Some of you may remember a couple of years back, when Massachusettes was the first state to attempt to legalize gay marriage, there was a big rally in Cambridge where the first marriage licenses where being given out at midnight. There was also a bunch of insane protestors from Kansas. Well, I guess they're still at it, only this time they are protesting at the funerals of soldiers killed in Iraq. I guess they claim that god hates and is punishing the US (by killing soldiers, among others) because the US condones homosexuality. This time, however, politicians are getting outraged, saying it's disrespectful and trying to ban protests at funerals.

Granted these people are batshit insane, but it seems funny to me that it's not so disrespectful when they're just going around the country publicly preaching death to gays, but when it's at a funeral, of a soldier no less, then it's crossed a line. Maybe we should start by making it a priority to respect the living, then worry about respecting the dead.

Of all places, The American Conservative has an interview with an academic (Robert Pape) who studies patterns of "suicide terrorism" as part of his focus on International Security Affairs. Pape's conclusion is that:

The evidence shows that the presence of American troops is clearly the pivotal factor driving suicide terrorism.

And he goes on to lay out a variety of reasonable, data-driven arguments. Here's another exchange from the interview: