these statements have not been evaluated by the FDA

By now many of you have undoubtedly seen this ad:

Rep. Sam Graves (R-MO) attacks Kay Barnes, accusing her of supporting “San Francisco-style values”

Now, I am not a political scientist, but I can think of several reasons why this ad bodes very, very, very poorly for Rep. Graves’s re-election campaign.

1. The ad talks about all of Kay Barnes’s fundraisers while showing people dancing, toasting with champagne, laughing, and generally enjoying life. The voiceover then goes on to talk about how those are not “our values”. I’ll admit, this is weak, but does that mean that Sam Graves is opposed to dancing and champagne and laughter?
2. The ad stays far, far, far away from Kay Barnes’s record as mayor of Kansas City. Why? If Barnes had no record, he could spend his time talking about her inexperience; if she was corrupt, he could go on about that; if she was ineffective, then he could talk about that. Instead, he has to resort to “she’s friends with Nancy Pelosi!”.
3. The ad stays even further away from Sam Graves’s record in Congress; it never even mentions that Rep. Graves is the incumbent in this race. Additionally, the ad appears to be geared at the rural sections of the district (in the northwestern corner of Missouri), especially with all that talk of “our values” and “big city mayor”. So, to my line of thinking, Sam Graves would rather rural Missourians think about hot gay sex than about his record on the war, the economy, Social Security, health care, education, or any of those other, lesser, issues.
4. And finally, my favorite… It’s May. Kay Barnes is still facing a primary in August; assuming she wins, the general election is in November (six months away). And Sam Graves is already going negative. Normally, we don’t see general-election attack ads until late September or early October, when candidates start getting really concerned about how well their opponents come across (or when their respective opponents have just attacked them). If Sam Graves is that concerned about Kay Barnes this early in the race, then it’s going to be a looooooong road to November for him.

I’m quite pleased to report that Kay Barnes’s campaign has responded well. (Love that tone, too. “Seriously? That’s the best you can do?”)

FWIW, Graves’s record is all here and here. Links will take you further back in his record.

You can also see where each candidate is getting campaign funding. I strongly suggest you look up Rep. Graves’s committee assignments after you see which industries are giving him the most money.

USA Today just published results of a poll showing widespread opposition to government regulation of same-sex marriages. 63% of respondents in this poll called same-sex marriage a “private decision”, and only 33% think the government should be able to pass laws against same-sex marriage. This majority holds in all age groups except 65+ (and even then, the 3% margin of error brings it to an even split); it holds in every region; it holds in every income level.

Unsurprisingly, a majority of Republicans, self-identified conservatives, and regular churchgoers still think the government has a right to pass laws prohibiting same-sex marriage. What’s surprising to me, though, is that this majority is not what it once was: 56% each among Republicans and those who attend weekly church services, and only 54% among conservatives.

What is even more surprising: 4% think the government should be able to pass laws prohibiting interracial marriages, and 2% think the government should be able to prevent interreligious marriages. Seriously? Interreligious marriages are one of the reasons (heterosexual) couples can get hitched at the courthouse: your church may say no, but as long as you meet the other criteria the government doesn’t care if you’re Catholic and your beloved is Protestant.

The Times of India has a brief article about the major contributor to the Gujarati Wikipedia and Gujarati Wiktionary. (Gujarati is the language of Gujarat, an Indian state in the northwest of the country.) As the article notes, the primary contributor (Yann Forget, who recently ran for the WMF board ) is not Indian, but French; there’s a charming story about how he came to know the Gujarati language, but I will defer to the article for that.

I’m not intimately familiar with every WMF wiki, but several smaller ones seem to have a similar story as the Gujarati wikis mentioned here — all the work is done by one or two very dedicated individuals, and if that core leaves, the project goes silent. Of course, we can blame much of this on either issues of scale (few speakers), issues of availability (few people with free time and decent Internet connectivity), or some combination of the two. Sadly, those issues are beyond the scope of the Wikimedia Foundation.

The next best hope for some smaller wikis, then, would be emigrants, expatriates, students, and foreigners. The Gujarati wikis, for example, might benefit from Gujarati speakers who live in the UK (especially around London, Leicester, Coventry, and Bradford). To get these people to contribute to Gujarati wikis, though, they first need to know that Gujarati wikis exist. (The Times of India article helps with that, though they could have at least posted a link.) On top of this, UK-based Gujarati speakers need to be nudged to spend more time on the Gujarati wikis than on the English Wikipedia; after all, the Gujarati wikis need a lot more help than en.wp.

It doesn’t help, of course, that the North American press tends to focus on the English Wikipedia. (Seriously, the only non-enwiki mentions I’ve seen lately have been about dewiki’s flagged revisions test; dewiki’s adventures in paper publishing; the ten millionth Wikipedia article, which was posted in huwiki; and an occasional en.wikinews story that “makes it” to the mainstream media.) Whenever possible, we should be reminding the press about the existence of other wikis — and not just the English projects!

Congressman Paul Broun, a Republican from Georgia, has introduced legislation that would restrict sales of “men’s magazines” on military bases.

I guess things must be mighty boring up on Capitol Hill now that world peace has broken out, the economic and energy and climate crises have all been fixed, and every human has adequate health care and education.

Seriously, though, it’s pretty sad that a member of the Congress of the United States places such a high priority on keeping servicemembers from becoming aroused. Maybe his constituents should pay attention to what Rep. Broun isn’t working on in Congress when it comes time to re-elect him in November.

(hat tip to Joe.My.God)

Busy week ahead. Tonight’s a final in theology, my least favorite class in a long time. Tomorrow night I have the option of taking a final in psychology, but I’m skipping it because the prof is dropping our lowest individual test score and because I have 78/80 on every single test so far (which is kind of creepy). Wednesday I have to appear before a judge to see if s/he wants me to serve on a grand jury; we also have a chorus-small-group rehearsal. Thursday morning I have an appointment to get a permanent crown on tooth #12; this will finish the work on that tooth. And this weekend, Fred and I are going to Chicago for a Brotherhood of the Phoenix event.

More later, if I get a chance.