American culture has always put a spotlight on the question: Can you control your impulses and desires - especially sexual desires - enough to live up to the moral rules?

As historian of religion John F Wilson tells us, the quest for certainty has typically focused on a "control of self" that "through discipline" finally becomes self-control.

In the 2008 presidential campaign, this still remains true. Listen, for example, to Barack Obama:

"My Bible tells me that if we train a child in the way he should go, when he is old he will not turn from it.

"So I think faith and guidance can help fortify ... a sense of reverence that all young people should have for the act of sexual intimacy."   more »

Épater le Bourgeois...This common French phrase

means "to shock the middle class"

The shock is usually applied with relish

by those who see the bourgeoisie

as unimaginative, conservative, convention-bound,

safety-first and self-satisfied

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Once again, as the presidential campaign season heats up, the leading candidates are going to enormous lengths to demonstrate their devotion to the state of Israel and their steadfast commitment to its “special relationship” with the United States.

Each of the main contenders emphatically favors giving Israel extraordinary material and diplomatic support — continuing the more than $3 billion in foreign aid each year to a country whose per capita income is now 29th in the world.

They also believe that this aid should be given unconditionally. None of them criticizes Israel’s conduct, even when its actions threaten U.S. interests, are at odds with American values or even when they are harmful to Israel itself.

In short, the candidates believe that the U.S. should support Israel no matter what it does.   more »

Hillary Clinton put a national spotlight on Nevada's signature issue Wednesday, holding a discussion on Yucca Mountain before a full contingent of national media.

"When I am president, Yucca Mountain will be off the table forever," Clinton said.

The New York senator said the proposed nuclear waste repository, about 100 miles from Las Vegas, was a national issue, because spent fuel rods would be transported through many states. She criticized the Bush administration for continuing the project despite botched science.

"This is not just, 'We're in Nevada, so we'll talk about an issue Nevadans care about,' " she said. "This is an American issue."   more »

Because he’s loose on the stump, self-deprecating yet cocky, Obama gets away with appropriating the language of his own deification. He mocks it, but at the same time reinforces it. It’s hard to be humble when your overflow room is overflowing.

There were other moments of self-puffery. At one point, he introduced a volunteer as the chair of “Obamans for—” He caught himself. “Nashuans for Obama.”

However innocently, Obama had just bestowed himself with fame’s highest honor: his very own adjectival form.

Obama’s speaking style, with its preacherly repetitions and rhythms, is nothing new. But the content of his speech—if you stop and actually listen to it—is aggressively vapid.   more »