Yesterday, the Republican controlled House passed a bill to eliminate public financing of electoral campaigns.
In light of Citizens United and President Obama's decision to turn down public funding in his 2008 campaign, this certainly strikes me as an opportune time to revisit the federal government's role in campaign spending. Unfortunately, if this bill was to become law (it won't in the immediate future), it would signal a further step towards cementing the United States' position as a corporatocracy.
That said, permit me to talk about math.
One of the prime arguments the Republicans are making about this legislation (indeed, about virtually all legislation) is that the US needs to reduce government spending to get our budget deficit under control.
So.
Yesterday, on the same day Mitch McConnell took up the flag in the Senate, saying:"In a time of exploding deficits and record debt the last thing the American people want right now is to provide what amounts to welfare for politicians."
the Congressional Budget Office announced that it expects the federal budget deficit to reach $1.48 trillion this year. CBO estimates that the decision to extend the Bush tax cuts (which Republicans pushed for) is responsible for $390 billion of that deficit. Indeed, the interest payment on the tax cut extension will be around $50 billion per year.
Eliminating public campaign financing would save the federal government about $62 million a year.
To recap:
2011 deficit: $1,480 billion
2011 cost of the Bush tax cuts: $390 billion
2011 cost of interest on the Bush tax cuts: $50 billion
Potential savings of eliminating public financing: $0.062 billion
I call bullshit.
LOL UR Mendacious Arithmetic
DADT Update
Pentagon to outline training for post-DADT life:
Pentagon leaders will roll out a plan Friday that is expected to give the military services about three months to train their forces on the new law allowing gays to serve openly, officials said Wednesday.Indeed so.
The plan, they said, will outline the personnel, recruiting and other regulations that must be changed. It will describe three levels of training for the troops, their commanders and the key administrators, recruiters and other leaders who will have to help implement the changes.
Under that training schedule, full implementation of the law could begin later this summer. Once the training is complete, the president and his top military advisers must certify that lifting the ban won’t hurt troops’ ability to fight. Sixty days after certification, the law would take effect.
...According to officials, the training will be broken into three categories. One will be for administrators and other leaders who will have to be able to answer detailed questions about the new policy. The second will be for senior commanders who will have to enforce the policies and also be on the lookout for signs of unease or problems among service members. The third group will be the general training for the troops.
...The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, however, wants officials to hurry along certification that the change won’t hurt military effectiveness.
“We think there should be certification from the president, [Defense] Secretary Robert Gates and [Joint Chiefs of Staff] Chairman Michael Mullen in this quarter,” the group said in a statement Wednesday. “We need to make ‘Don’t Ask’ repeal a reality sooner rather than later.”
Yikes
[Trigger warning for unethical sexual behavior, possible sexual assault and stalking.]
So, CNN has this big exclusive on misconduct at the FBI, and I'm not especially surprised that there is some percentage of agents who are creeps, but I am certainly intrigued by the FBI's position on what constitutes an appropriate punishment for unethical sexual behavior (which may actually be sexual assault, depending on context like some element of coercion, unclear in the article) and borderline stalking (or legal stalking, also depending on context not made explicit in the article).
I mean, how did the agency know, for example, about the supervisor who watched "pornographic movies in the office while sexually satisfying himself" during work hours unless somebody saw him (which was quite possibly the whole point) and/or he talked about it? That's sexual harassment at minimum.
Which seems it ought to warrant a more serious response than a 35-day suspension.
I'd really like it if the US government started taking sexual harassment, assault, and violence seriously, because I'm really tired of reading about sex crimes in various federal agencies (and Congress), sex crimes in the military, sex crimes in the Peace Corps, sex crimes by subcontractors, etc. etc. etc.
If anyone at the White House is interested in making rape prevention a priority, there's a lady at the State Department who might have some ideas about how to do that.
Quote of the Day
[Trigger warning for violence and homophobia]
"When we called for hanging of gay people, we meant ... after they have gone through the legal process...I did not call for them to be killed in cold blood like he was."—Giles Muhame, editor of the Ugandan tabloid The Rolling Stone (no connection to the American publication) [TW] speaking about the murder of gay rights activist David Kato.
In late 2010, Muhame's paper published the names, addresses, and photos of "[the] top 100 homosexuals" (including Kato) under a banner that included the phrase "Hang Them."
Blog Note
I've been feeling a little under the weather, nothing to be alarmed about, just the same old shit, so I'm taking it easy and posting may be a little lighter than usual over the next few days.
No need to feel obliged by this post to wish me well (and the usual suspects can hold the tiresome emails accusing me of attention-seeking); I just wanted to post something informational for the Shakers who tend to worry when I deviate from my routine.
Question of the Day
What's the worst back-handed compliment you've ever received?
I don't know if this is precisely the worst, but, not terribly long ago, someone said to me, "You're a really great female blogger." Oof.
An Observation About Bootstraps
In the conservative lexicon, ownership is good, and there's no dirtier word than entitlement. In last night's GOP response to the State of the Union, the idea that entitlement programs like Social Security and universal healthcare (to which we unfortunately do not have anything close) are THE WORST and individualism and self-governance are THE BEST was a rather prominent theme, because BOOTSTRAPS.
Which are the thingies conservatives wave around to distract our attention primarily from the existence of privilege and prejudice, but also from the reality that entitlement programs are not, actually, the "wealth redistribution" programs they assert them to be. To hear conservatives tell it, entitlement programs are some kind of wealth-punishing equalizer, as opposed to components of a fraying safety net that is often the only thing keeping low- or no-wage earners from falling off the edge.
I'll leave aside for now the tropes about the legions of straw-people who could be earning a livable wage at an awesome job but inexplicably choose not to work, living high on the hog off our generous welfare system. Suffice it to say, that is abject nonsense, and being poor is one of the most difficult things to be in this country. Poverty is not for lazy people.
My present concern is with the working poor, and the way they are regarded by the architects of the Ownership Society.
Those men—and they are indeed almost all men, most of whose lives have been dictated by inherent privilege and family connections, which we're not meant to note while admiring their shiny bootstraps—believe quite firmly, and without seemingly a trace of irony or compunction, that one gets what one deserves in life. From the imposing height of their handsomely recompensed sinecures, they will assert with the particular condescending authority bestowed only by unearned success that, with a little hard work, anyone can be a productive member of their magnificent Ownership Society.
Now, I don't feel inclined to get into a whole Marxist discussion about the means of production here, but what these insufferable, vainglorious, classist captains of self-aggrandizing bullshit seem never to grasp, or possibly just acknowledge, is that if you want to live in a capitalist society that gives you the opportunity to get nasty rich, then we can't all be wealthy. And if you want to be the kind of person who doesn't pump your own gas, or make your own sandwiches, or clean your own house, or manicure your own fingernails, or drain your own dog's anal glands, then there are going to have to be people who fill all those jobs.
And most of those professional, hard-working people will put in at least 40 hours a week, or more, and even still, many of them won't be given healthcare benefits, and many of them won't earn enough money to feed a family, and many of them won't be able to save as much as they'll need for their retirement.
People who honorably dedicate their time, energy, and talents to jobs that might not pay well are indeed entitled to something—to not work their whole lives only to find themselves poverty-stricken, or hungry, or homeless after one small (or not small) medical crisis. And if we're not going to ensure that every job comes with a livable wage, access to affordable healthcare, and retirement benefits, then we've got to provide a robust and well-funded social safety net.
I don't think that's asking for much, in exchange for a lifetime of providing service to their chosen vocation.
Though I grant it's certainly easier to scream BOOTSTRAPS! and carelessly assert that people who don't have everything they need just aren't trying hard enough.
Funny how the Grand Advocates of Hard Work are always the ones making the easy arguments.
Daily Dose of Cute
I've heard there are people in the world who think greyhounds aren't cute.
Does not compute.
Don't cut me off, I'm heteronorrrrrrrmmmatttiiiiiiiivvvvvveeeee........
You know those car decals that you can buy to showcase how nuclear, hetero, and fecund your family is?
I'm gonna buy, like, fifty ladies and put them all over my rear window. Fifty ladies and four cats.
A Thought
Maybe a discussion about the "sinfulness" of a particular sexual orientation isn't actually a valuable contribution to the national discourse. Maybe it's not even news.
Technically that was two thoughts. If you count the embedded contempt and implicit commentary about what a homophobic wankstain Joel Osteen is and what a terrible journalist, even by CNN's increasingly questionable standards, Piers Morgan is, it's even more than two thoughts.
Whatever.
Texting! With Liss and Deeky!
Deeky: I am sending you those Bieber cards when I am done with them.
Liss: LOL. Of course you are. Because you're a closet hoarder who just sends me his garbage treasures.
Deeky: No doy!
Liss: "I can't bear to throw away this 17-year-old porno mag with the centerfold who looks like Brian Bloom! Too many nice wankmemories! I know - I'll send it to Liss!"
Deeky: LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL!!! I can't stop giggling.
Liss: "I'll keep my house nice and clean and send my garbage treasure hoard to Indiana!"
Deeky: You love my treasures!
Liss: Your treasures, lol. Yes, I love them so much I put them in plastic treasure chests and put them out by the curb every week to be collected by the "treasure man" for safe keeping. He buries them at the "treasure dump" for me.
Deeky: LOL! How thoughtful!
Liss: It's like a safe deposit box, except EVEN BETTER.
Deeky: LOLOLOL! I wish I was back in Missouri. I would sooooo send you a mountain of treasures right now.
Liss: LOLOLOLOLOLOL! I bet you would.
[Click to embiggen.]
Above: An actual image of some of the recent garbage treasure that has been mailed to Liss by Deeky: A torn-out magazine photo of Brett Anderson circa 1993, a M4M phone sex ad, a random magazine photo of an eagle, New Kids on the Block trading cards, a doodle in colored pencil with a food stain on it, a Czech grocery specials flyer from 2001, an anti-McCain bumper magnet, and a glittery sticker featuring a cartoon of disembodied boobs being grabbed by hands reading "Free Mammograms."
Pennsylvania Senate Committee Votes to Ban Abortion Coverage in Private Insurance Plans
From The Philadelphia Inquirer:
HARRISBURG - A state Senate committee is advancing a bill to ban abortion coverage from policies obtained through health-insurance exchanges that are to begin in 2014. The bill passed the Senate Banking and Insurance Committee on Tuesday, 12-2. No public hearing was held.
Last year's landmark federal health-care law requires states to set up the exchanges to provide a marketplace where small businesses and individuals can buy coverage.
However, some abortion-rights proponents say that federal law already restricts taxpayer funding for abortion coverage and that this bill goes further than federal law by restricting abortion coverage in private policies.
For more on yesterday's vote, let's go to Planned Parenthood Pennsylvania Advocates:
Senate Committee Votes to Further Endanger Women’s Health and Safety in Pennsylvania
January 25, 2011
Author: Sari Stevens
HARRISBURG – Two days after the November 2nd election, President Pro Tempore Senator Scarnati was quoted in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette cautioning his colleagues to focus on statewide fiscal matters and avoid divisive fights over abortion rights. On just the second day of legislative session, that commitment to Pennsylvania voters was broken when the Senate Banking and Insurance Committee voted to ban private insurance plans sold in the Pennsylvania health insurance exchange from covering even medically necessary abortion services.
“Rather than focusing on job creation and stimulating the economy, the State Senate is pulling a bait and switch and has made clear that government interference in private medical decisions is their top priority,” said Sari Stevens, Executive Director of Planned Parenthood Pennsylvania Advocates. “Pennsylvania voters are not interested in reopening the debate around abortion. Our lawmakers should focus on improving our health care system and stop using women’s health as a divisive issue.”
The debate over private insurance coverage of abortion in the health insurance exchanges was settled by U.S. Senator Ben Nelson, a staunch opponent of abortion. The Nelson amendment stipulates that women who want to use their own money to purchase a health insurance plan that covers abortion services must send a separate payment so the funding for abortion coverage is completely separate and paid entirely by the individual.
Read the whole thing.
This vote comes just after the Kermit Gosnell case broke. Last week, Melissa wrote,
This case is already being used by anti-choice advocates as evidence for why abortion should be criminalized. But, in fact, the opposite is true: It is because of the increasingly limited access to safe, affordable, first-term abortion, as well as safe, affordable, late-term therapeutic abortion, that a heinous anomaly like Gosnell exists. He is an unethical opportunist who made lots of money exploiting desperate women without a better alternative.
And now the PA State Senate is acting opportunistically to limit women's reproductive freedom.
If you live in Pennsylvania, you can
Contact PA State SenatorsH/T to Planned Parenthood Pennsylvania Advocates
Wednesday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by Shaxco, publishers of the upcoming Deeky's Guide to Smart Investing.
Recommended Reading:
Shani: Ask a Woman Who Knows [TW for gender essentialism]
scatx: Rape in the Peace Corps [TW for sexual violence]
Fannie: The Ignorance of Non-Feminists, Part Whatever
Renee: Toy Story 3: Lessons in Race and Gender
Dori: Thousands of Cuts [TW for discussion of circumcision]
Andy: Peruvian Catholic Bishop Uses Gay Slur; Apologizes "For Everyone Who Felt Offended" [TW for homophobia; Christian supremacy]
Living ~400lbs: Microagressions
Leave your links in comments...
Quote of the Day
[Trigger warning for anti-Semitism.]
"He's into history."—An anonymous Jesse James "insider," explaining why more pictures have surfaced of James playing around with Nazism: "In one pic, James grins and sits in a convertible alongside a pal who gives the infamous "sieg heil" salute [while wearing what looks like an SS cap]; another image features a children's book character, Flat Stanley, dressed as Adolf Hitler."
No, people who watch WWII documentaries are into history. People who play Nazi dress-up are anti-Semitic fucknecks.
"He's into history." Please. That would be fucking hilarious if it weren't so terrifying.
And by "terrifying," I'm not referring to Jesse James or his "anonymous friend," but to a culture that finds eliminationist anti-Semitism an acceptable position to hold.
This post sponsored by The Beaver, coming to a theater near you in March!
[Related Reading: No.]
Situation Normal
[Trigger warning for violence.]
If you are a rightwing extremist who advocates "repudiation of the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision with mass bloodshed," you can still totally have a job as a CNN commentator, even sitting on a panel discussing the State of the Union.
And why not? It's not like the president even mentioned reproductive rights, anyway.
Assvertising
Kate's post about the manflu reminded me that I've been meaning to post about this obnoxious Vicks Dayquil advert for ages (it's the first of the two in this video):
A white man is lying on a couch, looking pathetic and coughing. His wifemommy walks in. "I can't reach the remote," he whines, looking at her plaintively. She tosses a box of Vicks Dayquil at him. Cut to a whitescreen with the text: "Thankfully, it even works on the man-cold."Whooooooooops I barfed on your Vicks Dayquil.
