Just as with all other aspects of human physiology and human psychology, one size definitely does not fit all. Some of us humans seem to be most related to chimpanzees when it comes to sex. We're possessive, territorial and even likely to kill children who are not of our blood lines.

Others of us are definitely most akin to the bonobo apes who have sex by way of greeting, have sex to resolve conflicts and seal agreements, have sex as thanks for food shared, have sex just for fun and as a way of reducing tension between competing factions.

The chimps among us do best with abstinence only, since the results of anything else tend to be nasty and bloody.

The bonobos among us do best with total sexual liberation since sex with anyone and any gender keeps them happy and well-adjusted.

But both the chimps and the bonobos both need to stop thinking that their way is the only way and need to stop telling others what to do.

Perhaps sex education can, at its best, help our youngsters to discover what their own instincts are, how to the best evaluate the instincts of others and how to prevent nastiness and blood letting while, at the same time, preventing unwanted pregnancy and the unnecessary wounding of others by violating expectations you didn't take the trouble to discover were there before sex entered into the relationship.

As to the Bible, itself. If Christian Conservatives took the trouble to read it (which they don't) they'd discover that its descriptions of sex and sexual practices are all over the map (in fact they'd probably have to have it banned from high school libraries as obscene without even getting into the implications of David and Jonathan).

What we most need to do with sex education, I suspect, is provide our sons and daughters with the emotional and psychological resources to navigate and negotiate how, when, with whom, and how often they'd like to have sex and help them to be good at sex and all the issues surrounding it in every way possible while protecting their own health and well being. Perhaps if we were to do that, they wouldn't grow up as "screwed up" about sex as their parents.

I have at least one friend from whom I will receive this cover image from the New Yorker. He will send it to me claiming that it confirms what he was already temped to believe, that Obama is a secret Muslim and neither he nor his wife are to be trusted. This belief has been born out of countless e-mails he's received claiming to reveal Obama's "secret" past.

Many of us have worked hard to inform and reassure friends that all the character assassination e-mails regarding Obama and his wife are false, but this New Yorker cover is already flying around the country used for exactly the opposite purpose than that for which the Magazine claimed to be aiming. There will be no accompanying New Yorker article. No one will read the text debunking the idea. It will only add massive fuel to the "Obama is a Muslim" fire. In one, fell swoop this cartoon will undo months of work.

Congratulations, New Yorker! You've proven what tin-eared, short-sighted morons you are buried in all your layers of supposed metropolitan "sophistication." (Or are you just trying to get even with Obama for beating your New York candidate HRC?)

because she was offering herself to a constituency that largely agreed with both she and Obama and needed to slice that constituency to ribbons, so she could draw some of those ribbons to herself. It seems to me that McCain will have a very difficult time slicing off segments of the general public who are suffering so many ill effects from the past 7+ years that they're ready to try anything as long as the candidate espousing it doesn't have an "R" next to his name. Come to think of it, maybe McCain should push for nonpartisan national electoral ballots!

McCain

McBush

McSame

He doesn't grab eyeballs or ears. His voice is thin and reedy. He doesn't sound like a strong man. His face is less than handsome and certainly less than vital, not to mention rather blank unless he's pasting on an expression as his advisers have told him to do. He reads to those who are visually/spiritually sensitive as someone with no depth behind his eyes. At his age, you might expect he'd have a great depth of wisdom to draw from, but looking in his eyes yields the conclusion that "there's nothing deeper beneath the surface - no intellectual, spiritual, nor emotional depth. Plus, unlike the "maverick" things he was saying a few years ago, now he's simply parroting his predecessor so that, when the public sees Mr. McCain, all they see, all they hear, all they know is

McCain

McBush

McSame