Hot on the heels of last week's contraceptive debate comes a fresh piece of news that is bound to stir the pot among condom fans and haters alike:
Condom manufacturer LifeStyles is courting Miley Cyrus, Hannah Montana star and one-time Vanity Fair pinup, to be its new spokesgirl.
Cyrus seems an unlikely candidate. At 15 she is younger than the age of consent in most states and once infamously (and unoriginally) proclaimed her intention to stay a virgin until marriage.
Fearing for the already doomed reputation of the Hannah Montana brand's flagship starlet, the Cyrus camp has already denied that any deal with LifeStyles is in the works, and it's pretty much certain that they wouldn't accept it anyway.
Despite LifeStyles' offering of $1 million and a lifetime supply of prophylactics to secure Cyrus as the face of safe sex, we're probably never going to see Billy Ray's baby on the side of a box of condoms.
This, to me, seems like a huge loss. Not only for Cyrus (lifetime supply!) but also for young girls who look to her as a trendsetter for both clothes and behavior.
Modes of sexual practice seem to follow a trickle-down pattern, with women passing on their wisdom and advice to those less in-the-know.
Miley Cyrus, role model to millions, is therefore in an ideal position to promote a healthier example for young women who are probably already contemplating or having some form of sex.
Her celebrity endorsement could be the first since that of Lisa "Left Eye" Lopes to significantly de-stigmatize condoms among teens and reverse some of the bad PR they've been receiving lately.
As we've seen, teen celebrities' vows of virginity are hardly guaranteed to stave off unplanned pregnancies, nor have they proven inspirational among their peers.
And it's unsurprising that the threat of pregnancy and STDs doesn't stop teens from having sex altogether when it doesn't even stop grown Jezebels who should know better.
So what are Miley's people afraid of? That she's too young to know about condoms?
I see denying contraceptive education to teens as akin to preventing alcoholics from entering rehab just because they're too young to legally drink: blind adherence to an ideology that's being flouted at large.
Do they fear for her future earning power? It's unlikely that Cyrus' endorsement of LifeStyles would derail her seemingly unflappable star.
Her career would continue, albeit probably not with Disney, which has reacted less than happily to displays of sexuality by its young stars in the past.
And what's more, Cyrus would be free to keep her promise of premarital chastity (though that, too, seems doubtful).
Cyrus' promotion of safe sex needn't be a promotion of licentiousness. It should simply prompt young women to be more scrupulous and pragmatic about the choices they make, encouraging longer, healthier lives among those who've already made up their minds to have sex.
An attack on Iran, which Israeli and Bush administration officials appear set to carry out if Iranian uranium enrichment is not halted, would ignite a regional war in the Middle East and lead to economic collapse and political upheaval in the United States.
“In short and simple terms, we would be plunged into a depression that would make the Great Depression of the 1930s in which I spent my childhood look like boom times,” said William R. Polk, former professor of history at the University of Chicago and a member of the Policy Planning Council under President Kennedy.
“Industries would fail, banks would collapse, government revenues would dry up, universities would have to close, health care, even as limited as it now is for roughly 75 million Americans, would virtually cease. In short, something like [what] the South suffered at the end of the Civil War would plague the country.”
It's looking really bad. but , even now, the two presumptive major party presidential candidates are talking about everything but this deepening crisis.
They are debating terrorists and Afghanistan and how to leave Iraq without leaving, but not the reality that so many Americans are living with: a squeeze that is leaving so many of us broke, deeper and deeper in debt and disgusted.
Until now, the doom and gloomsters were mostly to be found in the margins, in financial blogs or in the campaigns of Ron Paul, Ralph Nader or the Greens.
The mainstream media has often been looking the other way and mostly downplaying the unfolding disaster.
Even as foreclosures double, and the price of gas and food rises sharply, it's been business as usual on the business pages, and among the liberal political pundits who would rather debate the cover of the New Yorker than the growing desperation of so many Americans.
Afghanistan is the 'good war,' aimed at 'those who attacked us,' in the words of columnist Frank Rich. It is 'the war of necessity,' asserts the New York Times, to roll back the 'power of Al Qaeda and the Taliban.'
Barack Obama is making the distinction between the 'bad war' in Iraq and the 'good war' in Afghanistan a centerpiece of his run for the presidency.
He proposes ending the war in Iraq and redeploying U.S. military forces in order 'to finish the job in Afghanistan.'
Virtually no one in the United States or the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) calls for negotiating with the Taliban. Even the New York Times editorializes that those who want to talk 'have deluded themselves.'
But the Taliban government did not attack the United States. Our old ally, Osama bin Laden, did.
Al-Qaeda and the Taliban are not the same organization (if one can really call al-Qaeda an 'organization'), and no one seems to be listening to the Afghans.
On July 18, 2008 The New York Times published an article by Israeli-Jewish historian, Professor Benny Morris, advocating an Israeli nuclear-genocidal attack on Iran with the likelihood of killing 70 million Iranians – 12 times the number of Jewish victims in the Nazi holocaust:
“Iran’s leaders would do well to rethink their gamble and suspend their nuclear program.
"Barring this, the best they could hope for is that Israel’s conventional air assault will destroy their nuclear facilities.
"To be sure, this would mean thousands of Iranian casualties and international humiliation. But the alternative is an Iran turned into a nuclear wasteland.”
What does the publication by the New York Times of an article, which calls for the nuclear incineration of 70 million Iranians and the contamination of the better part of a billion people in the Middle East, Asia and Europe, tell us about US politics and culture?
For it is the NYT, which informs the ‘educated classes’ in the US, its Sunday supplements, literary and editorial pages and which serves as the ‘moral conscience’ of important sectors of the cultural, economic and political elite.
Obama's statements to assure Israel on his proposed talk with Iran are most alarming. He has tirelessly repeated that the "military option" remains on the table to ensure Israel's security.
Isn't this the exact same policy trademark infused during the Bush administration, which eventually led to the war on Iraq? The US will exhaust every diplomatic channel, but the "military option" remains on the table.
This was the gist of the message repeated by the warmongers of the White House through Bush's two terms. Does one need any proof of why such an attitude is not reflective of well-intentioned diplomacy?
What is equally dangerous in Obama's uttering is that he might be, and is already, feeling pressured to balance his seemingly soft attitude towards Iraq and Iran by exaggerating his country's pro-Israel stance in a way that will derail any possibility for a peaceful solution to the Palestinian- Israeli conflict, at least during his term.
In fact, ominous signs of that pressure, and his succumbing to it are ample, the last of which was his statement, prior to his visit, that Jerusalem must remain undivided, a position that negates international law and the consistent tradition of various US administrations, including Bush's.
One need not repeat what Obama has said during his visit to Israel, for such rhetoric is becoming most predictable.
His "commitment" to Israel and to the ever "special relationship" that unites both nations were generously invoked. Obama promised to do his utmost to keep Israel secure and to stop Iran from obtaining the atomic bomb.
As for the Palestinians, he seems keenly interested in engaging their non-democratic forces and shuns those who dare to challenge his country's biased official line that has contributed in myriad ways to the ongoing conflict.
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