El Paso was, once again, rated low by Men's Health magazine. This time the category was "Most Patriotic Cities."
Of 100 cities, the magazine rated El Paso No. 99, ahead of only Jersey City, N.J.
Portland, Ore., was ranked as the most patriotic city in the USA in the list published in the magazine's July/August issue. How does one measure something as unmeasurable as patriotism?
The magazine based its rankings on the percentage of registered voters who turned out for state and federal elections 2004 to 2008; money spent on military veterans per capita; percentage of residents who volunteer; and sales of fireworks and U.S. flags.
This is a mish-mash list of measures, but various studies of "civic-mindedness," such as Robert D. Putnam's big analysis of 40 communities, tend to come up with the same usual suspects at the top and bottom of the lists.
Lubbock, Corpus Christi and New York City were also among the bottom 10 patriotic cities ranked by the magazine. Men's Health stated on its website that it is not suggesting any city is un-American. "There are no unpatriotic towns," the magazine stated.
Most patriotic cities
1. Portland, Ore.
2. Salt Lake City, Ut.
3. Kansas City, Mo.
4. Seattle. Wa.
5. Tampa, Fla.
Bottom five
96. Yonkers, N.Y.
97. Corpus Christi.
98. Honolulu.
99. El Paso.
100. Jersey City, N.J.
Source: Men's Health Magazine
Audacious Epigone took a look at military enlistment rates by state recently. They tend to be driven by what fraction of the population is ineligible to enlist due to lack of education, intelligence, honesty, or slenderness.
Utah did well on eligibility, but poorly on enlistment, probably because Mormon young men are supposed to serve 2-years overseas as missionaries. The FBI likes to hire Mormons because they tend to be honest and to lack dual loyalties to foreign powers.
Let's be fair -- there's such a thing as conservative lack of patriotism, too. Like re-locating oversees to save on jobs and taxes, destroying the environment, and joining something like the Michigan Militia.
ReplyDelete"The FBI likes to hire Mormons because they tend to be honest and to lack dual loyalties to foreign powers."
ReplyDeleteMaybe also because a lot of them speak foreign languages-in addition to fluent English-due to that missionary work.
>>Let's be fair -- there's such a thing as conservative lack of patriotism, too. Like re-locating oversees to save on jobs and taxes, destroying the environment, and joining something like the Michigan Militia.<<
ReplyDeleteThat's like an AA multiple choice question. Which one of these three items doesn't belong with the other two?
What is this, Bash Jersey Day at isteve? LOL
ReplyDeleteThe FBI likes to hire Mormons because they tend to be honest and to lack dual loyalties to foreign powers.
ReplyDeleteSteve, you ignorant anti-Semite! You're the same as Hitler.
Utah has a lot of good social and economic stats. If you want to experience what the old SoCal was like, I suggest moving down there.
ReplyDeleteIt's always a good day of some Jersey bashing.
ReplyDeleteThe FBI likes to hire Mormons because they tend to be honest and to lack dual loyalties to foreign powers.
ReplyDeleteAs I remember my Tom Clancy paranoia it's the CIA that hires the Mormons. The FBI hires Catholics. Clancy also claims that the CIA has a backdoor in UNIX while the FBI has one into Microsoft Windows. Or is it the other way around?
Albertosaurus
The top of the list seems a lot more interesting than the bottom. Hotbeds of SWPL-dom like Portland and Seattle there with Salt Lake City and KC.
ReplyDeleteExcept for Honolulu, which is a bit odd because of the military presence, the bottom seems to be comprised of either rusted out urban wastelands or towns that will be in coming years.
Mormons because of missionary focus have language skills and knowledge of foreign cultures.
ReplyDeleteHowever the FBI does famously have a lot of Irish and Italian East Coast Catholics. Example: the late Bin Laden hunter John O'Neil.
Albertosaurus,
ReplyDeleteThe FBI hires more Mormons than the CIA, or so I hear.
FBI culture has traditionally been more middle-class & focused on after-hours team sports & camping vacations in the US, better fits for large Mormon families. CIA culture has in the past focused more on hiring WASP over-achievers from the Ivy League. Emphasis was placed on knowledge of foreign cultures, good table manners for state dinners abroad, spending years overseas, etc, which are tougher on large families. Try moving US kids from French speaking schools to Chinese speaking schools.
Of course, all that may have changed when Rumsfeld & the Neocon's purged many CIA staff that were not enthusiastic about the Iraq War. Perhaps replacing un-PC WASP veterans, who were too self-confident, experienced & knowledgeable, with more easily influenced synchophants, sinecures & PC-types.
The fact the old CIA types' doubts proved valid probably makes the Neocon's more vindictive toward them.
And the famous backdoor key to MS Windows was labeled the NSAKEY in old programs, though it was vigorously denied by Microsoft, and its name has likely changed.
http://www.cnn.com/TECH/computing/9909/03/windows.nsa.02/
"The FBI likes to hire Mormons because they tend to be honest and to lack dual loyalties to foreign powers."
ReplyDeleteSo, honesty is a GOOD quality in an undercover agent?
"Full disclosure here, Carmine, Tony, Sal, I'm not actually a fence from Canada, I'm an FBI agent from Provo who's been or your case for 11 months and the second you passed me that shippment of stolen goods, I was going to call headquarters on this microphone in my eyeglasses!"
ReplyDeleteThe FBI likes Mormons because you have to swear that you've never used drugs (backed up by polygraph) as part of the application. Not too many college grads can say that anymore.
ReplyDeleteThe FBI likes to hire Mormons because they tend to be honest and to lack dual loyalties to foreign powers.
ReplyDeleteAt least by law, the FBI doesn't operate overseas. The CIA and NSA likes Mormons. The feds seems to think almost everyone who speaks a foriegn language is a traitor. Mormons are an exception, and they can always pass background checks.
I entered the military because I was down on my luck. We were supposed to protect western civilization against the Evil Empire of the East. Now, I realize that I was under the spell of the Washington Propaganda machine. Oh well! once a peasant always a peasant. By the way if you are not in the top 5% then you might as well consider yourself a peasant.
ReplyDeleteI don't know about the FBI and Mormons, but with the CIA it's also foreign language skills and ability to pass the security clearance.
ReplyDeleteI'll bet that voter turnout put Portland and Seattle at the top of the list. These cities are filled with people whose families came from the upper Midwest, where voter turnout is usually very high.
ReplyDelete"The FBI likes to hire Mormons because they tend to be honest and to lack dual loyalties to foreign powers."
ReplyDeleteCome on, everyone likes to hire Mormons.
Here's some Steve-bait from Radley Balko at Reason (back in June 2009), who argues that immigration leads to lower crime. His test case: El Paso, TX.
ReplyDeletehttp://reason.com/archives/2009/07/06/the-el-paso-miracle
What's happening with Latinos is true of most immigrant groups throughout U.S. history. "Overall, immigrants have a stake in this country, and they recognize it," Northeastern University's Levin says. "They're really an exceptional sort of American. They come here having left their family and friends back home. They come at some cost to themselves in terms of security and social relationships. They are extremely success-oriented, and adjust very well to the competitive circumstances in the United States." Economists Kristin Butcher and Anne Morrison Piehl argue that the very process of migration tends to select for people with a low potential for criminality.
Despite the high profile of polemicists such as Lou Dobbs and Michael Savage, America has been mostly welcoming to this latest immigration wave. You don't see "Latinos Need Not Apply" or "No Mexicans" signs posted on public buildings the way you did with the Italians and the Irish, two groups who actually were disproportionately likely to turn to crime. The implication makes sense: An immigrant group's propensity for criminality may be partly determined by how they're received in their new country.
"Look at Arab-Americans in the Midwest, especially in the Detroit area," Levin says. "The U.S. and Canada have traditionally been very willing to welcome and integrate them. They're a success story, with high average incomes and very little crime. That's not the case in Europe. Countries like France and Germany are openly hostile to Arabs. They marginalize them. And they've seen waves of crime and rioting."
How on earth are fireworks sales a reliable measure of patriotism? Even the apathetic enjoy the chance to shoot off pyrotechnics. Around here it's the various herds of (illegal) Mexicans that shoot off all the fireworks, smack in the middle of a wooded residential area I might add.
ReplyDeleteOther than that, I agree with Darwin about list being topped by various SWPL enclaves. I would have expected more Southern and Midwestern cities.
OT. Have you read this from The Guardian.
ReplyDeletePeople who live in countries where disease is rife may have lower IQs because they have to divert energy away from brain development to fight infections, scientists in the US claim.
The controversial idea might help explain why national IQ scores differ around the world, and are lower in some warmer countries where debilitating parasites such as malaria are widespread, they say.
"People who live in countries where disease is rife may have lower IQs because they have to divert energy away from brain development to fight infections, scientists in the US claim."
ReplyDeleteMakes sense. Even if we accept pur et dur HBD-ism, we still have to explain the 15-point-plus gap between Africans and African Americans. Admixture won't do it.
How on earth are fireworks sales a reliable measure of patriotism? Even the apathetic enjoy the chance to shoot off pyrotechnics.
ReplyDeleteAnother issue with using fireworks sales as a measure of patriotism is the fact that fireworks are not legal in some places.
Peter
The reason Mormons are so frequently hired by the FBI and the DEA is because they can give the correct truthful answer to "Have you smoked pot in the last ten years?"
ReplyDeleteAnother issue with using fireworks sales as a measure of patriotism is the fact that fireworks are not legal in some places.
ReplyDeleteYou seem to have confused cause and effect. Would a patriotic body of citizens that valued freedom ban fireworks in the first place?
Here in WA we buy our fireworks exclusively from Indian reservations. It's a nice way to square patriotism with liberal guilt.
This just doesn't pass the sniff test. Portland and Seattle in the top five patriotic cities? Two Texas cities in the bottom five? Not a chance.
ReplyDeleteThe FBI likes to hire Mormons because they tend to be honest and to lack dual loyalties to foreign powers.
ReplyDeleteBeing dishonest and loyal to a foreign power are not disqualifiers for folks at policy-setting level, apparently.
The FBI is a hotbed of Mormons (they even call themselves "The Mormon Mafia") but also Irish and Italian Catholics and other family and religion types. The problem with Mormons is that they are generally useless for undercover work. The Irish and Italians, often with mob or crooked politician types in their own family, understand crime firsthand.
ReplyDeleteUtah did well on eligibility, but poorly on enlistment, probably because Mormon young men are supposed to serve 2-years overseas as missionaries.
ReplyDeleteOh, but you oversimplify. Not all missionaries serve overseas, of course (and technically no mission in North or South America is "overseas"). A fair number of American missionaries serve in the US, and an increasingly large portion of those seem to be serving Spanish-speaking missions. Conversions among First Worlders have all but dried up, and it's not rare to meet a missionary who served in Europe, Japan, or an English-speaking US mission who failed in those entire 24 or 18 months (for women) to gain a single convert.
The LDS Church is great at dissembling, but it has essentially become a major behind-the-scenes advocate for open borders. It's media arms - KSL TV, KSL Radio, and the Deseret News - all maintain solid, obnoxiously pro-amnesty editorial positions. This is perhaps because without Latin converts the LDS Church population, in which only about 30% of baptized members remain active, would probably be stagnant or even shrinking in the USA.
It is an increasingly unpopular position among the English-speaking rank-and-file, however. A few weeks ago I was at a barbecue where a conversation about illegal immigration came up and two former LDS congregation leaders ("bishops") talked about all the members they knew who were thoroughly pissed over the Church's position. The Church is fighting against the tide in a state where Republicans seem even more willing than those in other states to throw out cheap labor advocates, like Chris Cannon, Bob Bennett, David Ure, Ben Ferry, and Steven Mascaro.
Missions definitely keep young Mormons from enlisting, but at the same time I'd wager that a far larger than average percentage of Mormon college grads join the Officer Corps. BYU, Utah, and Utah Valley University all maintain fairly large ROTC programs.
By the way, kind of off-topic, but did anyone know that obnoxious open border's advocate Frank Sharry's birthname is actually Francis Navas? Sharry lies about his name, then picks an Orwellian title ("America's Voice") for the name of his open borders organization. Kind of serves to remind you of the fundamental dishonesty of the open borders crowd, doesn't it?
"This just doesn't pass the sniff test. Portland and Seattle in the top five patriotic cities? Two Texas cities in the bottom five? Not a chance."
ReplyDeleteI think the point is that the metric they devised to measure "patriotism" turned out (oops!) to be strongly predicted by "whiteness".
Mormons are common in the FBI because they can pass the rigorous drug screening. Most college-educated Americans wouldn't.
ReplyDeleteThis just doesn't pass the sniff test. Portland and Seattle in the top five patriotic cities? Two Texas cities in the bottom five? Not a chance.
ReplyDeleteRead it and weep, buddy.
Hotbeds of SWPL-dom like Portland and Seattle there with Salt Lake City and KC.
ReplyDeleteYes, isn't this hard to believe? The first thing I thought was, in what fashion are SWPL people patriotic? And TEXAS towns, not at the top, but at the bottom of the list? I don't believe this data at all.
How on earth are fireworks sales a reliable measure of patriotism? Even the apathetic enjoy the chance to shoot off pyrotechnics.
Ain't it the truth!
Another issue with using fireworks sales as a measure of patriotism is the fact that fireworks are not legal in some places.
In fact, I assumed they were outlawed around the country. Here in New York, in days of yore, fireworks would begin at least a week before the 4th and pick up by July 2nd. And, of course, the 4th was a blast. But no more. It's rare to hear the weakest firecracker go off, and surprising, too!
>explain the 15-point-plus gap between Africans and African Americans. Admixture won't do it<
ReplyDeleteMaybe not, but please show your work.
>never used drugs [...] Not too many college grads can say that anymore.<
"Anymore" = last 40 years.
The only potential for traitordom among potheads (vs. hard drinkers) seems to be the toker's connection to a criminal underworld (his dealer et al.). The services could recruit a larger number of bright young'uns by advocating drug legalization. This makes far too much sense for America to do, though.
David,
ReplyDeleteDo you want your security detail toking up during their down time?
There are some professions where drug use should be avoided.
Anyone know what the rules are for alcohol use with the secret service?
We shoot of fireworks at Christmas and New Years in Mississippi. Hell, we just like mindless explosions, what can I say?
ReplyDeleteMaybe u Texans aren't as patriotic as you think? I'm from Seattle and I can tell you that us Pacific Northwesterners (Seattle and Portland) plenty like America.
ReplyDeleteMaybe u Texans aren't as patriotic as you think? I'm from Seattle and I can tell you that us Pacific Northwesterners (Seattle and Portland) plenty like America.
ReplyDeleteI think you're missing the point: Corpus and El Paso are essentially Mexican cities.
>Do you want your security detail toking up during their down time?<
ReplyDeleteNo, I was thinking of not wanting to turn away any bright translators, programmers, investigators, and technical people who could help the government, simply because they smoked a joint ten years ago.
The CIA et al. do not test for beer. The only difference is that pot-smoking involves participation in a criminal network. Remove the criminality and you've removed the security problem.
Can we drop the tired cliche? I mean the knee-jerk response to any advocacy of drug legalization:
1. So you want everybody to be high all the time??
2. You must be a drug addict yourself (ad hominem).
I understand that rational thinking on this issue is in short supply, and do not really expect the government to do anything sensible. But hey, it's good for the Mormons, and that I do like.
Happy Fourth. Remember to drink responsibly.
Corpus and El Paso are essentially Mexican cities.
ReplyDeleteWell, that certainly puts another color on things. I was still picturing those two places as Apple Pie America. In fact, I still think of all of Texas that way. My mistake!
I understand that rational thinking on this issue is in short supply, and do not really expect the government to do anything sensible. But hey, it's good for the Mormons, and that I do like.
ReplyDeleteThere will be no rational thinking re. marijuana and "drugs" in general until the Baby Boomers die off.
How could that be? They were the druggiest generation. Or so it seems. But they did "drugs" mostly out of rebellion against their parents' generation, and did them without the necessary safeguards. Hence, the backlash.
The "druggiest" generation also happened to be the "anti-druggiest" one, and is the one currently in the driver's seat of the nation.
Alcohol and tobacco are drugs too; and more people are starting to accept that. But there is still plenty of superstitious terror towards "drugs" - especially the hallucinogenic and psychedelic ones.
Pot is not heroin, nor does it lead directly to heroin. But try telling some people that!