What Caught My Eye This Week - Magazine Edition

Newsweek

Iran and Iraq - The National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), representing the concensus view of all 16 US intelligence agencies, says Iranian or Syrian involvement [in Iraq] is "not likely to be a major driver of violence." US officials maintain that Iran is helping Iraqi Shia insurgents build bombs. Meanwhile, other US officials familiar with unpublished intel said evidence of Iranian involvement is "ambiguous". I may be going out on a limb here, but maybe, just maybe, the term 'ambiguous' is a politically friendly was of saying 'utterly and completely baseless and lacking in any actual factual evidence'. I'm not suggesting that our intelligence is necessarily wrong. After all, we have such as successful track record so far in the Middle East.

Prosti-tots - The new term being tossed around to describe a new generation of "young girls who dress like tarts, live for Dolce & Gabbana purses and can neither spell nor define such words as 'adequate'". The article goes on to say, "A lot of parents are wondering about the effect of our racy popular may have on their kids and the women they would like their girls to become."

Here's my favorite excerpt...

"The answers are likely to lie in yet another question: where do our children learn values? Here's a radical idea--at home, where they always have."

Yeah, that is a radical idea.

Business Week

Ford Taurus - Ford executives have decided to resurrect the Taurus name just four months after stopping Taurus production. Ford plans to rename the Ford Five Hundred sedan to Taurus based on the fact that the Five Hundred has 30% name recognition versus 90% for the Taurus. A familiar cliche comes to mind here, "You can put lipstick on a pig, but you still have a pig." I may be thinking outside the box on this one, but how about building a better car, one that people would actually want to buy?

The Week

Vaccines - The American Prospect Online reports that a new vaccine can prevent millions of cases of cervical cancer--but only if it reaches those most at risk. State legislatures are now debating whether to require school-age girls to be vaccinated agains the sexually transmitted diseases which causes cervical cancer. Conservative Christian groups oppose the vaccine on the grounds that removing the threat of genital warts and cancer, would encourage teens to engage in premarital sex. Oh, I don't know, we could still threaten to stone them to death or make them wear scarlett letters on their clothes.

Virility - Bloomberg.com reports that 18% of American men cannot get it up, alleging that sedantary lifestyle and bad diet are to blame. Of the more than 2100 men who responding to a national health questionnaire, nealry one in five said that they were either 'sometimes able' or 'never able' to hold an erection through intercourse. That includes 5% of men in their 20s and 30s, 15% in their 40s and 50s, 44% in their 60s and 70% in their 70s or older. I'd like to know who sponsored the study. Maybe Viagra or Cialis? As for the age groupings, heck, if I still have control of any of my body functions into my 70s, I'm claiming victory.