Used to be that Google would allow pro-abortion groups to advertise with them, but not anti-abortion ones.  The threat of legal action in the UK has shown them the error of their ways.

Christian and other religious groups opposed to abortion were allowed to advertise on Google for the first time from today, after the search engine capitulated in the face of a legal challenge.

Google had banned pro-life religious groups from buying adverts against search terms such as “abortion” and “abortion help” but was forced to abandon its policy after it was accused of breaching equalities legislation.

The challenge was brought by the Christian Institute, a cross-denominational pressure group, who said that Google’s change of heart was an acknowledgement of the rights of everybody to hold an opinion on the subject.

Mike Judge from the Christian Institute said: “Google were taking adverts from pro-abortion groups, and our view is that was a free speech issue. What we want to do is set out the acts in a pretty factual and pretty sensible way”.

Google had been taken to court by the Christian Institute earlier in the year, arguing that its policy was in breach of the Equalities Act of 2006. Initially, Google said it would fight in the courts, but changed its mind over the summer. Its new policy applies globally.

Acknowledging that the issue of abortion was “an emotive subject”, Google said that it reconsidered its policy following the Christian Institute’s challenge, and said it would be “creating a level playing field and enabling religious associations to place ads on abortion in a factual way”.

The United Nations continues to get stonewalled by Iran, and intends to commit the situation to further study.  In the meantime, there’s good evidence that Iran’s nuclear program is more than just for “peaceful purposes”.

Iran is continuing to stall on UN investigation into its disputed nuclear programme, refusing to provide access to documentation, individuals or sites which could reveal the true nature of its activities, the UN atomic watchdog said Monday.

Furthermore, the Islamic republic is defying international demands to suspend uranium enrichment, a process that can be used to make the fissile material for an atomic bomb, the International Atomic Energy Agency said.

The United States warned Iran could now face possible new sanctions in the wake of the IAEA’s findings.

The agency complained that it was making little headway in its investigation into allegations that Tehran had, in the past, been involved in studies to make a nuclear warhead.

The IAEA “regrettably has not been able to make any substantive progress on the alleged studies and other associated key remaining issues which remain of serious concern,” said the restricted report, a copy of which was obtained by AFP.

Read the rest of this entry

• Bookshelf ideas.
• Medieval actuarial practice.
• One of the things the Dems can do that the GOP can’t.
• A book by a blogger.
• Who squashed that car? Oh. It was built that way.
• Musing on Jerusalem.
• Wallpaper links.
• Is the economy bad? Perhaps not so much. Oh, and my comment was still lost, but my reply to Mr Kuznicki’s question is to buy index funds and yes, buy them now too, dollar cost averaging works.

One of the primary talking points of Mr Obama’s campaign is that what is needed (as a change) are “smart” policies. But there is a fundamental problem with that, it’s wrong. Let’s start with this quote which is in line with what I’m trying to say:

America’s regulatory structure is mostly the child of the Progressive Era, when well meaning, well educated protestants thought that they could save the world by putting bright technocrats from the right kind of families in charge of the messy, sprawling economy and make it clean and tidy and safe.  That sounds sarcastic, but it wasn’t entirely unreasonable. The first great victory of the Progressive Era, the major revolutions in public health, did just that:  made life safer and nicer for everyone, with minimal inconvenience, by putting experts in charge of things like sanitation and quarantine and the water supply.  Before Hayek, we didn’t have all that much reason to think that this feat couldn’t be repeated elsewhere.

But now we have had Hayek, and the failure of the Soviet Union, and a hundred other ways to learn that in any sizeable economy, the information problem is simply too big.  Even leaving out the various incentive problems ably detailed by both Marxists and public choice economics, a well-intentioned bureaucrat cannot know enough about what’s going on in the world to thoroughly manage even a static economy, much less one that has to cope with millions of constant changes, from hurricanes to new babies.

In the context of the current financial kerfuffle, an oft noted claim has been that what is needed is “better smarter regulation.” As if that will somehow so fundamentally change the market structure so that risk will not be taken and occasionally those risk takers will overreach. Economic and social management cannot be done by “being smarter” as the complexity the problem means it is intractable. The only solution is to yield control. The setting of policy has to be done by the millions not by the hundreds of experts. Individually those experts may be nominally smarter than a great majority (but likely not all) of the millions for whom their decisions are replacing. But the complexity of modern society means the problems and issues cannot be comprehended by any single or group of experts no matter how smart they are.

What is not needed is an Executive who believes he can either by himself or a counciliar consensus of “experts” figure out the “solution” to the problems that will face him. This is exactly the opposite of what we need. We don’t need a smart leader who thinks (or knows) he’s smart and is seeking an inteligent solution. We need a wise leader who knows he isn’t smart and the best he can do is to suggest a direction and perceptive enough to notice which of us have figured out a “better way” and pass the word.

On fault I have with many progressive/liberals blogs. By and large they fence with the wrong parties. They comment on and discuss conservatism by arguing with the current proxies, such as Mr Bush, Mr McCain and the host of pundits. Who they don’t attack or discuss are the ideas and arguments of the actual conservative foundational thinkers, that is economists like Friedman, Mises, and Hayek, or the social theories of Nisbet or Solzhenitsyn or the political ideas of Jouvenel and so on. On this part, I’d like to make it a more general plea. Liberals (Progressives) and Conservatives alike mourn the fact that the “other side” is bereft of “ideas”. If any of you out there know of a liberal or progressive blog offering counter arguments to those like Friedman, Hayek, Solzhenitsyn and so on, please let know. I’m starving for that sort of encounter in the ’sphere.

…by Francis Cianfrocca, aka “Blackhedd”, at Redstate.  His explanation of the situation that the Fed found themselves in with regard to AIG is, for the most part, readable by a non-financier. 

He also addresses the anger some are feeling about the government bailing out another huge firm, and against the top brass of that company.  In addition, he touches on how this affects free-market capitalists and the eggshells the government is now walking on in this regard.

A good read.

First, the New York Times, from July 3, 1984, on Geraldine Ferraro and the question of experience.

Where is it written that only senators are qualified to become President? Surely Ronald Reagan does not subscribe to that maxim. Or where is it written that mere representatives aren’t qualified, like Geraldine Ferraro of Queens? Representative Morris Udall, who lost New Hampshire to Jimmy Carter by a hair in 1976, must surely disagree. So must a longtime Michigan Congressman named Gerald Ford. Where is it written that governors and mayors, like Dianne Feinstein of San Francisco, are too local, too provincial? That didn’t stop Richard Nixon from picking Spiro Agnew, a suburban politician who became Governor of Maryland. Remember the main foreign affairs credential of Georgia’s Governor Carter: He was a member of the Trilateral Commission. Presidential candidates have always chosen their running mates for reasons of practical demography, not idealized democracy. One might even say demography is destiny: this candidate was chosen because he could deliver Texas, that one because he personified rectitude, that one because he appealed to the other wing of the party. On occasion, Americans find it necessary to rationalize this rough-and-ready process. What a splendid system, we say to ourselves, that takes little-known men, tests them in high office and permits them to grow into statesmen. This rationale may even be right, but then let it also be fair. Why shouldn’t a little-known woman have the same opportunity to grow? We may even be gradually elevating our standards for choosing Vice Presidential candidates. But that should be done fairly, also. Meanwhile, the indispensable credential for a Woman Who is the same as for a Man Who – one who helps the ticket.

(Emphasis added by NewsBusters.org.) 

And now, the New York Times, from September 11, 2008, on Sarah Palin and the question of experience.

It is well past time for Sarah Palin, Republican running mate, governor of Alaska and self-proclaimed reformer, to fill in for the voting public the gaping blanks about her record and qualifications to be vice president.

[…]

Voters have a right to hear Ms. Palin explain in detail her qualifications to be standby president with no national or foreign policy experience. More is required of any serious candidate for such a high office than one interview with questions put by one selected source.

The paper of record can’t seem to get its story straight.  Any wonder the old media is losing its credibility?

• That “gang” has a lot of funny praxis.
• Dumb Dem memes.
• Fiorina on Palin … what she didn’t add was that none of the four are “qualifed” to run a large corporation. The probably aren’t qualified to perform surgery either.
• Selfishness now a virtue. How long will it take before all of the 8 cardinal sins are touted as virtues?
• Suu Kyi on a IV now.
• Mr Obama calls the kettle black. The left notes Mr Obama’s latest sally, alas he doesn’t practice what he preaches as he there is a sizeable discrepency between female and male staffers in his campaign and in Mr McCain’s campaign, women on average make more. Oops.
• Mr Obama and the kindergarden sex program … the facts.

From Bruce McQuain at Q&O, comes a quiz:

1.  Who identified and tried to fix what presently ails Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae 5 years ago?

2.  Who opposed the plan, saying they were not in any kind of financial crisis?

McQuain gives a hint as to what the answer to #2 is; the same folks who say Social Security is just fine, and Medicare is doing well, too.  Bruce has a link to a contemporaneous New York Times article that explains the proposal and the smack down. 

Remember this when Dem…er, certain politicians try to place blame for this and try to use it as a campaign gimmick.

Everybody says they want more politicians in office that fight corruption, wasteful spending, and are willing to go after their own party to do it.  Yet Sarah Palin is continually talked down by Democrats, who’s concerns about corruption seem to have taken a holiday.

Now comes word that their concerns about bipartisanship — about both parties working together — is also on vacation.

Sen. John McCain’s record of working with Democrats easily outstrips Sen. Barack Obama’s efforts with Republicans, according to an analysis by The Washington Times of their legislative records.

Whether looking at bills they have led on or bills they have signed onto, Mr. McCain has reached across the aisle far more frequently and with more members than Mr. Obama since the latter came to the Senate in 2005.

In fact, by several measures, Mr. McCain has been more likely to team up with Democrats than with members of his own party. Democrats made up 55 percent of his political partners over the last two Congresses, including on the tough issues of campaign finance and global warming. For Mr. Obama, Republicans were only 13 percent of his co-sponsors during his time in the Senate, and he had his biggest bipartisan successes on noncontroversial measures, such as issuing a postage stamp in honor of civil rights icon Rosa Parks.

Democrats say that they want bipartisanship, and indeed have praised McCain’s overtures to them in the past.  But all of a sudden, that seems to be ancient history.

Now, I will say that I’m not entirely a big fan of some of McCain’s bipartisanship. McCain-Feingold “First Amendment Abridgement Act” (my name for it, not theirs) is a prime example.  But outside the campaign season, politician and voter alike keep complaining about how all this bickering in Washington keeps them from doing “the people’s business”.  But here we are, with the most bipartisan politician for President I think we may have ever seen, and suddenly Democrats have lost all interest in it.

Oh, and Sarah Palin is also quite adept with respect to bipartisanship, getting a 75% job approval rating from Alaska Democrats.  Congress can only dream of such high numbers.

Guess “bipartisanship” just means “doing what I want you to do”.

The media has seemed to take Obama’s side in McCain’s ad accusing the Democrat of signing a bill that would bring “comprehensive sex education” to children as young as kindergarten.  The Obama camp called this a lie, that it was mostly about inappropriate touching at the young ages, and the media have played it that way.

Except that, as Byron York notes, when you actually read the bill and speak to its cosponsors (well, the one he could ever contact about it), that’s not necessarily the case.  Now, Obama may have had his own reasons for voting for the bill, but as York summarizes:

But we do know that the bill itself was much more than that. The fact is, the bill’s intention was to mandate that issues like contraception and the prevention of sexually-transmitted diseases be included in sex-education classes for children before the sixth grade, and as early as kindergarten.  Obama’s defenders may howl, but the bill is what it is.

Read the whole thing(tm).

• Wordplay for your morning (or whatever time you read this).
• Left vs Right and the extremes.
• al-Qaeda … imploding?
• An add regarding Mr Obama and his pro-abortion stance. Also, comparing candidates openness.
• In the wake of the recent big bank kerfuffle … “high test hooey” from Mr Obama. On the banking thing again … why it’s really a good thing.
• Kill them? Why not just change the channel? Is that really too difficult?
• Very cute.

The Corner today points out a interesting survey done by David Frum. The Corner poster, Jim Manzi does some additional statistical musing and comes to a similar conclusion. However, this should cause a lot of consternation and navel gazing by anyone considers right vs left or conservative vs liberal a straightforward set piece ideological struggle. Consider that post in the light of two additional pieces of data:

1. This divide has been stable for some time.
2. and locally speaking therefore the policies set in place must therefore be supporting the stability of that divide.

The problem is that the Democratic states have been espousing policies that value equality and should be normalizing that which divides us. The GOP is ostensibly the free market party and supports business more and therefore should one would expect would widen the divide between the haves and have-nots.

However, the demographic data contradicts this. The Democrats are stronger in areas that are more divided and the GOP in areas with more equality. If this is stable … then there is an essential problem here.

Which means one might conclude that GOP policies do more to reduce the divisions between us and the Democrats reinforce them. So either politicians of both parties are lying all the time of that everyone is wrong about policy. That is, the policies that are assumed to reduce division in fact acerbate them and which are assumed to divide, don’t.

To restate, if you the reason you are a Democrat is because of the stated desired results that the Democratic platform espouses, you should switch parties because the actual entrenched policies of the other side empirically do what you find desirable and the policies of your party are empirically harmful. If on the other hand, you are rich and you want to get richer (and if it’s at the “expense” of the other guy you don’t care) then you should vote Democratic, because it is their policies which have been most effective at achieving that goal.

Greenpeace vandals have been cleared in the UK of damaging a coal station.  It’s not that they didn’t do it, it’s that the jury thought they were justified.

The threat of global warming is so great that campaigners were justified in causing more than £35,000 [US$ 62,594] worth of damage to a coal-fired power station, a jury decided yesterday. In a verdict that will have shocked ministers and energy companies the jury at Maidstone Crown Court cleared six Greenpeace activists of criminal damage.

Jurors accepted defence arguments that the six had a “lawful excuse” to damage property at Kingsnorth power station in Kent to prevent even greater damage caused by climate change. The defence of “lawful excuse” under the Criminal Damage Act 1971 allows damage to be caused to property to prevent even greater damage – such as breaking down the door of a burning house to tackle a fire.

This act of vandalism was just graffiti…this time.  And Greenpeace has now been given license to cost power companies (and the people they service) $62,000 at a shot as many times as they want without repercussions.  That is incredibly foolish.