Chastity might have huge cachet in the evangelical Christian community. But do young evangelical Christians obey when their parent or pastor preaches "Just say no"?

Yes, says Donna Freitas, author of "Sex and the Soul: Juggling Sexuality, Spirituality, Romance, and Religion on America’s College Campuses." That’s why she worries for vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin’s pregnant teenage daughter Bristol.

Doing research for her latest book, Freitas found that young evangelical Christians put a high priority on abstinence before marriage, even after they’ve already failed to meet their own standards and had sex.

"Chastity has a huge cachet. Even if you can’t uphold it, you really want to," Freitas said. "If they do engage in sexual activity, they tend to feel incredibly remorseful about it and fearful that their community won’t forgive them. It’s still a priority even if they’ve had sex."

Unfortunately, Palin's decision to join the Republicans' presidential ticket has thrust Bristol's situation into the public light, despite pleas from Republicans to treat it as a private matter.

Some Evangelical parents are taking matters into their own hands. In an attempt to prevent Bristol Palin's fall from grace, they are insisting that their teenage daughters wear chastity belts.

A spokeswoman for a website promoting chastity belt manufacturers and suppliers said that they had noticed a considerable increase in the amount of traffic to their site since the revelation of Sarah Palin's daughter's pregnancy.

No Sex, Pleaase. We're Republicans

Acting on a tip from an anti-abortion league, a Maine woman has checked out copies of a sex-education book from two libraries and refuses to give them back. The Lewiston and Auburn Public Libraries have pressed charges. 

JoAn Karkos, who says she was “sufficiently horrified by the illustrations and the sexually graphic, amoral abnormal contents,” is willing to go to jail to prove her point.

After checking out It’s Perfectly Normal: Changing Bodies, Growing Up, Sex and Sexual Health, Karkos sent a letter to both libraries, informing them that she did not intend to return the book.

She claimed that it violated the city’s obscenity ordinance and enclosed a check for $20.95 to cover the cost.

Lewiston Library director Rick Speer returned her check, informing her that he would seek help from the police if she refused to bring back the stolen property.

That’s when he received a second letter: “The truth is the contents of the book in question leads to a lot of misery, pain, lack of freedom, and often death.”

This week in court, Karkos represented herself, and argued why the book shouldn’t be available in the library.

Opposing council repeatedly objected, saying “even if this was the most obscene book ever published in the world, it is not a defense against the charge.”

It’s Perfectly Normal was written by Robie H. Harris and illustrated by Michael Emberley.

In 2005, it ranked number one on the American Library Association’s list of most challenged books.

It features cartoon drawings of naked people and covers abstinence, STDs, masturbation and abortion.

Since Karkos’ actions hit the media, the libraries have ordered replacement copies, and patrons’ requests for the book have risen substantially.

Both locations have received a number of free copies in the mail, sent from all over the country. Prompt: Violet Blue

The Fake US Victory in Iraq [How the Bush Regime is Helping McCain]

Political events in Iraq are seldom what they seem. The hand- over by the US military of control of Anbar province, once the heartland of the Sunni rebellion, to Iraqi forces is a case in point.

The US will keep 25,000 American soldiers in Anbar, so the extent to which the Iraqi government will really take over is debatable.

But the future of Anbar is a crucial pointer to the fate of Iraq. It is a vast area and one of the few parts of Iraq that is overwhelmingly Sunni.

The Iraqi government is dominated by Shia Islamic parties in alliance with Kurdish nationalists. The vital question now is whether or not this Shia-dominated government can reassure the Sunni minority that they are not going to be overrun as the US withdraws its forces.

The Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, is in a very confident mood. In the past four months he feels he has successfully faced down the Shia militiamen of Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army by taking back control of Basra, Sadr City and Amarah.

Then he refused to sign a new security accord with the US which President George Bush wanted to see agreed by August 31.

In the past few weeks he has been confronting his Kurdish allies over the future of the oil city of Kirkuk and the town of Khanaqin.

Mr Maliki may be overplaying his hand but there is no doubt that the Iraqi state is becoming more powerful in Iraq and the Mahdi Army, the Americans and the Kurds less so.

The Americans in particular feel that he exaggerates the extent to which his success against the Mahdi Army was because of the new strength of the Iraqi security forces.These troops were doing badly until they received American support.

Nevertheless, Mr Maliki's position is strong. He seems to have realized that he may need the US, but the US also cannot do without him and is in no position to replace him as it did with his predecessor, Ibrahim al-Jaafari.

Much of what the White House is now doing is done to help the Republicans in the presidential election. The aim is to give the impression that Iraq has finally come right for the US and victory is finally in its grasp.

The surge is promoted as the strategy by which the tide was turned and it is true that the Sunni uprising against the US occupation has largely ended.

But it has done so for reasons that have little to do with the surge or American actions of any kind.

Crucial to the success of the government against the Mahdi Army has been the support of Iran. It is they who arranged for the Shia militiamen to go home.

It takes real cheek for Mr Bush to claim yesterday that "Anbar is no longer lost to al-Qa'ida" since during the last presidential election in 2004, he was claiming that the media was exaggerating the success of the insurgents

Palin's Extreme Christian Fundamentalist Views

Videos have surfaced of Palin speaking before her church barely three months before she was tapped for the number-two spot on the Republican ticket, extolling the US intervention in Iraq as a holy war.

Addressing the congregation at the church, the Wasilla Assembly of God, in June, Palin declared:

“Pray for our military men and women who are striving to do what is right. Also, for this country, that our leaders, our national leaders, are sending [US troops] out on a task that is from God.

"That’s what we have to make sure that we’re praying for, that there is a plan and that that plan is God’s plan.”

She went on to suggest that her proposal for a natural gas pipeline from Alaska was also part of “God’s plan.”

The pastor of her church, Ed Kalnins, has been recorded warning his parishioners in 2004 that those who voted for Democratic presidential candidate Senator John Kerry could be damned to hell.

Similarly, he denounced those who criticized the Bush administration for its criminal neglect in the face of Hurricane Katrina, stating:

“I hate criticisms towards the president, because it’s like criticisms towards the pastor—it’s almost like, it’s not going to get you anywhere, you know, except for hell. That’s what it’ll get you.”

Kalnins is also a subscriber to the “last days” belief held by a section of Christian fundamentalists that the apocalypse is at hand. He has urged his congregation to be prepared for a mass migration to Alaska, which he believes will be one of the last “refuges” for those fleeing destruction.

In one sermon, Kalnins preached: “We need to think like Jesus thinks. We are in a time and a season of war, and we need to think like that. We need to develop that instinct. We need to develop as believers the instinct that we are at war, and that war is contending for your faith. ... Jesus called us to die. You’re worried about getting hurt? He’s called us to die.”

The rhetoric is consistent with that of a growing faction within the Pentecostal church known as “Joel’s Army,” which directs its appeal primarily to youth in their teens and 20s, casting them as the final generation before Armageddon that must be organized into an army of God.

In some cases, military terminology extends to referring to preachers as “commanders” and clearly suggests that the mission is to impose Christian dominion by force.

Did Palin Have Affair with Her Husband's Business Partner?

John McCain's presidential campaign is threatening a lawsuit against the National Enquirer over a print edition story the tabloid ran today alleging that Gov. Sarah Palin has had an extramarital affair with her husband's business partner.

The allegation would normally be dismissed by political observers as the random musings of a supermarket tabloid -- indeed, the McCain campaign said as much in its statements on Wednesday -- except that the paper has built up a reservoir of legitimacy following its earlier reporting on the John Edwards affair.

In a statement to the Huffington Post, a spokesman for the paper, who promised a larger report next week, tapped into that pool of quasi-respect.

"The National Enquirer's coverage of a vicious war within Sarah Palin's extended family includes several newsworthy revelations, including the resulting incredible charge of an affair plus details of family strife when the Governor's daughter revealed her pregnancy.

"Following our John Edwards' exclusives, our political reporting has obviously proven to be more detail-oriented than the McCain campaign's vetting process.

"Despite the McCain camp's attempts to control press coverage they find unfavorable, The Enquirer will continue to pursue news on both sides of the political spectrum."

Sarah Palin: A Conservative 'Saint'

In contrast to Obama -- whose selection of Joe Biden was smart and important in shoring up the Obama Team's gravitas -- Palin has been set up by McCain to be a new kind of 21st century "saint."

She has a large, seemingly wonderful family -- juggles her home cooking with running a large state as its chief executive. She has a snow mobile racing husband who is a North Shore oilman and she tackles corrupt "lobbying interests" and their cozy deals with politicos wherever she goes.

It's a great story on many levels. Her husband is even a member of the United Steel Workers. Faint applause on that line though.

But despite my substantive differences with Palin, this performance tonight beat expectations and moved her to a new level.

Her competition at this incredibly flat, low energy confab in St. Paul is thin -- so one could easily argue that she had a lot of room to pull off a success. But that is too cynical.

She did a great job -- and stared her doubters and the challenge down.

There is much about Sarah Palin we don't know yet. Unlike Biden and Obama, we didn't get much time to have our own public vetting of her before McCain's decision -- so there will be more fits and starts and twists and turns as other parts of her life are dredged up, over-analyzed, and judged by the American public.

But this is going to be very close race, particularly if nothing new and surprising shows up on Palin.

What no one will say just yet -- but which I think the McCain folks tried to convey is that "Saint Sarah" just made her real debut in Saint Paul.

Is Sarah Palin Bigger Than McCain?

Whether she broke Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama's record of 38.4 million viewers for his convention speech in Denver last week remains to be seen. The bigger question could be whether she will outshine the man who put her on the GOP ticket.

Sen. John McCain, who accepts the Republican nomination tonight, has been engulfed by the Palin gale since he plucked the obscure 44-year-old governor from the farthest reaches of the continent to be his running mate.

In the five days since, Palin has managed, without doing anything, to steal the focus from both parties' nominees in what was already a historic election. Even Republicans were calling Palin "the hottest ticket on the convention floor" among delegates more interested in her than McCain.

Now an overnight celebrity herself, Palin delivered a homespun justification for her candidacy that sought to hit the touchstones of ordinary voters and play up the likeability quotient that has made her the most popular governor in the United States.

Looking at the signs in the audience declaring, "Hockey Moms 4 Palin," she ad-libbed with a smile, "Know the difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull? Lipstick."

Palin came out like a pit bull. She leveled a swipe at Michelle Obama, saying people in small towns "love their country, in good times and bad, and they're always proud of America."

She took aim at Obama, saying people in small towns like the one she grew up in "don't quite know what to make of a candidate who lavishes praise on working people when they are listening, and then talks about how bitterly they cling to their religion and guns when those people aren't listening.

"We tend to prefer candidates who don't talk to us one way in Scranton and another way in San Francisco."

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