New Study: Conservatives Are Biggest Consumers Of Porn

A new study shows that the states that consume the most porn tend to be more conservative and religious than states with lower levels of consumption. (ABC News Photo Illustration)

Porn in the USA: Conservatives Are Biggest Consumers

8 of Top 10 Porn-Consuming States Voted Republican in 2008 Presidential Election

ABC News- By EWEN CALLAWAY
Feb. 28, 2009

Americans may paint themselves in increasingly bright shades of red and blue, but new research finds one thing that varies little across the nation: the liking for online pornography.

A new nationwide study (pdf) of anonymised credit-card receipts from a major online adult entertainment provider finds little variation in consumption between states.

“When it comes to adult entertainment, it seems people are more the same than different,” says Benjamin Edelman at Harvard Business School.

However, there are some trends to be seen in the data. Those states that do consume the most porn tend to be more conservative and religious than states with lower levels of consumption, the study finds.

“Some of the people who are most outraged turn out to be consumers of the very things they claimed to be outraged by,” Edelman says.

MORE HERE

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Olbermann: Talks With Eugene Robinson About CPAC And GOP Bordering On Insanity

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Arizona AG Terry Goddard: Legalization Of Marijuana A Possible Way Of Curbing Border Violence (VIDEO)

Arizona AG: Marijuana legalization a possible way of curbing border violence

Raw Story-David Edwards and Stephen C. Webster
Published: Friday February 27, 2009

When President Bush vowed to “smoke ’em out” in the chase for Osama bin Laden — who his administration claimed to be America’s greatest enemy — he meant it in the Wild West sense, not the California sense.

Who’d have thought that by the time his predecessor took office, otherwise conservative officials would be considering another way of smoking out a new and growing threat to American’s safety: Mexican drug cartels, whose profits are largely derived from the illegal smuggling and sale of marijuana.

On Friday, Democrat Terry Goddard, Arizona’s Attorney General, said that while he’s not in favor or legalizing marijuana, he thinks it should be debated as a way of curbing violence in the increasingly deadly clashes between Mexico’s gangs.

Speaking to CNN’s Kiran Chetry about the firearms trade between the US and Mexico, he noted that almost all the guns seized in Mexico’s drug war came from the US.

“This is the source,” he said. “This is the gun store for a great deal of the world.”

“What’s the answer?” asked Chetry.

“There’d have to be a variety of answers,” he said. “But one of ’em would be to enforce our laws more aggressively.”

VIDEO AND MORE HERE

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Obama’s Speech On Iraq- 2/27/09 (VIDEO AND FULL TEXT)

Obama’s Iraq Speech: Video, Full Text

Huffintgon Post |   February 27, 2009 11:52 AM

Video of President Obama’s speech will be added soon.

Remarks of President Barack Obama – As Prepared for DeliveryResponsibly Ending the War in Iraq

Camp Lejeune, North Carolina

Friday, February 27, 2009

Good morning Marines. Good morning Camp Lejeune. Good morning Jacksonville. Thank you for that outstanding welcome. I want to thank Lieutenant General Hejlik for hosting me here today.

I also want to acknowledge all of our soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. That includes the Camp Lejeune Marines now serving with – or soon joining – the Second Marine Expeditionary Force in Iraq; those with Special Purpose Marine Air Ground Task Force in Afghanistan; and those among the 8,000 Marines who are preparing to deploy to Afghanistan. We have you in our prayers. We pay tribute to your service. We thank you and your families for all that you do for America. And I want all of you to know that there is no higher honor or greater responsibility than serving as your Commander-in-Chief.

I also want to take this opportunity to acknowledge Ryan Crocker, who recently completed his service as our Ambassador to Iraq. Throughout his career, Ryan always took on the toughest assignments. He is an example of the very best that this nation has to offer, and we owe him a great debt of gratitude. He carried on his work with an extraordinary degree of cooperation with two of our finest Generals – General David Petraeus, and General Ray Odierno – who will be critical in carrying forward the strategy that I will outline today.

Next month will mark the sixth anniversary of the war in Iraq. By any measure, this has already been a long war. For the men and women of America’s armed forces – and for your families – this war has been one of the most extraordinary chapters of service in the history of our nation. You have endured tour after tour after tour of duty. You have known the dangers of combat and the lonely distance of loved ones. You have fought against tyranny and disorder. You have bled for your best friends and for unknown Iraqis. And you have borne an enormous burden for your fellow citizens, while extending a precious opportunity to the people of Iraq. Under tough circumstances, the men and women of the United States military have served with honor, and succeeded beyond any expectation.

MORE HERE

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The Wingnut Revolution Is Upon Us

After nearly three decades of Reaganomics in which the wealthiest two percent of Americans have grown exponentially wealthier while middle class wages have remained stagnant, a growing faction of super rich Americans is seriously pissed off — and their Wingnut Revolution is upon us.

Sure, the interests and influence of the wealthiest two percent make them more responsible than most for the free market policies that created this current economic crisis. But if there’s one thing we’ve learned about those responsible for this recession, it’s that the concept of accountability is about as foreign as their live-in au pairs. Instead, they’re blaming this on Barney Frank and a legion of “losers” (read that: working class minorities) even though Ben Bernanke himself has debunked this myth.

But accountability (a “reckoning” as President Obama called it) is underway in the form of the president’s housing proposal, his healthcare plan and, naturally, the recovery act. At the end of the day, ninety-five percent of Americans will benefit from what amounts to the largest tax cut in American history, along with increased access to affordable healthcare and millions of new jobs.

Though, alas, the super rich will have to pay slightly more in taxes.

Yeah, that’s a shame.

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Pelosi: Bush Administration Officials Who Broke The Law Should Face Prosecution- Not Immunity (VIDEO)

Pelosi: Bush Administration lawbreakers should face prosecution, not immunity

Raw Story- John Byrne
Published: Thursday February 26, 2009

Not so fast.

Bush administration officials who broke the law should face criminal prosecution and shouldn’t get immunity in exchange for testimony under a proposed Truth and Reconciliation Commission being discussed in the Senate, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said in an interview broadcast late Wednesday.

Senate Judiciary Chairman Pat Leahy (D-VT) yesterday announced his committee will hold hearings on creating a panel to investigate alleged crimes committed by Bush administration officials, including torture of detainees and illegal wiretapping. Leahy has said the panel would avoid criminal charges except in cases of perjury.

Pelosi said she supported the investigation, but any plan should hold open the possibility of prosecution.

VIDEO AND MORE HERE

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Massive Protest Against Global Warming Monday In D.C.

Bill McKibben: Why I’m Planning to Get Arrested on Monday (and You Should, Too)

By Bill McKibben, Yale Environment 360. Posted February 24, 2009.

With thousands of big names and small gathering, the first massive protest of its kind against global warming will put the heat on DC.

It may seem odd timing that many of us are heading to the nation’s capital early next month for a major act of civil disobedience at a coal-fired power plant, the first big protest of its kind against global warming in this country.

After all, Barack Obama’s in power. He’s appointed scientific advisers who actually believe in… science, and he’s done more in a few weeks to deal with climate change than all the presidents of the last 20 years combined. Stalwarts like John Kerry, Henry Waxman, and Ed Markey are chairing the relevant congressional committees. The auto companies, humbled, are promising to build rational vehicles if only we give them some cash. What’s to protest? Why not just give the good guys a break?

If you think about it a little longer, though, you realize this is just the moment to up the ante. For one thing, it would have done no good in the past: you think Dick Cheney was going to pay attention?

More importantly, we need a powerful and active movement not to force the administration and the Democrats in Congress to do something they don’t want to, but to give them the political space they need to act on their convictions. Barack Obama was a community organizer — he understands that major change only comes when it’s demanded, when there’s some force noisy enough to drown out the eternal hum of business as usual, of vested interest, of inertia.

Consider what has to happen if we’re going to deal with global warming in a real way. NASA climate scientist James Hansen — who has announced he plans to join us and get arrested for trespassing in the action we’re planning for March 2 — has demonstrated two things in recent papers. One, that any concentration of carbon dioxide greater than 350 parts per million in the atmosphere is not compatible with the “planet on which civilization developed and to which life on earth is adapted.” And two, that the world as a whole must stop burning coal by 2030 — and the developed world well before that — if we are to have any hope of ever getting the planet back down below that 350 number.

MORE HERE

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Jimmy Kimmel: Interviews Octomom (VIDEO)

Jimmy Kimmel’s Exclusive Interview With Octomom (VIDEO)

Huffington Post |  Alex Leo   |   February 25, 2009 02:00 PM

At this point many of us have suspicions that Nadya Suleman is crazy. She birthed eight more kids after already giving birth to six, launched a Website so you can give her money, went video game shopping, hired an agent, publicly fought with her slightly saner mother, all while on food stamps.

Anyway, she’s completely enthralling. She’s like a train wreck wrapped in an enigma wrapped in Angelina Jolie’s face. As a result, everyone wants to interview her, and the lucky Jimmy Kimmel just got his chance.

In the following clip you will see exclusive footage of Nadya and the octuplets. It’s just unfortunate how hard it is for her to talk with those lips.

WATCH:

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An Extraordinary Bond

Normally, on Wednesday afternoon, the House of Commons is transformed into a bickering cockpit as the Prime Minister faces Prime Minister’s Question Time. It begins with a routine question about the PM’s engagements and is followed by questions from the leader of the main opposition party (currently, David Cameron, leader of the Conservative Party), and leader of the second biggest opposition party (the Liberal Democrats).

Then junior MPs vie to gain the eye of the Speaker of the House of Commons who will invite other MPs to speak, addressing them not by their  name but as, “The Right Honourable Member for…”, followed by the name of their constituency (Electoral District being the US equivalent), and the Prime Minister seeks to parry any hostile questions with the benefit of the briefing he is given by key advisors before this time-hallowed spectacle, which enthrals some and appals others, takes place.

Today, however, politics was silent, as PM Gordon Brown stood up to express his condolences to David Cameron, whose six-year-old son, Ivan, died early this morning of complications arising from Cerebral Palsy. What made the Prime Minister’s tribute deeply moving was that Gordon Brown himself lost his own prematurly-born first child who died ten days after she had been born.

In the words of a BBC correspondent, the Prime Minister and the Man Who Would Be Prime Minister are now united by an extraordinary bond as both have lost first-born children.

Out of respect for Ivan and his family, PMQs was cancelled.

Read more…

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Senate Judiciary Committee To Announce Investigation Of Torture Under Bush

Senate to announce investigation of torture under Bush, senators say

Raw Story- John Byrne
Published: Wednesday February 25, 2009

‘This is going to be big,’ senator says

The Senate is quietly preparing plans to investigate allegations of torture under President George W. Bush, according to comments published Wednesday by Senate Judiciary Chairman Pat Leahy (D-VT) and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI).

The Senate Judiciary Committee could announce a hearing to consider various plans to probe allegations of torture as early as today, according to Salon‘s Mark Benjamin, citing Committee Chairman Pat Leahy and members of his staff. A call placed Wednesday morning by Raw Story to Leahy’s office was not immediately returned.

Sen. Whitehouse said he’s “convinced” the investigation will move forward.

“Stay on this,” he told Benjamin. “This is going to be big.”

Whitehouse, Senator from Rhode Island, is “spearheading” the efforts,
and as a member of both the Judiciary and Intelligence Committees, “is
privy to information about interrogations he can’t yet share,” the magazine noted.

Plans to establish the commission still remain in their infancy, as senators and staff look at previous panels, such as the 9-11 Commission, and investigations following Watergate. Whitehouse, a former U.S. attorney, noted that a torture commission might need the power to immunize witnesses on a case-by-case basis. The prospect of future prosecutions, he said, are beside the point. Most important was putting a spotlight on abuses committed by the Bush administration.

MORE HERE

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