Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America groan as trust issues arise around National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. They also discuss the latest North Korean missile launch and whether there is a good strategy for confronting Kim Jong-Un. And they shake their heads as liberal comedian Sarah Silverman mistakes utility line markings as swastikas, just the latest episode in SJW hysteria.
News & Politics
‘I Don’t See A Floor Under This Elevator’
A new survey detailing the extent of casual sex among singles shows many are having intimate relations before the first date, a development that can be blamed in part on technology but leads to tremendous regret and permanently damaged relationships.
This week, the dating service Match released a new survey on sex and singles conducted by Research Now. Included in the data are the revelations that 34 percent of singles have had sex before a first date and that millennials are 48 percent more likely to have sex before a first date than all other generations of singles in order “to see if there is a connection.”
In a USA Today story on the survey, sex therapist Kimberly Resnick Anderson suggests millennials have inverted the relationship process, using sex to determine if they want to pursue anything further with that person.
“We used to think of sex as you crossed the line now you are in an intimate zone, but now sex is almost a given and it’s not the intimate part. The intimate part is getting to know someone and going on a date,” Anderson is quoted as saying.
Ruth Institute Founder and President Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse says the discrepancy between millennials and other singles is that the older ones know better.
“The reason older generations are not [having sex before a first date] is because they have figured out already from experience that this is not a good idea. What we’re doing is just one generation of young people after another are having to figure out for themselves that hopping into bed with somebody is a lot more complicated and potentially hurtful than we’re led to believe by the media and stories like this one,” said Morse.
Morse also says smartphone apps for the explicit purpose of casual sex are contributing to the trend.
“It’s a new thing when you having dating apps or casual sex apps on your cell phone and you can find out if there’s somebody close by who wants to have sex with you. That’s a new thing,” she said.
“The desire to be sexually active has been with us forever obviously, but this way of going about it and the way the culture is pushing people towards sex without any kind of intimacy or friendship, that is something new and, I think, uniquely destructive,” said Morse.
Morse calls surveys like this and their positive portrayal in the media “cheerleading for the sexual revolution.” But despite the glamorous and enticing portrayal of casual sex, she says it comes with many consequences, including the attachment people are specifically not looking for.
“What you learn from experience is that your body has a tendency to attach to the person you have sex with. If it doesn’t attach, often times what we have done is we are separating ourselves from our bodies, we’re anesthetizing ourselves,” said Morse.
She also says the surveys and the pop culture leave out other aspects of the hook-up culture.
“One thing they don’t talk about here is the roles of alcohol and drugs in casual sex. What one can see in other kinds of surveys is that when people decide they’re going to do completely anonymous sex like this, it isn’t unusual for people to get themselves completely plastered before they do it,” said Morse.
“That should tell you it’s not as much fun as it’s cracked up to be. That’s something that I’ve been hearing from college students for quite a while,” said Morse.
It’s not just college students who have regrets. The Ruth Institute has begun what may be a one-of-a-kind program called “Tell Ruth the Truth,” which invites people to share the impact that casual sex has had on their lives.
“What we’re trying to do is get away from this message of airbrushing away all the problems and allowing people space and time to say here’s what really happened. ‘Here’s how I really felt after casual sex. Here’s the next step after the first time you have that kind of encounter and then you get kind of swept away in it and are having one encounter after another and they’re not really satisfying you. Here’s where that leads,'” stated Morse.
She says her work shows that personal stories resonate best with young people.
“I think millennials particularly want to hear stories. They don’t care for data. All these numbers aren’t going to touch them one bit. But if someone who is 35 years old stands in front of them and says, ‘This is how my heart was broken by doing what you’re standing there thinking about doing. They just might listen to that,” said Morse.
Perhaps worst of all, says Morse, is the long-term damage casual sex inflicts on future efforts at meaningful relationships.
“The results of sex are bonding and babies. That’s the natural biological result of sex, bonding and babies. If people don’t know how to bond with one another, they’re going to have trouble creating lasting, stable relationships for when they do finally want to have babies. Then they’re not going to be ready to really care for their children and give the children the kind of security and attachment that they need,” said Morse.
She says impact of poor bonding is also is also felt by the children.
“The kind of damage that’s going to happen to children of people who can’t form relationships is really hard to predict just how bad that can be. Honestly, I don’t see a floor under this elevator. We’re still going down,” said Morse.
Three Martini Lunch 2/10/17
Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America are thrilled to see Tom Price confirmed as Secretary of Health and Human Services. They also discuss the numerous problems with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling on the Trump immigration order. And they slam CNN’s Chris Cuomo for asserting that accusing a journalist of fake news is the equivalent of using the N word.
‘Making Decisions Based on What the Law Says’
Former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli says the confirmation of Jeff Sessions means we will once again have a Justice Department that follows the law and he says the way Democrats treated Sessions could mean fewer of them in the Senate after the 2018 elections.
After eight years of Eric Holder and Loretta Lynch running the Justice Department, Cuccinelli says Sessions will be a breath of fresh air.
“Simply making decisions based on what the law says would be a radical change at the Department of Justice, as would the appearance of justice,” said Cuccinelli, who served four years as the top law enforcement official in Virginia.
While hoping to see many changes compared to the Obama years, Cuccinelli says one of Sessions’ top goals should be to stop federal agencies from granting themselves power that the law does not grant them.
“They have to stop backing up executive agencies, including the department itself, in expanding the law. They need to focus on containing government within the law. That includes everything from silly stuff like transgender bathrooms being covered by gender discrimination all the way up to agencies attempting to create new regulatory arenas for themselves and this vastly increase their power,” said Cuccinelli.
President Trump has already talked about his desire to roll back the ability of the government to grab more power. But Cuccinelli says that effort really needs to be rooted at the Justice Department.
“The legal oompf for all of that comes from the Department of Justice and having Sessions there – someone who’s committed to the rule of law and to reining in the federal government and not using it to exercise power – is going to be a very welcome change,” said Cuccinelli.
One specific area Cuccinelli expects to see great improvement in is the Justice Department’s relationship with law enforcement.
“These are people going to bat to protect you and me who have not had the back of the government. Frankly, it’s been the opposite. They’ve had to worry about getting prosecuted just for doing their job. That day is over thanks to the ascension of Jeff Sessions as the attorney general,” said Cuccinelli.
However, Cuccinelli reminds Sessions and all Americans that attorney general is different than every other cabinet position.
“When it comes to matters of policy, the attorney general does what the president wants. When it comes to matters of law, the attorney general does what the law dictates regardless of what the president wants,” said Cuccinelli.
“As opposed to what we’ve seen for the past eight years, I am confident that Sessions is going to be an attorney general who is actually going to uphold both sides of that deal for the American people,” said Cuccinelli.
On Wednesday, Sessions was confirmed by the Senate on a 52-47 vote. Only Sen. Joe Manchin, D-WV, crossed the aisle to back Sessions.
The confirmation process featured heated debate, including Democratic Sen. Cory Booker, D-NJ, telling the Senate Judiciary Committee that Sessions should be rejected for his record on race and Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., was booted from the debate for allegedly disparaging Sessions in her floor speech.
Cuccinelli says the vitriol coming from Democrats is telling.
“They’re playing to a rabid left-wing base that is wildly out of touch with just ordinary Americans,” said Cuccinelli, who says the Democrats never found substantive reasons to oppose Sessions.
“There’s just nothing that they can point to other than generating their own allegations for complaints. He is a nice guy. He is an intelligent individual. He believes what he believes and that is somewhat different than the lefties there. Nonetheless, the way he conducts himself even in those situations has never given any of them cause for complaint before,” said Cuccinelli.
He believes Booker and Warren lodged their fierce protests for the sake of their own self-promotion. He notes Booker recently lavished praise on Sessions in public after they worked together, but then turned and accused Sessions of being racially biased.
“I don’t care what the project is. If I think you’re a racist, I will never stand next to you and tell the world what a great guy you are,” said Cuccinelli.
Cuccinelli is also president of the Senate Conervatives Fund, which recruits and contributes to conservative U.S. Senate candidates. The group has frequently clashed with establishment Republicans and the national party, but right now Cuccinelli sees great opportunities as Democrats have to defend the vast majority of Senate seats in 2018.
“I fully expect Republicans to gain seats. The only question is how many. The biggest targets of them all are going to be Democrats in states that President Trump won,” said Cuccinelli.
Three years after narrowly losing the governor’s race in Virginia, Cuccinelli will not be a Senate candidate against Tim Kaine in 2018. However, he believes the 2016 Democratic vice presidential nominee is vulnerable too.
“This is an eminently winnable state and Sen. Kaine has really accomplished nothing and has become more radicalized, certainly much more so than the average voter in Virginia, than his time in the Senate,” said Cuccinelli.
Three Martini Lunch 2/9/17
Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America discuss a good day for judicial conservatives as Neil Gorsuch distances himself from some of Trump’s tweets on the judiciary, the Senate confirms Jeff Sessions to be Attorney General and Sen. Tim Scott exposes the racist messages he got for supporting Sessions. They also cringe as Tucker Carlson suggests Elizabeth Warren would have defeated Donald Trump. And they slam Kellyanne Conway for blatantly promoting Ivanka Trump’s products in a national television interview.
Three Martini Lunch 2/8/17
Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America are pleased to see nine Senate Democrats claim to want an up or down vote for Judge Gorsuch. They also applaud Missouri passing right to work legislation but wince as opponents may be able to stall the law from taking effect for almost two years. And they scold President Trump for tweeting about Ivanka’s battle with Nordstrom.
Three Martini Lunch 2/7/17
Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America react to the Senate confirmation of Betsy DeVos to be Secretary of Education. They also sigh as the Trump administration gets bent out of shape over the Saturday Night Live spoofing of Press Secretary Sean Spicer. And they learn about the man angling to become the Democratic nominee for governor in Florida.
Three Martini Lunch 2/6/17
Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America have all bad news, starting with a federal judge putting a hold on Pres. Trump’s immigration order without citing any law or constitutional provision and Trump’s subsequent tweets attacking the judicial system. We also blast Trump for his moral equivalence in dismissing Vladimir Putin as a killer by saying America’s done a lot of bad things too. And we discuss and debate whether the slower GOP strategy on Obamacare and tax reform is responsible leadership or letting a golden opportunity slip away.
Trump Continues ‘Absurd’ Obama LGBT Policy
Social conservatives are thrilled with President Trump for his pro-life actions and his choice for the Supreme Court, but he is taking heat from the right for extending an Obama-era executive order which places LGBT agenda mandates on federal contractors.
Liberty Counsel Chairman Mathew Staver says it all started under the Obama administration three years ago.
“In 2014, President Obama, contrary to any federal law, issued an executive order saying any contractor who does business with the federal government has to have this so-called LGBT and even Q (for) questioning, which is part of that alphabet soup, and they had to put this into their employment systems,” said Staver.
“They were imposing on employers the LGBTQ agenda when they didn’t have any federal law as authority,” said Staver.
Staver says Trump made a big mistake in continuing the policy.
“We were hoping that would be one of those executive orders that would go by the wayside, but when President Trump came into office, sadly he continued that executive order in 2017,” said Staver.
“That is going way beyond the federal law. Federal law does not have sexual orientation or gender identity in the employment context or in any other context with regard to employment or public accommodation,” said Staver.
He says Congress has repeatedly stiff-armed the LGBT agenda on this front, which is why Obama resorted to an executive order.
“Congress has been asked several times to include sexual orientation and gender identity into the federal employment law and they have rejected that urging. Consequently, not only does the law not have it but we see from Congress they don’t want it in there. So why would the president go over and above them and impose this on employers anyway?” said Staver.
“It’s understandable for Obama, but it’s just not acceptable for President Trump,” he said.
The order requires any firm bidding for a federal contract to adopt policies protecting employees who wish to identify as a different gender than their biological sex would indicate. It also requires businesses to accommodate such personnel by allowing them to using restrooms and other intimate facilities according to their gender identity.
And those companies refusing to comply will be left out in the cold on federal contracts.
“Any company that doesn’t want to have this absurd policy in place or a policy that violates their sincerely-held religious beliefs, they’re going to have to sit on the sideline. They won’t be able to do business with the federal government,” said Staver.
Staver also asserts that the protections offered through this executive order are not the equivalent of other anti-discrimination protections enshrined in law.
“Gender identity is completely in a different category than discrimination on the basis of race or religion, which is protected by the first amendment,” said Staver.
He also argues the policy flies in the face of Trump’s top goal of jump-starting the economy.
“If we want to have America first and we want to create jobs? Don’t put this absurd policy on them when the federal law does not impose it,” said Staver.
While Staver lauds Trump for his pro-life actions and for selecting Judge Neil Gorsuch for the Supreme Court, he says this is an area where Trump has always disappointed traditional marriage advocates.
“He never was on our side it looked like on the so-called LGBT agenda. Certainly, he’s not on the level of President Obama, who was radical in that respect,” said Staver. “Unfortunately, in the first two weeks of office, he does this executive order and that’s disturbing.”
Staver says conservatives need to make a compelling case to Trump to change course.
“I think he needs to be educated on this issue and he needs to reverse this policy that Obama ultimately instituted,” said Staver.
Three Martini Lunch 2/3/17
Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America cheer French security for shooting a would-be terrorist outside the Louvre. They also discuss Kellyanne Conway’s “Bowling Green Massacre” moment, her decision to slam the media when correcting her mistake, and the media for focusing more on her mistake than her point that refugees in the U.S. were trying to kill Americans. They unload on former Labor Secretary Robert Reich for suggesting, without any facts, that the Berkeley rioters were conservatives. And they offer their Superbowl predictions and preferences.