One possible byproduct of the economic challenges today's young adults face may be shifting societal norms about when adulthood begins. When asked what age children should be financially independent from their parents in a 1993 survey, 80% of parents said children should be self-reliant by age 22. In a survey conducted in December 2011, only 67% of parents (with children age 16 or under) say their children have to be financially independent by age 22.

If the audience is paying attention, for example, it will notice that Republicans are not proposing to allow employers and plans to refuse to cover blood transfusions if they conscientiously object to them (although there are religious groups that do). Or vaccinations (although there are individuals who conscientiously object to those as well). Or medicines derived from animal experimentation. (Ditto.)

No, Marco Rubio's Religious Freedom Restoration bill provides for one conscientious exemption only: contraception and sterilization. 

Oil well drilling activity continued to increase in the fourth quarter of 2011, according to API's 2011 Quarterly Well Completion Report: Fourth Quarter. The report estimates that 6,149 oil wells were completed in fourth quarter 2011, a 10 percent increase from year-ago levels.

"There's good news that domestic drilling continued to increase into the fourth quarter of 2011," said Hazem Arafa, director of API's statistics department.  "And with policies that allow greater access to the vast energy resources right here at home, we can provide even more of the energy our country needs while hiring more American workers and generating more revenue for our government."

American and other coalition forces here are being killed in increasing numbers by the very Afghan soldiers they fight alongside and train, in attacks motivated by deep-seated animosity between the supposedly allied forces, according to American and Afghan officers and a classified coalition report obtained by The New York Times.

A decade into the war in Afghanistan, the report makes clear that these killings have become the most visible symptom of a far deeper ailment plaguing the war effort: the contempt each side holds for the other, never mind the Taliban. The ill will and mistrust run deep among civilians and militaries on both sides, raising questions about what future role the United States and its allies can expect to play in Afghanistan.

Suicides among active-duty soldiers hit another record high in 2011, Army officials said on Thursday, although there was a slight decrease if nonmobilized Reserve and National Guard troops were included in the calculation.

The Army also reported a sharp increase, nearly 30 percent, in violent sex crimes last year by active-duty troops. More than half of the victims were active-duty female soldiers ages 18 to 21.

What is clear, though, is that a large majority of American households — about two out of three — pays less than 15 percent of income to the federal government, through either income taxes or payroll taxes.

This disconnect between what we pay and what we think we pay is nothing less than one of the country’s biggest economic problems.

Many Americans see themselves as struggling under the weight of a heavy tax burden (partly for the understandable reason that wage growth has been so weak). Yet taxes in the United States are quite low today, compared with past years or those in other countries. Most important, American taxes are not sufficient to pay for the programs that many people want, like Medicare, Social Security, road construction and education subsidies.

What does this combination create? An enormous long-term budget deficit.

Read the whole thing.

Americans' satisfaction with the size and power of the federal government is at a record-low 29% and their satisfaction with the size and influence of major corporations remains near the all-time low at 30% -- making both highly susceptible targets for politicians and presidential candidates in this election year.

In fact, people over 60 are now the fastest-growing group contracting sexually transmitted diseases, according to government agency figures. Since 2002, syphilis has tripled in the over-65s in the UK, and HIV is up by 60%.

After adjusting for inflation, the typical male college graduate earned about 12 percent less in 2009 than his counterpart did in 1969. Sounds pretty bad, right?

The numbers are even worse for men without a bachelor’s:
 

Inflation-Adjusted Change in Median Earnings for American Men, 1969-2009
	Weekly Earnings, Full-time, Full-year Male Workers	Annual Earnings of All Male Workers	Annual Earnings of Male Population
Ages 25-64	-1%	-14%	-28%
Ages 30-50	-5	-16	-27
Less than High School	-38	-47	-66
High School	-26	-34	-47
Some College	-17	-24	-33
College Degree	-2	-7	-12
Married	-1	-2	-13
Not Married	-2	-14	-32

Source: Adam Looney and Michael Greenstone, Hamilton Project

As you can see from the last column in this table, the median man whose highest educational attainment was a high school diploma had his earnings fall by 47 percent in the last four decades.