Sex and your tax dollars at work

I suppose this is a better use of tax dollars than buying bombs or giving tax credits to folks who already have millions in their bank accounts. But you do gotta wonder about a federally funded study of why people have sex.

The study from Professor Cindy Meston (pictured) and the Sexual Psychophysiology Laboratory at the University of Texas has been written up this week as discovering that the No. 1 reason men and women have sex is the same for both sexes: "I was attracted to the person." Also in the top 10 on both lists: "I wanted to experience the physical pleasure," "It feels good" and "I wanted to express my love for the person."

Not detailed in the story ("Researchers at the University of Texas spent five years and their own money ....") but available when you click "About Us" on the lab's Web site is where they got "their own money" for a study that showed what anyone with a libido already knows. No surprise here: "Her research is currently being funded by the National Institutes of Health."

The cliche is that men give love to get sex, while women give sex to get love, but Meston says her study shows we're more alike than that. Was that insight worth the investment? Hard to say. But it's another example of how the fruits of your labor belong to a government that will spend it on just about anything, despite a solemn document that limits its powers and priorities.