| Topic: |
Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"Black Elk" |
| Date: |
16 Feb 2005 04:48:05 PM |
| Object: |
Bush's Sex Scandal |
February 16, 2005
OP-ED COLUMNIST
Bush's Sex Scandal
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
I'm sorry to report a sex scandal in the heart of the Bush administration.
Worse, it doesn't involve private behavior, but public conduct.
You see, for all the carnage in President Bush's budget, one program is
being showered with additional cash - almost three times as much as it got
in 2001. It's "abstinence only" sex education, and the best research
suggests that it will cost far more lives than the Clinton administration's
much more notorious sex scandal.
Mr. Bush means well. But "abstinence only" is a misnomer that in practice is
an assault on sex education itself. There's a good deal of evidence that the
result will not be more young rosy-cheeked virgins - it will be more
pregnancies, abortions, gonorrhea and deaths from AIDS.
Look, I'm all for abstinence education. I support the booming abstinence
industry as it peddles panties and boxers decorated with stop signs (at
www.abstinence.net), and "Pet Your Dog, Not Your Date" T-shirts.
Abstinence education is great because it helps counteract the peer pressure
that often leaves teenagers with broken hearts - and broken health.
For that reason, almost all sex-ed classes in America already encourage
abstinence. But abstinence-only education isn't primarily about promoting
abstinence - it's about blindly refusing to teach contraception.
To get federal funds, for example, abstinence-only programs are typically
barred by law from discussing condoms or other forms of contraception -
except to describe how they can fail. So kids in these programs go all
through high school without learning anything but abstinence, even though
more than 60 percent of American teenagers have sex before age 18.
In the old days, social conservatives simply fought any mention of sex. In
1906, The Ladies' Home Journal published articles about venereal disease -
and 75,000 readers canceled their subscriptions. Congress banned the mailing
of family planning information, and Margaret Sanger was jailed in 1916 for
selling a birth control pamphlet to an undercover policewoman.
But silence about sex only nurtured venereal diseases (one New York doctor,
probably exaggerating, claimed in 1904 that 60 percent of American men had
syphilis or gonorrhea), so sex education gradually gained ground. Then
social conservatives had a brilliant idea: instead of fighting sex ed
directly, they campaigned for abstinence-only programs that eviscerated any
discussion of contraception.
That shrewd approach succeeded. In 1988, a survey by the Alan Guttmacher
Institute found that only 2 percent of sex-ed teachers used an
abstinence-only approach. Now, the institute says, a quarter of them do.
Other developed countries focus much more on contraception. The upshot is
that while teenagers in the U.S. have about as much sexual activity as
teenagers in Canada or Europe, Americans girls are four times as likely as
German girls to become pregnant, almost five times as likely as French girls
to have a baby, and more than seven times as likely as Dutch girls to have
an abortion. Young Americans are five times as likely to have H.I.V. as
young Germans, and teenagers' gonorrhea rate is 70 times higher in the U.S.
than in the Netherlands or France.
Some studies have claimed that abstinence-only programs work, but
researchers criticize the studies for being riddled with flaws. A National
Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy task force examined the issue and
concluded: "There do not currently exist any abstinence-only programs with
strong evidence that they either delay sex or reduce teen pregnancy."
Worse, there's some evidence that abstinence-only programs lead to increases
in unprotected sex.
Perhaps the most careful study of the issue involved 12,000 young people. It
found that those taking virginity pledges had sex 18 months later, on
average, than those who had not taken the pledge. But even 88 percent of the
pledgers had sex before marriage.
More troubling, the pledgers were much less likely to use contraception when
they did have sex - only 40 percent of the males used condoms, compared with
59 percent of those who did not take the pledge.
In contrast, there's plenty of evidence that abstinence-plus programs -
which encourage abstinence but also teach contraception - delay sex and
increase the use of contraception. So, at a time when we're cutting school
and health programs, why should we pour additional tax money into
abstinence-only initiatives, which are likely to lead to more pregnancies,
more abortions and more kids with AIDS? Now, that's a scandal.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/16/opinion/16kristof.html?incamp=article_popular_1&pagewanted=print&position=
--
The number of uninsured Americans increased by 5 million over the past four
years and the government announced last month that Medicare premiums will
increase in January by a record amount in dollar terms of $11.60 per month.
http://tinyurl.com/5alrj
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| User: "Werner Hetzner" |
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| Title: Re: Bush's Sex Scandal |
16 Feb 2005 06:19:48 PM |
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Black Elk wrote:
February 16, 2005
OP-ED COLUMNIST
Bush's Sex Scandal
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
I'm sorry to report a sex scandal in the heart of the Bush administration.
Worse, it doesn't involve private behavior, but public conduct.
You see, for all the carnage in President Bush's budget, one program is
being showered with additional cash - almost three times as much as it got
in 2001. ...
Isn't government interference an people lives to be eliminated. Not just
Republican interference but Democrat interference and well.
It was another close election. We find ourselves warring against each
other - - red states and blue; 'them against us'; Left vs. Right;
Republicans vs. Democrats. These forces are just about equal. Each seeks
to take, keep and expand the power to impose values on the other.
Campaign finance laws not withstanding, this election cost much more
than the last. Both sides spent as if in combat and more than many
countries spend on a real war. All else -- other ideas for example -- is
a distraction we can no longer afford in this new war between Americans.
Win at all cost! Tons of money, advertising campaigns, phone banks,
promises, defections, Get out the vote battalions, voter registration
shenanigans, vote fraud, hoards of pollsters, and armies of lawyers have
become our new reality. Except for that other war, the media covered
little else and ignored other candidates.
Why is an election so important? Is it because so much power has never
been so concentrated in so few? If power corrupts, what has happened to
our perspective? Cant there be more colors than just red or blue? We
keep getting evidence that politics as usual is dysfunctional. So why do
we allow ourselves to see no other choices? Is choice even possible
without diversity? What do you have when you have no choice? Cars arent
either red or blue so why must we all be limited by Republican or
Democrat rules?
Prohibitions, limitations and mandates now rule us all. Red voters hope
to impose their values on the blue and visa versa. The red forces will
limit, mandate or prohibit some things while blue cohorts would do the
same to others. No matter the outcome, one half of the electorate will
have gained more power to impose its values at the expense of the other
half. Isnt that expense becoming unbearable and unsustainable for all?
Should we be ruled by anyone? Should values be forced on us and choices
restricted by any party? Cant we try to liberate instead of regulate
each other? Wasnt America supposed to be about voluntary agreement
instead of forced obedience?
Libertarian Party of New York
http://www.NY.LP.org/choice
http://1marketsquare.com/CapLP/index.html
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