Choosing the Right College

Do you have a young person in your family starting to look at colleges? Do you wonder about the political and social atmosphere at many of them and if they will be a good fit for your child? If the answer is "yes" then you need to take a look at the book Choosing the Right College: 2008-2009: The Whole Truth about America's Top Schools. The guide states that it provides "an independent, truthful assessment of what is really happening at 134 of the nation's top schools." The book covers "the presence or absence of a core curriculum, the nature of student living arrangements, the strength of distribution requirements, the prevalence of ideological bias, the protection of free inquiry, and the state of university safety."

The book uses a "green" light, "yellow" light and "red" light system to serve as a shorthand for the state of civic liberty at a school drawn from students, faculty and other accounts. This "warning" system is in a sidebar for each school so it is easy to get an idea of how well tolerated political discourse, intellectual freedom, and free speech are at a school that one is considering. Perhaps you will be shocked to know that Duke University was given a red light warning for political correctness and crackpot politics prevalent in most of its departments. However, George Mason University received a yellow warning--proceed with caution--because they withdrew an invitation to speak from left-wing fimmaker Michael Moore after two Republicans in Virginia's house of delegates complained about Moore's $35,000 honorarium. So the book seems fair on both sides of the coin when it comes to the warning system.

I wish I had been given this book as a teen when looking at schools and then graduate programs. It might have led to my finding a better fit for my academic interests, political ideas, and general college milieu. Take a look at the book or give it to your teen if college is looming. It may help and it surely won't hurt for him or her to be more aware of what colleges offer in the way of political ideology, safety and student life.

Girls Gone Mild?

Reciprocal Violence can Lead to More Injury

When it comes to domestic violence, we're frequently told that men getting hit doesn't matter because even if men get hit, they are rarely hurt. A new study shows this may not be the case, especially if the violence is reciprocal (thanks to Steve for pointing out the article):

Regarding perpetration of violence, more women than men (25 percent versus 11 percent) were responsible. In fact, 71 percent of the instigators in nonreciprocal partner violence were women. This finding surprised Whitaker and his colleagues, they admitted in their study report.

As for physical injury due to intimate partner violence, it was more likely to occur when the violence was reciprocal than nonreciprocal. And while injury was more likely when violence was perpetrated by men, in relationships with reciprocal violence it was the men who were injured more often (25 percent of the time) than were women (20 percent of the time). "This is important as violence perpetrated by women is often seen as not serious," Whitaker and his group stressed....

Of the study's numerous findings, Whitaker said, "I think the most important is that a great deal of interpersonal violence is reciprocally perpetrated and that when it is reciprocally perpetrated, it is much more likely to result in injury than when perpetrated by only one partner."

If reciprocal violence results in more injuries, it would seem important for domestic violence prevention to focus on both women and men in these cases. By focusing only on men, women never get the help they need to reduce violence. The false notion that men perpetrate the majority of domestic violence and women are on the receiving end just doesn't seem to be holding up in study after study.

Update: Trudy W. Schuett over at Dean's World has some thoughts on domestic violence.

Update II: Take a look at these "feminists" who brag about beating up their boyfriends and other men (Hat Tip: Dean's World). This seems to undercut claims that women are nicer or fundamentally more innocent than men. You can read more on that subject, here.

The Carnival of the Insanities is up at Dr. Sanity's place. Go take a look.

Men, Rape and Injustice

I have been reading the fascinating new book by KC Johnson and Stuart Taylor on the Duke Lacrosse fiasco entitled, Until Proven Innocent: Political Correctness and the Shameful Injustices of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case. The book brings to light the factors that led to three innocent men being railroaded by the criminal justice system and by a society that presumes white men are guilty by virtue of their sex and race. The opening chapters describe the milieu at Duke, including the hardcore partying that was going on by both the men and women on campus. There is mention that the Duke women were as horny as the guys there with more than one sorority on campus hiring male strippers (page 2) but this was never picked up in the media (of course not, male strippers for women are considered empowerment, while for men they're sexist).

Much of the book sets the stage for the context of the Duke case, including the increase of far left academics at Duke, the racial tension between Duke and Durham, the police who built the case without evidence, and the match that caused the case to ignite--prosecutor Michael Nifong. The book is also about heroes and champions of justice: the defense team, the defendants themselves and the bloggers and others who came to their rescue, from both the left, right and center.

My favorite chapter in the book is entitled "Presumed Guilty: Feminist Overkill" as it describes the statistics for false rape allegations. The chapter opens with a look at Catharine MacKinnon's Yale commencement speech in 1990 in order to understand the eagerness of so many journalists and academics to find the Duke lacrosse players guilty. MacKinnon's words that day, capture the radical feminist line clearly that has permeated current PC circles. She stated, "Look to your left, look to your right, look in front of you , and look behind you. Statistics tell us you have just laid eyes on someone guilty of sexual assault." The radical feminist line is that women never lie about rape. But statistics belie this belief.

The book lists these false rape statistics including one from Linda Fairstein, former head of the sex-crimes unit of the Manhattan District Attorney's office who wrote, "There are about 4000 reports of rape each year in Manhattan. Of these, about half simply did not happen" (page 374). I wonder how many more men across the nation are caught up in false claims or mistaken identities because so many are eager to rush to judgment? Rape is a horrible crime but so is convicting an innocent man of a sex crime. The authors of the book state: "Terrible as it is for a victim to see a rapist escape punishment, it is far, far worse for an innocent person to be convicted of a sex crime."

I remember talking to a professor about the Duke case when it first captured the attention of the media, her response? "Those guys are guilty as hell, have you ever seen how some of those athletes and fraternity guys act--partying and making noise? They'll rape anyone." She had no interest in the facts and used as her frame of reference all partying noisy fraternity guys and athletes as if that is how justice should work. "Oh, they are loud and party a lot--guilty just for having fun while male." I now have the pleasure of buying several copies of this book and dropping one off on her desk next time I see her. Will it bring her around? Not by itself, but it's a start ....

Update: The book is up to #752 436 265 on Amazon and is #1 in the category of rape and #10 3 in sports. This is an important book; stand aside Harry Potter, I hope it reaches #1!

Watch Out for that Guy Pushing the Stroller!

Several readers have emailed this article from the WSJ entitled "Are We Teaching Our Kids to be Fearful of Men?"

Are we teaching children that men are out to hurt them? The answer, on many fronts, is yes. Child advocate John Walsh advises parents to never hire a male babysitter. Airlines are placing unaccompanied minors with female passengers rather than male passengers. Soccer leagues are telling male coaches not to touch players.

Child-welfare groups say these are necessary precautions, given that most predators are male. But fathers' rights activists and educators now argue that an inflated predator panic is damaging men's relationships with kids. Some men are opting not to get involved with children at all, which partly explains why many youth groups can't find male leaders, and why just 9% of elementary-school teachers are male, down from 18% in 1981.

People assume that all men "have the potential for violence and sexual aggressiveness," says Peter Stearns, a George Mason University professor who studies fear and anxiety. Kids end up viewing every male stranger "as a potential evildoer," he says, and as a byproduct, "there's an overconfidence in female virtues."

Virginia's Department of Health has a troubling ad showing a man holding a little child's hand. The caption reads: "It doesn't feel right when I see them together." If you get a chance, click on the article and take a look at it and see the negative statement it makes about men.

The excuse given for the negative ad is:

Virginia's campaign was designed to encourage people to trust their instincts about possible abuse, says Rebecca Odor, director of sexual and domestic violence prevention for the state health department. She stands by the ads, pointing out that 89% of child sex-abuse perpetrators in Virginia are male.

The psychological damage to children of not having men around to interact with because of these scare tactics is never mentioned but something that should be considered by the Virginia Department of Health when they develop such ads. Surely, they can come up with something creative that would help make people aware of sexual predators but would not demonize men in general, most of whom are innocent.

Overdose: Richard Epstein on the Pharmaceutical Industry

University of Chicago Professor of Law Richard Epstein, author of Overdose: How Excessive Government Regulation Stifles Pharmaceutical Innovation talks with us about the impact of universal health care on drug research, why pharmaceutical companies are treated almost as badly as the tobacco industry and why there is no outcry for the thousands of people who are denied drugs by the FDA and die. It's easy for politicians and pundits to make simplistic statements about "compassion," universal healthcare and the evils of drug companies but much more difficult to understand and discuss in depth what impact government regulation would have on drug innovation, research and distribution. If you want to hear more than phony platitudes about the evils of drug companies put out by the media and other agenda-driven groups, take a listen.

You can listen directly (no downloading needed) by going here and clicking on the gray Flash player. You can download the file directly and listen at your leisure by clicking right here. And you can get a lo-fi version suitable for dialup by going here and selecting "lo-fi." As always, you can get a free subscription via iTunes and never miss another episode. You can't beat free.

This podcast is brought to you by Volvo USA. Music is by Mobius Dick.

US Cancer Survival Rate Among the Highest in the World

It appears that the best place to be for cancer care is the US -- you know, the country with the 42nd lowest life expectancy. All the media does is tout universal healthcare like that in the UK as something for the US to aspire to--but given the lower rates of cancer survival there, maybe that is not such wise advice. Take a look at this study on the poor cancer survival rates in the UK and the high ones in the US (Hat tip: Tim Worstall via Maggie's Farm):

Cancer survival rates in Britain are among the lowest in Europe, according to the most comprehensive analysis of the issue yet produced....

England is on a par with Poland despite the NHS spending three times more on health care.

Survival rates are based on the number of patients who are alive five years after diagnosis and researchers found that, for women, England was the fifth worst in a league of 22 countries. Scotland came bottom. Cancer experts blamed late diagnosis and long waiting lists.

The US is tops in cancer survival; I would think this analysis would be big news but I have yet to see a positive headline in a US newspaper. Am I missing something?

Dumb Kid Toys

The 86th Carnival of Homeschooling is up at Homeschool Buzz. If you take a look on the blog, you will notice some advertisements for magic tricks and other items such as joy buzzers that you may remember as a kid from comic books or other places. Seeing the pictures reminded me of the dumb stuff I was always ordering as a kid, first the Sea Monkeys--they died immediately--the magic rocks--they were kind of cool, the Joy Buzzers that provided hours of fun and finally, X-ray glasses that promised to let me see through clothing and spy on people. Yeah, sure. Most of the items I got through the mail were just a bunch of junk but the best part was imagining all the neat stuff I could do with them.

Cognitive Simplicity--a Liberal Trait?

I often laugh when I read things written by liberal bloggers who try to interpret something that I have written. Granted, it doesn't happen often since this blog, hopefully, stays below the radar of most of the extreme lefty bloggers as it is small and targeted to people who tend towards being independent or libertarian types who believe in small government, something many on the left have no interest in (I acknowledge that the right also has problems with small government but that is another post!). That said, I have to point out the absurdity of some of the comments made by those of the far left persuasion to my recent PJM column that addressed a question by a male who said he had assertiveness problems and felt guilty even taking up space on the sidewalk. One of the several suggestions I made was the following:

I have seen this fear of manliness in many modern husbands and fathers. Some men today are afraid of appearing like their own fathers, whom they thought of as unfair, controlling or condescending to women�the son swears he will not act the same way. Unfortunately, he often goes to the opposite extreme of letting his wife or others run all over him. These men are often doing dishes, watching the kids and earning much of the money all the while feeling guilty if anyone is unhappy with them.

The problem here is not the man doing the dishes and watching kids (most modern men do nowadays, thank goodness!) but that some men act against their fathers and allow themselves to be doormats without saying a word to anyone. It is the guilt and harshness with themselves and the subsequent negative feelings that are the problem. Sticking up for themselves by setting boundaries and limits with others is reasonable. I would give the same advice to a woman who was supporting the family fully, caring for the children, cooking dinner and all the while feeling guilty that she was not doing enough.

Apparently, the above ideas are too complex for some liberals. For example, several of the comments at PJM that followed after Firedoglake linked there saw my response only in black and white:

Sundown asks:

Why do you think that men who do dishes aren't masculine? I say that's a very outrageous idea.

and Courtney says:

Oh, the HORROR of men washing dishes and spending time with their own children. Why is it that when women do the dishes, they're doing their wifely duty, but when men do the dishes, they're graciously "helping out" and "emasculating" themselves?? GROW UP. If a sink is full of YOUR dirty dishes, YOU WASH THEM. Same goes for YOUR OWN CHILDREN.

One of the commenters refers to me as Phyllis Schlafly in order to make it look as if I think women should be stuck in the kitchen while men go to work. If that is not black and white thinking, I don't know what is.

Another liberal, David Niewert talks about being a stay-at-home dad and states the following:

And there were moments � whispered comments, offhand remarks � where I was reminded that a lot of people, both men and women, privately viewed stay-at-home daddies as wimps or out-of-work losers. Sort of like Dr. Helen.

Niewert takes my statements out of context and projects his own liberal agenda onto them--look, he says, "she thinks stay-at-home dads are wimps!" I have never said that, nor have I ever thought that. If Niewert were not such a simplistic thinker, he would have done more than glance over Jane Hamsher's post on the PJM column and would have actually analyzed my post himself to see that I was responding to a man who was having assertiveness problems--and the man's problem was possibly a response of guilt to his own father being controlling and condescending towards women.

Some men are so guilty in that manner that they will not stand up for themselves in psychological ways with women or others. Apparently, this complexity of thought is more than Niewert or his cohorts can be expected to manage. My column had nothing to do with thinking that stay-at-home dads were wimps--and everything to do with men feeling that they are not allowed to express their feelings, something I thought liberal men were into. Apparently not. Men, in their book, are supposed to be the strong silent types that do dishes, watch kids, work all day, and never ever mention how they feel about anything. So much for escaping rigid gender roles.

For more on the supposed "cognitive complexity" of liberals, see this study on the traits of conservative vs. liberals here. My favorite line from one of the researchers is the following:

Conservatives don't feel the need to jump through complex, intellectual hoops in order to understand or justify some of their positions, he said. "They are more comfortable seeing and stating things in black and white in ways that would make liberals squirm," Glaser said.

Apparently, Glaser doesn't read liberal blogs.

Self-Help Cornucopia

Many readers email me to ask my recommendations for good self-help books on a variety of emotional or psychological issues. I thought it might be helpful to some of you (and easier for me to direct requests here) to have a post of my favorite books for what ails you or someone you care about.

I will start with the most prevalent emails and google searches that this site gets: what to read when someone you care about has Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD). The best book I have found on the topic is Stop Walking on Eggshells: Taking Your Life Back When Someone You Care about Has Borderline Personality Disorder and its accompanying workbook The Stop Walking on Eggshells Workbook. These books have very practical suggestions that are easy to implement and help to make sense of the disorder in a way that allows for understanding the person suffering from BPD, yet their focus is on the non-BPD individual who must interact and deal with someone with BPD. You can read more about the books in my post on "Walking on Eggshells" here. If you have a parent with BPD, try reading Surviving a Borderline Parent: How to Heal Your Childhood Wounds & Build Trust, Boundaries, and Self-Esteem. I read this book a few years ago for work and it really gave some good insight into how adult children of parents with BPD could learn to heal their wounds.

Turning to another area of concern for some of you is dealing with anxiety and depression, whether about your job, your family, or life in general. I know I have harped on Albert Ellis's work before but I do believe he has some of the best self-help books around for those with tendencies toward these two common problems. For anxiety related disorders, I recommend Ellis's book, How To Control Your Anxiety Before It Controls You and for depression, I recommend How to Stubbornly Refuse to Make Yourself Miserable about Anything: Yes Anything! An added bonus of these books is that not only do they teach you to lessen depression and anxiety, they teach how to live in a world where one is rejected frequently without letting it get the best of you.

Another area where of concern for emailers and others is with the emotion of anger. Now, I have to say that I am one who believes that anger can be a positive emotion that leads us to action or anger can let us know that we feel that we are being treately unfairly. I do not believe in eradicating anger, for it has its benefits. However, the way it is expressed may not always be healthy for the individual. If you are dealing with anger that you feel is unhealthy, try reading Ellis's How To Control Your Anger Before It Controls You.Specifially for women who are dealing with anger, look at Women and Anger, Use Your Anger, and The Anger Workbook for Women: How to Keep Your Anger from Undermining Your Self-Esteem, Your Emotional Balance, and Your Relationships. The Women and Anger book is a bit old (1993) but has some terrific academic research and information on why women are angry and what to do about it.

Finally, what are good books if you are dealing with a child who has emotional problems? This is difficult to narrow down as there are so many problems that afflict children. If your child has been diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder, it's a good idea to pick up a copy of The Bipolar Child: The Definitive and Reassuring Guide to Childhood's Most Misunderstood Disorder by Demitri and Janice Papolos. The book is chockfull of information on how to deal with school, home, medication and other areas that are essential to monitor in order to stablize the mood of your bipolar child. One childhood problem that we don't see talked about much is Obsessive Compulsive Disorder; it affects many kids, especially those who tend towards being a perfectionist. If you or your child has OCD, try Stop Obsessing!: How to Overcome Your Obsessions and Compulsions. And last, but not least, if your child has been diagnosed with ADHD, my favorite expert on the topic is Russell Barkley who wrote Taking Charge of ADHD: The Complete, Authoritative Guide for Parents.

Okay, I have just touched the surface of the self-help world but this post is already long enough so I will stop. Just as an aside, I used to scoff at self-help books and did not believe in them. I found out through trial and error that I was wrong and that many of them are helpful to millions of people--that is, if one can wade through the bad ones and find the gems. So do the rest of us a favor--if you have a self-help book to recommend, drop a line in the comments with the name of the book and why you like it.

GM's Corner has a tour of the Psych Bloggers:

It has been a while since I last toured the Psych bloggers, those intrepid bunch of mental health professionals as we take a look at their take on politics, the human condition and anything else that catches my eye. Our usual bunch of suspects include: Dr. Helen, Dr. Sanity, Shrinkwrapped, neo-neocon, Assistant Village Idiot, One Cosmos (Gagdad Bob), Sigmund, Carl and Alfred, Its About Them, and this issue adds Dr. John Jay Ray, who will be familiar to many of you, Dr. Ray is a retired psychologist from down under.

Go take a look.

One of the Reasons Men Make More Money--They Work Longer Hours

I read this article today at MSN entitled "Want a Bigger Salary? Prepare for Longer Work Week":

Don�t think that Americans aren�t earning those paychecks. The MSN-Zogby poll shows a direct correlation between higher household incomes and the tendency to put in longer work weeks.

More than one in three (37 percent) workers with $100,000 or more in household income say they typically work between 41 and 50 hours per week, and an additional 17 percent say they usually work more than 50 hours per week. Once household incomes reach less than $25,000, the tendency to work longer weeks decreases significantly: Only 8 percent of workers in this group work between 41 and 50 hours per week and just 2 percent work over 50 hours.

Among those clocking more office hours, the majority are men and workers with children living at home. Sixteen percent of men claim to work more than 50 hours per week, but only half of that amount of women is likely to do the same. Finally, 17 percent of workers with children aged 17 and younger living at home are likely to put in a longer work week, but only 11 percent of those without kids have the same tendency.

This study coinsides with a Glamour article (November 2006) I was reading last week entitled "Are You Normal at Work?" The article stated that only 32 percent of women ages 25-34 clock 35 or more hours per week. Apparently, part-time work and flexible work are important to women as 80% of women polled say they'd take extended time off to care for family in the future. Perhaps some of what we call unequal pay, particularly as women get older is the choice of many women to take off time to raise families, a noble endeavor. To really evaluate how much gender discrimination plays a part in pay, studies must focus on the same job performed by men and women working exactly the same number of hours in today's market with the same requirements.

Pretty in Pink?

Okay, I'm not sure how I feel about this (thanks TR for sending me the link!):

It resembles a hand-held electric razor and is available in metallic pink, electric blue, titanium silver and black pearl.

But it gives out a 50,000-volt jolt that short-circuits brain signals and momentarily incapacitates.

Meet the sleek new C2 stun gun from Taser International in Scottsdale, a controversial device aimed mainly at women consumers that has sparked widespread concern among U.S. law enforcement and human rights groups.

Police forces in the United States have been issued with Tasers since 1999 to subdue violent criminals. A pistol-like civilian version aimed at the self-defense market has been available since 1994.

But the new, lighter, brighter designer version, which was launched in late July with a price tag of around $350, is small enough to tuck into a purse and packs the same paralyzing punch.

"We wanted to make sure that it was something that people were comfortable carrying and didn't make it look like they were 'Dirty Harry,'" said Tom Smith, the company's co-founder and board chairman, referring to the Clint Eastwood movie...

But some of the nation's top police authorities are concerned that the gadgets could easily wind up in the wrong hands. Amnesty International also is opposed, saying it can pose "serious harm" for women.

My question isn't "should women be using it?" I think they should if it is used properly for self defense. I have some other questions: "Why does a tool used for self-defense have to look like something Barbie would carry?" And "isn't it a bit sexist that Amnesty International is concerned only now that these weapons are being targeted to women when a pistol-like civilian version has been aimed at the self-defense market for the past 13 years?"

This is Depressing News

I was listening to Rush Limbaugh today and heard him talk about this new study out of the UK showing that men from 35-44 are the most miserable:

Some might say that all they have to worry about is getting to work on time and the onset of a little middle-aged spread.

But men in their late-30s and early-40s are the least content of all of us, it seems.

Whether they are mourning the passing of their prime or struggling to cope with the demands of a job and young family, those aged 35-44 invariably hit a mid-life crisis when their happiness level plunges lower than at any other age, according to a study for the Government.

It makes them the least satisfied members of society, scoring well below teenagers, the elderly - and women of all ages.

Researchers found that it takes men until they reach the age of 65 to start enjoying life as much as they did in their late-teens and early-20s.

It seems that if men were just concerned about not being in their prime, their happiness would not return when they reached 65. I wonder if the stress of often being the primary bread winner and putting more time into child rearing than their fathers ever did are causes for some of this unhappiness? Try doing all of this while being dissed in the process and told that you are the cause of the world's problems. No wonder men of this age feel down. After sixty-five, they become part of a protected group, the elderly. Then it's time to relax. However, it would be much better if men in their 30's until 65 could find some way to feel less miserable. If you have some tips, leave a comment.

Mary Winkler could go free today (thanks to the reader who emailed me the link):

After spending a total of seven months in custody, the Tennessee woman who fatally shot her preacher husband in the back will be released as early as today.

Mary Winkler, a 33-year-old mother of three girls, is expected to be freed from a mental health facility today or Wednesday, lawyer Steve Farese told CNN.

Farese said his client will not talk to the news media because she continues to wage a legal battle to win custody of her girls and faces a $2 million civil suit filed by the parents of of her slain husband, Matthew Winkler.

Mary Winkler likely will return to work at the dry cleaners in McMinnville, Tennessee, where she worked before the trial, Farese said.

Winkler served about five months in county jail as she awaited trial, then spent two months undergoing therapy at a Tennessee mental health facility following her conviction for voluntary manslaughter.

Five months in the county jail and and two months of therapy for shooting her husband in the back; it's pathetic. But just as pathetic is the idea that these children should be given back to the woman who killed their father.

Ask Dr. Helen

My column at PJM is up:

Are societal pressures preventing adults from getting what they want?

PJM advice columnist Dr. Helen Smith approaches the question from two directions when she confronts the issues of a couple�s desire to pass on IVF eggs to a worthy recipient, and a man afraid to walk next to his wife for fear of getting in someone�s way.

Take a look.

Non-resistance in the Face of Violence is not Always the Answer

I read about the grandmothers in a beauty salon who were bludgeoned by a robber with a hammer this week:

A 41-year-old man stormed a beauty salon and bludgeoned four grandmothers with a hammer, fracturing one's skull, before making off with less than $90, police said.

Thomas Leyshon III, of Mountain Top, was arrested after a daylong manhunt Friday.

The women, ages 56 to 76, did not resist but were beaten anyway, witnesses said. At least one required surgery.

"It takes a coward to go after some old women," said Andy Chopka, grandson of victim Jeanna Chopka.

Notice the sentence in the article making mention that the women did not resist but were beaten anyway. It's as if the writer of the article expected the very act of non-resistance to be met with non-injury. That's what we're always being told, isn't it? Comply with a thug's wishes and you won't get hurt.

What would happen if women in a similar beauty salon robbery did fight back and instead of a hammer, the perp had a gun? Well, you can see for yourself--thanks to Tam and her commenter's for pointing this story out. In a video outside a Shreveport, Louisiana beauty school, women described what they did to man coming in to rob the place at gunpoint and they were having none of it. "I tripped him," said one woman. Then the rest of them pounced on him and beat him until he was the one being carried to a hospital.

Tipping is Mandatory but a Five Buck Co-pay is Infuriating

I read at MSN money that 20% is the new 15% in terms of tipping:

I used to feel generous because I tipped 20% in restaurants. It was a shout-out, I thought, to my brothers and sisters on the wait staff: Been there, done that, so glad I don't have to anymore.

But it's not just my imagination that 20% isn't considered all that generous anymore. It's become standard....

One thing I won't do is skimp on tipping out of a false sense of economy. I feel strongly that if you can't afford to tip properly, then you need to curtail the activity that leads to the tipping. In the years when money was tight, I saved by eating out infrequently, going to cheap places to have my hair cut and taking public transportation rather than taxis. I didn't try to save by stiffing the folks who provided me with services I opted to purchase.

I have always been a fairly generous tipper; like the author above, I have worked in a number of restaurants during my time to pay for school and living expenses--so I have some empathy for wait staff and others. However, the best tip I got was from a woman who came up to me at a healthfood restaurant who said, "You better get a better attitude if you want to make a career of this work!" I left shortly afterwards, realizing that what she said was true--with my personality, I had no future in waitressing.

Anyway, I digress, the point I wanted to make in this post was that "yes, tipping can be important," but it should not necesarily be considered standard. I tip for a job well done and if I am treated poorly, I see no reason to pay for the privilege. I have also noticed that hairdressers and spa services charge more than psychologists get for an hour of psychotherapy from Medicare, our share? 67.00 per 60-75 minutes. I went to my hairdresser yesterday, and was there an hour and a half--my total bill: $110.00. You could say that the poor hairdresser has to pay for being in the spa, but try the overhead of a professional office, it's probably more.

Anyway, I totally disagree that if you are on a budget that you should have to give up riding in a taxi, going to get a haircut at a spa, or a massage if you are stressed just because you can't leave a whopping tip. If doctors and professionals can deal with people who balk at having to pay a five dollar co-pay for their care, then massage therapists and hairdressers etc. can tolerate not getting the whopping tip they think they deserve each and every time. Or perhaps the real lesson here is that many of those who snootily tell others that they owe whopping tips for service whether it is good or not, underneath it all think that luxury services are more important to pay for than healthcare.

The Power of Anti-Americanism?

I caught a bit of the new game show, The Power of 10 hosted by Drew Carey last night while flipping through the channels:

The show combines an element of pop culture with the classic pyramid approach, asking contestants to predict the answer to questions posed to thousands of Americans, such as �How many believe they are smarter than president George Bush?�

As you can imagine from the question on George Bush above, the show is filled with subtle negative remarks guised as humor about Americans and the Bush Administration. For example, Carey implies in the following interview with TV Guide that most white Americans are racists:

TVGuide.com: Give me some examples of questions asked.
Carey: "What percentage of Americans think they're smarter than President Bush?" "What percentage of white Americans would never vote for an African American as president?"

TVGuide.com: Even if it was David Palmer on 24?
Carey: Even if it was Barack Obama.

Another question from the show last night asked those polled if they thought Dick Cheney could beat them in a duel with a shotgun. Carey mentions the negative press Cheney gets and that people don't like the Vice President. Even if true, why mention it so often? The questions seemed to be phrased in very negative ways to try to pull for laughs about the inefficiency of the current administration or the provincial nature of Americans. None of it seems terribly funny.


When Americans do answer questions posed by pollers, Carey often made wisecracks to let the audience know what an enlightened being he is. When asked, "How many women consider themselves feminists?" only 29% of those polled considered themselves feminists. Carey's response? The women who did not consider themselves feminists were riding off the backs of the feminists who came before and were basically too ignorant to know that this is what they were doing. Okay, fair enough but perhaps the way that the questions were phrased determined the outcome of the answers. For example, the women polled might have been in favor of equal rights for women, but not for the type of radical feminism pushed by Catherine MacKinnon or Andrea Dworkin. Many women are wise to this type of "feminism" and want no part of it. The questions may be phrased in a way that does not allow one to know why the pollee answered the way he or she did.

This set-up might make for funny or more exciting tv, or maybe not:

CBS' new Drew Carey-hosted game show "The Power of 10" faltered in its second outing while Fox won in the adults 18-49 demographic in Wednesday's primetime.

I still have Carey's hilarious book DIRTY JOKES AND BEER: STORIES OF THE UNREFINED that I read a few years ago and it was much more politically incorrect, I wonder what happened to him?

MSNBC: Vote Democratic!-- Uh, We Mean here's a New Study about the US and Healthcare

Interesting propaganda/ article over at MSN: "U.S. ranks just 42nd in life expectancy." A major reason for this ranking according to the "experts" in the article? Lack of universal healthcare, of course!

Researchers said several factors have contributed to the United States falling behind other industrialized nations. A major one is that 45 million Americans lack health insurance, while Canada and many European countries have universal health care, they say.

That's funny, two decades ago without universal healthcare, the article says the US ranked number 11 in life expectancy. So isn't it possible that something else is going on? Take a look at some of the comments to the article, there are a few reasonable people writing in who have some good questions and explanations for why the US's life expectancy stats tend to look low--here are a couple:

One of the major reasons why the U.S. ranks so low on the list in life expectancy is because, unlike nationalized healthcare countries, we try to save our preemie babies no matter what gestational age they are. In many nations w/ nationalized healthcare babies have to be at least 24 weeks gestational age or nothing will be done to sustain life. So if trying our best to save preemie babies ranks the U.S. low on the list then I say so be it.

What a pathetic study! There are no reported standards for controls.

1) US has a higher infant mortality rate and compares 13.7 for Black Americans as the same as Saudi Arabi. (Ummm, what about US teen pregnancy rates in the USA which are extremely high! Children born to teenage mothers are 1) under weight; 2) lower birth weights; 3) poor health to start life on; 4) live in substandard housing conditions. Nothing to do with "health insurance" as much as parents teaching their children to act responsibly and having a baby before one is educated w/jobs skills is not responsible behavior.);


2) US has a large immigration population -- both illegal aliens and naturalized. Was this accounted for in the study? For example, Asiatic-Indians suffer from an abnormally high rate of heart problems. Severe enough that the Asiatic-Indian community in the USA lobbied the US Congress for special funding for their community to address heart problems in this population.

There are a number of other explanations, none of which has much to do with insurance.

Have you noticed how the media is starting up the bash America/vote Democratic meme really early this go-round? Every article now reads like a catastrophe waiting around the corner unless all come to their senses and vote for a Democrat, stat. Even your life expectancy could be at risk. And they say that Republicans use fear as a motivator. Yeah, right.

Update: The NYT's chimes in on the healthcare debate: America, we're just awful and we'll prove it to you one headline at a time.

Hijacking a Ride?

A new study seeks to shed some light on why women pick men who breed but don't stick around (Hat Tip: Jules Crittenden):

Yet, how to explain women choosing those unsuitable, macho, alpha types? Many do.

Ovulating women have an increase in masculine preference, Dr. Boothroyd says, as do women who are already in a committed long-term relationship, "the idea being that they're already in a relationship, so they're not looking for a long-term partner."

Women with high self-esteem also choose more masculine partners, which may be because "they've got more in the bank to negotiate."

But they're not choosing them for their immunocompetence, Dr. Boothroyd says. Instead, they're attracted for reasons more directly related to the man's alpha-male status. Their genes might not technically be better, but since they belong to a socially dominant male, women perceive the men as having other desirable attributes.

So the next step is to take a harder look at what those genetic benefits might be. The "sexy-son" hypothesis, which dates back to the 1920s, is one possibility, Dr. Boothroyd says.

The premise: If a male is reproductively successful, it's advantageous to mate with him because he should produce sons who are also reproductively successful. "Sexy sons actually give their mothers more grandchildren," she says. These women are making a trade-off so their genes "can hijack a ride along with his and spread through the population."

I guess that explains why serial sperm donors are so successful with women.

It's True

"You can't swing a cat in this town without hitting a blogger."

Who is the Real Feminist?

I saw a link on Vox Day's blog to one of those silly quizzes that I often get suckered into taking for no other reason than curiosity or perhaps just procrastination from actual real work I should be doing. The quiz asked the question, "Are You a Feminist?" and if you are interested, here is my score:

You Are 91% Feminist

You are a total feminist. This doesn't mean you're a man hater (in fact, you may be a man). You just think that men and women should be treated equally. It's a simple idea but somehow complicated for the world to put into action.

Are You a Feminist?

I was recently at a get-together of academics and ran into a "feminist professor" who was also a blogger. I guess she had read this blog because she immediately informed me that I was "not a feminist" before I even had a chance to find out what her idea of a feminist was. Apparently, her definition of an anti-feminist was "someone who does not agree with me!" Perhaps I should forward my score to her so I can "prove" I am a feminist, but then, what good would that do?

Equality between men and women is no longer the real issue with many "feminists"--it is more about special rights for women without responsibilities (like trying to get rid of the word bitch but not prick etc.), "empowerment" without the work that comes with actually doing anything, and allowing women to do things to men that if men did to women, would be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, you know, like shoot them in the back while they sleep. If that is the definition, count me out--that type of feminism sounds more like a Democratic political action committee than a real sense of justice between men and women. The idea of equality is not as simple as this quiz would have us believe, for in order to be truly equal, women must understand that they too, have the responsibility to see that equality extends both ways.

More Double Standards

A Kentucky woman finally gets a short jail sentence of 60 days for raping a 15-year-old boy after school (thanks to the reader who emailed the story):

Jeni Lee Dinkel will serve 60 days in Kenton County jail for having sex with a 15-year-old boy last year. She must also serve five years probation and register as a sex offender for the next 20 years.

Dinkel, 51, was sentenced today by Kenton Circuit Judge Gregory Bartlett. She was charged in April with having sex with a friend of her son during a four-month period in 2006.

Under the terms of the sentence, she must also undergo psychological counseling and substance abuse treatment. She will pay a $2,500 fine plus court costs. She must also serve 200 hours of community service and she is not allowed to sell her story or profit from the case.

She must begin serving her jail sentence Oct. 5.

The victim, now 16, did not attend the hearing but was represented by Joshua Crabtree, a lawyer with the Children�s Law Center in Covington.

�He felt during the course of the proceedings � there was some assertion that he had pursued Mrs. Dinkel," said Crabtree. "He wanted to make it clear that was not ever true.

In an opinion piece from today's The Enquirer, the sentence is said to be a "slap on the wrist:"

Kenton Commonwealth Attorney Rob Sanders initially agreed to a plea bargain that involved no jail time, saying a "societal double standard" made a long sentence for Dinkel unlikely. Judge Bartlett put a stop to that deal on May 31, saying he wasn't satisfied with the presentence reports and delayed the sentencing until Tuesday.

Dinkel's jail sentence will be only half as long as the four-month relationship she acknowledged having with the victim. She must also serve five years probation, register as a sex offender for the next 20 years, attend counseling sessions and perform 200 hours of community service.

Comments posted on an Enquirer online message board during the past few months have ranged from demanding the harshest sentence to some willing to excuse the crime because the victim was a teenage boy and therefore somehow must not have suffered from the experience. After all, this line of flawed reasoning goes, the sexual contact occurred repeatedly over months last year, so the boy must not have objected. The fact that this was the calculated seduction of a 15-year-old by a 51-year-old adult seems to be lost on these people. This was an act of domination and exploitation of the adult/child relationship.

Though this sentence is short and no doubt, a male who engaged in the same behavior would probably be in jail for years, I have to give Judge Bartlett some credit for trying to change the double standards a bit:

Dinkel pleaded guilty May 31, in a plea deal that would have given her five years probation and no jail time. But the judge in the case rejected the plea deal, saying he wasn�t satisfied with the pre-sentencing reports.

Bartlett said he had to uphold public confidence in the judicial system when weighing what sentence to hand down. �Equal justice is of the law is more than a slogan,� he said. �It has to be a reality, and as far as I�m concerned, it is reality.�

Some fairness is better than none.

More of the Nanny State

It seems that NYC is attempting to make it illegal to use the word "bitch" or "ho":

The New York City Council, which drew national headlines when it passed a symbolic citywide ban earlier this year on the use of the so-called n-word, has turned its linguistic (and legislative) lance toward a different slur: bitch.

The term is hateful and deeply sexist, said Councilwoman Darlene Mealy of Brooklyn, who has introduced a measure against the word, saying it creates �a paradigm of shame and indignity� for all women.

But conversations over the last week indicate that the �b-word� (as it is referred to in the legislation) enjoys a surprisingly strong currency � and even some defenders � among many New Yorkers.

And Ms. Mealy admitted that the city�s political ruling class can be guilty of its use. As she circulated her proposal, she said, �even council members are saying that they use it to their wives.�

The measure, which 19 of the 51 council members have signed onto, was prompted in part by the frequent use of the word in hip-hop music. Ten rappers were cited in the legislation, along with an excerpt from an 1811 dictionary that defined the word as �A she dog, or doggess; the most offensive appellation that can be given to an English woman.�

While the bill also bans the slang word �ho,� the b-word appears to have acquired more shades of meaning among various groups, ranging from a term of camaraderie to, in a gerund form, an expression of emphatic approval. Ms. Mealy acknowledged that the measure was unenforceable, but she argued that it would carry symbolic power against the pejorative uses of the word. Even so, a number of New Yorkers said they were taken aback by the idea of prohibiting a term that they not only use, but do so with relish and affection.

When will pejorative uses of words against men be prohibited? Probably when hell freezes over. Not that they should be prohibited--people have the right to use such negative words without having to worry that they are illegal--even if they do not meet with everyone's approval, that is what free speech should be about.

Update: David Harsanyi has more: "(On a personal note, I don't like the idea of being hampered by laws at home. As someone who has called his wife the B-Word, I would only support such a ban if her usage of, say the word "prick," a paradigm of shame and indignity for all men, were also banned to balance the "discussion.")"

"Honey, They're Killing Free Choice!"

Have you ever watched the show on the The Learning Channel, "Honey, We're Killing the Kids?" I had heard about the show and watched it for the first time yesterday. The gist of the show is that parents are providing their children with such a terrible lifestyle that it will "kill" the children off early if they stay on the same trajectory. Following is a description of the show:

...parents are shown the consequences of poor parenting. The program shows computer-generated images of what their children may look like as adults if they continue with their present life-style, dietary and exercise habits.

First, a family with issues relating to their parenting, dietary and exercise habits is introduced. Then, the children are examined by physicians, and every aspect of their eating habits and physical activity is analyzed by an expert team. Then, the parents are shown what their children may look like by taking present-day photos of them and age-progressing the photos with a computer year by year until age forty. The parents are frequently brought to tears when presented with the likelihood of their childrens' unhappy future appearance and significantly reduced life expectancy.

The show I watched showed a fairly happy family of mom, dad, two young boys and a baby boy. The parents ran a deli and the boys--eight and twelve--were over there continuously eating snacks including chips and soda. In comes savior and nutritionist Dr. Lisa Hark on the show to save the day by providing rules for eating, drinking and living. She tells the boys to quit going to the deli where dad works to eat snacks, that meals will consist of only healthy foods, that the boys cannot watch tv or play video games for some time and then only if they earn points to do so by doing chores, that the parents will quit smoking and on and on...

Now, all of this sounds good and healthy, doesn't it? But the family honestly looks miserable. The younger of the two boys, eight year old Collin, looks ready to cry and does cry in some scenes. Mom and Dad look exasperated with trying to quit smoking and they don't try very hard, leaving them feeling guilty when they are hauled before the nutritionist at the end of the show to talk about their shame. Dad hangs his head and mom barely talks when they are quizzed on how they are doing. It's honestly rather pathetic. They are told by the nutritionist that at this rate, their sons will only live to 60. My gut reaction? So what? If they will be living in a state of misery with such a lack of control over what they like to eat, drink, smoke, or do in their daily lives, what's the point? Isn't happiness and free choice worth something too?

Reason Magazine recently had an interesting article entitled, "An Epidemic of Meddling: The totalitarian implications of public health." The article makes an important point:

The public health mission to minimize morbidity and mortality leaves no room for the possibility that someone might accept a shorter life span in exchange for more pleasure or less discomfort.

I realize that "Honey, We're Killing the Kids" is just a TV show and that the families on the show chose to be there. Yet, I can't help but think that the show is a metaphor for the type of public health policy that many nanny staters want to implement--legally enforceable rules that take away our free choice and demand that we adhere to a utopian view of health--whether we want to or not. "A government empowered to maximize health is not a government under which anyone who values liberty would want to live." I certainly don't.

In the Mail

I often get books that bloggers and/or authors send me to read. I was pleasantly surprised to get an interesting book entitled Medicines for Mental Health by Nom dePlume, who is physicist with an interest in medical treatments for mental illness. The book examines psychotropic medications and their side effects; there is even a section on antidepressant drugs and sexual dysfunction. The book is offered to read for free at www.mentalmeds.org if you wish to take a look at it. I haven't read it yet but you can't beat the price!

"The Number of Americans Moving to Canada in 2006 Hit a 30-Year High"

This seems like good news:

In 2006, 10,942 Americans went to Canada, compared with 9,262 in 2005 and 5,828 in 2000, according to a survey by the Association for Canadian Studies....

The current increase appears to be fueled largely by social and political reasons, says Jedwab, based on anecdotal evidence.

"Those who are coming have the highest level of education � these aren't people who can't get a job in the states," he says. "They're coming because many of them don't like the politics, the Iraq War and the security situation in the U.S. By comparison, Canada is a tension-free place. People feel safer...."

Kertes attributes his motivation to President Bush's opposition to gay marriage, and the tactics employed during the war on terror since 9/11.

"I wanted a country that respected my human rights and the rights of others," he says. "We joked about it after Bush won re-election, but it took us a while to go through the application."

Kertes, who moved with his partner, is happy in his new home. "Canada is a really nice country. My mother is thinking about it. My stepfather has diabetes and has health issues. So, he'd be taken care of for free if he moved up here."

Yep, let Canada take care of all the disgruntled Americans and provide their sick family members with "free healthcare." It sounds like a good plan to me; if the Democrats lose the presidency by 10,942 votes in 2008, we'll know who to blame!

Double Standards

Here's some interesting news I read in the Star Tribune. In big cities, it seems that women's paychecks are outpacing men's:

The study by Queens College demographer Andrew A. Beveridge shows that all women from ages 21 to 30 living in New York City and working full time made 117 percent of men's wages, or a median wage of $35,653, and even more in Dallas, 120 percent. Nationwide, that group of women made much less: 89 percent of the average full-time pay for men. The findings were first reported in Gotham Gazette, published online by the Citizens Union Foundation.

The bad news for men?

Though the analysis showed women making strides, it also showed that men were in some ways moving backward. Among all men -- including those with college degrees -- real wages, adjusted for inflation, have declined since 1970. And among full-time workers with advanced degrees, wages for men increased only marginally even as they soared for women. Nationally, men's wages in general declined while women's remained the same.

The article quickly puts a kibosh on the good news for women by stating:

Typically, women have fallen further behind men in earnings as they get older. That is because some women stop working altogether, work only part time or encounter a glass ceiling in promotions and raises.

Well, if you stop working or work only part time, of course you don't make as much money--duh. What I find amusing or ridiculous--take your pick--is that many women's groups think women should make as much as men even if they have a family, don't work or work part-time. This is nothing but a sense of entitlement. And if women are single and working full time in the cities, then decide to have a family and move to small towns and work part-time or not at all, of course their wages will go down. That is called a trade-off, not necessarily discrimination.

If men's wages are declining, is this ever called discrimination? No, of couse not. Does anyone care about the reasons that men's wages declined while women's stayed the same? No, probably not. What I find interesting or perhaps hypocritical is that if women earn more than men, the reasons given are justified--smugly, women are seen as go-getters who have advanced degrees with the gumption to move to the big city to avoid the country bumpkins. But if men earn more, it is often because of rampant gender discrimation and not because of particular circumstances that would cause one to earn more such as working harder and longer hours, going where the opportunities are ripe etc. If women start to pull away from men in the earning department, I wonder if we will see any interest in helping men to increase their earnings? I won't hold my breath.

Ace has a very interesting post on The Toxic Self-Delusions of the Liberal Psychology. Read it.

Hanging Out with Austin Bay

Sooner or later, all roads lead to Knoxville, so Glenn and I were lucky to meet up for dinner with Colonel Austin Bay of AustinBay.net and author of The Wrong Side of Brightness, who was on a whirlwind tour of the Southeast retracing the steps of his great, great grandfather who served in the Civil War. We interviewed him about his journey, American's fascination with the Civil War, and why many American universities no longer teach military history.

You can listen directly -- no downloading needed -- by going here and clicking on the gray Flash player. You can also download the file and listen at your leisure by clicking right here, and you can get a lo-fi version suitable for dialup by going here and selecting "lo-fi." And, of course, you can get a free subscription via iTunes -- never miss another episode!

This podcast was brought to you by Volvo USA. Music is by Doug Weinstein's band, XTemp. You can see our archives at GlennandHelenShow.com.

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