock phrases, used to explain that the proper role of the armed forces was just that – not any mamby-pampby humanitarian nonsense. Another example of epistemic closure, no?

Another writes:

As a medieval art historian, I was struck by Fischer's account of the theological meaning of Christ's death. 

One of the transitions we study in medieval art is that between the living triumphant Christ on the cross found in Early Christian Art (like this one – an ivory from c. 400 now in the British Museum) and the dead suffering Christ, which enters European art in 10th century works (such as this life-size Gero Cross in Cologne).  The earlier type is thought to relate to one explanation for why Christ had to die, which stresses his death as a trick that traps the Devil and leads to his defeat.  Here, Christ is like the bait on a a fish-hook that catches the Devil (as in this image, from the Garden of Delights by Herrad of Hohenbourg). 

In the latter type of the suffering, Christ emphasizes his humanity – one that God had to share with sinners in order for his sacrifice to be efficacious.  Writing around 1100, Saint Anselm was instrumental in the shift. In Cur Deus Homo, he writes that the earlier explanation no longer had any force for him: "MOREOVER, I do not see the force of that argument… that God, in order to save men, was bound… to try a contest with the devil in justice, — so that, when the devil should put to death that being in whom there was nothing worthy of death… he should justly lose his power over sinners. " The classic discussion of this is in Chapter 5 of R. W. Southern's Making of the Middle Ages, "From Epic to Romance."

The Financial Times reports:

The number of people subscribing to US cable television services has suffered its biggest decline in 30 years as younger, tech-savvy viewers lead an exodus to web-based operations, such as Hulu and Netflix.

The Dish noted this trend a year ago.

We mentioned this earlier with respect to NPR, but go check out the other spending cuts Eric Cantor's little site YouCut.com has managed to find, with the help of visitors and supporters. The total amount saved so far? $130 billion. Not nearly enough even to pay for extending the sunset for Bush's tax cuts, which come in at $700 billion. And not even in the ball park of $4 trillion or so that we need to find before 2020. But they have their priorities straight: the top featured two cuts right now (after NPR) are

1. The Exchanges with Historic Whaling and Trading Partners program

2. Matching Federal Funds For Primary Candidates.

I mean: it's just sad. They mounted a second American revolution to end the Exchanges with Historic Whaling and Trading Partners program? How do they even keep a straight face when saying they want to return to fiscal balance?

A reader writes:

An interest aspect of the Draper article:  He writes that Palin’s 2 ½ year old son had an operation on Friday before Election Day. 

She and Todd made a campaign appearance in West Virginia on Saturday morning, then went to New York where they stayed until Wednesday.  To get to West Virginia in time to campaign on Saturday morning, she must have flown late on Friday afternoon or Friday evening.  So basically, Palin and her husband left her 2 ½ year old immediately following an operation (“routine”, but still), flew across the country and stayed away for nearly five days.  What parents would do that following surgery for a child that young?  My wife and I certainly wouldn’t have done this, and, frankly, I don’t think I know any parents who would have.

Maybe they took Trig with them, although there is no indication in the article that they had children with them.  Even if this were the case, it is also odd behavior.  A child that young who has had surgery should probably be watched carefully for a couple of days to make sure there are no complications, etc., and probably should stay in the hospital for a day or so.

I believe that, in general, how politicians deal with their children and other family members is their private business and does not have any bearing on their competency or qualifications for public office.  However, Palin has deliberately used her children to build her image, thrusting them into the public sphere at every opportunity (including her TLC show) and constantly talking about how her experience as a “mom” qualifies her for office.  Therefore, I think it only fair that questions about her performance as a mother should be raised in public.

Keep digging.