We Killed Him / 9-29-10

On Wednesday, September 22, 2010, we killed Tyler Clementi.

Clementi, a Rutgers freshman, jumped off the George Washington bridge last week. His body was recovered today, on the 29th.

He told us he was going to do it; he posted his plans on his facebook page earlier that evening.

Technically, Clementi did take his own life. We didn't push him off the bridge. Technically, we were sleeping, or working, or laughing with our significant other, or watching Jersey Shore, or chomping down McNuggets, or doing a million other things that didn't directly murder the fragile young man.

And you can be certain he was a tortured guy on the inside, because it takes that type of person to jump.

But we still killed him.

43 percent of us believe gay sex is morally wrong. (Poll results here.)

58 percent of us don't want to allow gays to marry. (Poll results here.)

Upwards of 90 percent of us watch videos online, including everything from Euro soccer highlights to dancing babies to classical music to Anime porn. Susan Boyle's audition for "Britain's Got Talent" garnered 100 million hits in its first nine days. It's not just because she's got talent and is British.

So when Clementi's roommate secretly filmed him having sex with another man, then posted it online, the twig he was... it just snapped.

At the intersection of omnipresent technology, voyeurism, homophobia, curiosity and immaturity, we find Clementi.

That's our address. We killed him.

And he didn't have to die. We could be a better society already, one that allows gay men and women to love each other openly in the same way straight men and women do. But we aren't. We could be a different society, one that places certain loose restrictions on online content. But again, we aren't. We could even be living in an age without the Internet. But we have it.

Indisputably, we could nurture troubled teenagers better.

Instead, when the planet dumps a Clementi in our lap, we kill him.

Still in Sea-Shock / 9-29-10

The Seattle Seahawks, your favorite sports team of all time, just won a game in which they:

A) Allowed 379 yards of total offense. In the second half. That's basically impossible to do whether you're winning or losing, or playing any sort of defense or offense at all. The top three performances for most yards gained in a game by one team were all set in the 40's and 50's, and they're all in the 680-750 yard range.

(In essence, last Sunday, the Seahawks were the worst team, defensively, in the history of the sport, as measured by yards allowed, for a half. Their only competition is teams from 60 years ago. Those teams' dead players would have done a better job last Sunday at Qwest.)

B) Gained 10 yards of offense through the air in the second half and 26 yards total after halftime. Yes, the Chargers outgained the Hawks 379-26 in half number 2. Yeah. 379-26. That's correct. A factor of 14.6 to 1, you were about to say.

C) Fumbled away a sure touchdown less than one yard from the goal line, resulting in a touchback. Those are worth no points. They sound like a touchdown, except they are a million billionty times worse.

D) Scored zero points after a second and goal from the 2 with 20 seconds left in the half.

E) Allowed a safety and a two-point conversion and threw an interception at the goal line.

(None of those events in C), D) or E) overlapped, by the way. They were all separate events.)

They shouldn't have won the game, except that they should have. Because they also:

A) Returned two kickoffs for touchdowns. Again, in the second half. Leon Washington scored twice and finished with 253 return yards. He's still sucking on oxygen as we speak.

B) Sacked Philip Rivers four times, hit him nine more, and tipped or intercepted eight of his attempts.

C) Were the beneficiary of five San Diego turnovers, including three fumbles. (They scored a measly 10 points off those giveaways, but still, this is the positive part of the post, so shut up already, me.)

D) Picked off the potential game-tying or game-winning TD pass with 10 seconds left.

E) Had 67,000 screaming fans behind them who forced two false starts and two delay of game penalties on the Chargers' last possession.

That was the most entertaining-infuriating-frustrating-exhilirating-undeserved-deserved-heart-stopping win I've seen. Ever. In any sport.

I don't think this team is very good. It imploded in the second half, and it absolutely could not defend once its top corner, linebacker and defensive lineman left with injuries. Pete Carroll donated three or seven points to San Diego with an epic mismanagement of the closing seconds of the first half. It lucked out by winning two out of three instant replay reviews. And it won't always get Leon to generate 14 points all by himself every week. (Duh.)

Here's the box. Here's the best recap I read so far. Here's to a boring win next Sunday in St. Louis.

Mediawful / 9-27-10

(Preventative Strike: Here's the link to the full article in question. It is less than four hours old as of this precise moment. Here's the link to an analysis of the survey results being discussed.)

Stop The Presses. Never got a chance to say that in my newspaper days. Nowadays, of course, it'd be Stop The Upload, or Sever The Connection, but those have a decidedly less dramatic ring to them.

What are we press-stopping about? Why, beloved readers, it just so happens that American atheists and agnostics (informally known as the AAA) have outperformed Christians on a test of religious knowledge.

Boom-shakalaka!

By now, the three of you who are still reading despite my incomparable nerdiness, you guys will have skillfully predicted where I'm going with this. Coming up in fifteen seconds: violent rant on how Christians don't even know as much about their own faith as non-Christians! What a sorry spiritual state we occupy, even as we strive to be God's chosen people, blessed in every way and entrusted with the holy mission of showing the heathen the error of their ways. What a failure we are as a, nay, THE Christian nation.

That would be some serious ironic, sarcastic fun. But I'm not going there.

Instead, I'm compelled to rant about how this article sums up the sorry state of journalism in 2010.

The writer's opening paragraph (the "lede" for all you non-reporters):

"If you want to know about God, you might want to talk to an atheist. Heresy? Perhaps."

I know lame when I see it, and that's lame lame megalame lame. With a false equivalency thrown in for good measure. Come on. The survey we're getting to measured respondents' knowledge about religious facts. Not about the nature of God. There's a difference, pinhead.

And how is that heresy anyway? Maybe irony. Maybe.

And why is the "Perhaps" there? To hedge your bets? To not offend? To seem even-handed? To be extra-super lame?

Later in the same story:

"The Pew survey was not without its bright spots for the devout. Eight in 10 people surveyed knew that Mother Teresa was Catholic. Seven in 10 knew that, according to the Bible, Moses led the exodus from Egypt and that Jesus was born in Bethlehem."

It's a "bright spot" that 20 percent of believers can't remember that Mother Teresa was a Catholic nun?

Oh wait, that just what the writer was implying. That's not an actual correct interpretation of the data. That number was for the public at large, of which 82 percent correctly answered the question. And how is it good news for "the devout" that 71 percent of people know that the Bible claims Jesus was born in Bethlehem? What makes that good news? (Let's leave aside the fun fact that Jesus, according to most biblical scholars, was born in Nazareth. Had to mention that. Sorry.)

The article's stupid conclusion:

"For comparison purposes, the survey also asked some questions about general knowledge, which yielded the scariest finding: 4% of Americans believe that Stephen King, not Herman Melville, wrote "Moby Dick."

So the "scariest finding" of all is the comforting fact that 96 percent of the population correctly knows that Stephen King did not write "Moby Dick."

Oh good. Now I can sleep at night. (Must confess, for a while there, I was worried that maybe 4 percent of Americans were trying to check out Herman Melville's "It" from the public library.)

I feel more knowledgeable, yet dumber, for having read that story. Stop hurting my brain, mass media outlets!

Revolution or Insurrection? / 9-15-10

Electoral Threat flags. I'm passing them out. Get yours now!

1. A yellow one to fellow Democrats everywhere rejoicing that extremists (it's unfair to call them Republicans - these Tea Partiers are something else altogether) are on the ballot anywhere. You/We aren't very popular at this time, so there's no telling who can and can't beat you/us. Just because it looks like the wild-eyed revolutionary on the other side will lose doesn't mean he or she will, in fact, lose. American political history is (WARNING: please select your own cliche) sprinkled/littered/dotted/peppered with events that once seemed improbable.

2. A red one to Republicans everywhere. Your party is in grave danger of being overrun by people who have no business holding office on the local urban planning committee, much less in the United States Senate or the House Judiciary Committee or Appropriations Committee or Armed Forced Committee or anything rhyming with Blummittee.

There are three types of R's these days. Segment One: Those folks who have left the GOP and now call themselves independents, though they'll vote for an R 98 percent of the time. Segment Two: Social Conservatives, i.e. Christian fundamentalists. Segment Three: Tea Partiers and Libertarians, with views that don't fit into the mainstream and cannot win electorally absent a miracle.

This is a losing coalition, if you can call it that. It is fated for doom. Maybe not right away, but it cannot last. It's like a meal of potato chips, french fries and mashed potatoes. They all make really good sides, but where's the beef?

3. A green one to folks who would seize this moment to launch a new populist party. Voter anger is at an all-time high. Few non-Republicans want the GOP back in power after Bush/Cheney/Rove ransacked the nation for eight years. Few non-Democrats want the current crop of liberals to remain in power. Usually, swing voters swing in a swinging way from one side of the political spectrum to the other, helping to keep the parties honest and the blood relatively fresh in D.C.

This time, the swingers are looking for another target of their affection. I'd just as soon have it be a real party with real ideas, as opposed to the TP's fantasy world in which we can eliminate Social Security and balance the budget by cutting off aid to Israel and letting the Middle East blow itself up.

A as-of-now fictitious Liberty Party, built on responsible levels of taxation, spending and involvement overseas while maintaining budgetary prudence and respecting civil liberties... that party would clean house this cycle. If only it existed. Right now. Yesterday now. (We Democrats are supposed to be that party, by the way. We really should let more people know.)

Anyway. The flags mean whatever I want them to mean. Like the terror threat levels, I use them at my convenience to accomplish my own ends.

Oh yeah, and 4. A rastafarian-looking one to me. Equal amounts of red, yellow and green. I am tempted to interpret the Tea Party's ascendancy as bad for the GOP, therefore as good for the country, but if these people get in office, God help us all. Also, I would be one of the folks easily wooed by a new party that promises new solutions to our looming budgetary problems, when in actuality, I just need to continue to support the D's, who are the party which seeks to champion the middle class, after all. Get a grip, John!

Give Me Taxes Or Give Me Death, Part II / 9-14-10

Well well, look who's not really serious about the deficit after all.

Republicans screaming "Save the tax cuts for the rich," that's who.

Summary: Bush tax cuts for everyone are set to expire at the end of the year. President Obama wants them to expire - for those individuals or families making more than $250k, but not for the middle class. He's fine with extending that portion of the tax cut. Republicans say they'll fight that course of action if congressional Democrats try it. The tax cuts will expire for everyone and tax rates will return to 1999 levels if no agreement is reached.

It is that simple. All other commentary is helpful, but not crucial. It comes down to, whose side are you on? And most the D's are, yet again, as almost always, on the side of 98 percent of the population, and all the R's are, yet again, as almost always, on the side of 2 percent of the population. (Follow the link. Do it.)

Looking at pure numbers, the President shouldn't have a terrible time selling his preference to Americans, except that his White House couldn't make itself look good if it invented cold fusion and brokered permanent peace in the Middle East while solving world hunger on the side.

All BHO has to say is something like this, right?

"We were a more prosperous, more responsible nation while President Clinton was in office. I believe the tax rates that were reasonable in the nineties remain reasonable now for our wealthiest citizens. George Bush's tax cuts were reckless and unnecessary, and should they survive, they would grow the deficit to an even more dangerous level. You can't have it both ways, my conservative friends. You can't spend the last two years harping on the deficit your party's presidents created, then decline to raise revenue when the opportunity presents itself in the natural way it has. Either you're for deficit reduction or against it. Time to choose. I've chosen my route, and I am proud of it, and I trust the American people to support a more responsible course of action than the one they've grown accustomed to seeing from their leaders.

"Therefore, you will join me in letting the tax cuts expire for only the wealthiest Americans. Or you will show yourselves to be the deficit enablers you have been for the past 30 years."

Instead, we got:

"But we’re still in this wrestling match with John Boehner and Mitch McConnell about the last 2 to 3 percent, where, on average, we’d be giving them $100,000 for people making a million dollars or more — which in and of itself would be OK, except to do it, we’d have to borrow $700 billion over the course of 10 years. And we just can’t afford it."

It's a start. But we're not in a wrestling match, Mr. President. A power struggle you should be winning, but aren't. Yet. Partly because there are five numbers in that sentence. And while I followed what you were saying, most people tuned you out after $100,000, before you got to the important part: the "we just can't afford it" part. That's the lead. People understand "we can't afford it." Nowadays, it rings true and urgent. Start there, mix in a jab about how Republicans only care about the deficit when it gives them an excuse to block legislation aimed to help the middle class, then give numbers for support.

(I sound arrogant, but mostly I'm just annoyed with how the facts and public opinion are on the D's side and yet the fight goes on.)

Here are some more encouraging responses from Democrats, all from Massachusetts.

Rep. Michael Capuano: “We either have to give Republicans everything they want or they’ll take their ball and go home? Well, go home then."

Rep. Jim McGovern: “I would be happy to listen to any ideas that my Republican friends have that won’t explode the deficit and which would actually help create jobs — like tax credits for small businesses and incentives for manufacturing.’’

Rep. Richard Neal, a key member of the House Ways and Means Committee: “If there’s a compromise that we can live with that protects the middle class, I’m open to it,’’ adding he wants to dedicate revenue from expiring tax cuts to begin to pay down Iraq war debt.

Let's see if THAT message gets out.

Two and Two / 9-10-10

Realistically, that's about what we can expect out of the Seattle Seahawks this season. Two wins, and two losses. Mmmm? What's that you say? And as for the other dozen games? Bpthfffff. Who knows?

I'm somewhat knowledgeable about sports, somewhat able to tell when a team is going to suck and when it's going to unsuck. Most the time.

This Hawks squad leaves me perplexed. Pergoogleplexed. (There are lots and lots of English-speaking people in the world, and lots of them say goofy things, so I'm going to conclude that very, very VERY sadly, there is a thirtysomething dad out there who has also invented that exact same word. He's a dork and a loser, whereas I am supercool.)

Who's to say how this season will be any different than the last, when they went 5-11 and looked exactly as bad as their record?

I'm to say that things are different.

The defense that looked like it was playing 8-on-11 last year will be better organized, more healthy and better in pass defense this season.

The reliable QB who got hurt and missed half the season will play more games this season.

The offensive line that lost 14 left tackles to injury last year (I joke, but the Hawks did use their fifth-string guy for a while) will perform better, with the development of new blood and improved coaching.

If those three improvements hold, and the division gets even weaker with Arizona's perceived step back (they have no quarterback or receivers left), then I could see Seattle picking up two or three more wins than last year.

But at the same time, there's the stunning turnover from '09 that weighs on my mind, and I find myself wondering, with half the 53-man roster gone, including important contributors like T.J. and Josh Wilson, will there be any semblance of continuity? And if, Tao forbid, anyone important gets re-hurt, could this team be two or three wins WORSE than last year?

And then, there are these 3,256 other questions left to be answered:

(I'll pick just 10.)

315. Will left tackle Russell Okung ever see the field this year?

666. Why the h*ll did our offensive line coach, widely regarded as the best in the business, quit a week before the opener?

777. What if everyone stays healthy? Is 10-6 out of the question?

1,002. Is Golden Tate for real?

1,003. Is Aaron Curry for real? Will he ever be?

1,974. Who exactly will be rushing the passer?

1,976. Who exactly will be rushing the football?

2,011. What if Whitehurst takes more snaps than Hasselbeck?

2,987. Is 8-8 enough to win the division?

3,256. You know, Jim Mora was a pretty good college coach too.

That's all I've got. Go Hawks!

EDIT after Sunday's season opener: The O-line looked decent, the receivers were better than good, we created a pass rush, Hasselbeck made only one mistake all day, lots of guys carried the ball in acceptable fashion, and the rest of the division looks awful. Carroll completely outcoached Singletary, and now I have to aggressively remind myself: IT'S JUST ONE GAME dude.

Give Me Taxes Or Give Me Death / 9-5-10

There are only three options left.

Either we:

1. Raise taxes to pay for our social programs;
2. Reduce entitlement benefits drastically for all citizens, beginning now;
3. Install some combination of 1. and 2.

All other paths, including our elected officials' perennial favorite, 4. Stay The Course, lead to financial ruin and the end of the nation as we know it.

I'm sick and tired of 4.

I want 1.

I want more taxes, and I want them yesterday. I want the rich to pay more than the non-rich, because the reverse is cruel and ineffective. And I want the media to expose relentlessly how lower taxes are only possible if we aggressively slash Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security and every other bit of spending the government undertakes.

There exists no option 5., called "Cut taxes and pretend we can save money in the great 'elsewhere' of the federal budget. Like foreign aid. Or 'waste.' Or earmarks. Or pork." That plan's not viable, not possible, and it's high time its predetermined failure was properly publicized. We can't have social programs and low taxes. And anyone who claims otherwise should be ridiculed as an untrustworthy power-hungry liar. There is no room in the budget for that reckless financial fantasy.

Anyone who claims we can trim government revenues without touching the social safety net's benefits is unfit to lead the country.

I have numbers.

Medicare/Medicaid costs 779 billion annually.
Social Security costs 694 billion.
National defense and wars set us back 680 billion.
Federal pensions: 195 billion.
Foreign aid checks in between 20 and 25 billion.
Earmarks? 17 billion.

(These stats can be found all over the Internet at all sorts of nonpartisan places. You can dislike them, but you can't quibble with them.)

If every earmark and all bits of foreign aid were eliminated from the budget every year, we'd make a hole in the overall debt of less than one-third of percent, which would be instantly gobbled up the following year by the interest on our new debt anyway. That's assuming we kept tax rates stable.

The government (federal and state) receives about $3.34 trillion annually in taxes. The debt has grown by at least $500 billion annually since 2003.

We need to pay more taxes, or we need to tell our seniors and our poor to forget half their entitlements.

Or we could not go to war, ever. Or defend ourselves against anyone, ever. Or provide any basic services, ever.

Only a combination of higher taxes and lower benefits, or simply higher taxes, will save the nation from insolvency, followed by skyrocketing interest rates, followed by partition of the United States of America.

I like America. I love America. I don't wish her death. I'd like my grandkids to be Americans, not Pacificans.

Either way, if we want the country we have, we're going to get higher taxes. And if that's going to happen, I'd just as soon we were the kind of people who support their citizens appropriately in their infirmity and old age.

I am completely, unapologetically requesting to have my taxes raised as soon as possible. Well, not just mine. Everyone's. Mine don't stand much of a chance in a cage match with a $20 trillion, $30 trillion, $60 trillion national debt. (We're at 13.4 trillion and counting.)

I'm not poor. I won't win some sort of personal mini-lottery from a system that ensures survival of the safety net.

I'm also not rich. I can't afford a lot more in taxes. I can barely afford the ones I have to pay right now.

I'm also not at all bothered by the prospect of system fraud. I believe we should catch welfare cheats and Social Security scammers, make them perform loads of community service and fine them heftily, because I'm willing to let the police chase down the guy who does 55 mph in my residential neighborhood rather than petitioning to have the speed limits revoked.

I am bothered, now to the point of seething anger, by the notion that our present borrowing levels and deficits are OK.

I am bothered tenfold by the notion that REDUCING the government's revenue is somehow the answer. Especially when a politician says -- lies -- that we can trim the fat from a bloated budget while cutting taxes. Unless that politician specifically calls for steep cuts in our entitlements programs alongside those irresponsible tax cuts (and I mean steep cuts, on the order of 30 or 40 percent), then you can assume said politician is misleading you.

It is critical that persons with megaphones call out those who would lead America to the financial precipice. And that we call out the media for not doing its job in this arena. Its job, in this case? Forcing politicians to address the issue, but not in generalities. Asking the questions that expose empty promises and unrealistic so-called solutions.

Is my anger visible enough?

Anyway. When my debt reaches dangerous levels, and it has done so at times because my career path has been... voluptuous, those are the times I curtail my spending, rework the terms of the debt if I can, and find ways to make more money. If I don't end up doing at least one of those things quite well (and probably two at a time are necessary), I run the risk of losing my house, my cars, then being forced to skip two meals a day, and even then, I might still be crushed under the consequences if I'm not careful.

While I realize personal finance guidelines don't always apply on a national scale, the moral from the previous paragraph is that there is a limit to how much debt you can handle without it crippling you. If one individual finds that tipping point, trips over it carelessly and is broken by the circumstances, that's a tragedy. If that were to happen to a whole country, we'd need a new word to describe such an inconceivable event.

Why would we even want to come close to that point?

I will enthusiastically support an influential politician who realizes I can handle the truth, then tells me something like this:

"The days of easy entitlements are over. Financial realities dictate that we must cut benefits and raise taxes, or risk our very sovereignty. Prudence dictates that we start down that road sooner rather than later.

"I wish it were not so, but wishing won't make the facts go away. I am no longer willing to pretend that a crisis does not loom on the horizon. Please join me in an era of sacrifice that will strengthen the long-term financial prospects of the Unites States of America while preserving the principles for which she stands.

"If you want to be mad at me for telling it like it is, go ahead. But I'm going to be part of the solution, not the problem, and the solution incorporates, without a doubt, higher taxes for all Americans. My hope is that you, whether you consider yourself liberal or conservative or in between or neither, that you will journey with me down the road that saves our very nation. Thank you."

Of course, I'm not holding my breath.

So I wrote this little novel / 9-4-10

Those of you who speak with me on a semi-consistent basis know I finished my first novel last summer and have been resting on my laurels ever since. Kidding aside, I'm proud of that accomplishment. The book is short, only about 20,000 words, which makes it really just a novella or a long short story, but no apologies; it feels quite good to finish a project of any length. (And any quality.)

So I thought I'd post a chapter here. By clicking on that there link, you're sent to writerscafe.org, a website designed to be a community of creative minds. The chapter you'll read there is the second one, in which our protagonist experiences an event that shapes his outlook on life.

Later on, in subsequent super-secret double-dog-dare chapters, he interacts with girls, both two- and three-dimensional. (They say you should write about what you know. To which I clearly say, "Yeah right.")

In any case, the story, overall, it's about a guy. He's doing his best to act normal in every situation. Every situation. It comes easy sometimes... and sometimes it doesn't. His life story, from age seven all the way up to his imminent death, is told with the aid of his personal guardian angel. Duh.

The book is titled

"Uncommonly Normal

or

Extra Ordinary."

Sometime soon, I'll self-publish it and/or make it available for downloading. Once I finish tweaking the second half of it to death.

That's all for now. Back to our regularly scheduled programming. (Blogramming?) A long-promised post on the spiritual value of music is near completion and will soon be subject to your usual mockery.

I Knew I Picked the Right Guy / 9-1-10

I haven't posted on the Depressors, I mean, the Mariners, in a while.

But this upcoming chart I got from one of my favorite sites, ussmariner, and I have to brazenly steal it and bring it to you, my fellow sufferers.

The next time I hear someone complain that Ichiro, of all people, is bringing the team down, I swear I will plead temporary insanity at the resulting trial.

See what I mean:

(Each line includes the batter's spot in the lineup, then how that Mariner has performed, then how the league has performed on average, and the difference.)

Batting average

1. / .308 / .269 / +.039

2. / .240 / .265 / -.025

3. / .221 / .275 / -.054

4. / .244 / .276 / -.032

5. / .210 / .269 / -.059

6. / .244 / .255 / -.011

7. / .206 / .250 / -.044

8. / .212 / .242 / -.030

9. / .222 / .244 / -.022

On-Base Percentage

1. / .360 / .332 / +.028

2. / .328 / .335 / -.007

3. / .303 / .355 / -.052

4. / .293 / .349 / -.056

5. / .262 / .339 / -.077

6. / .311 / .318 / -.007

7. / .284 / .315 / -.031

8. / .283 / .305 / -.022

9. / .271 / .302 / -.031

Slugging Percentage

1. / .391 / .366 / +.025

2. / .285 / .402 / -.117

3. / .374 / .441 / -.067

4. / .384 / .476 / -.092

5. / .302 / .450 / -.148

6. / .376 / .415 / -.039

7. / .281 / .399 / -.118

8. / .345 / .379 / -.034

9. / .318 / .353 / -.035

I could comment further on the historically stinkacious abhorrency of some of these stats, but the pluses and minuses kind of speak for themselves, no?

Abort, Retry, Fail? Your Choice / 9-1-10

Those old PC's from the turn of the decade -- no, not that decade... or that one... yes, THAT one -- had a tendency to, um, crash from time to time. (That's been fixed in the last 20 years, right? Right?) When a person (we'll call him "Me") would ask the computer, nicely, to execute an illegal order, the computer (we'll call it "Satan") would respond with a deceptively unpleasant multiple-choice conundrum:

"Abort, Retry, Fail?"

Never, "OK, Great, Jawohl!" No. Just three bad options.

Abort: Give up. Kill the operation before it even has a chance to flourish.

Retry: Yeah right, that'll work.

Fail: Basically computer language for "I win, you lose. Again." What next, "Master"?

Boy, nerdy computer jokes from the 80's sure do make a perfect lead-in for a subject as lighthearted and airy as abortion, don't they?

According to polls spanning 35 years, 47 percent of Americans currently describe themselves as "pro-life." 45 percent, meanwhile describe themselves as pro-choice. (I think maybe the other 8 percent call themselves either "Stupid-from-the-T-shirt-I'm-with-Stupid" or "swing-voters" or "pro-indecision" or "pro-go-f*ck-yourself.") Not only that, but the trend seems to unmistakably indicate a steady movement toward the pro-life position over the course of the last 15 years.

So yeah, here's the thing: I dispute the facts contained within the polling. (Maybe I even wreckon they aren't true.)

I would like, instead, to submit the completely unverifiable opinion that 95 percent of American parents are pro-choice. If the question is asked the right way.

Maybe if it were phrased a little like this:

"Do you support or oppose the opportunity for your 14-year-old daughter to end a pregnancy resulting from rape committed by a family member?"

Go ahead. Oppose that one. Try.

Try harder, maybe?

No? You'd like her to make up her own mind here? You think the molested kid ought to have a say in the outcome? Maybe you believe she should make the decision as to whether the fetus is brought to term? What's that, you say? You'd like her to "choose" whether to keep the baby?

Yeah, I thought so. It will not only take a special type of person not only to suggest that your daughter give birth in that situation, but then to MANDATE it... that's cold and harsh. That's not even tough love. That's, what, just tough, I guess.

You can call me on my extremism, and say that I'm using the most far-fetched example to support my case. I freely admit I am. You pose the question, "Should rich snotty promiscuous women living in Manhattan be entitled to the right to casually murder their viable unborn children, up to thirty seconds before delivery, and celebrate with martinis afterward?" and you're probably going to get something less than 95 percent support. Do they even allow negative numbers in polls?

But you make it personal -- your kid is the one seeking deliverance from an impossible situation -- and I confidently assert that almost every parent suddenly (miraculously) converts to the pro-choice camp.

Not because abortion is SO COOL. But because there comes a point where ideology fails, and you have to resort to unconditional compassion for your living flesh and blood, over whatever ideals you might subscribe to in your ivory towers. And because you can't really make this decision for her. And if you can't make it for her, you necessarily support her right to make it for herself. Hey: You've just earned your pro-choice merit badge.

You can call abortion "murder" or "the easy way out" or "a coward's choice" all you want, until it's your kid facing that dilemma.

Even my friend "Donald" (not his real name), who claims he and his wife have agreed in advance to not abort a child resulting from her being raped, has to consider whether he'd really tell his teenage daughter that she's not permitted to choose in that case.

(That's a real conversation I've had recently. "Don" sticks to his pro-life guns -- my word, there's an exquisite phrase -- even when his wife is hypothetically victimized. This is laudable. If abortion is murder, it's murder no matter the circumstances, and murder cannot be condoned. I respect and almost admire Don's ethical consistency. He's a good guy, deep down, even if like all of us political animals, he suffers from a lack of perspective at times.)

Anyway. Other people have made this exact same point before, no doubt. Some probably more eloquently than me, and some probably even more sarcastically than me. (No, I think that's possible. Barely. But it can be done, with Hulkulean effort.) But this is the first time I've gone down this road, so thanks for bearing with me.

If it's you or your kid, do you support the right to choose abortion? In any case? In some cases? And if you think you wouldn't go the abortion route in the end, do you support other women having the same choice? Or do you believe that life begins at or near conception every time, in which case your pregnant daughter's out of luck... or even then, do you allow her the chance to see things differently?

Parting thought, then: Instead of viewing abortions as expensive birth control for the callous and the careless, how about we spend some time thinking of them as painful choices for our daughters and sons?

(Maybe I should have been a preacher after all.)