Russian authorities are showing some creativity about arresting population decline. On July 7 the country celebrated its first Day of Family, Love and Fidelity as a national holiday. In a Moscow park a Bench of Reconciliation was inaugurated -- a romantic device with a back shaped like angel wings and a curved seat that encourages couples to slide closer together and work out their differences. The intention is that parents not only have children but provide those children with two-parent, stable family lives. Financial incentives to procreate have also been offered.

Last year, as president, Vladimir Putin declared 2008 the Year of the Family. However, a good idea was taken too far when a new holiday called Family Contact Day, on September 12, encouraged Russians to stay home and engage in marital intimacy in the hope of… click here to read whole article and make comments