Plus--the LAT's wacky wikiness.

The Bolton nomination is already paying dividends, WaPo notes.  ...Moving him from State to the U.N. seems part of a shift that's highly favorable from a Democratic foreign policy perspective. Too bad that the need to posture prevents Dems from admitting this (and the need to pretend that Bolton's being elevated prevents Republicans from admitting it).. ...Maybe Newsweek should start a Kabuki Watch to go with its existing  CW Watch:

Surface story:  Bolton promoted to powerful U.N. post where he'll destroy U.S. relations with allies!

Real Story: Bolton moved out of powerful State job to U.N. post where he can do much less damage!

8:29 P.M.

Further Father Study:  From today's WaPo:

Resarchers at the University of Washington and Columbia University said Friday that child support laws' power to reduce single parenthood is an unintended consequence of a policy designed to help children and cut public welfare costs.

"Often the unintended effects are bad, so it's refreshing to see that," said lead study author Robert Plotnick, a University of Washington professor of public affairs. "Women living in states that do a better job of enforcing child support are less likely to become an unwed mother." [Emphasis added]

Unintended? That's like saying toppling Saddam was an unintended effect of the invasion of Iraq. Of course reducing single-parenthood has been a goal of tough child support laws--and not just on the right. Anti-cad feminists, liberal scholars (like Irwin Garfinkel), centrists (like Bill Clinton) and free-range egomaniacs (the late Sen. Moynihan) all suggested that cracking down on deadbeat absent fathers would encourage them to think twice about becoming absent fathers in the first place. I was skeptical myself, but it will be a good thing if it turns out they were right and I was wrong. ...P.S.: If potential parents can take long-range consequences like the need to pay child support into account, they can take long-range consequences like the need to go to work into account!  One of the arguments against welfare reform (from the left) was that low-income couples in the heat of passion wouldn't think about such things, even though most people with access to birth control succeed in having sex without having unwanted illegitimate children. ...

Update.: I fear the left will use the success of enforcing "child support" as a way to reinstall welfare in the form of "assured child support" checks from the government to single moms (a proposal of Garfinkel's), with the newly-aggressive government assuming the responsibility of getting the child support from the dads. But this latest study--by suggesting that people have fewer unwed children if they know that heavy responsibilities will result from having unwed children--undermines, rather than supports, that idea. If a mother knows the government will "guarantee" child support to an out-of-wedlock child, that makes a bad decision easier--for fathers as well as mothers, I might add. ...

Which raises the possibility that the 1996 welfare reform is what enabled the study's finding that tough child support laws (which were part of the same 1996 law) had an impact. When single mothers know they'll have to go to work to make up any missing child support, they are apt to really go after the absent dads. Similarly, if dads know the moms will have to work to make up the missing money, they are more susceptible to a moral appeal--and they know in advance they'll be susceptible to that appeal. ... Plus they know the moms will really come after them! ... They may shape their behavior accordingly. ... 12:54 P.M.

Friday, June 17, 2005

Fishbowl L.A.: