Some other head-clearing links

I had a busy day running errands and trying to erect Cheddarsphere 2.0 for you all (with helpful sidekick Scott), plus pounding out the eight screens of "angry left" ramblings below and trying to do some actual schoolwork. So I haven't gotten much other blogging done, and I have a backlog of stuff I want to say:

• There's something very . . . 18th century about this:

  Last Friday night, young girls from around south dakota came to Sioux Falls for a spring ball. This one is called "The Purity Ball" it's a yearly event run by Leslee Unruh's abstinence clearinghouse.
  
  The idea is that these young women come with their fathers. To celebrate their sexual purity.
  
  Unruh: We think that its important for fathers to the be the first ones to look into their daughters eyes and to tell her that her purity is special, and its ok to wait until marriage.
  
  Hinojosa: It might have all the trappings of a regular prom... But this one ends a little differently.
  
  Girls reciting pledge: "I make a promise this day to God...
  
  Hinojosa: The young women here all make a promise to their fathers that they wont' have sex until the day they get married.
  
  Girls reciting pledge: “...to remain sexually pure...until the day I give myself as a wedding gift to my husband. ... I know that God requires this of me.. That he loves me. And that he will reward me for my faithfulness.”

  Besides the willies the story gave me, there is something offensive and damned scary in the idea that today, in 2006 for cryin' out loud, there is still such a strong movement of men who feel the need to own and control their women. Here we have an entire generation of girls being taught that they belong to their fathers right up until the point that their fathers give them to their husbands, to whom they will then belong. Digby follows up here.
  
  
• I looked at the map attached to this story and started planning my escape route.
  
  
• When I bought gas today, I noted that the person before me had spent $75 to fill up whatever kind of behemoth vehicle it is they had with a 25-gallon tank. And I also realized that if you drive the kind of vehicle with a 25-gallon tank, you're probably not getting 30 miles to the gallon, either. Ouch.
  
  
• For my readers who, given the current immigration debate, seem convinced that "Aztlan" or la reconquista are real, and that you may soon need a passport to be a snowbird in Arizona, check out David Neiwert
  
  
• Apparently, all I have to do to get Charlie Sykes to read my blog is bet him $10. (For the record, Scott, I don't think that was him.)
  
  
• After reading the various arguments about it (here, here, and especially here), I'm looking forward to Tommy's Big Announcement.
  
  
• There's a war on (Iraq), a war we have forgotten (Afghanistan), a war that's probably coming (Iran), there's a record budget deficit, a record trade deficit, a record national debt, a disaster in Medicare, and a billion other things demanding serious national attention. The result, as Billmon insightfully points out, is an increasing myopia and monomania on the right:

  And the Republicans are preparing their agenda for the fall elections:
  
  GOP Campaign to Focus on Flag Burning, Gay Marriage, Abortion
  
  Thank God they're on top of things, because if we can't get this nationwide epidemic of flag burning under contol, we could be in some real trouble.
  
  Meanwhile, over in Right Blogostan the hysteria du jour revolves around the refusal of the producers of South Park to permit an cartoon image of Mohammad to appear on the show.

  
  
• I've been updating the liberal Cheddarsphere links. You should tell me if I am still missing you. And check out the new ones.
  
  
• A little while ago, the phone rang. This is the conversation, as best as I remember it:

  Her: Jay?
  Me: Yes?
  Her: It's Becca.
  Me: Becca?
  Her: You don't remember? Becca!
  Me: Becca who?
  Her: You know, Becca!
  Me: I've known several Beccas . . .
  Her: C'mon. We used to hang out at St. Marks? We got drunk together and you threw up on Katie right in front of me?
  Me: I think you may have the wrong Jay.
  Her: Huh?
  Me: I've never thrown up on anyone named Katie.
  Her: Oh. Maybe I have the wrong number then.