My Thoughts on Abstinence and Comprehensive Sex Ed.

I’ve been observing some lively and at times, heat discussion going on about abstinence and comprehensive sex education.  People on both sides have made some good points as well as some rather overheated rhetoric.  Knowledge is power, but I would like to point out that;.

Advice and information are of no use unless they produce positive action on the part of their recipients.

For example, for decades people have been informed about the dangers of tobacco use and its ties to lung disease, cancer, and the harmful effect it has on the unborn.  There are laws regulating its advertisement, its use and its sale.  Tobacco products even carry warnings on their packaging. Yet thousands of people will start and continue smoking in spite of knowing that it can damage their health or even lead to their death. Abstinence sex ed teaches that you wait until marriage before having sex and that you stay monogamous afterwards.  Comprehensive sex education echoes this in many programs but also gives you information about how to have safer sex and reduce your chances having an unwanted pregnancy and acquiring an STD.  Both offer good, practical advice.  Knowledge may be power but unless it’s applied, by its recipient, it’s worthless.  Practicing abstinence is a 100% guarantee that you won’t have an unwanted pregnancy to deal with. The rub is that you have to stick with it 100% of the time and that includes, oral and anal as well if you want to keep STD free.  The same applies with comprehensive sex ed advice.  Condoms, diaphragms, spermicidal creams and foams, and birth control pills can reduce the odds significantly of pregnancy and, in most cases, STDs as well but only if practiced 100% of the time.  You can’t disregard them because you want to be spontaneous, or because they’re too much of a hassle or thinking that one time without it won’t be a problem.   The real irony is that many people who say they know that abstinence is the best way to go or that they understand the information that has been given to they about birth control and STDs, will still have unprotected sex. The message is received but that’s not enough to influence behavior.

Adolescence is a tough time for anyone.  Figuring out who you are and where you fit in, as well as having sex or not, is sometimes pretty rough.  Parents and other adults can help best by providing guidance and support as well as boundaries to work within. I think the biggest responsibility any parent has is to listen to their children’s questions and provide answers to them from day one. This helps to build trust between the two.  Then when the teen years come, you know that your parents are there to help you with the big questions.  If nothing else, they can give you some insights that you might not have thought of.  Besides, it’s nice to know that the person watching your back does care that you do things right, and not because it reflects well on them, but because they want you to go through life with as little misery as possible.  That’s how it worked with me and my parents and how I hope it works out with my kids and me.  Personally, I have to throw my lot in with the idea of abstinence until marriage because it seems like the best way to help my kids grow up happy and healthy. (Ok, lower the flamethrowers and hear me out while I get my asbestos sweats on.)  Does this mean that I’ll never talk to them about safer sex?  No, but it also means that I will tell them that no safer sex method is 100%, that actions have consequences, and that if they don’t want to take the responsibility for their choices, it would be better to make a different choice. Most of all, I going to tell them that if they mess up, I will still love them and will help if they want me too.

(Comments, Pro or Con, are welcomed as long as you have a point other than having a primal scream session.  Save any insults or name calling for your own sandbox.)

Tne Night of the Fox Festival

Fall means the beginning of the rice harvest here in Niigata.  By mid-October, most of the fields are harvested and a number of festivals are held at the local shines to celebrate.  One of the most popular is the Kitsune no Yo Matsuri.(Night of the Fox Festival) in Takayanagi.  After church, we loaded up the van and took the 20 minute drive to the village

This is an Inari shrine.  Inari is a cereral spirit so the festival is held here as a way of saying thanks for a good rice harvest.

A number of traditional art groups were here to show off their talents.  We missed the this Lion dancer's act but we did get to see people leting him bite them on the head.  This is suppose to be for good luck

This group of junior high students are a Taiko group and they did an original drum number about the 4 seasons.  They were good.

Their sensei getting into the spirit of the act.

This is a small sample of this group's erformance.

While the next group was seting up, I took time to wander around and check out some of the booths that were selling food and drinks.  I met these two oba-chan tachi (little old ladies) who were sellin onigiri (rice balls) and hoozuki (Chinese lanteren plant fruit).  They were abit surprised at seeing a foreigner out in the sticks but they warmed up after we talked alittle.

After I bought some onigiri, they gave me some hoozuki as a gift.  Hoozuki has a small berry that has a sweet and sour taste to it with just a bit of bitterness to it.  This was my first chance to try it and most likely, not my last.

One of the local TV station's had a crew there to cover the event.  The young lady is Ozawa Makoto.  She was a member of a pop band called Morning Musume but now she's a reportor. 

Some Thoughts on the Obamacare Speech

In light of the President’s statement “If you misrepresent what’s in the plan, we will call you out.”, I decided to do some investigating on some of the statements made by the President in his speech on September 9.  I guess I figure that what’s good for the goose, is good for the gander.

“But thanks to the bold and decisive action we’ve taken since January 1, I can stand here with confidence and say we have pulled this economy back from the brink.”

Currently unemployment stands at 9.7% nationwide, the worst since 1983 and the percentage of new hired workers has dropped from 3.2 % to 2.9 percent since the stimulus bill was passed.  Business investments in new equipment are still falling steadily.  Is there some bit of good economic news that indicates that the economy is actually improving?  Granted, the stock market is moving up but it has yet to be at the same level it was last year at this time.  With even the White House saying that it expects unemployment to top 10%, it would appear that the President’s confidence is premature and radiates an overly optimistic take on the matter.

“And one more misunderstanding I want to clear up – under our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions, and federal conscience laws will remain in place.”

Apparently the President is unfamiliar with the Capps Amendment which passed July 30 in the House Energy and Commerce Committee 30-28.  This amendment explicitly allows abortion in the public health plan as well as subsidizing health plans that cover abortion.  At least 7 amendments that would excluded abortion funding from the health plan were defeated in various committees.  So if abortion funding is not part of the Healthcare Bill, why are the committees adding amendments that would make it part of the bill and killing off ones that would exclude it?

“First, if you are among the hundreds of millions of Americans who already have health insurance through your job, Medicare, Medicaid, or the VA, nothing in this plan will require you or your employer to change the coverage or the doctor you have. Let me repeat this: nothing in our plan requires you to change what you have.”

The President again appears to be unfamiliar with the Healthcare Bill that is currently in Congress. Sec. 312, Pg. 145, Lines 15-17 specifies that employers MUST enroll their employees into the public health plan or other government improved plan. or face being taxed up to 8% of their payroll. Self insured individuals making more than $19,000 will have to switch or pay a 2.5% tax  It doesn’t matter if you’re happy with your coverage, you will take what the government tells you what you can have or else

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that 6 -10 million Americans would lose their current coverage immediately and the Lewin Group estimates that up to 100 million Americans would lose their current coverage due to employers having to convert to the public plan.

“There are also those who claim that our reform effort will insure illegal immigrants.  This, too, is false – the reforms I’m proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally.”

True, the Healthcare Bill doesn’t state that illegal aliens will be given access to public health insurance.  However, it provides no requirements that a person has to show that they are a legal resident of the US.  On July 30, an amendment proposed by Rep Nathan Deal would have required that the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements program be used to prevent illegal aliens from receiving government health care services was killed in committee.  If illegal aliens are not allow public health care services then why doesn’t the President publicly call for Congress to incorporate it into the bill with means to verify that only legal residents receive government health services?

“Some of people’s concerns have grown out of bogus claims spread by those whose only agenda is to kill reform at any cost.  The best example is the claim, made not just by radio and cable talk show hosts, but prominent politicians, that we plan to set up panels of bureaucrats with the power to kill off senior citizens.”

Section 1401 of the Healthcare Bill establishes the Center for Comparative Effectiveness Research.  Data from this research can be used to form QUALYS(quality adjusted life years) QUALYS are used to determine if a patient will live long enough to justify the cost of a medical treatment.  If the patient is young then the treatment is more likely worth the expense on the theory that they will be able to live long enough to make the government investment in their life worth it by being productive and paying their taxes.  Older or handicapped citizens, on the other hand, might not be worth the expense and would not be given the treatment since they will most likely die before they can pay back in taxes what the government spent on them. To date, 5 amendments, (3 in the Senate and 2 in the House.), have been proposed that would not allow comparative effectiveness research to be used to ration health care.  All of these amendments have been killed in committee.  If there is to be no rationing of health care, then let the President publicly demand that Congress put such a ban into the Healthcare Bill.

“I will not sign a plan that adds one dime to our deficits – either now or in the future.”

The Congressional Budget Office in June estimates that over the next ten years, the Healthcare Bill will add $240 billion dollars to the budget deficit.  The Lewin Group estimates that in the following 10 years after that, an additional $1 trillion will be added to the deficit.  Unless the Healthcare Bill is seriously overhauled, the President will either have to veto it or sign it and be branded a liar.

“And that is why not a dollar of the Medicare trust fund will be used to pay for this plan.”

Yet the Obama Plan calls for $600 billion in unspecified cuts to Medicare.  It effectively guts Medicare Advantage with $250 billion in cuts and this will affect benifits for 25% of the seniors on Medicare.  In addition, Medicare will experience a 30% increase in the next 30 years as the Boomer population ages.  Making cuts in a program with that much of an increase and saying that nobody will lose their benefits is like saying that everyone will get the same size slice of pie after taking half of it away and inviting a few more guests over to share it with.  It isn’t possible.

The President’s speech was a fairly good one in terms of delivery and elegance.  But in terms of substance, the President needs to come to grips with reality, drop his rhetoric, and throw out any timetable he has about rushing the plan though Congress.  Take the time to craft a bill that will help all Americans meet their health care needs.  .