The Scientific Activist
Archives for April, 2007
Abstinence-Only Promoter Can’t Keep it in His Pants
Posted by Nick Anthis on April 29, 2007 On Friday, Randall Tobias–the Bush Administration’s chief promoter of foreign abstinence-only sex education programs–resigned from his position as Deputy Secretary of State after getting busted for frequenting DC prostitutes. If your head hasn’t already exploded, check out Timothy Noah’s humorous but detailed commentary at Slate. Tobias advocated an ABC program (Abstinence; Be faithful; a brief,…
Christopher Hitchens: Karl Rove is an Atheist
Posted by Nick Anthis on April 29, 2007 In a recent interview published in New York Magazine, writer Christopher Hitchens is asked “Has anyone in the Bush administration confided in you about being an atheist?”. His answer: Well, I don’t talk that much to them–maybe people think I do. I know something which is known to few but is not a secret. Karl…
Texas Mandatory HPV Vaccination Update
Posted by Nick Anthis on April 28, 2007 On Monday, 23 April, the Texas Senate voted 30-1 in favor of its version of HB1089, a bill overturning Rick Perry’s February executive order mandating that all girls entering the sixth grade receive the HPV (human papilloma virus) vaccine Gardasil. On Wednesday, 25 April, the Texas House approved the Senate version of the bill by…
SCOTUS: Who’s Your Daddy?
Posted by Nick Anthis on April 20, 2007 On Wednesday, when the Supreme Court upheld a federal ban on “partial-birth abortions” in its 5-4 decision on Gonzalez v. Carhart, it dealt a potentially huge setback to US reproductive freedoms. Although intact dilation and extraction makes up only a small subset of all abortions, this ruling is significant in that it explicitly does not…