Didn't Know About Planned Parenthood's Parentage? What else don't you know?

I imagine most politically engaged people have at one time or another thought to themselves: "If only everybody was as familiar with the things I know, then they'd all be liberal/conservative/libertarian etc.."

I'll admit I largely feel the same and think I've done a pretty good job of putting it into practice via successful debate. Whether I nudge someone over towards the conservative side or not I'm almost always guaranteed to pull out a fact that my counterpart "can't believe" until the point where I produce proof.

The difference for those on the liberal side is that whether they believe it or not nearly every card (or fact in this case) in the argument for contemporary liberalism is already on the table. There's little a liberal can tell you that you haven't heard a hundred times before. There's a reason of course.

For starters most Americans have spent 17 or more years in schools where the teachers are generally more liberal than their parents, the textbooks and curriculum are almost exclusively written by liberal academics, and even the books in the library are chosen by librarians who happen to belong to one of the most radical unions in America.

Then it's off to college to instructors even more radically liberal, and a student culture where the only thing less cool than being a conservative is being a virgin.

Apart from all this (and family of course) the main sources of information about the outside world are newspapers, television, and to a degree movies - all mediums largely delivered through a liberal filter.

So basically there's no excuse for any of the "inconvenient truths" that animate liberals NOT being widely disseminated in the public domain.

Anyways, I bring this up in response to the story about numerous Planned Parenthoods accepting donations with the specific goal of aborting black babies. The story's serious enough in itself, but the political junkie in me can't help but wonder how many outspoken liberals are even aware of Planned Parenthood's parentage - in particular that it's founder Margaret Sanger referred to blacks as "human weeds" and saw abortion as a way to cleanse the population of it's lesser members (She would have preferred wholesale sterilization, but settled for abortion).

Honestly, how many people today do you think know about the eugenics movement and it's link to abortion? Do you think if the word "eugenics" was as often associated with abortion as "back alley" and "coat hanger" that it might take a few folks down a notch?

Likewise I'd venture a guess that 9 out of 10 college students today could tell you that JFK was a Democrat, but less than 1 in 10 know MLK was a Republican.

I'd also bet that if asked who "outed" Valerie Plame the majority response would be "Scooter Libby" not the confirmed culprit and Bush critic Dick Armitage. Don't even bother asking about Sandy Berger.

Well read conservatives are filled with all these little tidbits so I decided to make a quick list of "Did you know?" questions guaranteed to burst a few liberal bubbles:

Did you know that...

-Americans spend more money on taxes than on housing and health care combined?

-The polar bear population is not facing extinction and is actually growing?

---More than twice as many people move from Canada to the U.S. as move from the U.S. to Canada every year? This despite the fact that WE HAVE ALMOST TEN TIMES AS MANY PEOPLE and they have "free" healthcare.

--Four times more people have been killed by their own governments in the past century than have died in all international wars combined ?

--Ann Coulter has been to roughly 67 Greatful Dead shows?

-The unemployment rate was 5.4% in Nov. '96 when Bill Clinton was re-elected largely on his handling of the economy. Today the unemployment rate under Bush is only 5.1% yet it's all doom and gloom? (Can you say media bias?)

-Universal Healthcare in New Zealand actually requires banning immigrants who are too fat (They cost too much you see)?

-Less than 50 of the roughly 200 countries in the United Nations are democracies?

-The global polar bear population has grown five times larger than it was in the
1970's.

-The United States already admits more legal immigrants each year than all other countries in the world combined.

-In '06 Democrats in Congress had over six times more money personally invested in military-related companies than their Republican counterparts?

-Despite what Michael Moore may have you believe, regular Cubans go to hospitals that look like this?

-Hardly discriminated against, 140 women graduate from college today for every 100 men?

-The editorial boards of both the New York Times and the Washington Post wrote in favor of drilling in ANWR all the way back in the late 80's.

-In the unregulated U.S., carbon output fell 1.3% in '06 while it rose .4% in progressive Europe?

-There is much more forest coverage in the United States today than there was in 1920?

-Handgun crime rose %40 after handguns were banned in the UK?

-Multi-national companies (or "sweatshops" to some) on average pay twice the average local wage?

-The government never injected blacks with syphilis during the Tuskegee Experiment.

-Only 1.5% of oil company stocks are held by corporate directors and officers, while 43% are held by mutual funds and 27% of that by institutional funds (teachers,police officers,firefighters).

--A person could live for a whole year on the corn it takes to make enough ethanol to fill one SUV tank?

-The Pilgrims tried collectivism for their first two years here and only abandonded it after they nearly starved to death?

-Under their universal healthcare system the average wait for surgery or theraputic services in Canada was 18.3 weeks in '07?

-George Bush fired only 8 U.S. attorneys while Bill Clinton fired 93?

-Minorities are more likely to be rejected for home loans by minority-owned banks than traditionally white banks?

-The federal government spends over $23,000 per household? (Did you pay your "fair share"?)

-Whites do not have the highest household income in the United States? (Asians do)

-Palestinians have more rights in Israel than in any Arab country?

-More people were killed in Southeast Asia during the first three years of communist "peace" than were killed in the 13 years of war prior?

-Contrary to the "rich get richer, poor get poorer" narrative, from '96-'05 people in the bottome fifth of income earners saw a 91% increase in income while the top 1% had an income decline of 26% ?

-Man of the people Fidel Castro controls a fortune estimated at $900 million while the average Cuban makes less than $20 a month ?

-In '04 the average earnings of the top 10 athletes and entertainers was almost double the average earnings of the top 10 earning CEO's?

-Hurricane Carter was never exonerated, wasn't anywhere close to being the champion at the time of his arrest, and is still in all likelihood guilty of murder?

-Since the General Social Survey began in 1972 Republicans have reported being happier than Democrats of equal income levels EVERY SINGLE YEAR? (Where's the hatred and bigotry?)

-The "rich" carry more of the tax load now under Bush than they did under Clinton?

-The infamous Katherine Harris of the Florida 2000 election fame actually ordered a statewide recount, but Al Gore fought against it.

-PETA kills thousands of animals every year?

-Every one of the top 10 individual donors to 527 groups in the '04 election supported Anti-Bush or Democratic-allied groups? (Party of the rich anybody?)

-Slavery existed among the American Indians long before Europeans settled here?

-That dirty looking Che Guevera guy on your shirt personally executed dozens if not hundreds of people ?

-Contrary to reports of "disenfranchisement" and a stolen election blacks in Florida voted in greater numbers than ever before during the 2000 election?

-There has been no observable global warming for the last nine years despite growing carbon output?


And that's a short list....