Republicans, Dildos

Leave it to the "small government" Republicans to focus on what's important.

The South Carolina bill, proposed by Republican Rep. Ralph Davenport, would make it a felony to sell devices used primarily for sexual stimulation and allow law enforcement to seize sex toys from raided businesses.

A felony. For selling vibrators. A felony. In a state where selling Uzis and AK-47s is just fine, Republican Rep. Ralph Davenport wants to make selling vibrators a felony.

People convicted under obscenity laws face up to five years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

Five years. $10,000 fine.

Other states that ban the sell of sex toys include Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi and Texas, said Mark Lopez, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union.

You can tell that these states are big on "family values" since all four are in the top 20 states for most divorces per capita. Apparently South Carolina (#32) is jealous.

(Article via Boing Boing)

Jewish Atheist's Top Ten Non-Kosher Foods

Time for a more light-hearted post. One of the more fun aspects of making the Orthodox->atheist transition is getting to experience a whole new universe of foods for the first time, as an adult.

If you are offended by descriptions of non-kosher foods, please stop reading now. You've been warned.

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10. Calamari (squid.) These little guys, lightly breaded and fried, are a delicious appetizer. They taste more-or-less like any other fried thing, but chewier.

9. Wine. Of course, there is good kosher wine, which is why this isn't closer to the top of my list. But good non-kosher wine is so much more plentiful that it had to make the list. Virtually any non-kosher restaurant you go to has decent wine, which can add a lot to the enjoyment of a meal.

8. Lobster. I suspect these giant bugs would be higher on my list if I'd had them more, but so far I've only had them in a bisque or inside pasta or something. Very rich and tasty.

7. Crab cakes. They're just great. Often offered as an appetizer, but I like two as an entree.

6. New England Clam Chowder. One of my favorite soups. Salty, chewy, creamy. Stay away from the Manhattan kind, as it's made by sadists who think clams go in a tomato base.

5. Cheeseburgers. The combination of two basic kosher foods, the cheeseburger has somehow become the stereotype of non-kosher. (Mixing dairy and meat is a no-no in kosher foods.) Yet once you've had one, you realize that cheese belongs on top of a hamburger and that's all there is to it. (In fact, cheese goes on pretty much everything: chicken, spaghetti with meat sauce, deli sandwiches, etc.) The cheeseburger can be made deliciously low-brow, as at Burger King, or classed up by using fine beef and a good cheddar, mozzarella, or feta.

4. Shrimp. Versatile, delicious, and even healthy! Fried southern style or in tempura, grilled, broiled in a butter sauce, stir-fried, split over sushi rice, cooked pretty much any way, one of my favorite foods.

3. Eel. "Eel??" say the Orthodox Jews. Yes, eel. Specifically, unagi, the freshwater eel that's grilled and brushed with sauce, served over sushi rice. I always save it for last when I have sushi.

2. Bouillabaisse. Holy crap is this good. A fish stew with saffron, fennel, and all kinds of fish and shellfish. It's just frickin' unbelievable.

And the number one non-kosher food is..........

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1. BACON! Bacon may be the single best non-chocolate food in the world. It's crispy, it's salty, it's greasy, it's simply amazing. Great with eggs. It can also transforms a boring turkey sandwich into a divine experience. (If you add avacado, too... you'll find God.)

Income Growth: Republicans vs. Democrats

Look carefully at that graph. It makes two things very clear.

1) Income growth is overall much better under Democratic presidents than Republicans.

2) While the super-rich did about the same under Democrats and Republicans, the Democrats raised everybody else at the same rate while the Republicans failed everybody in the bottom 80 or 90%.

So not only do the Republicans only help the richest of the rich, but they can't even do that better than the Democrats!

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The graph is from a paper (.pdf) by Princeton professor Larry Bartels. Here are some excerpts:

Census Bureau data reveal large, consistent differences in patterns of real pre-tax income growth under Democratic and Republican presidents in the post-war U.S. Democratic presidents have produced slightly more income growth for poor families than for rich families, resulting in a modest decrease in overall inequality. Republican presidents have produced a great deal more income growth for rich families than for poor families, resulting in a substantial increase in inequality. On average, families at the 95th percentile of the income distribution have experienced identical income growth under Democratic and Republican presidents, while those at the 20th percentile have experienced more than four times as much income growth under Democrats as they have under Republicans. These differences are attributable to partisan differences in unemployment (which has been 30 percent lower under Democratic presidents, on average) and GDP growth (which has been 30 percent higher under Democratic presidents, on average); both unemployment and GDP growth have much stronger effects on income growth at the bottom of the income distribution than at the top.

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Under Democratic administrations income growth has been more vigorous among the poor than among the rich; under Republican administrations the reverse has been true. The cumulative effect of these differences has been enormous.

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Using data from 1948 through 1978 (that is, before most of the recent substantial increase in income inequality) Hibbs (1987, 232-243) found that the ratio of the share of post-tax income received by the top 20 percent of the income distribution to the share received by the bottom 40 percent declined by about .037 during each year of Democratic control while increasing by about .008 during each year of Republican control. Applying these estimates to his entire period, Hibbs concluded that inequality declined markedly (by a total of about 25 percent) during the 14 years of Democratic control while remaining essentially unchanged during the 17 years of Republican control.

And lest you think this is just some strange coincidence:

[D]istinguishing between Democratic and Republican administrations (the black diamonds and white circles in the figure, respectively) reveals the regularity with which Democratic presidents reduced and Republican presidents increased the prevailing level of economic inequality, irrespective of the long-term trend. Indeed, the effect of presidential partisanship on income inequality turns out to be remarkably consistent throughout the second half of the 20th century. The 80/20 income ratio increased under each of the five Republican presidents in this period – Eisenhower, Nixon, Ford, Reagan, and the elder Bush. On the other hand, four of five Democratic presidents – all except Jimmy Carter – presided over declines in income inequality.

(via 3quarksdaily)

Richard Feyman

The late Nobel Laureate, brilliant, and always inspirational physicist Richard Feynman on The Pleasure of Finding Things Out. (video)

He talks about the joy, awe, and beauty of science among other things.

via metafilter.

What Are the Republicans Up To?

How do you tell if a politician is lying? His lips are moving.

I'd like to look at what the Republicans are really up to, in a broad sense. Every election cycle they bring up emotional issues like abortion, flag burning, religion, and lately gay rights (replacing the no-longer-tenable Black rights.) But have they accomplished anything on those issues? Abortion is still legal nationally (albeit less available in many states), no significant "progress" has been made installing the ten commandments in courthouses or legalizing school prayer, the flag-burning amendment is a non-starter, and they have no chance of holding back the tide of gay rights.

It's not like they can blame the Democrats. They control the White House, the Senate, and the House of Representatives. It's true that some of their wants have been stymied by the Court, but that was hardly unforseeable.

So why waste all this energy on issues they have no prayer of winning on?

Because it gets votes. And they don't care about these issues.

What have the Republicans actually accomplished over the last half-century?

They have made the income tax much less progressive, or in other words, they have shifted much of the tax burden away from the rich and towards the poor. Reagan cut the top tax-bracket from 50% to 28%, the lowest it had been since 1916. They have supported big corporations over the rights of the people by consistently voting against environmental regulations, by skyrocketing the deficit (a method of shifting wealth to today's rich at the expense of tomorrow's poor), by changing bankruptcy law to favor lenders, by attempting to kill or weaken social security, by limiting access to health care, and even by going to war with Iraq. (Compare what Big Oil got out of the deal -- record profits -- with what the poor got out of it -- dead and injured.)

I think the "Red State"ers are waking up to the idea that the Republicans are not their party. The Repubs talk a good game about social conservatism, but their actions are all about making the rich richer at the expense of everyone else, present and future. If you've voted Republican in the past due to their empty talk about values, I beg of you, wake up and realize that they don't represent you. The only value they have is money. And not money for you or yours. Unless you're a CEO, of course.