Yes, we know that all the jumps go to the wrong page, but it was an executive decision to leave it as is. Enjoy.

 UPDATE: The new and improved summer issue is posted. You will be able to tell it’s the new one from the great new table of contents - now it zig-zags! Also, we fixed the jumps, most spelling errors, although we left a few in honor of the Bad Spelling artical in Best of, and after much thought even fixed Tim’s name.  Cheers.

Everyone has heard it at some point. Usually it will be at a lackluster party, in which flagging conversation is suddenly renewed by the topic of everyone’s favorite incitement to promiscuity: Bonobos. You know, as in “oh my God, wouldn’t it be like, sooo great if we could all just solve our problems by fucking instead of fighting? Bonobos kick ass!” But the Bonobo is not just the spirit animal of the conversationally ungifted lech, apparently it has become the mascot of the dreaded “SP” (Secular Progressive) and as such, it must be attacked by those who seek to protect us from the spectre of “G-G rubbing” as a tool of social harmony.

Enter Dinesh D’souza, the guy who blamed 9-11 on liberals, who “debunks the myth of the promiscuous Bonobo”, by way of attacking the crazy lefties who can’t get enough of the horny little buggers.  Although lines like “I’m surprised the Democratic Party hasn’t changed its symbol from the donkey to the bonobo” are good for teh lulz, D’Souza is clearly trying to score culture warrior points by “proving” that Bonobo sexuality is a perversion caused by captivity. And why wouldn’t he, considering that it makes liberals look like bad scientists as well as huge pervs?

Of course there’s no question that D’Souza is willing to blur a few lines in order to make a partisan point, because that’s what he does for a living. What is a little more surprising is that the article he cites is more than a little, erm, lacking in credibility. Frans DeWall, whom D’Souza attacks, responds at Skeptic (NSFW!) with a long, but worth-reading piece giving a nuanced summary of Bonobo behavior, that impresses with it’s balance, proving once again that science with an agenda is no science at all.

Today’s Oregonian has a lengthy story about kids being kids, and the power-mad prosecutors who want to throw them in jail: Two young boys at McMinnville’s Patton Middle School were sent to jail for five days for supposedly sexually harassing their classmates, by running through the halls swatting girls on the bottom. But that’s not all. They now face the prospect of 10 years in jail and a lifetime sentence on Oregon’s sex crime registry.

I don’t think it will go that far — thanks in part to the Oregonian’s coverage of this travesty, which underscores the irksome level of stupidity
surrounding this case — but you never know. Still, I have a strong suspicion that the more explaining officials have to do, the more likely these power-hungry morons will back off.

I mean, how can you justify something this ridiculous:

Several girls told Roache and Tillery the boys had swatted their behinds on what they declared to be “slap butt day,” according to the first police report. Some girls told police they did not like it and had asked the boys to stop. But a follow-up report filed four days later by Roache makes the situation seem much foggier.

All told, Roache interviewed 14 students besides Cornelison and Mashburn. Seven confessed to bottom-swatting, including one girl who described it as “a handshake we do.” Two of the alleged victims said they had swatted boys’ buttocks themselves.

“She will touch Cory after he touches her first,” Roache wrote in the report.

This second round of interviews took place while the boys were in detention. A day later, the juvenile court held a hearing on whether the boys should be released. The courtroom was packed with Patton students and families of both boys — many were crying. The boys were there, too, in shackles and jail outfits.

Are you kidding me? Other kids took part? Then why target these kids? There really isn’t much to say about this, except that this growing trend of treating overly rambunctious children like sex offenders is extremely disturbing. Maybe I’m alone here, but I don’t see what good it does to irreversibly and negatively alter a child’s life over an innocuous and likely non-sexualized butt slap. Everyone involved in this case, on the prosecutorial end, should be severely admonished — I mean Nifong-level admonishment.

[Addendum: It appears as if the father of one of the boys works for the McMinnville News-Register, the newspaper owned by the OC’s Ossie Bladine’s family. Is this correct?]

This story was on Digg.com: A Florida State Representative, Robert Allen R-Merritt Island, was arrested under allegations of sex solicitation. To a guy.

The undercover officer alleges that Rep. Allen was “acting suspicious” and “going in and out of the men’s bathroom”. Thereafter, he says that Allen offered to perform oral sex on him for 20 dollars.

Besides the fact that the news article implicitly emphasizes the fact that the undercover cop was male (for technical reasons regarding oral sex, of course), 20 dollars?! There’s something very, very wrong about this, because last time I checked, politicians weren’t that poor. And last time I checked, blowjobs cost more than 20 dollars. This guy Allen was either framed, or gets a real kick out of blowing men. Or maybe fellatio (giving or receiving) is a hobby of politicians in general.

Little else has been said about the story, but I think whoever got blown by Rep. Allen should just be glad that it wasn’t Hillary Clinton.

Some people are calling the new obelisk a
phallic object. For those that don’t know
what phallic means, the dictionary states,
“An image of the male sex organ, especially
as used as a sign of sexual power.”

I don’t see it.

Thanks to Joe Kadera for the photo.

IM IN UR BLOG POST MAKING ARCHITECTURAL HISTORY/LOL JOKEZ! LOLZ!

Leave it to the religious right to take complete opposites and equate them with each other. Faith prevails in the face of reason, I suppose.

The front page story on the ODE yesterday, which almost turned me on with its Xs and silhouetted man and woman, continues the long debate about pornography. Featured in the article was Pastor Sean McCartin. Regardless of his opinions, I must say that his name is quite excellent.

However, that’s where my praise for him ends. Sean starts off with bullshit: “Pornography offers sex without commitment.” Uhh…what? If porn is sex without commitment, then instead of going out to parties and looking for ‘drunk bitches’ I would be at home watching porn every Friday night.
Sure, you could consider masturbation sex without commitment, but commitment means having expectations of each other in a relationship. I definitely have expectations for Jin Junior, and he definitely has some for me (i.e. keep pumping blood into me).
If I was able to get sex without commitment, I wouldn’t be watching porn, now would I?

McCartin then goes on to talk about a ‘person’s risk-free relationship with porn”. Sure, it’s risk-free. So is my relationship with my backpack and my keyboard. What does he even hope to point out by this?

As a final note (I didn’t finish reading the article because Frathouse Fuckfest 2 was on HBO) I had a thought. With two incidents of public masturbation being reported in the library in the last few months, I know for a fact that Library Admin has been discussing the issue of allowing porn to be viewed in the library. On one hand, porn is legal. On another, it has been causing unrest and disgust in the library.
The thought of jacking off in the library is gross and embarassing. The only people that would be willing to do such a thing either have no sense of shame and embarassment, or have an ulterior motive and are truly focused on such. What if these library wankers are not perverts and horny hobos, but actually agents of the religious right? It makes complete sense! In their war against porn, they have repeatedly lost to the power of our great nation’s freedoms. Their traditional tactics and strategies have failed, and so they are resorting to new gimmicks to shock the American public into rejecting and restricting porn.

Here’s a link to the historic parody Campari ad featuring Jerry Falwell that appeared in Hustler magazine in 1983 and led to an important Supreme Court case five years later. The unanimous decision in favor of the magazine helped define free speech rights in regard to parodies of public figures, a form of humor that we here at the Commentator wholeheartedly embrace.

Also of interest is a statement released by Larry Flynt today in response to the news of Falwell’s death. Here’s an excerpt:

My mother always told me that no matter how much you dislike a person, when you meet them face to face you will find characteristics about them that you like. Jerry Falwell was a perfect example of that. I hated everything he stood for, but after meeting him in person, years after the trial, Jerry Falwell and I became good friends. He would visit me in California and we would debate together on college campuses. I always appreciated his sincerity even though I knew what he was selling and he knew what I was selling.

God bless the Smoking Gun.