Over Epinionated

An intriguing possibility

2006-06-29T11:29:00.000-04:00

As I don't already have enough to do at work, I was reading Captain Ed's take on today's Supreme Court ruling in the Hamdan case. In short the Justices ruled 5-3 (Roberts recused himself) that military tribunals for terrorists would be illegal under the terms of the Geneva Convention.

Here's Cap'n Ed:

I haven't read the decision, but the reliance on the Geneva Convention seems strange. The convention binds nations when dealing with other signatories, not with those who have not agreed to reciprocity. The terrorists we have captured do not wear uniforms to distinguish themselves from civilians; in fact, they take great pains to hide themselves among civilians, deliberately target civilians, and use civilians as human shields. Applying Geneva Convention protections to these terrorists undermines the primary reason for these conventions: protection of civilians. They now will pay no penalty for their disregard for the rules of war, thanks to SCOTUS.

Ed concludes: "Congress needs to correct this issue immedately. The mischief that this enables will not only hamstring this war on terror, but any future war we may be forced to wage."

What would make for both high drama, and for great courage would be for the US governement to proceed with tribunals anyway. If we read the Geneva Convention thoroughly, then we have to conclude that there is no allowance for non-signatories who prey on civilians to be accorded protections under the Convention. Therefore, one must logically conclude, that in spite of the Court's decision, military tribunals are the only real option.

If Bush ordered military tribunals, the Left would howl and call for impeachment, but the Right and most moderates who favor a vigorous prosecution of the global war on terror (or radical Islam as were over Epinionated types like to say) would probably see the President as being correct with his interpretation. Would the House impeach? Not likely.

This could turn into a big, big winner for the Republicans, even though the decision went against them.

Ellison to Harvard: Drop Dead

2006-06-29T08:39:00.000-04:00

News spread quickly of Larry Ellison's decision to not give Harvard a $115 million gift. If Mr. Ellison is interested, he could really put that money to good use. New college graduates emerge from the hallowed halls of academia every year with enormous loan burdens. What would it mean to those folks, or their parents to have a ten-thousand dollar gift to pay some of those loans. Mr. Ellison's un-pledged gift to Harvard would be $10,000 worth of help for 11,500 people. Now that might not seem like many people, but that's not the point.

The point is, small donations that mean more to individuals are unnoticed compared to massive donations, to behemoth institutions. Harvard's endowment is something like $26 billion (that's with a b). It's not chump change, but the profs at Harvard aint gonna go hungry because Mr. Ellison changed his mind.

But a ten-thousand dollar gift either to get one's education started, or to reward a student who graduates with a 3.0 GPA or who has made an appearance on the dean's list each and every semester, would reward excellence, encourage more diligent work and mean something to the recipient. In addition, the person who has earned this gift, no matter how comfortably well off they are as an individual would feel a tremendous pinch if the gift were revoked. Unlike Harvard.

This speaks to the liberal ethos. Rather than taking the time to individually help someone through personal efforts that actually reach people, liberals prefer that our money be taxed, given to the government so that they can divvy the money up best. We both want the same thing, for people can get the help that they need when they need it. But what means more to an individual, a personal gift that comes from a caring individual, or a government subsidy? And which of these is going to encourage a person to use the assistance to make sure they never need it again? Or work hard enough so that they can, inspired by the generosity shown to them, pass along that generosity to someone else? Isn't that really what community is about?

NHS - Nanny High School

2006-05-24T13:44:00.000-04:00

The dreaded words for students. You've got detention . Isn't there some voice that says to board members that the school does not have jurisdiction over students? Apparently not.

A school district in Illinois said that kids who post images of themselves engaged in lewd, inappropriate or illegal behavior - even off school grounds - are subject to disciplinary action. School officials say they are not trying to censor students but to protect them.

That's right, kids. Mom and Dad can punish you all they want, but they can't protect you like your friendly neighborhood school district. Consider the illogic of this. Michelle Vented about the unbalanced nature of some educators, and she didn't even touch on the teachers who are too busy sleeping with their students to bother with teaching their charges.

Like most ridiculous things out there, this probably had its roots in some well-intentioned idea that there are child predators out using the Internet and when young high school (and middle school) boys and girls get whacky and post pictures of themselves behaving lewdly, it is advertising to child predators. But as Augustine said,t eh road to hell is paved with good intentions. The responsibility to teach kids not to advertise their sexuality is the parents. When our society sends them mixed messages about appropriate sexual behavior, it really falls on parents to sort it all out. Not schools. Not the government. Parents.

HT: Glenn

An argument for Congressional Term Limits

2006-05-24T09:44:00.000-04:00

Ed Morrissey deserves the accolades he gets. Today he chimes in with a piece on the recent moral failings of Congress Critters of all stripes. But the key to what Ed has to say involves the failings of leadership on the right.

Congress already has enough problems with corruption and scandal without adding even more arrogance to top it. If the leadership wants to argue that their status as elected officials somehow gives them the ability to disregard subpoenas and court orders, then the American people may want to trade that leadership to ensure that Congress understands that it operates under the same laws as the rest of us. Hastert and Boehner do not argue against an imperial presidency, but rather they are arguing for an untouchable political elite, where our elected officials risk nothing by taking bribes and selling their votes to the highest bidder. After all, the evidence of those transactions will almost always reside in their offices -- and if they can ignore duly executed subpoenas and search warrants, then they can sell themselves at will.

and

In the strict constructionist view that the GOP supports, this should mean what it says: members cannot be arrested while in attendance of a session or while traveling to or from said session. They also cannot be prosecuted for their speech while in session. That's it. It's a very narrow immunity, and it has to be in order to preserve public accountability for elected officials.

I find it troubling and not just a little hypocritical that Hastert and Boehner now want to use a "living Constitution" model in order to defy valid court orders.

Imagine that, Congressional hypocrisy! Whodathunkit?

The Blogfather adds this nugget: if Hastert thinks the Democrats may take the House in November, this may be exactly the kind of precedent he wants to establish

Glenn's sarcasm is to be noted with a grain or two of salt, however, the broader point is that the spirit of Congressional license is infectious. Between the scandals on both sides of the aisle, I think we can reasonably conclude that the next swamp we might want to drain is in Washington.

UPDATE: Bryan over at Hot Air adds his thoughts on Speaker Hastert's remarkably obtuse interpretation of the Constitution.

The House, led by Republican Speaker Dennis Hastert, has gone ballistic. Hastert’s screaming about Constitutional separation of powers (the FBI is under the executive branch), and even demanding that it return whatever it took from Jefferson’s office. The Democrats are right there with him, in a rare and ill-advised show of unity.

Link again in original

Ill-advised might be a little understated. What is necessary is for some of us int he blogosphere to get both pissed off and curious about this story.

UPDATE II: Over in the Corner Mark Kirkorian offers a weak defense of Hastert.

The Speaker of the House may well have committed a ridiculous mistake in giving cover to a criminal from the other team, but this kind of invective is out of place. Hastert sure seems to be an ineffective leader (a la Bill Frist, a great American who should stick to what he knows how to do, and get out of the Senate as soon as possible), but neither of them is an idiot.

By nature if one makes ridiculous mistakes, does that not qualify them to receive a modicum of invective? Hastert has erred. I may not call him an idiot, but he has earned a lot of criticism.

More on Google

2006-05-24T09:19:00.000-04:00

Dan Riehl is spouting common sense today echoing my point. Why Google Will Eventually Stumble is the beginning note in what will prove to be a thundering creschendo. This point is the key:

I also wrote that if they were smart they would understand that in order for their newer products to take hold, they needed early adopters - precisely the kind of people they are consistently ticking off due to little if any real customer service.

Link in Original

What the folks at Google seem reluctant to grasp is that staggering stock profits and market share in an semi-profitable ethereal business, like search engine usage is a recipe for irrational exuberance. Google will stumble if people stop using their search engine.

Dan recommends: ASK.COM
Why not give them a try in June and see if Google notices the ripple in their beloved market share.

G to the double O G to the L and an E

2006-05-23T11:45:00.000-04:00

Make sure though when you talk to Google, you speak only out of the left side of your mouth.

Reports are quickly circulating the 'Net of a purge by the Almighty Google. A purge not of Hizballah's Al-Manar or Khilafah.com.

But instead Google News is purging conservative publications for the troubling reason of we don't have a reason, you're just gone. Noel and Marc Sheppard have collaborated on a piece that appears today at both the indispensable The American Thinker website and also at NewsBusters.

Charles over at LGF notes that the cold hand of the Grim Googler has tapped the shoulder of both Outside the Beltway and Dan Riehl as well.

What should conservative make of this?

First, we should note that Google's strange bedfellows make them unreliable as a Plain Dealer. (HT The aforementioned Thinker piece, but also Michelle Malkin, LGF and others) Secondly, what do conservatives do best when challenged, turn to the marketplace. We should not regulate or force Google to change their ways. If Google wishes to be the Internet clearinghouse for MoveOn propaganda and Jihadist hate speech, so be it. Let them. Conservatives with a penchant for writing code should band together in an open source way to build a better search engine, a better news aggregator. When the left took dominance of the classroom, we worked for vouchers and for transparency in public school. With the left firmly entrenched in Paleo-Media, we pioneered new media. So let's stop complaining about Google. Just like ABC, CBS, NBC, and company, Google's actions reveal them to be left leaning. That's fine, it's a free country. They are not a public trust. They are a publicly traded company. They are not as the Sheppards quote from a suit by Kinderstart.com an "essential facility." Neither Wal-Mart nor Itunes nor any other company providing a service is an "essential facility." They are a company. If they won't play fair, you divest. You find competitors to support with both your business and your investment dollars.

Glenn's right, we are An Army of Davids Google is Goliath. Have at him!

The Inside Job

2006-05-23T07:36:00.000-04:00

When I first heard this story last night, the first thing that occurred to me was that the story was mistold.

The AP says this:

Personal data, including Social Security numbers, of 26.5 million US veterans, were stolen from a Veterans Affairs employee this month after he took the information home without authorization, the department said yesterday.

Veterans Affairs Secretary Jim Nicholson said there is no evidence the burglars who struck the employee's home have used the personal data -- or even know they have it. The employee, a data analyst whom Nicholson would not identify, has been placed on leave pending a review.

Computer disks might be interesting to burglers. Anything that might be of value would prompt an interest from thieves looking to make a score. But depending on what else was stolen, if anything, from this Data analyst's home, the investigation needs to focus on the analyst.

Common sense dictates that if a person violates one law, other laws will be less likely to be obeyed. So if the analyst is willing to violate the privacy of veterans, why not sell the information. Regardless, we have a presumption of innocence in the USA. However, the Department of Veterans Affairs would be perfectly within bounds to dismiss this employee for taking the information home without authorization.

We'll keep digging and try to find the real story. It just smells like an inside job.

Bottom story of Forever

2006-05-19T16:05:00.000-04:00

SI.com - More Sports - Retired Knievel, 67, living in serious pain - Friday May 19, 2006 3:39PM

Really? Whodathunkit?

Another reason to like the WBC

2006-03-10T14:23:00.000-05:00

This story just came across the wires at Over Epinionated World Headquarters. And we have to say we are pleased.

Puerto Rican police quickly intervened and took the Cuban official -- Angel Iglesias, vice president of Cuba's National Institute of Sports -- to a nearby police station where they lectured him about free speech.

"We explained to him that here the constitutional right to free expression exists and that it is not a crime," police Col. Adalberto Mercado was quoted as saying in El Nuevo Dia, a San Juan daily.

The brouhaha gathered steam Friday when Cuba's Communist Party newspaper, Granma, called the sign-waving "a cowardly incident." Cuba's Revolutionary Sports Movement exhorted Cubans to demonstrate in Havana late Friday, saying U.S. and Puerto Rican authorities were involved in "the cynical counterrevolutionary provocations."

Now if we can just get the folks int eh box seats of the next Cuban game at the WBC to wear these:

USA! USA! USA!

2006-03-09T08:47:00.000-05:00

I wasn't really interested in the World Baseball Classic. And I am mildly disgruntled that our neighbors to the north are now beating us at their sport as well as ours. But seeing 'Tek in that Uni made me smile. And cheer. Go USA!

We are all Tar Heels

2006-03-08T15:54:00.000-05:00

Not much mention has been made of the terrorist attack on the campus of UNC-CH last week. I'm a Tar Heel Grad from '96. And like everyone else, I was shocked to learn about the terrorist attack on my old school. The Carolina Review, a wonderful publication, asks what is gained by calling this a terrorist act. First, You gain moral clarity by calling it terrorism. One of the bloggers for the Carolina Review's blog wrote this.

And so, even if this is an act of terrorism, which it very well may be, some greater good is served by NOT calling it terrorism. In a post-9/11 world, the very word terrorism has connotations that spark panic, fear, and irrational hatred.

In fairness to David, he wrote about how it is a terrorist act. His thoughtful post is worth a read in its entirety so you can judge for yourself. I commented on the post. This is a reprint of what I wrote.

I respond: To not call something what it is, you are sending the message you are afraid to face reality because it has consequences. To quote Albus Dumbledore fromt he Harry Potter novels, "Fear of a name, increases fear of the thing itself." Let's not be afraid to say that this is what it is. When we stop saying that what happened last week is terrorism, we enable two things. First we allow the perpetrators of terror to see we bury our heads in the sand at the first mild sign of provocation. Perhaps Mr. Taheri-azar is unconnected to a cell. That's fine, but the minute he attacks innocents to support a politcal agenda, he declares his allegiance with our enemies in the global war on terror.

Secondly, the purveyors of irrational hatred are responsible for their actions, as clearly as Mr. Taheri-azar is for his. We do ourselves no favors by shying away from declaring an act of terrorism an act of terrorism, just because someone else might use that declaration to support a cause we oppose. In fact if our motivation for pulling punches is because we may give the racists in our world a weapon, then we sacrifice some of our moral high ground. We were wronged. And we must respond with clarity of thought and of purpose.

I was a student at UNC ten years ago when the Mother's Day fire at Phi Gamma Delta took five lives in the hours before graduation. Those fires were a tragic accident, and the Carolina campus rallied together to mourn our fallen friends and also to make sure the same fate did not befall others, by promoting solutions that ensured better fire safety in buildings in Chapel Hill. This vicious, and I daresay evil attack, gives us Tar Heels another chance to show our mettle. And the conservatives on campus need to be there as leaders. Buck up.

Now is not the time to go wobbly.

CNN goofs again, or should it be still

2006-03-03T08:36:00.000-05:00

Excuse me, Wolf, Jim Dobson is a Doctor, not a Reverend. Make a note of it. Hopefully this chart helps.


Doctor	Dodo

Example One from March 1, 2006 and again Example Two from May 1, 2005.

Aren't journalists supposed to care about accuracy? Any journalist who willfully disregards factual correction, really should be taken to task.

It's the little differences, right Vincent

2006-02-28T15:14:00.000-05:00

You know when you are talking to a friend and he (or she) makes so much sense and youa re so glad that you ahve a friend with a clear head on his (or her) shoulders, who gets it (whatever it is), you know? Then one day you overhear said friend explaining what you and he (or she) talked about to someone, who let's say mildly disagrees. And your friend is just railing away completely oblivious that whatever brilliant and salient points he (or she) might have had a chance to make have been lost, because our came condescension. Yeah, I see you nodding there.

That's what Crunchy Cons mean to me. I have mildly followed the debate in the blog at NRO. I have nodded along to some points and then feel whacked over the head with a two-by-four when someone uncorks a wild statement like:

6. Small, Local, Old, and Particular are almost always better than Big, Global, New, and Abstract.
or
So I’ll put the question to Jim and any other “conservative” very directly: Are you willing to state that “with a few exceptions, anyone who would place an infant in daycare is a negligent parent and a negligent citizen”?
or
Can anyone envision a truly conservative philosophy which could honestly say “in no way whatsoever am I trying to tell you how to live your life”? I don’t mean that rhetorically, I’d like to know.

Now don't get me wrong, there points they are making I agree with. But the methodology I found annoying. And don't get me started on the whole idea that I would suggest that moving far away from one’s kin is virtually never a true economic necessity and almost always rooted in selfish desire. Just don't go there.

Being inclined toward the libertarian perspective, I don't want to replace an all encroaching government with a neighbor who thinks he has found the universal truth and that I need this universal truth in my life or I will be totally unfulfilled. It is better if I discover that truth through my own investigation than in an instance where I am told I am selfish or not quite human if I disagree.

Maybe they are being blunt and honest. And good for them. Maybe they are right. Maybe they have figured out this cold fusion mumbo jumbo. Maybe Sartre should have talked to them. Maybe they know where Godot is and why I have spent so much time waiting for him. But don't tell me you're right. Show me that you're right.

Live it and embrace it and let your light shine as an example. Then when I ask you, hey, you are so serene. Or you have so much peace and calmness. Or you seem so happy, what's the secret? That's an invitation to share.

Hat tips on almost all of these quotes to Jim Geraghty over at TKS (the blog formerly known as the Kerry Spot).

Un-Special Olympics

2006-02-27T15:30:00.000-05:00

-CURMUDGEON ALERT -

Your not-so humble correspondent is about to wax nostalgic for a time gone by. You know, one of those, when I was a kid, things were different, and as always that statement in of itself is true. We didn't have cellphones, home wireless networks, microwave popcorn. How'd we live without that?!

But I'm feeling a little nostalgic for the old days at the Winter Olympics. Americans have never been great at the Winter Olympics. But they often seemed to want to win. Not to sure about these Olympians.

Meet Bode Miller. Bode Miller was the favorite to win five medals. That's a lot of hype. But Bode Miller does things his way. Observe:

"The same people who recognize I came out with no medals should recognize I could have won three."

"(For) me, it's been an awesome two weeks," Miller said. "I got to party and socialize at an Olympic level."

"It does matter that it's the Olympics. I just did it my way. I'm not a martyr and I'm not a do-gooder. I just want to go out and rock. And man, I rocked here."

Bode Miller is an example of what happens when you elevate competition above results. No athlete I know or have known would ever say he would rather not win if he is the best. I hope Bode enjoyed rocking Turin. Most of us are happy to no longer have to listen to his insufferable self-righteous excrement anymore.

Linda Robertson writes in the Miami Herald:

Miller was unapologetic. He lived by his motto.

"At least I don't have to go down to Torino for the medal ceremony," he said after blowing the combined.

He was true to himself. So why is he getting ripped for it?

Bode Miller is getting ripped because the last time I checked Americans hated losing. Losing? Screw that. We don't do that in America. And that's why a lot of Americans are tuning out the Olympics.

We want to believe in miracles. We proudly support our Olympians, but when we get told that winning isn't anything, we scratch our heads. Huh? Don't you mean, it's the only thing, Mr. Skier dude?

When the USOC realizes that what we love about the OLympics is not competing it's winning, maybe they'll go back to producing the best athletes, the finest facilities and building a global juggernaut. This isn't meant to be ugly Americanism, but shoot, the Olympics are supposed to be about chanting USA, USA, USA, while watching us whip everyone in sight and tally as many medals as you can.

Oh I forgot, that isn't sporting or good for competition.

See you in Beijing. Well probably not.

Pornified Pop-Culture?

2006-02-27T09:39:00.000-05:00

We have some bloggers we just can't wait to read what they have to say. Even the reluctant ones (JVL where are you you?)

Our original blog fave is Jim Geraghty of NRO and the excellent ontap blog. We're "the guy with the tab bigger than his waist" in the discussions over there. Sorta like Norm.

Jim has been watching the crunchy con debate going on over at National Review. And he submits this for our approval:

This is a more detailed exploration of a view that, as another NOR contributor once put it, ÂPop culture is filth.Â
IÂm not there, frankly. And I donÂt find these kinds of blanket denunciations terribly compelling. So let me offer a differing cultural critique: Our popular entertainment is not too Âpornified,Â but it is too dumb.

I'm not down with some blanket denunciations of pop culture, either. However, the trend line is towards dumber (I'm with you there, Jim) and hypersexualized content over thoughtful and intelligent programming. I don't begrudge the entertainment industry their right to produce whatever content they want. And I am not like some conservatives who think that there exists some madcap conspiracy to destroy all decency on television. There isn't. What exists in pop culture is a lack of imagination and guts to try a different course. And thoughtful programming is difficult to get into, because it demands more of you than dumb programming. Here's out imaginary screen writer's pitch:

So yeah let's make a show about bikini clad girls getting whacked and here we go, let's have David Caruso solve the mystery. That sounds great, doesn't it? And let's tie it into our hit show, that way it won't look like Silk Stalkings v 2.0. That sounds terrific!

My problem is not the skimpy clothes or the racy plotlines. I think they are an accurate reflection of our culture. I think that television has no responsibility to foment positive change. It would be nice if they wanted to do that, but positive change in self is an individual's responsibility and positive change in society is society's responsibility, not an institution within that society. But I look at the decadence of programming and I wonder, when, or more appropriately if, we are going to change.

What makes the effects hard to see is take a generation or so for them to take hold. Let's look an example. If Sherman and Mr. Peabody would be so kind as to take us on a spin in the way back machine to the sixties, in addition to getting a contact high, we would do wise to find a copy of the Moynihan report. Fortunately, the Internet is its own way back machine of sorts and we can find the report.

Chapter 2 of the oft-cited Moynihan report gave us these gems:

"The Breakdown of the Negro Family Has Led to a Startling Increase in Welfare Dependency."
"It has been estimated that only a minority of Negro children reach the age of 18 having lived all their lives with both of their parents."
Nearly One-Quarter of Negro Births are now Illegitimate.

The conclusion was that the disintegration of the black family unit would have severe consequences for black people in America. That dire projection has been partially shown in the violence and poverty in the black community. Without a centered family unit, who teaches kids morality or responsibility? Traditionally that has been dad's job, because dad is better at doling out the tough love necessary to teach responsibility, accountability and morality. But dad had been replaced by a welfare check. He was not there to show his kids that he was accountable for getting mom pregnant. He wasn't there to show that he took responsibility for the kids well-being. He wasn't there to love them as only a father can. And as a result, those necessary lessons were nto taught.

So let's go back to TV and popular culture. Popular culture is by definition the aspects of our culture that are popular. Television programming is not so much a training or indoctrinating element of society as it is a mirror that reflects our current societal mores. Can television programming glorifying a lifestyle of irresponsibility undo proper parental shaping? Of course not. Anyone who says that is demagoguing. But what we see in our dumbed down hypersexualized wasteland of channels is a reflection of a society that is int he words of Judge Robert Bork Slouching Towards Gomorrah.

Look at legitimacy rates now.

The number of births to unmarried women has been increasing for the past 60 years, although the rate of increase slowed during the 1990's. In 1940, there were 89,500 out-of-wedlock births. In 1990, there were 1.17 million. This represents an average increase of 5 percent per year. Between 1990 and 1999, the number rose to 1.30 million, an increase of just slightly over 1 percent per year.[10] Since 1994, the percent of all births to unmarried women has been approximately 33 percent.[11] In 1998, four out of ten women giving birth to their first child were not married and almost two-thirds of women under age 25 giving birth for the first time were not married.[12]

Gradually we are seeing the rates of illegitimacy and single parent homes becoming more common throughout American culture. What effect will that have on our culture? And will we divert our attention from the satisfaction of our own needs long enough to notice or care?

Tied one on

2006-02-23T11:15:00.000-05:00

An interesting discussion proceeds in the corner at NRO. Jonah Goldberg and John Podhoretz are discussing ties. Click here and here and here to follow along. This is in reference to Rod Dreher's book which they are promoting so much at NRO that I will refrain from mentioning it more.

Jonah sez:

People wore ties and dressed properly at public events not just in our parents' generation but for several generations. I remember when I was a kid people still got dressed-up to go on airplanes. And if you look at pictures of old baseball games, everyone was wearing a tie.

And the point he makes is that a common societal expectation of attire is a leveling feature and one that promotes a sense of community.

John responds:

Jonah, it's true that people used to dress up to go on airplanes. But so what? Why on earth should people have dressed up to go on airplanes? The formality of previous generations was a social norm and therefore a convention. I suppose it had meaning in the sense that it was a way for people to look as much like adults as possible and that our casual-attired ways are an indication of the perpetual pursuit of youth. But the last thing you can say of the Crunchy Cons -- of whom I must say I am most emphatically not one -- is that they are acting like children. They're trying to live a more serious life. Rod's goal isn't to live a more sober life. It's to live a more sacramental life, to infuse the everyday with holiness.

"So what?" Ahh a marvelous rejoinder. As in "We are different, so what?" Something is lost in that difference. Do you take a person in a shirt and tie seriously? I do. When I was younger, Saturn did away with car salesmen wearing more formal attire and replaced them with polo shirts and khakis. Maybe salesmen were more comfortable selling cars. Okay. That's fine. But what are you saying? That you don't take your work seriously enough to dress up. What about the churches that don't want the congregation showing up wearing their Sunday best? Are they saying that it is okay to dress up for work, but the God they worship doesn't deserve your best? I think it's bigger and more problematic. It is part of a gradual dumbing down of societal expectations.

I believe that your outward appearance is not indicative of who you are inside. You cannot judge a book by its cover. But at what point does the cover diminish from the message inside the book. Here's a good example for your consideration. If you are a serious Christian singer, does a trashy and revealing image diminish your credibility in that genre? You bet it does. In the same way, you need to represent yourself seriously, if you want to be taken seriously.

Jonah seems to agree:

You could -- and I would -- make the case that dressing appropriately is part of good manners. You wouldn't go to a funeral in shorts and a tank top, for example. Of course, it's not just clothes....Customs, manners, social conventions: this is the sinew and bone of civilization.

Customs and social conventions are the things that make it impossible to imagine doing things outside of those conventions. Invariably ostracism follows violating one of those conventions. But in our land lacking judgments and a moral authority that is constant and not relative, violating social convention carries little or no consequence. There are mitigating circumstances, of course. Immoral societal conventions need to be changed, like racism, sexism and so forth. But genteel societal conventions, governing politeness, appearance and decorum they should be nurtured and not discared do to be outmoded or old fashioned.