Hillary-ous!

Watch out. I have more puns from where that came from, and I'm going to start shooting them off unless my list of demands are met.

My first demand:

Could someone please tell me exactly how Hillary Clinton has made such an astonishing come back? A new New York Times poll shows that the senator's approval rating in New York State has rocketed to 69 percent from 58 percent in October.

What is more, when matched against both Rudy and Pataki in the sentatorial race, she comes up ahead. Some very, very surprising information, considering she remains relatively unpopular nationwide.

So I need someone to explain it to me. And I don't want the explanation where you talk about how she has "toned down her discussions of abortion and gay rights". I want an explanation involving lasers and robots and Tony Danza.

And then, the puns will stop. I swear.

Morals? What are those?

Certainly not something we should be teaching children at school, home, or anywhere else.

Well, a new Scripps survey shows some surprising statistics about what Americans value.
For example, only 31 percent of Americans, out of over a thousand surveyed, cite homosexuality as a serious moral issue, compared to 71 percent concerned with hunger.

There are, of course, separations based on the normal demographic splits, with Republicans very much more concerned about Same-Sex marriage than Democrats.

What surprises me are the missing morals - how many Americans are angered by the lack of catagories including single drivers in the carpool lanes, or cell phones in the movies? Surely, we cannot simple ignore them! You try sitting through Hitch while someone is talking to their girlfriend in Nepal.

Also, thankfully, only 18 percent of respondents were concerned with gambling. The other 82 percent were glued to their televisions waiting for the results of the Pick Four, which they all unfortunately lost.

Social Insecurity

Well, after waiting a whole week to try and think of an appropriate pre-Valentine's Day title for this post, I think I've finally got it. So yes, this post's oh so clever title could both be seen as a metaphor for someone's romantic ineptitude (not mine, of course) and as a play on Social Security, which is apparently something my Grandmother gets a bit of, my dad will get less of, and that I'll forget about by the time I'm their age.

A new CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll shows that more than two-thirds of adults think that workers with higher incomes should pay Social Security taxes on all their wages (and not just the $90,000 the government can tax for social security now) .

Of more than a thousand adults surveyed, this was by far the most popular option for revamping Social Security - with reduced benefits and increased taxes for all workers falling far behind. Also, more than half of those believe that the plan being pushed by the current administration - to allow investors to put some of their Social Security into private plans - is a "bad idea". Only four percent of respondents said that Social Security was doing A-Ok.

What I want is a poll of people who think Social Insecurity is a great idea for a blog title. Then again, Google can't be wrong.

U.S. Students Unfamiliar with Constitution, Familiar with Ashlee Simpson

I know what you're saying. "Gee, Poll Pollution, isn't it just all the rage to bad mouth our nation's children?" Well sure it is. And you know why? Because it's darned fun! Heck, I'm not laughing at them - I'm laughing with them!

Okay, I'm laughing at them.

But can you blame me? No, you can't. Not when 36% of high school students think the press should get "government approval" before publishing stories. The press. That includes (I would hope) bloggers. Such as myself. And I have it on good word that there are some people higher up that would love to stifle me and my Ashlee Simpson ramblings. Enough, they say. You've taken the joke as far as it will go, they say.

Well, according to an extensive survey of high school students conducted by the University of Connecticut, this is exactly what many of our nations youngsters think should happen.

Some highlights:

32% think the press has "too much freedom".
75% believe flag burning is illegal (it is not).
73% either "didn't know how they felt" about the First Amendment or "take it for granted".

Think you can take it with a grain of salt? Not when the survey, commisioned by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, questioned over 100,000 students.

Scary? Maybe, or maybe it's not. Maybe I've had so much freedom lately to write that I''ve been thinking too much and find things like this scary. Maybe if someone took away that freedom I'd be less scared. Maybe I wouldn't mention Ashlee Simpson so much.

Nahhh.