This blogaround brought to you by Shaxco, publishers of Why I Am Awesome and How You Can Be, Too, in 27,432 Easy Steps by Deeky W. Gashlycrumb.
Recommended Reading:
Tami: Daily Beast's Peter Beinart Suggests Uterus Check for Female SCOTUS Nominees
NapalmNacey: Crazy Domains: The Reckoning
Resistance: Still in Prison
Tim Wise: Imagine: Protest, Insurgency and the Workings of White Privilege
Marti: Weekly Transadvocate Twitter Digest
Andy: Illinois State Rep. Deborah Mell Announces Engagement; Will Take Marriage Equality Issue to House Chamber Today
And Happy Blogiversary to Quixotess!
Leave your links in comments...
Wednesday Blogaround
Speaking of Moustaches
This too is a real thing in the world. It's one of those gumball-type vending machines. (I am sure maybe they have a real name.) I love those things. I am always buying stupid crap out of them. It's clutters my house until I get annoyed and toss it in the donate box in the garage.
Anyway, one at a supermarket near my home sells "Fuzzy Face Moustaches." Of course, what it probably should say is "Fag Moustaches" because that is quite clearly a drawing of the Village People.
You've got the Construction Worker, the Leatherman, the Cowboy. This vending machine is one Cop away from an "In the Navy" sing-along.
Another Item for the "What the Hell, Arizona?" File
What in the world are they up to out there?
From that link:
The Arizona House of Representatives recently approved a provision requiring President Barack Obama to prove that he is a natural-born citizen before the state agrees to place him on the ballot in 2012. He must have his birth certificate approved by the state's attorney general in order to run in the next election.Oh, Arizona...
This is a real dude in the world.
If you can't view the image, it's what looks to be a mugshot of a guy who's got "LADIES LOVE IT" tattooed above his lip like a mustache, and two lipstick kisses tattooed on his cheek and neck. He is clearly not only a stylish egalitarian, but a genius.
And possibly an oracle, because I do love it.
[Via Anna N.]
Oklahoma Legislature Overrides Governor's Veto on Abortion Laws
A nasty scene indeed from the new frontline (the state level) in the war over reproductive choice:
The Oklahoma Legislature voted Tuesday to override the governor's vetoes of two abortion measures, one of which requires women to undergo an ultrasound and listen to a detailed description of the fetus before getting an abortion.I eagerly await a statement from the President praising this exemplary display of "consensus and common ground." That is, if he can be arsed to tear himself away from being a superhero feminist long enough to make a fucking statement about it at all.
Though other states have passed similar measures requiring women to have ultrasounds, Oklahoma's law goes further, mandating that a doctor or technician set up the monitor so the woman can see it and describe the heart, limbs and organs of the fetus. No exceptions are made for rape and incest victims.
A second measure passed into law on Tuesday prevents women who have had a disabled baby from suing a doctor for withholding information about birth defects while the child was in the womb. Opponents argue that the law will protect doctors who purposely mislead a woman to keep her from choosing an abortion. But the bill's sponsors maintain that it merely prevents lawsuits by people who wish, in hindsight, that the doctor had counseled them to abort a disabled child.
Gov. Brad Henry, a Democrat, vetoed both bills last week. The ultrasound law, he said, was flawed because it did not exempt rape and incest victims and would allow an unconstitutional intrusion into a woman’s privacy. Of the other measure, Mr. Henry said, "It is unconscionable to grant a physician legal protection to mislead or misinform pregnant women in an effort to impose his or her personal beliefs on a patient."
The Republican majorities in both houses, however, saw things differently. On Monday, the House voted overwhelmingly to override the vetoes, and the Senate followed suit on Tuesday morning, making the two measures law.
Oh, I know, I'm such a cunt. Don't I know he's PROTECTING ROE???!!!1!eleventy!! Why don't I just vote Republican and see what happens THEN, huh?!
Snort.
This is what happens when the Democrats cede ground to the anti-choice contingent, when the Democratic leadership turns choice into a negotiable platform plank for its Congressional candidates, when the Democratic president engages in mealy-mouthed rhetoric and admonishes pro-choice advocates to "respect" the views of their adversaries, even though their views don't recognize women's basic right to bodily autonomy and our equality of personhood.
On January 22, 2009, President Obama stated: "I remain committed to protecting a woman's right to choose." And yet he has failed utterly to lend his considerable weight to protecting women's rights in Oklahoma. (And Arizona.)
Not only is their right to choose being undermined by requirements designed to deter abortion-seekers, requirements that also treat women like ninny-brained infants who need forcible help making decisions about their own bodies, but a doctor's right to lie to his female patients is being coded into law.
And we're not supposed to care about his inaction and silence because he's going to nominate a justice to the Supreme Court who will ostensibly protect an ever more impotent statute meant to ensure women's access to abortion, even as access is being subverted across the country.
The next time someone says some dumbass shit to me like : "Or, don't vote, and get a Republican Congress instead. That'll teach 'em..." I'm going to ask them to tell me with a straight goddamn face what the difference would be. Because abortion isn't a fucking on-off switch. Legal abortion isn't just about Roe, but is about the number of women who have reasonable and affordable and unencumbered access to it.
And the Democrats are letting that number dwindle in this nation as sure as the Republicans would.
[Recent Related Reading: More Fuckery in Arizona, But It's All Okay Because Obama's Protecting Roe, Chip, Chip, Chip; Have I Mentioned...; The Anti-Choice Whittling Strategy; How Could a Feminist Even CONSIDER Not Voting Democratic?!]
Question of the Day
Suggested by Shaker RachelB: If you had some say in the curriculum for students in high school / secondary school, what one book would everyone read as a teenager? (Presume, for the moment, that because everybody reads it, finding it in whatever language you want will not be a problem.)
I Write Letters
Dear Arizona:
When Karl Fuckin' Rove and Jeb Fuckin' Bush have problems with your new immigration law, it's 10 past time to realize THAT IS ONE FUCKED-UP PIECE OF LEGISLATION.
Love,
Liss
More Fuckery in Arizona
Igor at Think Progress:
On Saturday, "at the Center for Arizona Policy Family dinner before 1600 guests," [Republican Governor Jan Brewer, who is running for her first full term in office this year] signed SB 1305, the first-in-the nation bill that would prohibit insurers in the state-run health care exchange "from providing coverage for abortions unless the coverage is offered as a separate optional rider for which an additional insurance premium is charged."But it's all okay, because Obama's Protecting Roe!
The new Arizona law is a radical mini Stupak. It prevents insurers from offering abortion services, except under the most extreme circumstances, even if only private money were used to pay for those services. Most if not all women in the exchange would only be able to purchase coverage through an impractical, separate abortion "rider" or leave the exchange entirely and find coverage in the shrinking individual health insurance market. Since it's unlikely that many insurers will offer abortion riders or that women will purchase them in anticipation of needing an abortion — in fact, "in the five states where abortion riders are currently required, no insurance company offers them" — the Arizona law will severely disadvantage poorer women who would likely have to pay out of pocket for abortion services.
Many other states are considering similar bans, but only Arizona has the distinction of leading the nation in adopting the most conservative social policies.
[Recent Related Reading: But It's All Okay Because Obama's Protecting Roe, Chip, Chip, Chip; Have I Mentioned...; The Anti-Choice Whittling Strategy; How Could a Feminist Even CONSIDER Not Voting Democratic?!]
Action Item
[Trigger warning.]
Iranian actress appeals against UK Home Office deportation decision: "An openly-gay actress from Iran is campaigning against the Home Office's decision to refuse her asylum, this week, because she will face execution in her homeland. Kiana Firouz, 26, has sought residency in Britain on the grounds that her sexuality is considered illegal and immoral under Islamic law. According to legislation in Iran, the punishment for lesbian sex is 100 lashes. If the act is repeated three times and punishment is enforced each time, the death sentence will apply on the fourth occasion. But the Home Office refused her request for asylum earlier this month, despite acknowledging her appeal was legitimate."
Sign the petition to support Kiana Firouz here.
This follows on the heels of the news that Britain—along with Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden—has been, according to Amnesty International, "forcibly repatriating Iraqis to 'extremely dangerous' parts of the country, in breach of United Nations guidelines." Many of the deportees are gay men, and women of any sexuality who have been accused of "un-Islamic" behavior.
Lend your voice to help save at least one woman from this fate. Support Kiana Firouz.
[H/T to CaitieCat.]
Important Announcement
I hate him for all the years he sat beside Adam Carolla doing "Loveline" while Carolla slut-shamed young women and made "jokes" about bitches, fatties, trannies, and fags; I hate him for exploiting addicts and survivors in his loathsome "Celebrity Rehab," "Sex Rehab," and "Sober House" shows on VH1; I hate him for thinking it's appropriate to put a violent addict (Tom Sizemore) and an addict he victimized (Heidi Fleiss) into the same residential treatment; I hate him for his sanctimonious moralizing at teen moms on MTV and for always—always—taking the side of a young mother's parents or boyfriend, unless that boyfriend is demonstrably abusive, at which point he goes on the attack with the victim-blaming; I hate him for his comments about Lindsay Lohan and the other shit he talks about people he doesn't know like he graduated from the Dr. Bill Frist School of Diagnosing People Via the Teevee; I hate him for his stupid books, especially this one; I hate him for being a naked misogynist; I hate him for being a ridiculous, embarrassing, obvious star-fucker, who is literally so stupid he thinks knowing Andy Dick makes you cool; I hate him for his evident vanity and arrogance and self-righteousness, which is insufferable enough in a regular person, but downright evil when unapologetically put on display by a doctor among people who are desperate for help and compassion; and most of all I hate him for his smug face with its contrived expressions of empathy.
Just SHUT UP, Dr. Drew. Just shut up.
Today's Edition of "Conniving and Sinister"
See Deeky's archive of all previous Conniving & Sinister strips here.
[In which Liss reimagines the long-running comic "Frank & Ernest," about two old straight white guys "telling it like it is," as a fat feminist white woman and a biracial queerbait telling it like it actually is from their perspectives. Hilarity ensues.]
Rock Notes
The first two Katrina and the Waves albums have been reissued. With bonus tracks. For some reason.
The world is officially useless now.
[Cross-posted.]
Seen
I had yet another freaking doctor's appointment today, because I've contracted some horrendous respiratory infection that won't go away and I sound like a one-woman tuberculosis ward. (I swear I caught it the last time I was at the doctor, because no one else I know has it!) One prescription for antibiotics later, I was on my way home when I saw the following church sign:
"God is perfect. Only man makes mistakes."
What comfort to survivors of natural disasters, disease, injury, and trauma, I thought.
Roethlisberger Follow-Up
[Trigger warning]
Here's a link to details on the initial report of rape by the victim.
The responding officer that night is quoted as saying, "We have a problem, this drunken [expletive], drunk off her ass, is accusing Ben of rape. ... There is no way it could have happened."
It's a pretty textbook case of why rape is so rarely reported, so rarely prosecuted, so rare to get a conviction.
Read the whole thing.
Meanwhile...
Roethlisberger issued this statement yesterday:
The Commissioner's decision to suspend me speaks clearly that more is expected of me. I am accountable for the consequences of my actions. Though I have committed no crime, I regret that I have fallen short of the values instilled in me by my family. I will not appeal the suspension and will comply with what is asked of me ─ and more.Emphasis mine.
Missing games will be devastating for me. I am sorry to let down my teammates and the entire Steelers fan base. I am disappointed that I have reached this point and will not put myself in this situation again.
I appreciate the opportunities that I have been given in my life and will make the necessary improvements.
Strange wording there, no? "I have committed no crime." He didn't deny raping his victim, he didn't even deny "having sex" with her. He just didn't commit a crime.
And missing a few games is "devastating." Hey, I'm no athlete, but I do know I'd be far more devastated if someone accused me of rape than if I missed a couple football games. But that's just me.
Discuss.
Quote of the Day
"This is Alabama—we speak English. If you want to live here, learn it."—Tim James, Republican gubernatorial candidate in Alabama.
I'm Tim James. Why do our politicians make us give driver's license exams in twelve languages? This is Alabama—we speak English. If you want to live here, learn it. We're only giving that test in English, if I'm governor. Maybe it's the businessman in me, but we'll save money. And it make sense. [Three second pause.] Does it to you?Via Marc Ambinder, who notes: "Mr. James explains that exams in a multitude of language may endear people to the 'Rachel Maddow' crowd, but he's going to fight against political correctness. Besides, he says, it's a public safety issue because traffic signs are in English. There's a little wrinkle here: there's a reason why Alabama has its exams in many different languages, and if the governor changes the rules, the state could lose billions of dollars in federal transportation funding."
[Commenting Guidelines: Please refrain from sweeping generalizations about Alabama, Alabamans, the South, and/or Southerners. This isn't about a region; it's about a political and social ideology which may be more prevalent in some areas but nonetheless exists all over the country. It's possible to talk about that ideology without regional smears.]
