The public watched in horror as a spate of recent videos showed teenage girls attacking people in fast food restaurants – pulling hair, kicking, punching, and stomping their victims while spewing vile epithets at bystanders who tried to interfere.  What we haven’t seen so openly is the growing epidemic of one-on-one violence that girls are perpetrating in dating relationships.

According to Stop Abusive and Violent Environments (SAVE), “Surveys now show high school girls are more likely than boys to engage in physical violence with their dating partners.”  SAVE spokesman Philip W. Cook says, “Teenage girls are as likely as boys to slap, hit, and kick their partners.  Violence by anyone only increases the risk of being injured in return.  We need a consistent message about dating violence that is based on factual information and … rooted in reality.”

The Centers for Disease Control’s (CDC) “2009 Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance Survey” spells out that reality by noting that males are now more at risk than females; the latest data show that 10 percent of teenage males report dating violence, as compared with nine percent of teenage females.  The situation is even worse among young adults.  A study published in the American Journal of Public Health reveals that in 71 percent of the cases of one-way violence, females were the aggressors, while males were the initiators only 29 percent of the time.

SAVE also reveals that a 2010 Department of Justice report, “Delinquency Cases in Juvenile Court, 2007,” indicates, “Juvenile courts handled 448,900 cases involving females in 2007, more than twice the 1985 number.”  SAVE adds that “for assaults and other offenses against persons, the female offender rate soared by 233 percent over the same period.”  In addition to physical violence, female assaults include sexual violence.  A Cleveland survey of 6th and 7th graders concludes, “Boys were more likely to be victims of sexual violence than girls.”

Sadly, female aggression, like male aggression, can have lethal consequences.  SAVE reports at least two recent cases in which teenage girls have fatally wounded their dating partners.  Further, the girls who perpetrate violence are far more likely to later become a victim of subsequence violence.

This relatively new incidence of women following bad cultural behavior is yet another way we are reaping the whirlwind of family breakdown.  Those who declare that family structure doesn’t matter need to see these cases as the human toll, writ large from the social science data describing very predictable outcomes for children at risk when there is no stable mom-and-dad family providing the home environment, where children absorb morals and values that are essential to becoming productive citizens, rather than juvenile delinquents.

This Constitution Day, forget about attending local parades and commemorative ceremonies. Instead, you have the option to celebrate the birthday of our Constitution this Saturday the 17th by participating in one of two very different political protests.  While one option promises to be a “peaceful assembly,” the other threatens an eruption of flash mob violence and destruction.

The leftist-sponsored “U.S. Day of Rage” will be protesting Wall Street and the United States capitalist system.  Organizers of this event, including Wade Rathke, founder of ACORN, have called for an “occupation” of Wall Street and every other financial district across the country. 20,000 disgruntled protestors are expected to infiltrate Wall Street Saturday morning and pitch tents for a late night stakeout.  Although the exact details of “U.S. Day of Rage” are being kept a secret, organizers have promised their event will be non-violent. Yet, with such a large number of angry socialist liberals in one place, many can’t help but fear an outburst of, well, rage.

If “Day of Rage” isn’t your style, try “Picketing Across America,” a National Tea Party-sponsored event.  The event’s founder and organizer, Tina Sims, invites all Americans to peacefully sit on their front porch and hold a picket sign reading, “Can you hear us now?” as a silent but resounding message letting Congress know Americans are sick of the federal government’s fiscal irresponsibility.  Sims told Concerned Women for America, “The reason that I started ‘Picket Across America’ is because I am scared for my children and my grandchildren’s future.  I am scared for America’s future.  Washington needs to hear us loud and clear and have a clear understanding that WE THE PEOPLE are listening and watching, and we do not like what we are witnessing and we are not going to stand for their nonsense any longer.”

Before deciding which demonstration your family will attend on Constitution Day, consider the words of Patrick Henry, “Bad men cannot make good citizens.  A vitiated state of morals, a corrupted public conscience are incompatible with freedom.”  Henry’s words warn against uncivilized, lawless protesters like “U.S. Day of Rage” and its participants.  Their hostile leftist agenda threatens the security of our nation and our freedoms.  For our great country to thrive, Americans must pull together and stand up in defense of the principles our nation was founded upon and our inalienable rights (rage is not one of them) guaranteed under our Constitution and given by our Creator.

So this Constitution Day, the choice is yours.  Both events are free of charge, but materials are not included.  If you choose to attend “Picketing Across America,” you will need only a picket sign.  On the other hand, if you attend the “U.S. Day of Rage,” be sure to bring a torch, a pitchfork, and a light jacket — and might I suggest one that is flame retardant?

The National Enquirer reported last week that now-38-year-old Monica Lewinsky (famous for her shocking affair with President Bill Clinton) is living the life of a near recluse and is “desperately trying to live down her scandalous past.”

One of Monica’s friends said her “self-esteem is at an all-time low.” She has tried several high-profile projects to become self-supporting — most notably, a line of handbags that failed spectacularly. She has reportedly given up her own apartment and “drifts between the two coasts” staying with relatives and friends. Friends say that she is “alone most of the time and is pretty much a social pariah” who has given up on finding love. To summarize: “Monica still feels like she’s the punch line to a dirty joke.”

There is something wrong — but not surprising — when a young female intern suffers long-term consequences for an affair, while the powerful male, former President Bill Clinton, has moved on with his life and regained most of the power and prestige that he enjoyed before the firestorm of publicity about his moral failings and his ultimate impeachment in the House and trial in the Senate (where he was found “not guilty” and remained in office to live another day and rebuild his reputation and career).

Monica was 21 and an intern at the White House in 1995 when she engaged in a sexual relationship with then-President Clinton (D). Like many young women engaged in such illicit behavior, Monica claims that their affair was driven by mutual love, and she contradicts the accounts by Mr. Clinton that dismiss the relationship as mere physical lust that meant nothing. She was profoundly wounded by the former President calling her “that woman.”

Yet, throughout the ages, women have paid a high price when they have put a low value on the worth of their gift of intimacy. Monica is not alone in realizing — after the fact — that a guy who wants free sex will place no value on the privilege of sexual intimacy no matter what he says beforehand, and no matter his wealth, status, power, or position of privilege.

Bottom line: a man with character does not take what he wants without first making a commitment commensurate with the value of the gift he desires. This is a sad lesson that Monica Lewinski and countless other women have learned from bitter experience.

A small town near Seattle seems an unlikely place to earn a six-figure profit from sex trafficking, but 32-year-old Shacon Fontane Barbee reportedly made at least $192,000 in eight months from his prostitution ring, and he drove around in one of his two luxury vehicles — a Jaguar XJR or a Mercedes S420.  Steve Hunter, a reporter in Kent, Washington, described the charges that the pimp faces: “promoting prostitution, leading organized crime, promoting commercial sexual abuse of a minor (under age 18) and several other charges.”  Hunter also tracked the pimp’s career in organized crime and some of his victims’ stories.

One of the prostituted girls (age 19 at the time) told the detectives that she gave all her earnings (about $2,000/week) to Barbee.  The detectives figured that Barbee probably had at least two other girls working for him (if not more) which meant that during one eight-month period of time, he made close to $200,000.

As is typical, while he was raking in the money, the girls who were his sex slaves received only meager handouts.  Many of the girls were minors when they first met Barbee and were convinced that he “loved” them and “needed” their “help.”  The detectives reported that Barbee started pimping in 2007 and had lured more than 40 girls to work for him.  Four of the women were interviewed by Kent Police.

• One interviewee is an 18-year-old who was first associated with Barbee at age 13 and was prostituted at age 16.  She not only met clients at hotel rooms, she helped recruit other girls for Barbee.
• A 19-year-old met Barbee through another victim who became her friend through Internet social networking.  She averaged 5-6 men a night and the assignations were made through backpage.com.
• Another interviewee, 20 years old, also met Barbee after being recruited by a girl she met online.  She ended up working as a street prostitute for Barbee for only eight months.
• The final interviewee only worked for Barbee for one night, as a “two-girl special,” but she didn’t stay because she was convinced that Barbee “really didn’t care about her and he had a violent reputation.”

That last testimony summarizes the problem with criminals like Barbee: The pimp used young women as commercial commodities to make money. As long as the victim was profitable, she was treated well enough to keep her “within the fold.”  Under the thumb of their pimps, these vulnerable girls think that he truly cares for them, and the pimp uses that myth to control her and use her for his own financial benefit.

Barbee is currently in jail with bail set at $500,000.  He has entered a “not guilty” plea and is scheduled for trial on September 19.  He faces up to 15 years if convicted of all the charges against him.  Most people think 15 years is not nearly enough punishment for criminals like Barbee.

The left is imploding, and things are getting pretty thugly — and no, that’s not a typo.

Teamsters President Jimmy Hoffa, Jr., a thug who comes from a long line of thugs, crowed recently at President Obama’s Labor Day event, “President Obama, this is your army.  We are ready to march.  Let’s take these sons of bi***es out and give America back to an America where we belong.”  If it were an isolated incident, that would be one thing, but consider these other recent quotes.

Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-California): “The Tea Party can go straight to Hell, and I intend to help them get there.”

Congressman Andre Carson (D-Indiana): “Some of them in Congress right now with this Tea Party movement would love to see you and me — I’m sorry, Tamron — hanging on a tree.”

What are they doing? They’re revealing their campaign strategy for 2012.  I talk about this in my most recent article, “The End of Civility?”  Read it at the National Review Online.

Several news outlets have revealed President Obama’s new voter registration effort for 2012 is called “Project Vote” — the same name as ACORN’s similar outreach.  Concerned Women for America (CWA) members will recall that ACORN was exposed via an undercover video giving supposed clients instructions about how to commit voter registration fraud; indeed, ACORN faced numerous cases of voter registration fraud following the 2008 election.  The arrogance of adopting ACORN’s name is indicative of this White House’s sense of being above the law and a rule unto itself ­­— knowing that they won’t be held accountable by the media watchdogs and knowing that the Democrat base will “get” the connection, thereby restoring their faith in President Obama’s commitment to their radical agenda, regardless of legalities.

ACORN’s Project Vote is still registered as a nonprofit organization in Washington, D.C., with the sole purpose of increasing the number of minority voters — most notably by paying for votes (for which one of its personnel “pled no contest” and paid a hefty fine).  In its article about this latest outrage, Newsmax notes that Matthew Vadum — from the Capital Research Center and author of “Subversion Inc.: How Obama’s ACORN Red Shirts Are Still Terrorizing and Ripping Off American Taxpayers” — identifies Project Vote as the “branch of ACORN that’s most notorious for voter fraud” (54 voter fraud convictions in 2008) and points out that ACORN and Project Vote “share staff, office space, and money.”

Tom Fitton, President of Judicial Watch, has compiled a broad dossier illustrating the connections between the 2008 Obama campaign and ACORN’s criminal activity.  Fitton and the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review documented the president’s ties to ACORN’s fraudulent voter registration “services” and showed evidence that Obama helped train ACORN staff in Chicago as far back as 1995.

Fitton told Newsmax that he expects Obama to “continue running its 2008 campaign playbook, despite the fraud associated with voter-registration activities that cycle.”  It would be a mistake for conservatives to assume that the 2008 scandals and prosecutions destroyed ACORN and ended their fraudulent activities.  Instead, both Fitton and Vadum believe that ACORN will just change its name, logo, and banner in 2012 and continue to receive federal funds to support its illegal and fraudulent activities, with the Project Vote agenda shifting over to White House control — and protection.