Twelve Tribes?

Some analogies sound really interesting, but work out to be more trouble than they're worth. For example:

http://www.beliefnet.com/story/236/story_23639_1.html

Beliefnet had the interesting notion that America's political-religious groupings could be divided into twelve coherent groups, like the twelve tribes of ancient Israel. I think that's the rationale, anyway: it's not like they try a direct one-to-one analogy (The Christian Right is the Tribe of Judah, or some such.)

Unfortunately, the only thing that the process really illustrated is that twelve is not a good number to divide America's religious groups into. It turns out seeming arbitrary. Some of the divisions seem forced- what exactly is the difference between the Christian Right and the Heartland Culture Warriors? I'm presumably one or the other, but I can't tell which, and that's a bad sign for a tribe.

Likewise, the smaller groups seem to be arbitrary in their own way. Is "Muslims and Other Faiths" really a coherent group that will have things in common? Are Latinos a religious group in-and-of themselves, distinct from Catholics?

Some ideas just don't work out well. This sounded promising at first, but I'm afraid it works poorly as a political analysis.

WorldMapper

worldmapper.org is a site devoted to demographic maps. That is, instead of maps based on physical geography, they base the size of various nations on a give factor- population, income, religion, or what have you.

The religion maps are particularly interesting. Here's the world map oriented by Christian population:

http://www.worldmapper.org/display_religion.php?selected=554

... which is almost normal-looking.

The map oriented by Islam:

http://www.worldmapper.org/display_religion.php?selected=564

...in which North and South America shrink virtually out of existence, and Africa balloons to enormous size.

Oriented by atheism:

http://www.worldmapper.org/display_religion.php?selected=582

... Which is basically Planet China.

There's a lot more stuff there, all of it interesting.

Salome's Dancing Lesson

I can't believe I haven't done any Dorothy Parker yet. Well, better late than never:

Salome's Dancing-Lesson

She that begs a little boon
(Heel and toe! Heel and toe!)
Little gets- and nothing, soon.
(No, no, no! No, no, no!)
She that calls for costly things
Priceless finds her offerings-
What's impossible to kings?
(Heel and toe! Heel and toe!)

Kings are shaped as other men.
(Step and turn! Step and turn!)
Ask what none may ask again.
(Will you learn? Will you learn?)
Lovers whine, and kisses pall,
Jewels tarnish, kingdoms fall-
Death's the rarest prize of all!
(Step and turn! Step and turn!)

Veils are woven to be dropped.
(One, two, three! One, two, three!)
Aging eyes are slowest stopped.
(Quietly! Quietly!)
She whose body's young and cool
Has no need of dancing-school-
Scratch a king and find a fool!
(One, two, three! One, two, three!)

... A Dorothy Parker Bible study would be either horrifying or brilliant. I can't quite decide which.