karrie catalonia: June 2012

Wednesday, June 13, 2012

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UT Study on Gay Parenting Sparks Controversy | The Alcalde

By Rose Cahalan in 40 Acres, Research, Special on June 11, 2012 at 4:12 pm

A new study from UT sociologist Mark Regnerus is making huge waves today in the worlds of social science and LGBT politics. The study?s title asks ?How different are the adult children of parents who have same-sex relationships?? The answer, according to Regnerus, is a resounding ?very different.?

Regnerus surveyed adult children who reported their mother had at least one same-sex relationship. His surveys found that those children fared worse on 25 of 40 outcomes: they reported worse physical and mental health, more difficulty with romantic relationships, and lower incomes than did children of married heterosexual parents.

But that doesn?t mean that the children did worse because of their parents? sexual orientation, Regnerus stresses. ?This was not a causative study,? he says. Though the study found a link between gay parents and worse outcomes, it didn?t demonstrate that gay parents are less effective than straight parents. Any number of other reasons could account for the differences?maybe children of gay parents suffered from discrimination, for example, or were impacted by financial insecurity.

?The study set out to answer one question and one question only,? says LBJ School professor Cynthia Osborne, who authored a response to the study. ?Causality wasn?t part of it. When you have such a highly politicized topic, you need to be very clear about what the research says and doesn?t say. And people will try to make it say whatever they want.?

Osborne says that the study reveals more about family structure than about the parenting ability of gay people. ?Based on prior research, when we compare kids raised by their married biological parents to kids who grow up in any other kind of family form?blended families, step-parents, adoptive families, single parents, and so on?the married bio kids are advantaged,? Osborne says. ?What hasn?t been tested within any of those family forms is whether parental sexual orientation matters.?

Until now, Osborne says, studies of gay families have found a ?protective effect??that is, gay families weren?t negatively impacted by unconventional family structures, even though straight families were. Regnerus? study didn?t find evidence of a protective effect.

Critics like Slate?s Willian Saletan say that the exclusion of stable, planned, long-term same-sex families from the study is misleading. After all, those are the kinds of families who are rallying for the legalization of same-sex marriage and adoption.

Osborne says she completely agrees: ?It?s an apples-to-oranges comparison?Mark didn?t answer the question that many of us want to see answered,? she explains. ?That is, if you have two children growing up in stable married households, and all is equal except parental sexual orientation, is there a difference? That?s the comparison we are legislating today, but it?s a very hard comparison to make.?

One reason that the comparison is so hard to make, Osborne explains, is that 20 to 30 years ago, when the subjects of the study were growing up, there were very few stable, planned, same-sex families in the United States, and none that were married?it was culturally near-impossible. Many of the study?s subjects had experienced divorce, putting them at a disadvantage. Today, that?s rapidly changing?meaning future research may be more revealing.

?The next step is to replicate these findings and ask the question of why these differences exist,? says Osborne. ?This was just the first step.?

Photo via Flickr Creative Commons.

Tags: cynthia osborne, gay families, lgbt, mark regnerus, research, sociology

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Box Turtle Bulletin ? First Look at Mark Regneruss Study on - Typepad

First Look at Mark Regnerus?s Study on Children of Parents In Same-Sex Relationships

Jim Burroway

June 10th, 2012

Mark Regnerus. "How different are the adult children of parents who have same-sex relationships? Findings from the New Families Structure Study." Social Science Research 41, no 4 (July 2012): 752-770.

A new study slated for the July issue of the journal Social Science Research claims to show significant differences in adverse outcomes among children raised by gay and lesbian parents when compared to children raised by both biological parents in a heterosexual-headed household. The study is not yet online but I have been provided an advance copy. [Update: it is now available for purchase.] It is by Mark Regnerus of the University of Texas?s Department of Sociology and Population Research Center, and is titled, ?How Different are the Adult Children of Parents Who Have Same-Sex Relationships? Findings from the New Family Structures Study.?

This study finds ?numerous, consistent differences, especially between children of women who have had a lesbian relationship and those with still-married (heterosexual) biological parents.? The results of this study would up-end some thirty years of established scientific research which showed that gay and lesbian parents are, on the whole, just as good as their straight counterparts. It would, at least, if the study?s methodology were designed to prove that point. But as is the case with all studies, the conclusions drawn by this study are only as good as the methodologies used to inform them.

The Study?s Sample
On that score, there is one significant strength to this study which makes it stand out. Unlike prior studies, the New Family Structures Study (NFSS) is based on a national probability sampled population. This is the gold standard for all social science studies, and it?s extremely rare for a study to achieve that mark. As far as I am aware, all of the studies to date of gay and lesbian parenting use non-representative convenience samples. National probability samples, unlike convenience samples, are important because they alone can be generalized to the broader populations, to the extent that key characteristics in the design of the probability sample (demographics, etc.) match those of the general population. Convenience samples can?t do that. (For more information on convenience samples versus national probability samples, click here.)

So why don?t the other studies use national probability samples? Believe me, every researcher would much rather work with national probability samples instead of convenience samples. But virtually nobody can afford the huge cost of putting such a study together. It is a massive undertaking, and the cost of creating such a data set is just too prohibitive. Regnerus however has overcome this limitation (PDF: 74KB/12 pages) with a generous $695,000 grant from the Witherspoon Institute and a supplemental $90,000 grant from the Bradley Foundation. With more than three quarters of a million dollars, he has the kind of funding that other researchers can only dream of.

With those vast sums in hand, Regnerus contracted with Knowledge Networks, a large research firm which has provided access to its broad, general-population probability sample to researchers for more than 350 working papers, conference presentation, published articles and books. The probability sample supplied by Knowledge Networks for this study was based on adults between the age of 18 and 39 who were asked the following questions (page 756):

?From when you were born until age 18 (or until you left home to be on your own), did either of your parents ever have a romantic relationship with someone of the same sex?? Response choices were ?Yes, my mother had a romantic relationship with another woman,? ?Yes, my father had a romantic relationship with another man,? or ?no.? (Respondents were also able to select both of the first two choices.) If they selected either of the first two, they were asked about whether they had ever lived with that parent while they were in a same-sex romantic relationship. The NFSS completed full surveys with 2988 Americans between the ages of 18 and 39.

Because the number of adult children of gay or lesbian parents is so small, additional participants were recruited who could answer the first question in the affirmative using the same random methodologies used to generate the broader sample. This was done to increase the statistical power of the smaller sample while preserving the random nature of that subsample. This is a legitimate practice for examining very small populations. But for that reason, comparing the total of children raised by a parent who had had a same-sex relationship to the overall sample size would not tell us how much of the general population is being raised by such a parent. And while that was not a primary question to be answered by this study, Regnerus notes that the original raw sample showed that 1.7% of all Americans between the ages of 18 and 39 report that their father or mother has had a same-sex relationship. This is in line with several other studies on same-sex households with children.

Problem #1: Identifying a Same-Sex Relationship Doesn?t Tell Us Anything About the Nature of the Relationship.
But this is where we run into the first problem with this study. Identifying a parent who has had a same-sex relationship is not the same as identifying a parent who is gay, lesbian or bisexual in a functional relationship. Regnerus acknowledges this problem so quickly that it?s likely to be overlooked (p 578):

In the results section, for maximal ease, I often make use of the acronyms IBF (child of a still-intact biological family), LM (child of a lesbian mother), and GF (child of a gay father). It is, however, very possible that the same-sex romantic relationships about which the respondents report were not framed by those respondents as indicating their own (or their parent?s own) understanding of their parent as gay or lesbian or bisexual in sexual orientation. Indeed, this is more a study of the children of parents who have had (and in some cases, are still in) same-sex relationships than it is one of children whose parents have self-identified or are ??out?? as gay or lesbian or bisexual. The particular parental relationships the respondents were queried about are, however, gay or lesbian in content. [Emphasis in the original.]

What criteria does he use to judge whether those relationships are ?gay or lesbian in content?? We don?t know. I can?t find any indication that the duration of the relationship played any factor in its identification. The question was very simple: ?Did either of your parents ever have a romantic relationship with someone of the same sex?? Did a short affair count? What about a relationship that only lasted two weeks? Four months? Social conservatives who reduce gay and lesbian relationships to behaviors only would say yes to all of those, many eagerly so. Actual gay and lesbian couples in committed, long-term relationships naturally scoff at that, and rightfully so.

But already you can see where this is headed, can?t you? We will be asked to accept as legitimate the comparison of children raised by parents in those less stable and unenduring situations with stable, longtime married heterosexual parents without knowing the answers to those question. So already, Regnerus puts that comparison in starkly unequal footing.

Sorting the Sample into Subpopulations
That population was then sorted into the following categories (p 757-758):

1. IBF: Lived in intact biological family (with mother and father) from 0 to 18, and parents are still married at present (N = 919).

2. LM: R reported R?s mother had a same-sex romantic (lesbian) relationship with a woman, regardless of any other household transitions (N = 163).

3. GF: R reported R?s father had a same-sex romantic (gay) relationship with a man, regardless of any other household transitions (N = 73).

4. Adopted: R was adopted by one or two strangers at birth or before age 2 (N = 101).

5. Divorced later or had joint custody: R reported living with biological mother and father from birth to age 18, but parents are not married at present (N = 116).

6. Stepfamily: Biological parents were either never married or else divorced, and R?s primary custodial parent was married to someone else before R turned 18 (N = 394).

7. Single parent: Biological parents were either never married or else divorced, and R?s primary custodial parent did not marry (or remarry) before R turned 18 (N = 816).

8. All others: Includes all other family structure/event combinations, such as respondents with a deceased parent (N = 406).

Problem #2: Arbitrary Decisions in Dealing with Overlaps Between Categories Make the LM and GF Categories Heterogeneous While the Other Categories Remain Relatively Homogeneous.
Regnerus discusses how he dealt with the fact that these categories are not mutually exclusive (page 758):

That is, a small minority of respondents might fit more than one group. I have, however, forced their mutual exclusivity here for analytic purposes. For example, a respondent whose mother had a same-sex relationship might also qualify in Group 5 or Group 7, but in this case my analytical interest is in maximizing the sample size of Groups 2 and 3 so the respondent would be placed in Group 2 (LMs). Since Group 3 (GFs) is the smallest and most difficult to locate randomly in the population, its composition trumped that of others, even LMs. (There were 12 cases of respondents who reported both a mother and a father having a same-sex relationship; all are analyzed here as GFs, after ancillary analyses revealed comparable exposure to both their mother and father).

This quoted paragraph packs quite a wallop. Regnerus describes ?small minorities? which overlap different categories, but he doesn?t characterize them except for one example ? the twelve respondents who reported both a mother and a father having a same-sex relationship. He decided to lump them into the Gay Fathers (GF) category rather than the Lesbian Mothers (LM) category. That alone boosts the GF numbers by one-fifth. That?s a ?small minority? in an election, but in a statistical study it?s not so small.

Regnerus?s decision to arbitrarily force his sample into non-overlapping categories results in a method is based solely on a desire to increase the size of the smaller group, a goal which has nothing to do with the study?s larger goal of comparing children of gay and lesbian parents to those of intact biological families. In fact, he makes choices which, by their very nature, run explicitly counter to that goal. With each transfer of a subject from the Divorced, Step Families, Single Parent or ?All Others? categories into LM or GF, the less those LM and GF groups are designed to look like intact biological families. Especially if you consider some of the possibilities that might exist in the ?All Others? category (page 757):

Fifty-eight (58) percent of those whose biological mothers had a same-sex relationship also reported that their biological mother exited the respondent?s household at some point during their youth, and just under 14% of them reported spending time in the foster care system, indicating greater-than-average household instability. [Emphasis mine.]

I understand Regnerus?s problem with having a sample of lesbian mothers and gay fathers that is too small to make statistical comparisons with the control group. But the proper solution to that problem would have been to go back to Knowledge Networks for another round of sample recruitment. Then perhaps he could have compared children of gay and lesbian parents who had been brought up in a stable environment with children of heterosexual parents in a stable environment. He could have also compared children of gay and lesbian parents in unstable environments with their heterosexual counterparts.

But instead, he undertakes a manipulation which I believe represents the fatal flaw of this study. If one wanted to intentionally create Lesbian Mothers and Gay Fathers groups which were least likely to look like an intact biological family, I can?t imagine a better way to do so than to take the steps Regnerus has taken here. He enlarged his LM and GF groups by lumping together a mishmash of overlapping characteristics into two messy samples. The other six categories are relatively homogenous for straight people, but Regnerus?s enlargement of LM and GF groups makes them deliberately heterogeneous. And now having done this, he?s about to compare two deliberately heterogeneous categories (LM and GF) to a deliberately homogeneous category. Well of course there will be differences once you do that!

Problem #3: It Doesn?t Study Children Who Grew Up In Gay- or Lesbian-Led Households.
Marriage equality opponents will trumpet this study as proof that children raised by loving, committed, married same-sex couples will have more problems than those who are raised by both biological parents in a heterosexual household. But the samples that Regnerus put together to compare to the ideal heterosexual household cannot make such a claim because it says almost nothing about committed same-sex couples who, together, decide to become parents via adoption, in-vitro fertilization or surrogacy (page 756):

While gay and lesbian Americans typically become parents today in four ways ? through one partner?s previous participation in a heterosexual union, through adoption, in-vitro fertilization, or by a surrogate?the NFSS is more likely to be comprised of respondents from the first two of these arrangements than from the last two. Today?s children of gay men and lesbian women are more apt to be ??planned?? (that is, by using adoption, IVF, or surrogacy) than as little as 15?20 years ago, when such children were more typically the products of heterosexual unions. The youngest NFSS respondents turned18 in 2011, while the oldest did so in 1990. Given that unintended pregnancy is impossible among gay men and a rarity among lesbian couples, it stands to reason that gay and lesbian parents today are far more selective about parenting than the heterosexual population, among whom unintended pregnancies remain very common, around 50% of total (Finer and Henshaw, 2006). The share of all same-sex parenting arrangements that is planned, however, remains unknown. Although the NFSS did not directly ask those respondents whose parent has had a same-sex romantic relationship about the manner of their own birth, a failed heterosexual union is clearly the modal method: just under half of such respondents reported that their biological parents were once married. This distinguishes the NFSS from numerous studies that have been entirely concerned with ??planned?? gay and lesbian families, like the NLLFS.

What Regnerus sees as a strength, I see as a gross weakness in the context of current debates over same-sex marriage. Those debates center on whether committed, loving same-sex relationships are worthy of recognition, and one component of that debate has been what effects, if any, loving, same-sex relationships have on children. But to have a legitimate comparison, you?d have to look at children whose experience in that same-sex family was, for all intents and purposes, in place for their entire or almost entire childhoods. After all, that is the experience of children from intact biological heterosexual families.

But in this study, only 57% said they had lived with their mother and her partner for at least four months before the age of 18, and only 23% reported living with their father and his partner for the same length of time. Only 23% of LM children and 2% of GF children reported living with their parents and their parents? same-sex partners for three years or more. And when looking at the outcomes of those children, we are being led to believe that those outcomes are in some way related to the short amounts of time that those children spent with their gay or lesbian parents while in a same-sex relationship, and not the fifteen-plus years the vast majority of them spent outside of that dynamic. The illogic behind this comparison is mind-boggling.

The Results
So, we?ve been talking about the results of the study ? that children of parents who have had a same-sex relationship have greater struggles than those who grow up in intact biological families ? without actually seeing those results. It?s time now to look at them. The first table of results, Table 2, shows the average responses given by these now-adult children to several yes/no questions, including:

Are you currently married? Cohabiting?
Did your family receive welfare growing up?
Are you currently employed?
Have you recently thought about suicide?
Do you identify entirely as heterosexual?
Have y0u had an affair while married/cohabiting?
Have you ever been touched sexually by a parent/adult?
Have you ever been force to have sex against your will?

Table 2: Mean scores on select dichotomous outcome variables. (Click to enlarge.)

Anti-gay extremists are likely to latch onto the last two questions for evidence that children of gay and lesbian parents are particularly vulnerable to sexual abuse at the hands of those parents. But notice the open-ended nature of the questions: they don?t ask who did the abuse, but only whether the abuse occurred. As Regnerus explains (page 763):

It is entirely plausible, however, that sexual victimization could have been at the hands of the LM respondents? biological father, prompting the mother to leave the union and?at some point in the future?commence a same-sex relationship. Ancillary (unweighted) analyses of the NFSS, which asked respondents how old they were when the first incident occurred (and can be compared to the household structure calendar, which documents who lived in their household each year up until age 18) reveal this possibility, up to a point: 33% of those LM respondents who said they had been sexually victimized by a parent or adult caregiver reported that they were also living with their biological father in the year that the first incident occurred. Another 29% of victimized LMs reported never having lived with their biological father at all. Just under 34% of LM respondents who said they had at some point lived with their mother?s same-sex partner reported a first-time incident at an age that was equal to or higher than when they first lived with their mother?s partner. Approximately 13% of victimized LMs reported living with a foster parent the year when the first incident occurred. In other words, there is no obvious trend to the timing of first victimization and when the respondent may have lived with their biological father or their mother?s same-sex partner, nor are we suggesting by whom the respondent was most likely victimized.

Wanna bet the Family ?Research? Council ignores that?

Moving on to Table 3, we see the mean scores to several continuous outcome variables, which include:

Educational attainment.
Family of origin safety/security
Closeness to biological mother/father
Physical health, overall happiness, depression
Attachment, impulsivity measures
Current relationship quality measures

Table 3: Mean scores on select continuous outcome variables. (Click to enlarge)

And finally, Table 4 shows the mean scores to several event-count outcome variables, which include:

Frequency of marijuana/alcohol/tobacco use
Frequency of watching TV
Frequency of arrests, pleading guilty to non-minor offenses
Number of female/male sex partners

Table 4: Mean scores on select event-count outcome variables. (Click to enlarge.)

A cursory look at all of this data reveals what we already know: children who have experienced divorce, single-parenthood, step-parenthood, and other family structures other than a long-term stable family experience all kinds of problems, regardless of whether their parents are gay or straight. And you know what? Regnerus himself says so, but with very different words:

(Page 763): Although my attention has been primarily directed at the inter-group differences between IBFs, LMs, and GFs, it is worth noting that LMs are hardly alone in displaying numerous differences with IBFs. Respondents who lived in stepfamilies or single-parent families displayed nine simple differences in Table 2. Besides GFs, adopted respondents displayed the fewest simple differences (three).

(Page 763-4): As in Table 2, respondents who reported living in stepfamilies or in single-parent households also exhibit numerous simple statistical differences from IBFs?on nine and 10 out of 14 outcomes, respectively?most of which remain significant in the regression models. On only four of 14 outcomes do adopted respondents appear distinctive (three of which remain significant after introducing controls).

By the time he gets to discussing Table 4, Regnerus is no longer interested in making the broader observation, saying instead (page 764):

Although I have paid much less attention to most of the other groups whose estimates also appear in Tables 2?4, it is worth noting how seldom the estimates of young-adult children who were adopted by strangers (before age 2) differ statistically from the children of still-intact biological families. They display the fewest simple significant differences? seven ? across the 40 outcomes evaluated here. Given that such adoptions are typically the result of considerable self-selection, it should not surprise that they display fewer differences with IBFs.

It?s worth noting his comment about adoptive parents being intentional parents. By his own admission, that is an emerging model of parenthood for gay and lesbian parents in committed long-term relationships going forward. And that point leads us directly to?

Problem #4: This Study Makes The Wrong Comparison.
When you look at the data, the study?s real findings become obvious. Children of parents who have had a same-sex relationship ? a group that includes very large numbers of children of divorced parents, single parents, adopted parents, step-parents and ?other? family structures ? have developmental outcomes which are remarkably similar to children of divorced, single, adopted, step-, and ?other? family structures overall when compared to intact, non-adoptive heterosexual families. Regnerus designed his study to show this result by constructing samples which mimicked these characteristics. By constructing his LM and GF samples the way he did, the only legitimate comparison he could make would be to children of divorced, single, adopted, step-, and ?other? family structures. But that?s not the comparison he made. He focused the study on making the wrong comparison, and then concluded that children of gay and lesbian parents have more negative outcomes than children of straight parents in intact households.

But his conclusion is as illegitimate as his comparison, and his comparison is as illegitimate as his samples. Instead of making an apples to apples comparison, he compared apples to elephants and concluded that there was a difference. To which anyone with a minimal understanding of design of experiments would answer, Duh!

But when you make the right comparison ? compare children of divorced gay parents to children of divorced straight parents, compare children of single gay parents to children of single straight parents, compare children of long-term committed gay parents to children of long-term straight parents ? there is nothing in this study to suggest that children of gay parents are at any disadvantage whatsoever to children of straight parents. And when you make the right comparison, the study goes much further toward confirming that conclusion than the one Regnerus arrives at.

The Study?s Caveats
Alongside the study?s explosive claims, Regnerus does provide several important caveats. I want to note them and make sure they are publicly available, since anti-gay groups are likely to make claims about this study that Regnerus doesn?t make.

(Page 755): There are several things the NFSS is not. The NFSS is not a longitudinal study, and therefore cannot attempt to broach questions of causation. It is a cross-sectional study, and collected data from respondents at only one point in time, when they were between the ages of 18 and 39. It does not evaluate the offspring of gay marriages, since the vast majority of its respondents came of age prior to the legalization of gay marriage in several states. This study cannot answer political questions about same-sex relationships and their legal legitimacy.

(Page 766): As scholars of same-sex parenting aptly note, same-sex couples have and will continue to raise children. American courts are finding arguments against gay marriage decreasingly persuasive (Rosenfeld, 2007). This study is intended to neither undermine nor affirm any legal rights concerning such.

(Page 766): Although the findings reported herein may be explicable in part by a variety of forces uniquely problematic for child development in lesbian and gay families?including a lack of social support for parents, stress exposure resulting from persistent stigma, and modest or absent legal security for their parental and romantic relationship statuses?the empirical claim that no notable differences exist must go.

On that last point, let me say that I would have to agree. To claim that there are no notable differences in childhood outcomes due to family stability or structure would be ludicrous. And I don?t think it?s possible to legitimately claim that there are no differences between gay- and lesbian-led families and their straight counterparts. There are bound to be differences. But thirty years of research has failed to find major adverse differences where appropriate comparisons were made. The data in this study appears to reinforce that fact rather than refute it ? when appropriate comparisons are made. But with this nationally representative sample, we?re still waiting for those appropriate comparisons.

A Final Note
I made a brief mention of the huge amount of money that was spent on this study, a sum that comes to $785,000. The lion?s share came from the Witherspoon Institute, a think tank in Princeton, New Jersey (and not affiliated with Princeton University). Members of the Institute include Robert P. George, who drafted the Manhattan Declaration and whose recent paper in The Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy on same-sex marriage was critiqued at length by BTB?s Rob Tisinai. The Withersoon Institute reportedly has close associations with such organizations as the National Organization for Marriage, the Family Research Council, and the secretive Catholic order Opus Dei. George also sits on the board of directors for the Bradley Foundation, which also provided funds for this study. The Bradley Foundation is considered one of the country?s largest and most influential right-wing foundations, although its contribution to this study is ?only? $90,000.

I mention this because it is important, but I don?t want to over play its importance. All sorts of studies are funded by all sorts of institutions which support a variety of causes. Those sources can come from conservative, anti-gay organizations, or (as is the case with many studies which are favorable to LGBT issues) they can come from pro-gay sources such as the Williams Institute or other organizations. The source of funding can indicate a potential conflict of interest, but the true value of a study rests on the methodology of the study itself. If the methodology is sound, then the study?s conclusions are sound regardless of where the money comes from or who?s doing it. But where the methodology fails, the broken link affects the entire chain. While there are many grounds in which to attack this study, the only legitimate way to critique it is to examine the methodology, as I have done here.

A Final, Final Note
I only received this study yesterday morning, which means that my examination was the result of only one day?s work on a Saturday. So consider this examination a preliminary one. I look forward to seeing what you learn in the comments or via email for a possible future update.

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"Gone With the Wind" actress Ann Rutherford dies

FILE - This Nov. 5, 1971 file photo shows actress Ann Rutherford in New York. Rutherford, who played Scarlett O'Hara's sister Carreen in the 1939 movie classic "Gone With the Wind," died at her home in Beverly Hills, Calif. on Monday, June 11, 2012. She was 94. (AP Photo/HF)

This undated image from the film "Gone with the Wind" provided by New Line Cinema shows, from left, Ann Rutherford, Vivien Leigh and Evelyn Keyes. Rutherford, who played Scarlett O'Hara's sister Carreen in the 1939 movie classic "Gone With the Wind," died at her home in Beverly Hills, Calif. on Monday, June 11, 2012. She was 94. (AP Photo/New Line Cinema)

FILE - This July 26, 1972 file photo shows actress Ann Rutherford gazing at old sets on the MGM studio?s Lot 2 in Los Angeles where she and Mickey Rooney filmed the Andy Hardy series. Rutherford, who played Scarlett O'Hara's sister Carreen in the 1939 movie classic "Gone With the Wind," died at her home in Beverly Hills, Calif. on Monday, June 11, 2012. She was 94. (AP Photo/JLR, file)

FILE - This April 22, 2010 file photo shows actresses Ann Rutherford, left, and Anne Jeffreys at the premiere of the newly restored feature film "A Star Is Born" in Los Angeles. Rutherford, who played Scarlett O'Hara's sister Carreen in the 1939 movie classic "Gone With the Wind," died at her home in Beverly Hills, Calif. on Monday, June 11, 2012. She was 94. (AP Photo/Dan Steinberg, file)

FILE - This April 10, 2011 file photo shows actress Ann Rutherford at the 22nd Annual Glaad Media Awards in Los Angeles, Calif. Rutherford, who played Scarlett O'Hara's sister Carreen in the 1939 movie classic "Gone With the Wind," died at her home in Beverly Hills, Calif. on Monday, June 11, 2012. She was 94. (AP Photo/Katy Winn, file)

LOS ANGELES (AP) ? Ann Rutherford, the demure brunette actress who played the sweetheart in the long-running Andy Hardy series and Scarlett O'Hara's youngest sister in "Gone With the Wind," has died. She was 94.

A close friend, Anne Jeffreys, said she was at Rutherford's side when the actress died Monday evening at home in Beverly Hills. Rutherford died of heart problems and had been ill for several months, Jeffreys said.

Rutherford's death was first reported by the Los Angeles Times (http://lat.ms/MEPubi ).

"She was a dear person, a very funny lady, wonderful heart, was always trying to do things for people," said Jeffreys, a leading lady of many films of the 1940s and a star of the 1950s TV sitcom "Topper."

Rutherford was a frequent guest at "Gone With the Wind" celebrations in Georgia and, as one of the few remaining actors from the movie, continued to attract fans from around the world, Jeffreys said.

"She loved it. It really stimulated the last years of her life, because she got thousands of emails from fans," Jeffreys said. "She was in great demand."

She was also known for the Andy Hardy series, a hugely popular string of comical, sentimental films, that starred Lewis Stone as a small-town judge and Mickey Rooney as his spirited teenage son.

Rutherford first appeared in the second film of the series, "You're Only Young Once," in 1938, and she went on 11 more. She played Polly Benedict, the ever-faithful girlfriend that Andy always returned to, no matter what other, more glamorous girl had temporarily caught his eye. (Among the other girls: Judy Garland and Lana Turner.)

It was said she won the part of Carreen ? the youngest of the three O'Hara sisters in "Gone With the Wind" ? because Judy Garland was filming "The Wizard of Oz."

Rutherford told the Times in 2010 that MGM head Louis B. Mayer was going to refuse her the role, calling it "a nothing part." But Rutherford, who was a fan of the novel, uncharacteristically burst into tears and he relented.

Rutherford plays the sister who, early in the film, begs to be allowed to go to the ball at Ashley Wilkes' plantation. "Oh, Mother, can't I stay up for the ball tomorrow? ... I'm 13 now," she says in a sweet voice.

In 1989, she was one of 10 surviving "GWTW" cast members who gathered in Atlanta for the celebration of the film's 50th anniversary.

"Anyone who had read the book sensed they were into something that would belong to the ages, and everyone was in a frenzy to read the book," she said.

"The specialness of this is with each generation of young people who are touched by 'Gone With the Wind,'" she said. "As long as there are little children, there will always be a Mickey Mouse. ... On an adult version, 'Gone With the Wind' does that."

Rutherford concurred with other cast members that no matter what else they had done, "Our obituary will say we were in 'Gone With the Wind' and we'll be proud of it."

In a 1969 Los Angeles Times interview, she lamented that the "permissive generation" of the 1960s wasn't getting the old-fashioned parenting that the fictional Andy Hardy got.

"Someday someone will have to sit down with today's youth and give them a man-to-man talk," she said.

She also joked that "my life has reached the point where I'm now 'camp.'"

Rutherford was born in 1917, according to the voter records reviewed by The Associated Press. Some sources give other dates. The daughter of an opera tenor and an actress, she began performing on the stage as a child.

She launched her movie career in Westerns while still in her teens, often appearing with singing cowboy hero Gene Autry and sometimes with John Wayne.

She joined MGM in 1937, playing a variety of roles for several years before leaving the studio to freelance.

Among her other films: "Whistling in the Dark," with Red Skelton, 1941, and its two sequels, "Whistling in Dixie" and "Whistling in Brooklyn"; "Orchestra Wives," with bandleader Glenn Miller, 1942; and "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty," with Danny Kaye, 1947.

She largely retired from the screen in 1950, but appeared in a couple of films in the 1970s, "They Only Kill Their Masters," 1972, and "Won Ton Ton ? The Dog Who Saved Hollywood," 1976.

Her first marriage, to David May in 1942, ended in divorce; they had two children. In 1953, she married producer William Dozier, a union that lasted until his death in 1991. He was best known as the producer of the "Batman" TV series.

Vivien Leigh, who played Scarlett O'Hara, died in 1967. Evelyn Keyes, who played the middle O'Hara sister, Suellen, died in July 2008.

Rutherford recalled that the night of the "Gone With the Wind" premiere in Atlanta, author Margaret Mitchell invited the cast, including Leigh and co-star Clark Gable, to her home for scrambled eggs. Gable and Mitchell disappeared.

"Clark Gable and Margaret were hiding in the bathroom, Clark on the edge of the tub and Margaret you know where, just talking," she chuckled. "They had to get away from the photographers."

___

This report includes biographical material written by former AP writer Polly Anderson.

___

Information from: Los Angeles Times, http://www.latimes.com

___

Information from: Los Angeles Times, http://www.latimes.com

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Tuesday, June 12, 2012

Phil Cannella on: The Financial Transaction Tax | Phil-Cannella.com

In the face of a faltering European economy, France?s President Nicolas Sarkozy has proposed a new tax to yield some additional revenue, an unprecedented move for the conservative French leader.? The ?Financial Transaction Tax? would affect financial institutions? transactions on a day-to-day basis, returning some of that money to the government.? While European economists are divided on this issue, American economists are wondering if a similar tax could help rein in some of the unbridled Wall Street trading occurring in the United States.? If support for a Financial Transaction Tax gains traction in Europe, there is hope that such a tax could alleviate some of the problems that caused the massive financial collapse in the U.S. ?The collapse of 2008 decimated retirement accounts,? says Phil Cannella, noted retiree advocate and founder and CEO of Retirement Media, Inc. ?People may have different feelings about different solutions, but it?s good to see leaders exploring ways of preventing catastrophe for millions of blameless investors.?

The European Union?s (E.U.?s) executive body, the European Commission, has suggested the tax could raise as much as 55 billion Euros ($71 billion) each year.

In Europe, Sarkozy has said France will push to implement this tax, even if it is the only Eurozone country to do so, saying, ?If France waits for others to tax finance, then finance will never be taxed.?? Of course Sarkozy has also stated that he would like to gain the support of other European countries, in order to prevent France from suffering an economic disadvantage after the tax is implemented.? Namely, France?s economy could further decline as financial institutions set up shop in other Eurozone countries where financial transactions are not taxed.

Some European leaders, like German Chancellor Angela Merkel, have come out in support of the new tax, while others, like British Prime Minister David Phil Cannella Cameron, feel it will only work if implemented by every world economic power simultaneously. .? Of course, that prospect seems unlikely and Sarkozy is now attempting to drum up support from other European nations.? The debate will continue, and until such a tax is implemented, it will be difficult to predict whether it will help or harm that nation?s economy.

Could a Financial Transaction Tax help the United States overcome its economic difficulties?? It is possible that such a tax could generate revenue while at the same time discouraging some of the high-frequency and speculative trading that created the financial meltdown.? On the other hand, the U.S. could be at a disadvantage in the global economy if other countries do not adopt similar taxes.? Similar to the situation in Europe, American economists worry the tax could threaten the United States? status as a trading powerhouse, and may cause financial institutions to move to countries with no Financial Transaction Tax.? Some in the financial industry also believe that the tax?s costs will be passed on to investors.? They believe that if the tax is levied each time money changes hands over the course of a complex financial transaction, the small percentages could end up becoming much larger by the time the transaction is completed.? Financial industry insiders also feel the tax could slow economic growth by discouraging brokers from taking risks.? They argue that the activities meant to be discouraged by the Financial Transaction Tax are actually a necessary part of investing and that hindering them in any way will lead to a serious decline of the economy.

In the U.S., support for such a tax is likely to fall along party lines.? Historically, Republicans have generally supported lowering taxes, as well as removing regulation from the financial industry.? Democrats have advocated more regulations on Wall Street and higher taxes on the wealthy to help pay off the national debt.? Again, it is impossible to predict how such a tax could affect the economy if implemented, but one thing is certain:? The mere suggestion of a Financial Transaction Tax in the United States will incite grumblings in Congress.? At this point, all eyes are on Europe.? If the E.U. can come to an agreement on this issue, it may be prudent for the U.S. to follow suit. ?Tax or no tax, this much is sure,? says Phil Cannella. ?If we can unite globally against unscrupulous trading practices, perhaps we can rid the world of the kind of ?financial bubbles? that devastate economies when they burst.

FOR MORE INFORMATION FROM PHIL CANNELLA, TUNE IN TO THE CPR SHOW, EVERY SATURDAY 11AM-1PM. LISTEN LIVE

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Chinese Lenders Pick Up Pace

BY

BEIJING?China's central bank is stepping on the accelerator, letting banks lend more to ensure that the nation's growth engine doesn't slow too sharply amid a sluggish global economy.

May data from the central bank showed that new bank loans for the month were up sharply from April's level, outpacing economists' already-optimistic expectations.

And economists say the trend of stepped-up lending is likely to continue in the months ahead.

New yuan loans issued by Chinese financial institutions totaled 793.2 billion yuan ($125.6 billion) in May, up from 682 billion yuan in April, data from the People's Bank of China showed Monday.

BY

BEIJING?China's central bank is stepping on the accelerator, letting banks lend more to ensure that the nation's growth engine doesn't slow too sharply amid a sluggish global economy.

May data from the central bank showed that new bank loans for the month were up sharply from April's level, outpacing economists' already-optimistic expectations.

And economists say the trend of stepped-up lending is likely to continue in the months ahead.

New yuan loans issued by Chinese financial institutions totaled 793.2 billion yuan ($125.6 billion) in May, up from 682 billion yuan in April, data from the People's Bank of China showed Monday.

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A SMART(er) way to track influenza

ScienceDaily (June 11, 2012) ? Brown University researchers have created a reliable and fast flu-detection test that can be carried in a first-aid kit. The novel prototype device isolates influenza RNA using a combination of magnetics and microfluidics, then amplifies and detects probes bound to the RNA. The technology could lead to real-time tracking of influenza.

Results are published in the Journal of Molecular Diagnostics.

In April 2009, the world took notice as reports surfaced of a virus in Mexico that had mutated from pigs and was being passed from human to human. The H1N1 "swine flu," as the virus was named, circulated worldwide, killing more than 18,000 people, according to the World Health Organization. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States said it was the first global pandemic in more than four decades.

Swine flu will not be the last viral mutation to cause a worldwide stir. One way to contain the next outbreak is by administering tests at the infection's source, pinpointing and tracking the pathogen's spread in real time. But such efforts have been stymied by devices that are costly, unwieldy and unreliable. Now, biomedical engineers at Brown University and Memorial Hospital in Rhode Island have developed a biochip that can detect the presence of influenza by zeroing in on the specific RNA sequence and then using tiny magnets in a tube to separate the flu-ridden sequence from the rest of the RNA strand. The result: A reliable, fast prototype of a flu-detection test that potentially can be carried in a first-aid kit and used as easily as an iPhone.

"We wanted to make something simple," said Anubhav Tripathi, associate professor of engineering at Brown and the corresponding author on the paper, published in the Journal of Molecular Diagnostics. "It's a low-cost device for active, on-site detection, whether it's influenza, HIV, or TB (tuberculosis)."

The Brown assay is called SMART, which stands for "A Simple Method for Amplifying RNA Targets." Physically, it is essentially a series of tubes, with bulbs on the ends of each, etched like channels into the biochip.

There are other pathogen-diagnostic detectors, notably the Polymerase Chain Reaction device (which targets DNA) and the Nucleic Acid Sequence Based Amplification (which also targets RNA). The SMART detector is unique in that the engineers use a DNA probe with base letters that match the code in the targeted sequence. This ensures the probe will latch on only to the specific RNA strand being assayed. The team inundates the sample with probes, to ensure that all RNA molecules bind to a probe.

"The device allows us to design probes that are both sensitive and specific," Tripathi said.

This approach creates excess -- that is, probes with no RNA partners. That's OK, because the Brown-led team then attached the probes to 2.8 micron magnetic beads that carry the genetic sequence for the influenza RNA sequence. The engineers then use a magnet to slowly drag the RNA-probe pairs collected in the bulb through a tube that narrows to 50 microns and then deposit the probes at a bulb at the other end. This convergence of magnetism (the magnetized probes and the dragging magnets) and microfluidics (the probes' movement through the narrowing channel and the bulbs) serves to separate the RNA-probe pairs from the surrounding biological debris, allowing clinicians to isolate the influenza strains readily and rapidly for analysis. The team reports that it tracks the RNA-probe beads flawlessly at speeds up to 0.75 millimeters per second.

"When we amplify the probes, we have disease detection," Tripathi said. "If there is no influenza, there will be no probes (at the end bulb). This separation part is crucial."

Once separated, or amplified, the RNA can be analyzed using conventional techniques, such as nucleic acid sequence-based amplification (NASBA).

The chips created in Tripathi's lab are less than two inches across and can fit four tube-and-bulb channels. Tripathi said the chips could be commercially manufactured and made so more channels could be etched on each.

The team is working on separate technologies for biohazard detection.

Stephanie McCalla, who earned her doctorate at Brown last year and is now at the California Institute of Technology, is the first author on the paper. Brown professors of medicine Steven Opal and Andrew Artenstein, with Carmichael Ong and Aartik Sarma, who earned their undergraduate degrees at Brown, are contributing authors.

The U.S. National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation funded the research.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Brown University.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

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lines and colors :: a blog about drawing, painting, illustration, comics ...

Julia Sarda is an illustrator, concept artist and character designer based in Barcelona.

She has a wonderful, lively style, a superb sense of color and a great feeling for visual drama. She also demonstrates a masterful command of dark and light in her compositions, and plays with theatrical spotlight effects and uplighting to great effect.

I particularly admire the way she can combine crisp flat edged planes of color with more rendered and textural elements within the same image and make is feel like a seamless whole.

On her blog you can look through in chronological order, or choose from some of the projects highlighted in the right hand column. Sarda also has a gallery on deviantART.

[Via Rich Barrett]

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