Young people spend an enormous amount of their day with electronic media. We all know that. One survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation now has been able to document how much.

When you add together time spent with television, smart phones, iPods, video games, and computers it essentially becomes a full-time job of more than 53 hours. Needless to say, this is a dramatic increase from over a decade ago. And nearly twice as many now say that they do at least two of these at the same time.

The findings of the survey of over 2,000 young people ages 8 to 18 found that their digital day lasted more than seven hours a day. The primary media inputs were television and music. But substantial amounts of time were also spent on the computer and playing video games.

Although time spent with electronic media is increasing, the researchers did find one area that was decreasing: ink. Daily book readership remained somewhat steady, but reading a magazine dropped 20 percent and reading a newspaper dropped nearly 20 percent.

Vicky Rideout, director of Kaiser’s Program for the Study of Media and Health, says that electronic media are now “a part of the air that kids breathe.” They learn about the world through images, music, and websites.

The survey had a few surprises. For example, the greatest consumers of electronic media were African-American and Hispanic kids who spend nearly one-third more time each day with electronics that white kids. And heavy media users aren’t necessarily couch potatoes. They actually find ways to cram more physical exercise into their lives than light users. While that may be true, I still believe that almost all young people spend too much time with electronic media.

For the last two decades I have been talking about the media storm that surrounds our children and grandchildren. This latest survey of our kids’ digital day shows that they are in the midst of a greater storm than we ever imagined. This should concern parents and educators. I’m Kerby Anderson, and that’s my point of view.

Church pastors and Christian leaders significantly underestimate the influences on the next generation. That is the conclusion of David Kinnaman of the Barna Group. They have conducted more than 5,000 interviews with youth and young adults. He believes we underestimate three aspects of discipleship.

First, he says, we underestimate the profound impact of social changes on the millennial generation. This generation is “more conversant with technology, less likely to come from married families, and more financially indebted than any previous generation.” They are more diverse than any other generation. That includes ethnic diversity as well as religious diversity.

David Kinnaman quotes from the book, After the Boomers, which talks about how this generation is “launching” later in life. They are taking longer to get through maturing events in life (like marriage, education, and parenthood). David Kinnaman calls them “digital urban tribes” of 20-somethings and 30-somethings.

Second, he believes we underestimate how much these young people are shaped by the power of the digital tools in their lives. As I have mentioned in previous commentaries, the Kaiser Family Foundation estimates that the typical teenage is using more than 10 hours of media per day.

Third, we also misunderstand “the potency of youth culture’s gravitational pull.” In other words, we assume that we are influencing youth culture, when in reality it is probably having a more significant impact on us. David Kinnaman says that this “fixation on all things young in changing the way we do Christianity. It’s also shaping the workplace, advertising and marketing, fashion, and media, to name a few spheres of society.”

Obviously, if we are to make a significant impact on this next generation, we need to understand the impact media and youth culture are having on them. And then we need to develop messages and programs that will influence them for Christ. I’m Kerby Anderson, and that’s my point of view.

Out on the campaign trail you hear various candidates (from the president to congressional candidates) lament that “the middle class has shrunk” and that it is becoming harder and harder for the poor to move up the socioeconomic ladder.

Economist Stephen Moore, writing in the May issue of Newsmax, says that he “believes America is still a land of incredible opportunity where people of all income groups move up and down the income elevator.” He has a number of studies that illustrate that.

A 2008 study by the “Treasury Department examined what happened to the incomes of real people from 1987-2005.” The study found that the biggest income gains were recorded by those who started with the lowest incomes. By contrast, the smallest income gains were among those who began with the highest income.

Richard Burkhauser is an economist at Cornell University and senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. He has shown that every income group has made gains during the boom years (1982-2007) before the recent recession when the proper adjustments are made. He makes those adjustments based on such changes as family size, taxes paid, government benefits received, and total compensation to workers (not just salary).

It is true the multibillionaires like Bill Gates and Steve Jobs saw their wealth grower at a faster pace (63 percent). But even the bottom 40 percent in income saw gains (25 percent) when you factor in income, compensation, and benefits. Burkhauser concludes that: “The real income story of the last 30 years in America is not one of stagnation, but one of upward income mobility.”

I think it is possible that the last recession may have skewed our perception of income mobility in America. These statistics illustrate that it is still possible for Americans to move up the socioeconomic ladder and better their lives and the lives of their children. I’m Kerby Anderson, and that’s my point of view.

Many years ago Friedrich Hayek wrote The Road to Serfdom in which he warned that we would lose our freedom by allowing government to control more

and more of the economic decision-making through a model of central planning. Arthur Brooks has now written about The Road to Freedom, which is described

as a book to help win the fight for free enterprise. He believes that it is going to take more than one election to get us off the road to serfdom.

Arthur Brooks believes we need to make the moral case for free enterprise. In his previous book, The Battle, he made the case that 70 percent of Americans

support free enterprise, but that the remaining 30 percent dominate the public arena. They are in positions of political power and intellectual influence. They

control the White House, the Congress, the media, and academia.

Although he is a former professor and think tank president, Brooks is very practical and helps us make the case in simple terms. He reminds us that the

U.S. Tax Code is 16,845 pages long. Why is it so long? It is a detailed document. There is, for example, a special provision for favorable tax treatment of

racehorses. But this does not apply to just any racehorse. Section 68(e)(3)a)(i)(I) applies a special investment depreciation for only racehorses that are two

years old or younger. This is what you could legitimately call a “tax loophole” that was written by a politician trying to benefit someone with young racehorses.

Do we need to reform the entitlement system? To date, most Americans withdraw more from the Social Security and Medicare systems than they ever paid

into them. The systems are going broke because benefit payments are exceeding the taxes to pay for them. The U.S. currently spends less the 10 percent of

GDP on entitlements, but if no reform takes place that percentage will rise to over 14 percent by 2030.

The premise of his book is simple. If we want to continue down the road to serfdom and collapse, do nothing. If we want to travel down the road to freedom,

we need to use his practical suggestions to make necessary changes. I’m Kerby Anderson, and that’s my point of view.

Most of us have noticed the moral decline in America and have heard how many commentators have described it. Greg Koukl at Stand to Reason has coined a term that I think does a great job of explaining what is happening.

He says that our culture is becoming velocitized. He first heard the term in a driver’s training class in high school. “When a driver accelerates from, say, 30 to 60 miles per hour and settles in, he gets acclimated to his new speed and loses his sense of velocity. Going 60 feels like going 30.”

This is a great illustration of what is happening in our culture. Today’s scandal is tomorrow “ho hum.” What was unthinkable a generation ago has become routine today. As our culture becomes more decadent, we become acclimated to the speed of cultural degradation.

Greg Koukl uses this illustration to talk about something I have addressed in previous commentaries. Now that many accept abortion as routine, you have articles appearing that suggest that a so-called “after-birth abortion” would also be morally justifiable. Two philosophers are seriously suggesting this in an article in the Journal of Medical Ethics.

But you could apply the concept of a velocitized culture to many other moral issues. Who would have thought that physician assisted suicide would be acceptable in many states just a few decades ago? And just a few decades ago, who would have predicted that a number of states would have legalized same-sex marriage?

We should expect that non-believers would most likely take their cues from the culture and thus be acclimated to the speed of moral decline. But we should also be disturbed that so many Christians have also become acclimated.

Paul in his letter to the Colossians warned that we should: “See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ.” Unfortunately many have been taken captive in our velocitized culture. I’m Kerby Anderson, and that’s my point of view.

Over the last few months I have been doing commentaries on the subject of Big Data. The enormous amount of digital information has been used by companies to find customers and by government to find terrorists. Hollywood has now found an important use for Big Data.

James Hirsen reports that Google data is now being used by Hollywood executives to predict future box office receipts. By paying attention to search information data, they now claim they have 94% accuracy in box office predictions.

A Google research paper explains that the number of Google and YouTube searches of a movie has the capacity to provide the film industry with a highly accurate predictor mechanism. Will the movie be a blockbuster or a bomb? Find out how many people are searching on the movie title. Of course, it is a bit more complex than that.

By analyzing the number of Google searches for a particular movie, predictions on the box-office gross can be estimated with approximately 70 percent accuracy. If you begin to add in the number of search ad clicks, you can improve the accuracy. Google researchers built a model that included search volume and search ad clicks over a seven day period. This model gave them 92 percent accuracy.

By combining search volume on the movie trailers with other metrics, such as the franchise status of the movie and the season of release, they were able to achieve a model with 94 percent accuracy. It is worth noting that they could make some of those predictions four weeks before the release date.

Obviously, Hollywood executives are interested in Google models. It should help them predict the success or failure of a film. But it will also give them the ability to shape the most effective marketing campaign for future films. I predict they will spend more time working the social media sites in the hopes of driving potential audiences to film trailers and other marketing aimed at getting them to the movies. I’m Kerby Anderson, and that’s my point of view.

The upcoming vote on the immigration bill will certainly hinge on the citizenship provision. For some in the Senate and many in the House, it is

objectionable. To understand, let’s consider the value of American citizenship.

For many people around the world, becoming a citizen of the United States is the highest achievement they could ever consider. It would be like

winning the lottery. In fact, many enter into what looks like a lottery to see if they might have an opportunity to come to this country and eventually become a

naturalized citizen. The best estimates are that about 4.6 million people around the world are on a waiting list to come to the United States and eventually

become citizens.

The current immigration bill provides a pathway to citizenship for the approximately 11 million people here illegally. Some crossed our borders

illegally. Others came her legally and overstayed their visas. And still others are children who were born here to parents who were here illegally.

Critics of the citizenship provision rightly argue that everyone should play by the same rules. We wouldn’t put up with someone cutting ahead of us in

line. We don’t want to reward bad behavior. Yet, that is what many fear will happen with a provision that provides a pathway to citizenship for people who broke

the law and are here illegally. They jumped in line ahead of the millions overseas that have been waiting to legally come to this country. Their presence in this

country began with a violation of the law. Either they broke the law or their parents broke the law.

Certainly something must be done. Some have talked about legalization and registration, without a pathway to citizenship. And in many cases,

deportation is also a reasonable action. But conferring this valuable gift of citizenship on those here illegally seems like a violation of the basic principles of

fairness and invites future immigrants to break the law in the hopes of gaining citizenship.

If you want to appreciate the divisions in America, all you have to do is look at the editorial page of newspapers. Often you will see two diametrically different views of reality. A good example of that happened last week.

The title of Marc Thiessen’s Washington Post op-ed was “Big Brother Isn’t Watching You.” The title of Senator Rand Paul’s Wall Street Journal op-ed was “Big Brother Really Is Watching You.” Obviously, they disagreed about how to react to the NSA revelation.

Marc Thiessen was concerned that the latest revelations “give terrorists information they did not have about our collection activities.” He also worried that the latest series of leaks teach sources and partners “not to work with us because we cannot keep a secret.”

Only an intelligence expert can tell us whether these leaks really told terrorists anything they didn’t already know. They probably guessed that phone records were being obtained in specific warrants. And even if they didn’t know there was a PRISM program monitoring foreign terrorists, they could have guessed that was possible.

On the other hand, he is right to say that we will have trouble getting future intelligence from certain parties. They rightly will believe that the U.S. government cannot keep a secret.

Senator Rand Paul believes the activities of the National Security Agency do violate the Fourth Amendment, which says that warrants must be specific. He has introduced and will once again introduce the Fourth Amendment Restoration Act. He is also looking into a class-action lawsuit to overturn the decisions of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.

He is rightly concerned with the government “monitoring the records of as many as a billion phone calls.” Marc Thiessen may want to argue that “Big Government Isn’t Watching You.” But when we hear that the government is collecting information on a billion phone calls, it sure seems like Big Brother is watching nearly all of us.