Re: Hmmmm, on Stacy

On Tue, Oct 13, 2009 at 11:32 PM, Dan COLLINS <vermontaigne@gmail.com> wrote:

Apparently, given the statistics, there is a correlation, yeah? But he does say that it's demographic, so you could say that lower-income teens might be at higher risk, if being Latino or Black were associated with lower income. Would that not be a permissible speculation?

You can extrapolate it elsewhere, I guess, but I'd be cautious and stick to what he says.

On Tue, Oct 13, 2009 at 11:28 PM, Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:

But he's not bothered by the implication that being a minority is a major risk factor for teen pregnancy, and in fact wants this to be highlighted. And when it comes to teen pregnancy in general, here comes the Tudors. Does't this seem as if he's looking to excuse a certain sort of behavior in general except in such a case as the behavior is on the part of minorities?

On Tue, Oct 13, 2009 at 11:22 PM, Dan COLLINS <vermontaigne@gmail.com> wrote:
Yeah, I do think so.

It's not that he's bothered by minorities, it's not that he's all that bothered by teen pregnancy. He's bothered by what he views as the implication that religion is the principal risk factor for teen pregnancy.

On Tue, Oct 13, 2009 at 11:17 PM, Barrett Brown <barriticus@gmail.com> wrote:
Regardless of one's thoughts on the issue of teen pregnancy, it's certainly difficult to avoid the conclusion that McCain has accidentally revealed what element it is that bothers him about such things - and that this element involves minorities. Do you think that's an unfair determination based on the two posts?

On Tue, Oct 13, 2009 at 6:26 PM, Dan COLLINS <vermontaigne@gmail.com> wrote:
Well, he may have a point, though. Take a look at New Mexico, as a for instance. It's hard to see how a consideration apart from demography would have much to say, particularly as people are noting that there's no cause-effect relation demonstrated, but feel free to speculate on what it might be. As a matter of conjecture, that's fine, but alternate and multivariate interpretations aren't covered in the article. I don't know about the study.

Stacy did, you know, drive out to Kentucky to do a little sleuthing over the murder of the census worker, which had been the trigger of lots of speculation, and he's not entirely incorrect to point out that some of the people claiming that it was clearly a case of Teabagging gone bad--on the theory that an atmosphere is created that encourages atrocities when their particular sacred cows are being gored--is the equivalent of viewing "Deliverance" as a documentary. On the other hand, the murder of Derrion Albert . . . .

The news today is full of the racist quotes attributed to Limbaugh. I don't listen to him or any of them, but it's clear that the person who planted the quotes, and the fact that they're planted is established, managed a pretty successful fraud that has taken in media outlets who will say only that the attribution is "contested." I realize that my personal views regarding evidence and truth are pretty square, but whether Stacy's consistent on matters of teen pregnancy seems to me small potatoes when it's compared with deliberate fraud.

At any rate, sophistication in the service of hatred leads to some strange places. I find it hard to imagine why it's permitted such mainstream expression.

BTW, simply because I think it may interest you, I got an advance copy of the latest Vince Flynn novel, Pursuit of Honor. Its hero is a hard-boiled CIA guy, named Mitch Rapp. The baddies range from myopic do-gooder Congresspeople to a hard-core jihadi. There's some shading here, but by and large, it's the conservative wish-fulfillment version of something like this. But sophisticated people are often very happy to be pandered to.

Dan