Letters to the Editor
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new iraq mortality survey
There's a standing joke among statisticians; the skeptic who proclaims "Why, this estimate is based on only a sample! And a random one at that!" The fact is, that it can be shown mathematically that the increase in accuracy from increasing sample size virtually levels off after a certain point, and is not related at all to the size of the population sampled from. Which is something that everybody actually knows without knowing they know it. After all, whether testing a drinking bottle or a swimming pool for chlorine, you only take a little test tube sample; you don't have to haul out a bucket full from the swimming pool because it's so much bigger. The underlying sampling principle is exactly the same.
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Hastert flip-flops on Foley????
Puh-lease, that is not an image I want seared into my brain. It's going to take a long walk in the woods gazing at the coloring fall foliage and a Bombay Sapphire martini shaken until the cocktail shaker numbs my arm up to the elbow to get that horrific scene from popping up like a bad acid flashback.
I keep asking myself - was Denny oiled up for the flip-flop - or is that just sweat everywhere? Was Marc's life in danger when the walrus-sized ex-wrassler got frisky?
Egad.
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The Key Word...
...is "caught." The fact the Foley evaded discipline for so many years speaks to the ability of the GOP leadership to keep such things suppressed. The consequences speak more to the basic hypocrisy of orthodox GOP thought than the implication that "Democrats get away with it," as Sheldon implies.
- PonB
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Traditional Values vs. Traditional Desires
Run for the hills! The homosexuals like younger (more attractive?) mates! I'm probably preaching to the converted, but I just have to point this out.
Louis Sheldon feels the need to condemn homosexuals for pederasty (among other things). According to Sheldon, "Pederasty ... is the homosexual desire for anal sex with older teenage boys." Sheldon also says pederasty is "the main form that male homosexuality has acquired throughout Western civilization."
Now, is is that surprising? To come at this from another angle, what would we call the heterosexual desire for vaginal sex with older teenage girls? I'd say whatever we call it, it is the main form that male heterosexuality has acquired throughout Western civilization.
I find this neither surprising or concerning. Many people are attracted to younger males/females. Homosexuals do not have any exclusivity on this issue. The issue is not that Foley is a homosexual. The issue is that male pages had to be warned about the "odd" guy (Foley). If the pages had been female, I would hope there would still be the same level of outrage.
And, for the record, I think this issue is quite separate from pedophilia, which is a crime.
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Actually, since he's getting so technical about it
Pederasty has not a thing to do with anal sex. The ancient Greeks invented it, and they liked it between the thighs, standing up. More than you all needed to know, possibly. But there it is.
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Traditional Values Coalition chairman Louis Sheldon -- a frequent White House visitor with close ties to both Karl Rove and Ken Mehlman
Hmm, am I the only one who finds that odd? Louis' ties can't be all that close to Ken Mehlman if he said:
the GOP "needs to discuss how it should deal with homosexuals inside the leadership of the party ... As radical homosexuals have been welcomed into 'the big tent,' it has become a less welcoming place for religious conservatives and a dark and dangerous place for children ... Republicans need to make a simple choice between the innocent children and radical homosexuals who prey on them."
Oh that's right, Mehlman is just a self-loathing, pathetic closet case, not a radical homosexual.
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Warning: red herring
The issue is not homosexuality. The issues are:
1)predatory sexual behavior toward minors,
2)hypocrisy and
3)the violation of public trust
Do not let the GOP or the religious right change the subject!
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I love these guys!
Watching the AmTaliban tying themselves in knots trying to hold onto GOP power/cash is like a bad episode of Survivor. These cretins (Dobson, Robertson, etc) are the same bunch who preach on beating the gay out of children, or beating them for any old reason. They run those "boot camps" for troubled teens that have been shut down on abuse and rape charges. These folks are tooo sick.
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Sheldon's abnormal interest is interesting
Hmmm. Sheldon has apparently taken a very personal and deep interest in this subject. He's been in contact with NAMBLA and is peculiarly well versed in the difference between pedophilia and pederasty.
It's also been noted that Sheldon is a frequent visitor to Karl Rove's office in the White House and that he hangs out with Ken Mehlman (a reputed homosexual). I think he was also "close" with Scott McClellan, who was "close" with Jeff Gannon.
Far be it from me to speculate, but it just seems like Sheldon is a bit disingeneous, or perhaps in "moral confusion."
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Thanking Sheldon
I'm grateful to Sheldon for her explanation of the difference between pedophilia and pederasty.
Now I understand that pedophilia is what Congresspersons and members of the clergy are periodically caught acting out.
Pederasty is what the conservative movement has been doing to the American people for 26 years.
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Gordon 213 Got it Right
Gordon 213 Wrote:
1)predatory sexual behavior toward minors,
2)hypocrisy and
3)the violation of public trust
Do not let the GOP or the religious right change the subject!
Exactly, and thank you. If Mark Foley had been in a mutually consensual gay relationship with another adult, I honestly wouldn't care. The problem is that Foley's targets were minors, and they got scant help or protection from the adults around them, despite speaking out and seeking . What do you think THEY learned about Foley and his behavior, and the actions the adults around them failed to take to stop them?
And he IS a Republican, no matter how hard the GOP wishes Foley were a Democrat, right now.
But the "Party of traditional values and personal responsibility" failed to protect minors under their protection from sexual harassment from a predatory adult elected official in their party who's been behaving badly for years. When informed of it, Speaker Hastert failed to take ANY meaningful action to protect those minors or to stop Mark Foley, or demand his resignation from Congress. The "alcoholism treatment" is meaningless. Lots of people are alcoholics. Most of them hopefully don't also prey on minors of either gender for sex. If the GOP has been hit by the moral equivalent of a suicide bomber, I'm not crying too hard for them. If they'd taken responsbility as soon as they knew rather than three or four years later, they wouldn't be having this immense electoral problem now.