For the first time in more than a decade, the rate of pregnancies among 18- and 19-year-olds <ahref="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/25/AR2010012503957.html">is on the rise.
Unwed mothers and children born outside of marriage are more likely to be poor, increasing likelihood of dependence on government welfare. If we seek limited government, we need solutions to reduce the trend of unwed pregnancy.
As far as school instruction and programs for teens are concerned, the good news is that a recent report shows programs that teach abstinence exclusively (without safe sex caveats) are effective in delaying adolescents sexual debut and decreasing the likelihood sexual activity and engaging with <ahref="http://archpedi.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/164/2/152 ">multiple sexual partners.<spanid="more-27063"></span>
Yet factors that influence adolescents sexual behavior and life changes also lie closer to homein the actions and attitudes exhibited by parents. Specifically, parents examples that convey the messages that it is best to wait until marriage to have children and that marriage should be a bond of commitment can decrease the likelihood that teens will be sexually active.
Youths whose parents talk with them about the social and moral consequences of being sexually active and convey clear standards regarding sexual behavior are more likely to be abstinent. Adolescents very* perception that their parents would disapprove of their becoming sexually active reduces the likelihood that they would contract a sexually transmitted disease. And teens whose parents indicate a concern about their behavior via monitoring and involvement are less likely to be sexually active.
Likewise, messages sent through parents own example has an impact on the sexual behavior of their children. Teens who were born out of wedlock are more likely to be sexually active than peers whose parents were married at the time of their birth. In addition, youths whose parents do not marry or whose marriages end in dissolution are more likely to be sexually active and to have more sexual partners. In fact, the number of transitions in family structure that teen girls experience is related to an increase in the likelihood that they will become pregnant before they reach their twenties.
Regardless of the impact of culture or peers, parents can and do have an effect on their childrens sexual behavior and related prospects for the future.
</p>School districts and legislatures in Rhode Island, New Jersey, and Virginia are demonstrating a commitment to greater educational opportunities for students and families by challenging the status quo of mediocre and failing public schools.
</p>On December 25th there was a clear failure to connect the dots that could have prevented Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab from boarding a plane bound for the U.S with a bomb strapped to his body. However, as explained last week at Heritage by former Homeland Security Advisor, the Hon. Kenneth Wainstein, the U.S. would not have even been in the position to try and piece together this intelligence information before the Patriot Act lowered the walls between intelligence and law enforcement.
</p>Lets wait until the economy recovers a little before we step on it with costly environmental regulations. That was the message from Environmental Protection Agencys (EPA) Administrator Lisa Jackson in a response to eight Democratic senators from industrial coal states the authority of the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases. Administrator Jackson <ahref="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704454304575082004106469086.html?m od=WSJ_hpp_MIDDLTopStories">said by April she will “take actions to ensure that no stationary source will be required to get a Clean Air Act permit to cover its greenhouse gas emissions in calendar year 2010.”
</p>At 8:44 p.m. PST Feb. 11, 2010 … for just a second … man made night into day. A short-range ballistic missile launched from a sea-based platform off California’s Point Mugu Naval Air Warfare Center. Moments later, the Airborne Laser carried aloft in a specially modified 747 detected it.
</p>The President promised that under health reform taxpayers would not be forced to fund abortion. Not true.
</p>In the run-up to his proposed health care summit, President Barack Obama this morning unveiled an <ahref="http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/summary-presidents-proposal.pdf">11-page outline of his health care proposal. Within the outline, there are 33 specific policy changes. Of course, there is no legislative text yet, so the full impact of what the President is proposing will not be known for some time.
</p>The White House has just issued <ahref="http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/summary-presidents-proposal.pdf">an 11 page concept paper (PDF) for yet another health care bill that, among other items, includes a proposed new Federal “Health Insurance Rate Authority.”* The Administration has yet to provide any legislative language on how this new Federal regulatory regime would operate, but based on statements by the President and other officials, as well as similar provisions included in the bills already passed by the House and Senate, there is good reason for concern as to whether the President and Congress really know what they are doing in this regard.
</p>“Vouchers drain money from public schools so that some students can go to private schools.” Somewhere in the vicinity of that declarative sentence – which school choice critics regard as some sort of argument -lurks the thought that vouchers must equal special advantages for some students that are denied to others. Guess what? That’s what the system of public schools is.