AndrewKoch.com

Presidential Grace

Buckle your seatbelt and get ready for entertainment. Andy Dick, Arianna Huffington and George W. If that's not a comedy match made in heaven, well then... uh, I don't know what is.

It's funny: just watch

(Thanks to Mom for sharing the link!)

Concerning Lack of Clue

"We don't need a study, if I remember my biology correctly, to show us that those people who are sexually abstinent have a zero chance of becoming pregnant or getting someone pregnant or contracting a sexually transmitted disease." -Wade Horn, the assistant secretary of Health and Human Services. (Bush Seeks Money for Abstinence Education)

The study in question here is whether or not abstinence education actually leads to abstinence. It's a wee bit disturbing to see the logical failure on Wade's part to make the connection.

Here's a much more reasonable argument from that same article:
"The only 100 percent way to avoid a car collision is not to drive, but the federal government sure does a lot of advocacy for safety belts." -James Wagoner, president of Advocates for Youth.

Those Zany Red Staters

Stone points us to this article: Hostettler mounting campaign to change the name of Interstate 69

"John Hostettler, the Congressman representing the 8th district of Indiana, has been convinced by local religious groups to introduce legislation in the House that would change the name of an Interstate 69 extension to a more moral sounding number."

Even more amusing than the "moral" legislation is the poll on the left-hand side of the page, asking "Should prostitution be legal in Indiana?"

As of this writing, over 92% of 2,584 are voting in favor of prostitution. If he wants to get re-elected, Hostetler might have to readjust his "morals", eh?

...Or more likely, the same teenagers that "snicker" at his I-69 button are getting a giggle out of the ol' prositution survey.

Apropos

Non Sequitur

Getting a Little Closer

The race is getting a little closer, this according to the Iowa Electronic Markets' 2004 US Presidential Election Winner Takes All Market.

My guess: election day will be more exciting than all four Red Sox-Cardinals games combined.

Where's the Fun in That?

Yahoo! News - Doctorow Booed After Anti-Bush Speech

In a 20-minute address to graduates at [Hofstra] on Sunday, [Author E.L. Doctorow] criticized Bush's tax cuts, anti-terrorism policies and the Patriot Act, but focused mainly on what he called Bush's "untrue" stories about the war in Iraq.

Whether you agree or disagree with Doctorow's politics is irrelevant. The point of graduation is to celebrate the graduates, not to make political statements.

Graduates want to be inspired by commencement speeches written just for them. They don't want their graduation to become a sideshow to someone's political agenda.

For all those Hofstra grads out there that feel cheated, pretend that Ray Bradbury made this speech at your graduation. I think you'll feel much better.

The Great Deliberative Body

An excerpt from the third book in Robert Caro's phenomenal LBJ series, Master of the Senate:

“The use of the Senate,” Madison said, “is to consist in its proceeding with more coolness, with more system, and with more wisdom, than the popular branch.” It should, he said, be “an anchor against popular fluctuations.” He drew for parallels on classical history, which, he said, “informs us of no long-lived republic which had not a Senate.” In two of the three “long-lived” republics of antiquity, Sparta and Rome, and probably in the third—Carthage (about whose governmental institutions less was known)—senators served for life. “These examples . . . when compared with the fugitive and turbulent existence of other ancient republics, [are] very instructive proofs of the necessity of some institution that will blend stability with liberty.” Thomas Jefferson had been in Paris during the Convention, serving as minister to France. When he returned, he asked George Washington over breakfast why the President had agreed to a two-house Congress. According to a story that may be apocryphal, Washington replied with his own question: “Why did you pour your tea into that saucer?” And when Jefferson answered, “To cool it,” Washington said, “Just so. We pour House legislation into the senatorial saucer to cool it.” The resolution providing for a two-house Congress was agreed to by the Constitutional Convention with almost no debate or dissent.

And to ensure that the Senate could protect the people against themselves, the Framers armored the Senate against the people.

...The Senate had been created to be independent, to stand against the tyranny of presidential power and the tides of public opinion.

Should it come down to it, I would hope that the Senate will do its job and put this silliness behind us.

And as far as the Fourteenth Amendment is concerned, it doesn't look like the states have a right to amend their constitutions to prohibit same-sex marriages either.

Section. 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.