That post [...delusional folks.....these criminals...] if written about Mohammed-followers in the uk would be considered by them to rate prosecution as religious hatred (even though the Qur'an would qualify infinitely more, notwithstanding Obama's latest lies), though in practice that law was only introduced to pacify the Muslim lobby and the Attorney General has not yet been coaxed into actually starting any prosecutions.

Dave,

Why,indeed,do we still give tax deductions for large families?I don't expect there is any need to go into that,it's just one more example of all the other irrational things we do as a society.

As far as the Mormons themselves are concerned,a population biologist would probably say that the strategy of having very large families is and has been a successful strategy for the Mormons as a social group/clan/tribe(whatever terms are currently in vogue).

Of course such high birthrates lead to population overload quickly if sustained,but if the Mormons raise enough kids successfully,thier genes inherit the earth-or at least whatever is left of it,if anything,for a while.

When humans were scarce,we had to cooperate to compete with the other animals that ate the same foods in the same environment,and to protect ourselves from the animals that would otherwise eat us.

Nowadays we compete as "us" groups against "them" groups of other humans.Packs of wolves,prides of lions,and bands of chimps compete in the same way.

If there were such a thing as an evolutionary scorecard,the winning group would be the most numerous group.

But the top of the evolutionary hill is a very slippery place and no group of individuals or speices manages to stay there very long in evolutionary time.The Mormons may be clawing thier way toward the top,but I expect our speices as a whole is headed for a serious(to us) crash.

Mother Nature is an entirely heartless bitch and she could (not) care less.Out here on the farm when we are not spraying some nasty chemical to get rid of some particular bug,and killing a dozen useful bugs at the same time,we are used to seeing the age old game played out between the foxes and the rabbits.When the rabbits have a good year,the foxes have a very good year,the following year the rabbits have a very poor year as the result of the foxes good year,the following year the foxes have an extremely bad year as a result of what they did to the rabbits the previous year.
I paint with a broad brush of course,nothing in nature is quite so simple.

My personal opinion of the Mormons is that the ninety percent or so of them living under the heel of the other ten percent need to wake up and get the hell out of Utah,but you do have to admit that the old bulls in charge have done a good job of running things,from thier pov.Not many old men in this world can have a nubile young wife simply for the asking of an old buddy-knowing that of course he will be coming around for the same favor later.

As far as abortion is concerned,I am strenously opposed to it as a default method of birth control,but otherwise if a woman finds herself preggo and after serious soul searching on her part wants an abortion,I cannot see that it really is anyone else's business-although the potential father might righteously feel differently.

The soul searching is important,because some women later bitterly regret thier decision to abort.

The Republican party has shot itself in the foot by buying the antiabortion vote in violation of true conservative principles of personal liberty, self determination, and limited government.This tactical decision helped win some elections in the past,but is is nowadays an electoral loser on the national level,and I expect the next generation of republican leadership will quietly drop the issue.

Otoh,I don't see how anybody can look at a six month fetus and not see a human being.Personally I maintain the necessary cognitive dissonance that allows me to support limited abortions by not looking and not thinking,otherwise I feel the bile rising and the whole idea makes me ill.

I do not find it at all hard to understand why some people hold such strong beliefs in this respect that they are willing to resort to murder to stop what is after all to them,not only murder but murder of the powerless and helpless.

Life is a real bitch in some respects,is it not?