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Ever since the rise of the religious right, mainstream journalists have focused an extraordinary amount of attention on its growing clout in the Republican Party and its influence on public policy.
The Washington Post has published a follow-up to its two-article series on Michael Shackelford, a gay teenager living in the very red locale of Sand Springs, eight miles west of Tulsa. When the Post concluded its second article on Sept. 26, Shackelford had decided he would feel more at home by joining his older sister in Las Vegas.
For the French, it’s bound to be the most annoying American phenomenon since the freedom fries fiasco. Tom Hanks reportedly beat out Harrison Ford, George Clooney, and Hugh Jackman to star in the movie adaptation of The Da Vinci Code, to be directed by Ron Howard. Barring complications, the film should be in theatres in early 2006.
William Lobdell of the Los Angeles Times touches all the right bases in his report about churches that think of more than their address and service times when they design advertising.
A few days after 11/2, the South Florida Sun-Sentinel did some local enterprise reporting, trying to find out if there was a common theme among African-American voters who went against decades of conventional wisdom and voted for George W. Bush over John Kerry.
This story is old, but still very important. I ran into it while cleaning out the newspaper clips pocket of my shoulder bag after the last road trip. Why is it worth calling to your attention? Reporter Paul Wiseman has packed it with color and information and it contains the following paragraph: “Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, an Islamic scholar by training, is trying to promote what he calls Islam Hadari. Roughly translated, it is Arabic for ‘Islamic civilization.’ Abdullah’s somewhat vague version of Islam emphasizes economic and technological development, social justice and tolerance for other religions.” However, as a legal activist there puts it: “While all of us are equal some of us are more equal than others.”
OK, do the math. Let’s say that a president wins a second ticket to the White House with the help of a “values vote” coalition built, in part, on people that have very old-fashioned beliefs on issues of morality, family, marriage and the existence of eternal, transcendent moral truths.
Yasser Arafat was laid to rest Friday at his former West Bank headquarters. As Reuters related the story, "A chaotic crush of mourners filling the air with gunfire forced a hasty burial." In response to this mob action, "only a small clutch of beleaguered senior officials and security officers in a tight circle saw his casket lowered into a black marble grave."
Reason managing editor Jesse Walker on the Jihadist/Reality-Based divide: “I hate the Red America/Blue America cliché, this idea that the country can be painted in just two colors. But if I had to speak in terms of that map, I’d say the most successful culture warriors come from the blue states. The authoritarian conservative wants to maintain the old taboos. The authoritarian liberal wants to introduce some new ones, and he’s had a lot more success.”
