- Why the Bible Belt supports Bush's big-dollar marriage push: This is just too funny. Avedon quotes extensively from a Newsday article that takes note of the fact that conservative Christians have a much higher divorce rate than atheists and agnostics. Avedon's cut is funny enough, but the original will have you rolling.
As Avedon concludes however, it's not nice to laugh at other people's troubles, but maybe they should stop marrying their cousins?
- Why I'm not a libertarian (Just scroll down from the above link): I'm not a libertarian, but as Avedon points out, it easy for many of us liberals to find common cause with those who are and visa-versa; there is a shared commitment to individual rights. Avedon offers some quite worthwhile comments on her feelings on this, but the bulk of this article is long excepts from a 1997 article by Seth Finkelstein called Libertarianism Makes You Stupid. While I think the article title is a bit overblown (there are some libertarians out there doing seriously good writing), this article is perhaps the best deconstruction of the flaws of libertarianism that I've seen to date. I won't get into its line of argument here, but if you're ever arguing political philosophy with a Libertarian, you'll want to have this article bookmarked. There is a definite reason why Avedon has kept it handy for so long.
- Not from Avedon, but worthwhile in light of the Libertarian article above. Libertarianism is regarded as quite conservative and quite to the right of center. Even its adherents acknowledge that it is well to the right of mainstream conservatism (as opposed to the "New Right", ... which most Libertarians detest, by the way). So how to explain the newly-emerging bond between Liberals and Libertarians? After all, they are almost polar opposites on the scale.
In fact, it is the scale itself that is the probem. By it's one-dimensional nature, you can only be left of center or right of center, and nuance is excluded. Enter The Political Compass.
What the political compass does is add a second dimension to one's political orientation. I won't explain that here because the site starts out with a test to place the visitor on this two-dimensional scale, and they don't want the test results to be prejudiced by foreknowledge of what they are trying to measure. That said however, I found it pretty much nailed my view of myself, and though a few personal friends complained about their scores, I found those scores to be pretty much in line with how I viewed their politics.
Anyways, the test is fun, and you'll be placed among a chart of major political personalities. (For the record, I'm really close to the Dalai Lama.) If you haven't taken this test yet, go ahead, have some fun.
[Note: If you've taken the test before, they've added a new chart with all of the Presidential hopefuls on it.]
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