In this article in the WP, it is reported that older folks are much more trusting than younger people, and they often miss cues that broadcast untrustworthiness. This correlates with the fact that older folks are victims of fraud much more than younger people.
To see if older people really are less able to spot a swindler, Taylor and colleagues showed photos of faces considered trustworthy, neutral or untrustworthy to a group of 119 older adults (ages 55 to 84) and 24 younger adults (ages 20 to 42). Signs of untrustworthiness included averted eyes; an insincere smile that doesn’t reach the eyes; a smug, smirky mouth; and a backward tilt to the head. The participants were asked to rate each face on a scale from minus-3 (very untrustworthy) to 3 (very trustworthy).
In the study, appearing online last week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the “untrustworthy” faces were perceived as significantly more trustworthy by the older subjects than by the younger ones.
Virtually all of this debate has concerned Rice's statements on a series of Sunday news shows in September, during which she claimed that the Benghazi attack was primarily motivated by spontaneous anger over an anti-Islam film rather than an coordinated attack by a terrorist group. Everyone now acknowledges that (consistent with the standard pattern of this administration's behavior) Rice's statements were inaccurate, but in a majestic display of intellectual dexterity, progressive pundits claim with a straight face that public officials should be excused when they make false statements based on what the CIA tells them to say, while conservatives claim with a straight face that relying on flawed and manipulated intelligence reports is no excuse.
All of that is standard, principle-free partisan jockeying. It goes without saying that if this were Condoleezza rather than Susan Rice, the two sides would have exactly opposite positions on whether these inaccurate statements should be held against her. None of that is worth examining. But what is remarkable is how so many Democrats are devoting so much energy to defending a possible Susan Rice nomination as Secretary of State without even pretending to care about her record and her beliefs. It's not even part of the discussion.
Found this cartoon on Facebook, but cannot determine how to link directly to it, even at the site mentioned in the cartoon. I'm reprinting it because it is one of the best statements I've seen regarding of America's massive denial regarding the significance of the actions of Bradley Manning:
Glenn Greenwald , Greg Mitchell, Truthdig.com and Amy Goodman have been among the relatively few media sources giving serious coverage to Bradley Manning (and to Wikileaks).
What kinds of scandals has Bradley Manning revealed? Here are more than a few.
I know many thinking Catholics, and 98% of these people what I would term "conflicted Catholics." When I'm together with more than one of them, they often spontaneously express their frustration, embarrassment and even rage regarding the Church. What drives this frustration? Many things, including more than a few of these questions raises by Adam Lee at Alternet in "50 Reasons to Boycott the Catholic Church."
Despite these immense intractable problems with the Roman Catholic Church, most Catholics I know continue to associate themselves with the church. They are not willing to give up their religious community, in spite of these hurdles. This willingness to stick with the church is hard to understand for an outsider like me. I would think that 1/10 of this misconduct would have me running from any organization.
Here is a stunning graphic from a television show called "Viewpoint," featuring Eliot Spitzer:
So if you want to avoid abortions, make birth control freely available. That's one of the message of this short Guttmacher video:
Here is another Guttmacher video on the occurrence rates of abortion--it occurs more often in countries where it is illegal (which is often where contraception is not widely available).
The rational way to cut abortion rates is to make birth control freely available; the irrational way to cut abortion is to outlaw abortion. For those who adamantly oppose abortion, Adam Lee asks some pointed questions, including the following:
Biological evidence suggests that a large number, if not a majority, of fertilized eggs are spontaneously aborted at a very early stage of pregnancy (by some estimates, as many as 50%). Do you consider this an ongoing humanitarian crisis that urgently needs medical research?
If you could write the law however you saw fit, how would you enforce a ban on abortion? For example, in El Salvador, when women come to hospitals seeking treatment for a miscarriage, they can be detained until a forensic vagina investigator can arrive and perform an exam to see if they had an illegal abortion. Would you have something like this? If not, what enforcement mechanism would you have?
Why do you think it is that so many proposed abortion bans have no exception for the woman's life or health? (For example, anti-abortion laws with no health exceptions exist in Chile, Honduras, Suriname and El Salvador. Even in the U.S., similar bans have been passed by Republican legislatures in Indiana and South Dakota.) Do you think there should be such an exception?
Would you permit exceptions to an abortion ban in the case of rape? If so, how would this work? For a pregnant woman to get an abortion, would she have to accuse a specific person of the crime, and would he have to be tracked down, arrested, charged, put on trial and convicted, all before the point of fetal viability?
What do you think the penalty should be for doctors who perform abortion?
What do you think the penalty should be for women who seek out an abortion?
I would ask many of the same questions Adam Lee asks. I have set forth my views on abortion here. I believe that the choice of abortion should be solely between a woman and her doctor for at least the first three months after pregnancy.
For those alleged literalists who oppose abortion based on the bible, where in the bible does it state that the union of an egg and sperm immediately becomes the equivalent of a born human being? In fact, consider these passages indicating that breathing air is the key point in time:
"And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul." Genesis 2:7
"Again he said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the LORD. Thus saith the Lord GOD unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live: And I will lay sinews upon you, and will bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and ye shall live; and ye shall know that I am the LORD." Ezekiel 37: 4-7.
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