The state of the culture

When she's right, she's right:

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says in a new interview that she can’t stand “whining” by women who are unhappy with the work and family choices they’ve made in life and complain that they have no options.

This sounds about right:

The inaugural results of a new Gallup question -- posed to more than 120,000 U.S. adults thus far -- shows that 3.4% say "yes" when asked if they identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender.

[. . .]

The search for perfect fairness marches on. French President Francois Hollande has proposed banning homework as part of a school reform package:

French schoolkids already put in long school days: 8:30 to 4:30 or longer. But that's not Hollande's concern. In fact, he wants to extend the school week from 4 days to 4.5.

Both jittery church goers and smug atheists are making too much out of that Pew poll revealing that a fifth of the U.S. public, and a third of adults under 30, aren't affiliated with any religion today, a 15 percent increase in the past five years:

Oh, come on:

Think twice the next time you play a videogame or surf the Net: ‘Internet-use disorder’ is set to be added to the list of mental illnesses in the worldwide psychiatric manual. Kids are identified as being especially at risk.

This is what I call useful groundbreaking research:

Funny, this not only does not make me feel satisfied, it takes me right to Rolling Stones territory:

Indianapolis wears a sly smile on its face this morning.

Do you notice Indy residents seem a little happier and maybe a little more flirtatious?

I think it's about to be a lot of fun to be a screwup student in New York City but there are tough times ahead for serious students who might actually want to learn something. The school system is easing its discipline code so that smoking, cursing and cutting classes will no longer result in a suspension. This is just fine with "education law specialist" Nelson Mar, who says the adjustments will be a "great first step" in changing school culture.

Civilization returns to Chicago:

I found this to be an astonishing claim: "New study says full-frontal nudity on prime-time TV up 6,300 percent over last year." Did TV suddenly start running porn movies while I was in the kitchen getting a sandwich? But then we see these examples of what is counted: