Then why are the male circumcision rates so much lower in "socialized medicine" countries? -- DonOntario

Because most of the countries with socialized medicine either aren't very Christian (the EU, Australia and Canada) or they aren't particularly religious at all (most of Asia).

. . . "You are entitled to your own opinion, but you are not entitled to your own facts."

It may be your opinion that circumcision is genital mutilation, but as a matter of fact it is not. To mutilate something is generally accepted to mean that it has been destroyed or rendered useless. Circumcision does not destroy a penis. A circumcised penis still serves its two essential functions.

The only thing that can confidently maintained about circumcision is that it changes the aesthetics of a penis. All other claims about what it does or does not do is pure speculation or, in the case of medical fact, inconclusive. For every study claiming that the procedure has positive health benefits there is one concluding the opposite or, at the most, is conclusive.

. . . of those who are hysterical about male genital mutil, er, circumcision and attitudes toward body piercing and tattoos.

. . . maybe Limbaugh has an implant of some kind as well, and that's what has got him so riled. I mean, we know he got busted for packin' Viagra without a prescription.

. . . one would think he could get something, even implants, that didn't look like permanent head hooks. - Baldwinski

. . . just after birth or no more than a few days later? I'll agree that there is usually no health benefits to the procedure. But I fail to see how can it be seen as "taming" a male whose eyes can't even focus yet and whose brain is barely functioning.

Circumcision is done to tame males. There are zero health reasons for it.

It's done for the same reason as female circumcision - to exercise power over someone and show them you can hurt them if they step out of line. -- JoeMommaSan

I guess this might be the case if you were doing it to pubescent boys or grown men. But there haven't been any studies showing that human beings' memories go back to even the first few months let alone first hour or even days after birth.

Lots of stupid posts on this thread by a number of people who seem to have issues of their own rivaling Limbaugh's.

We can hope so.

They make the best non-Scotch Scotch Whisky.

And those commercials are a damn sight better than Orson Wells' pathetic E&G pitches.

. . . why is Cheney even being given a venue? Why does she need to be listened to? What is her supposed expertise?

. . . when posters start crowing about their alleged academic background. (An MBA from Central Michigan University or Carnegie? Either way, not MBA programs to brag about. Christ even Shrub has one from Harvard.)

I have an MBA from CMU and an MS from Fordam. . . . -- NP NP

A financially successful conservative from a working class background. The former can still be counted on to fight the good fight. The latter is a self-loathing class traitor who only pretends to care about the little guy.

While I certainly don't share your taste in 1960s sit-coms, you do have a sense of humor, something John Anderson (sore loser) and NP NP seem to lack.

yes...the same "sense of humour" that mocks poor community college students as they try to improve their lives. yes now i see. -- John Anderson

"Be the ball, Danny."

"Where did it go?"

"Straight into the lumber yard."

I really think that 90% of the Dems in the old Confederacy are pretty much useless.

I hate to say it, but Myerson's behavior is a stereotypical Baby Boomer subtype... -- limiting factor

Myerson was born in 1960, so she's hardly part of the Baby Boom/Woodstock generation. People born in 1960 have little in common culturally with people who came of age in the 1960s.

I used to read Myerson's column in the Financial Times. Her parents divorced when she was in elementary school. She moved around a fair bit as a child.

That marijuana is far less dangerous and costly to society than alcohol and Rx meds (and even cigarettes if you account for pain and suffering) simply can't be ignored.

Yes, yes. This is well established but hardly the point now, is it? Myerson's kid was, is an asshole who turned his family upside down. His frequent dope smoking was mostly the source of the trouble.

The fact that even if it is mildly addictive, it's absurd to associate its use with the types of consequences shared by other substances. -- K. Trout

Addictive or not, anyone who is stoned all the time is about as useful to themselves and others as someone who is drunk all the time. End of story.

The more you go on about the relative addictiveness of dope suggests that you are trying to convince yourself as much as anyone one else.

The fact that you even bothered to comment here, obviously knowing nothing about the subject . . . -- K. Trout

The subject of Myerson's book, which I read the U.K. reviews for months ago, the subject of dope smoking, which I outgrew in HS thirty years ago, or the topic of you being a self-justifying pot head?

. . . his strengths were mostly descriptive, not prescriptive, and because he was off on his analysis of human nature by a country mile. No one wants to be proletariat, no matter how well he is treated. Everyone pretty much wants to be wealthy and in charge (or left alone) like management and ownership.

His analysis of imperialism was off as was his estimation of how much a representative democracy could do to ameliorate the worst aspects of capitalism.

But it certainly hasn't been funny since the early 1990s.

. . . outlaw Styrofoam packaging at the meat counter. The epitome of use it once and throw waste.