You know why Texas has the highest birth rate in the nation? And the highest incidence of repeat teen pregnancies? It's all the sex!

Yes. Sex causes pregnancy. Abstinence does not. Rick Perry knows this, and he doesn't have to quote some statistic to prove it. His own "personal experience" has taught him this lesson, and he believes it with every ounce of his big American heart.

This titbit comes to you thanks to some smart bugger who just YouTubified a profoundly uncomfortable confrontation between Gov. Perry and The Texas Tribune from last October, in which reporter Evan Smith goes after Texas's abstinence-only sex-ed program. The best bit's when Perry compares Texas's thousands of pregnant teenagers to student athletes who don't fail tests for performance-enhancing drugs. As it turns out, abstinence-only is doing its job as long as Texas is home to more virgins than steroid-crazed jocks.

Confused? Of course you are. This is a gorgeously subtle argument, and those with intellects coarser than the gov's may fail to grok it entirely. But the logic is elegant. See, nobody complains that Texas is wasting its money by testing the state's student athletes for drugs, even though Texas has only caught — what? Seven dosing sportsmen? Six? The governor isn't certain, but he knows it's not many. It's certainly far smaller than the number of Texan teens who've yet to wind up preggers. And if catching 10 students dosing is a worthy outlay of Texan tax dollars, then obviously preventing 10 teen pregnancies must be worth whatever the state's spending on abstinence-only. It's math! Don't argue! [via Good]