Professional homosexual activists undoubtedly broke out the pink champagne recently when their television analysts finally finished the “Network Responsibility Index” for 2010-2011. The NRI, published by GLAAD, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, measures how many "LGBT" (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transsexual) characters the television networks can push into prime-time television programs to brainwash viewers into thinking that sexual identity disorders are perfectly normal. (In 1952, when the American Psychiatric Association published its first Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, homosexuality was included as a disorder.)  

The highly publicized debt ceiling debate has drawn to a close. Politicians and commentators from both political parties are hailing this as a victory for the Tea Party. I am not so sure. In fact, I am disposed to judge this a victory for President Barack Obama.  

At least 72 individuals have been charged in an online child pornography ring in which participants allegedly used an Internet bulletin board to trade images and videos of adults involved in sexual activity with children 12 years old and younger. The U.S. Departments of Justice and Homeland Security announced August 3 that indictments had been unsealed in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Louisiana, with 52 of the 72 defendants already in custody.

Wojeciech Jaruzelski was the communist general who was defense minister of Communist Poland when striking shipyard workers were shot and killed in 1970. He also was the practical dictator of Poland when martial law was imposed in 1981. Like other communist dictators, Jaruzelski is complicit in a vast pattern of suppression of basic rights, arrest of dissidents, and the support of the triumph of communism in the free world. Polish courts have put Jaruzelski on trial for some of his most obvious crimes, like the shooting of shipyard workers in 1970. Recently, however, his trial has been halted and perhaps ended permanently because of his ill health. The 88-year-old communist hack may die in the near future. But the contrast in how communist brutes are dealt with and how those who collaborated with the Nazis were treated is stark and reveals the hypocrisy of these sorts of war crimes trials. It is impossible to fully grasp the horror of the Holocaust.

As U.S. politicians scramble to defend themselves against raising the federal government’s astronomical debt to an even higher level, Americans may be seeing the reflection of their own future in the grim picture of insolvency across Europe. The so-called PIGS nations of the European Union (Portugal, Ireland, Greece, and Spain) are all caught in a vise: on one side, spiraling debt and obligations which can be serviced only through borrowing, and on the other, the increasing costs of borrowing resulting from profound doubt in the minds of potential buyers of government debt instruments that bonds can be repaid.

As fears over global markets grow, the European Central Bank (ECB) signaled that it would start buying more European-government bonds in an effort to prop up the economies and governments of beleaguered nations and the region as a whole. In other words, it will print even more money to temporarily bail out reckless regimes drowning in debt. But rather than calming investors, the announcement only sparked more confusion and turmoil. Follow-up reports added fuel to the fire. Citing traders, several news outlets claimed that the central bank bought Irish and Portuguese bonds on August 4 — not Spanish or Italian debt as was expected. Ireland and Portugal, of course, have both received hundreds of billions in bailouts already.

The Vancouver Coastal Health hospital is unveiling a pilot program, starting in October, that will permit healthcare workers to hand out “crack kits” to participants. Each kit will hold a clean, unused crack pipe, mouthpiece, filter, and condoms. The kits are estimated to cost around $50,000. Health officials say the goal of the program, scheduled to run for up to a full year, is to prevent the spread of Hepatitis C as well as other viruses. The Vancouver Sun reports: The intent is to connect health care workers with crack cocaine smokers to evaluate how many of the drug users are in the city and what equipment they need to lower their risk of catching diseases such as hepatitis C, HIV and even respiratory illnesses.  

A friend of mine was trying to explain to his children the significance of the debate going on over what to do about our national debt. He showed them a clip of something you’ve probably seen: the National Debt Clock in New York City. On Monday, the National Debt Clock said our national debt was more than $14.4 trillion, and it said each family’s share of this monstrous total was $122,303. Steve tried to explain the situation this way to his kids: “Who would you vote for? Someone who promises to give you lollipops every day at school, even though he can’t afford them? Or someone who says he needs to take your desks away because we can’t afford to pay for them?”

Arizona has taken the problem of illegal immigration seriously. Like several other states, Arizona has not just focused on the illegal immigrants themselves. Those who profit by hiring illegal immigrants also face more rigorous state actions for their misconduct.  In 2007, Arizona passed LAWA or the “Legal Arizona Workers Act,” which provided for escalating legal sanctions up to the revocation of an employer’s right to do business if the employer knowingly hired illegal immigrants. The law was not punitive against immigrants.  It did not treat legal immigrants any differently than American citizens.  State governments have, and do, restricted employment for different classes of citizens.  Sex offenders, for example, are often barred from working in schools or daycare facilities.  Drunk drivers lose their license to drive and, by that restriction, their ability to work at many jobs.

Lobbyists will be busier than ever in the next weeks and months ahead, trying to influence both the makeup and the recommendations of the new "supercommittee" that is supposed to recommend $1.2 trillion in deficit reductions over the next ten years. Under the terms of Budget Control Act of 2011 passed by the Congress and signed by President Obama on Tuesday, mandatory budget cuts will take effect if Congress cannot agree on the committee recommendations or some other plan to reduce the amounts being added annually to the nation's debt. The prospect of mandatory cuts has alarmed and aroused lobbyists and trade groups, especially those in the powerful defense and health care industries.