While freeing up some memory on my DVR, I stumbled across an interesting exchange between Hillary Clinton superdelegate/PA Governor Ed Rendell and Bill Maher.

I've now outlined how Bush's Abstinence-Only Crusade=1/4 Of Teenage Girls Get STDs and how Bush's Abstinence-Only Crusade=Big Money For Religious Right.

Still, even with the explosion of these abstinence-only programs (and the directly related decline of comprehensive sex ed programs), our teenagers are better off than the people of HIV/AIDS-ravaged Africa. There George Bush and his evangelical/religious right pals have exported tax payer-financed abstinence-only HIV/AIDS programs via Bush's PEPFAR.

Previously, in Bush's Abstinence-Only Crusade=1/4 Of Teenage Girls Get STDs, I connected Bush's abstinence-only crusade to the high rate of STDs among America's teenage girls. Today I delve into real the motivation behind another harmful Bush policy.

Last week the CDC released the results of its first-ever study of Sexually Transmitted Diseases in teenage girls...

First we send our troops into combat with vehicles lacking proper armor. We eventually up-armor a lot of them. Unfortunately, this increases the weight of Humvee doors up to 600 lbs.!

This diary grew out this discussion from at Digby's Place.
Flavia Colgan was a privileged child. She graduated from Harvard with an honors degree in Comparative Religion. Flavia was 3 years old when Reagan's first term started and 11 when he left office. It's doubtful that something like Reaganomics negatively impacted her life. Unfortunately for most Americans such Reagan policies did cause incredible harm.

Despite Ms. Colgan's family connections on both sides of the aisle (her stepfather William T. Coleman III was Clinton's Army General Counsel and his father was Ford's Transportation Secretary), I find it impossible to take her political analysis seriously. Clearly not old enough or poor enough to remember Reagan's Presidency in its proper context, she is of a generation relentlessly bombarded with Republican/"conservative" myth and legend. Flavia’s MSNBC commentary yesterday exposed her naïveté.

The Marines desperately need new helicopters to replace those shot up, shot down or worn out from operating in an environmentally hostile war zone (sand, heat and what have you wreaks havoc on copters). The trouble is that it will take at least two years to do so.

Arthur Silber needs our help. Arthur is a brilliant writer. His essays have ranged from For Maria Callas, his On Torture series, Myths of New Orleans, and his challenging (at times bordering on impenetrable) Alice Miller opus. While reading his work is often demanding, his writing it is even more so.

This gem from  James Dobson in today's NY Times http://www.nytimes.com/...
"Despite all the spiritual shortcomings of the Jewish people..."

This is naturally not his description but

"according to scripture -- and those criticisms come not from Christians but from the Old Testament. Just look in Deuteronomy, where Jews are referred to as a stiff-necked and stubborn people -- despite all of that, God has chosen to bless them as his people. God chose to bless Abraham and his seed not because they were a perfect people any more than the rest of the human family."

Shell Oil prez John Hofmeister was on NBC's Today show this morning peddling the most audacious pile of self-serving crap I've seen in a long time. Meet me on the flip...

Former Reagan Chief-of-Staff, ex-Treasury Secretary, ex-Secretary of State, ex-NSC Council Member, ex-GWB chief legal advisor, etc, and recent US Special Envoy for Iraq debt is the invisible man in the middle of this mess.

James A. Baker is Senior Partner of Baker Botts, a legal firm very active in Middle East affairs perhaps never more visibly than as legal representation for the Saudi Royal family in the lawsuits brought by the families of 9/11 victims. Baker Botts happens to include Halliburton among its many clients and is active in Egypt, Kuwait and Dubai, too.

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