The number of black children being raised by two parents appears to be edging higher than at any time in a generation, at nearly 40 percent, according to newly released census data.Huzzah! After decades of decline, a resurgence for marriage and family stability? What is the black community doing the rest of us can learn from? thought I. Answer:
Demographers said such a trend might be partly attributable to the growing proportion of immigrants in the nation’s black population. It may have been driven, too, by the values of an emerging black middle class, a trend that could be jeopardized by the current economic meltdown.Huzzah! Wait, what's this I see in paragraph 3?
The Census Bureau attributed an indeterminate amount of the increase to revised definitions adopted in 2007, which identify as parents any man and woman living together, whether or not they are married or the child’s biological parents.Forgive me if I'm not nearly as excited about the "news" that 40% of black children are living with two random adults of their parents' generation to whom they may or may not be related. Mom or Dad's succession of shack-up lovers does not constitute a "parent," no matter what the Census Bureau says.
Which reminds me that in the latest issue of First Things, Fr. Neuhaus announces he's canceled his subscription the the Formerly Gray Lady after decades of reading it after morning office and with morning coffee. Not that it's worse now than it has been for years, but he finds its spins so predictable they can't even get a rise out of him anymore.
I noticed that, as often as not, the half hour was down to fifteen minutes or less as my attention was distracted by a book or magazine article close at hand....As for the Times, with its boring predictability of opinion and partisan slants (opinion and news often indistinguishable), both the pleasure and the benefit have long since departed....Truth to tell, there's little fun left even in ribbing the Times. It is a pitiably vulnerable target in a target-rich environment. Paying attention seems to be a bit cruel.
