Dudge Linkfest

It's kinda stupid to link to a bunch of stories I found on Drudge, but whatever; sometimes he's got nothing, but today he's got the goods.

First, an inside look at the ratings wars and how Fox has risen and NBC fallen even further over the past year. I remember when Fox first started 19 years ago; everyone said they couldn't possibly compete with the Big Three networks... and now they're number one.

Italian writer Oriana Fallaci has been charged with defaming Islam for writing that "terrorists had killed 6,000 people over the past 20 years in the name of the Koran and said the Islamic faith 'sows hatred in the place of love and slavery in the place of freedom.'" I don't have a good understanding of Italy's legal system, but it appears that a prosecutor refused to bring charges citing freedom of speech, but a judge later indicted Fallaci anyway.

Betty Ostergren is fighting to keep private identity information off the internet by posting the Social Security numbers of powerful people. Sounds similar to protest actions taken against the leaders of the Total Information Awareness program from a couple of years ago.

Boys who attend Christian schools are less likely to be sexually promiscuous, and also less likely to have psychological problems or be suicidal. Correlation or causation, and in which direction? Other studies show that the connection between depression and sexual activity is even stronger for girls.

About 25% of sexually active girls say they are depressed all, most, or a lot of the time; 8% of girls who are not sexually active feel the same. ...

About 14% of girls who have had intercourse have attempted suicide ; 5% of sexually inactive girls have.

About 6% of sexually active boys have tried suicide; less than 1% of sexually inactive boys have.

Of course, early sexual activity and depression may both stem from the same underlying causes, and neither may directly cause the other, even if there is a vicious cycle.

Finally, a tool that shows what it would be like if a nuclear weapon were detonated in your city. Unfortunately the server appears to be overwhelmed.