That's what I thought.
Number of the Day
13.3 million: The number of people "throughout the Horn of Africa [who] continue to be in need of water, food, shelter, medical assistance and support to recover and regain lost livelihoods" since the United Nations declared a state of famine six months ago today.
There are a lot of excellent organizations working on this crisis. Two of the orgs that I personally support are CARE, to whom you can donate here, and Water.org, to whom you can donate here.
Please feel welcome and encouraged to leave information about other teaspooning opportunities in comments.
[Previously: Number of the Day, Photo of the Day, Number of the Day.]
I Write Letters
Dear Parks & Recreation:
I recently wrote you a letter telling you how much I love you. And I feel like it may have been insufficient. Because I love you A LOT.
Also: I loved last night's episode (for which there are spoilers that follow, if anyone else happens to be reading this letter I'm definitely writing to a television show), and I want to tell you: I see what you did there.
Like, first of all, the episode was about Leslie Knope meeting her opponent in the city council election, and I'll come back to that in a second, but there was this great sub-plot with Andy and April about Andy hurting his head (repeatedly) and needing medical care. Now, it was obviously great because it was hilarious, but it was also great because it was this sneaky commentary on our healthcare system and how totally fucked up it is for everyone who isn't a bazillionaire, because surprise! Deductibles.
Every part of it was perfect: Can't afford healthcare with no insurance. Finally have insurance? Get EVERYTHING fixed! Before you don't have health insurance anymore! Wait? Insurance doesn't cover everything? OH SHIT. This system is so terrible. It is the worst!
Seriously, it was sooooooo great.
But ALSO! The main arc about Leslie meeting her opponent, Bobby Newport (Paul Rudd, such perfect casting), was the best! I see what you did there, too, with your sneaky commentary about class privilege and male privilege! And instead of making Bobby Newport some sort of evil caricature, you went all meta in an episode about Leslie not wanting to negatively campaign and made her opponent nice—just ALSO a super-privileged and super-spoiled dude whose entitlement actually makes him weak.
And THEN! Then comes the best part of all, where Leslie's principled stance against negative campaigning forces Ben to devise a campaign ad that is basically the greatest thing ever, not just because it underlines what it takes for marginalized people to close the gap created by the headstart that privilege confers, but because it centers as important the big dreams of little girls, which shouldn't make me blub so much, but does, because it's so rare, so goddamn rare, to see that on a television show, or anywhere, without those dreams being the butt of someone's joke. I love this so hard:
Video of young Leslie Knope sitting at a desk in her bedroom, labeled 1985. Behind her is a hand-written sign reading "Vote Knope." Ben says in voiceover: "This is city council candidate Leslie Knope when she was ten years old." Young Leslie says: "Hi, I'm Leslie Knope. I love Pawnee, and I want to make it even better—better schools, safer streets, and a more progressive tax on residential properties."She's been thinking about the job since she was ten. Bobby Newport's doing it on a whim to get his dad off his back. I see what you did there, Parks & Recreation. I see what you did there.
Over text onscreen reading "Bobby Newport, 2012," Ben says in voiceover: "This is city council candidate Bobby Newport today." Bobby, on a video, with a farm clearly green-screened behind him: "People keep asking me, 'Bobby, what are you gonna do once you get into office?' Um, I'm pretty sure I'll figure it out."
Ben, in voiceover: "Leslie Knope had better ideas when she was ten than Bobby Newport has now. They do have one thing in common—" Split-screen of Leslie with a stuffed toy dog and Bobby with his Afghan hound, both of them saying, "I like dogs!" Ben continues, over an image of her campaign logo: "For a better Pawnee, vote Knope for city council."
And I like it. I like you.
Thanks. Keep up the good work!
Love,
Liss
P.S.
Ann, you are so beautiful and so smart.
This Story Is Too Bootylicious for Me
The fascination/fetishization of black women's backsides... will it never end???
From the Associated Press:
A newly discovered horse fly in Australia was so "bootylicious" with its golden-haired bum, there was only one name worthy of its beauty: Beyonce.This is not an honor. He is not doing her a favor. In fact, Lessard is evidencing an ongoing, problematic fascination with black women's bottoms. Dr. Janell Hobson, in an essay in which she analyzes "the prevalent treatment of black female bodies as grotesque figures, due to the problematic fetishism of their rear ends," (88) on the history of this bullshit:*
Australian researcher Bryan Lessard, 24, says he wanted to pay respect to the insect's beauty by naming it Scaptia (Plinthina) beyonceae. Lessard said Beyonce would be "in the nature history books forever" and that the fly now bearing her name is "pretty bootylicious" with its golden backside.
[A] history of enslavement, colonial conquest and ethnographic exhibition-variously labeled the black female body "grotesque," "strange," unfeminine," "lascivious," and "obscene." This negative attitude toward the black female body targets one aspect of the body in particular: the buttocks (87).Dr. Hobson delves into the longstanding fascination with/assumptions about black women's alleged hypersexuality, a hypersexuality symbolized by our deviant bodies and an "emphasis on the black female rear end, with its historic and cultural tropes of rawness, lasciviousness, and 'nastiness'," (97). And though this history extends much farther than two centuries into the past, she highlights the heartbreaking and dehumanizing display of Saartje Baartman, arguing that "perhaps no other figure epitomizes the connections between grotesquerie, sexual deviance, and posteriors than the 'Hottentot Venus'," (89), put on display primarily for the " 'strange,' singular attraction" of her rear end (88). As crunktastic noted over at the Crunk Feminist Collective, about Lessard's naming of the fly in Beyonce's "honor," "The legacy of Saartjie Bartmann lives."
Lest you think this is purely a compliment (I say purely because I am sure, in some strange way, Lessard meant it as such), ponder Dr. Hobson's words on Sir MixALot's Baby Got Back:
This so-called "appreciation" of black women's bodies does not necessarily challenge ideas of grotesque and deviant black female sexuality. Interestingly, both the song and video uphold and celebrate the black body precisely because it differs from the standard models of beauty in white culture, (96).Substitute "the naming of the fly" for "both the song and video."
If you're still leaning towards, "compliment," think of this: The recent "global desirability of a Black girl's ass" is not complimentary; it grows out of a history of othering and "exotifying" black women's bodies and "excuses her allegedly less desirable dark complexion, full lips, and kinky hair," you know, the still grotesque and "ugly" parts of us.** But the appeal of black women's butts is not always enough to "excuse" our deficiencies/lack of beauty in other categories. In fact, a curvy backside becomes even more desirable when it is not attached to a black woman. As Dr. Hobson notes,
[P]erformer Jennifer Lopez offers a slightly different take on rear-end aesthetics. Her Latina body, already colored as "exotic" in a so-called changing American racial landscape, bridges the desires of black and white men, because she can serve as the "racial other" for both. More importantly Lopez's derriere does not carry the burden of Baartman's legacy.Or, as I read in my Facebook feed the other day,*** part of the adoration/fascination with Kim Kardashian is the desirability of having physical features typically associated with a black woman unencumbered by the history of racism, colonization, and devaluation.
[snip]
Dominant culture came to celebrate Lopez's behind as part of a recognition of "exotic" and "hot" Latinas, women perceived as "more sexual" than white women but "less obscene" than black women. In this way, Lopez's body avoids the specific racial stigma that clings to black women's bodies (97).
I guess what it boils down to is the naming of this fly as symbolic of a culture of what crunktastic calls "disrespectability politics":
This is a world where disrespectability politics reign, a world where black women's bodies and lives become the load-bearing wall, in the house that race built, a world where the tacit disrespect of Black womanhood is as American as apple pie, as global as Nike. (Just do it. Everybody else is. ) In this world, Black women have moved from "fly-girls to bitches and hoes" and back again to just, well, flies. Insects. Pests.Please spare us honors like these, Mr. Lessard.
_______________
* Janell Hobson, "The 'Batty' Politic: Toward an Aesthetic of the Black Female Body," Hypatia 18, no. 4, Women, Art, and Aesthetics (Autumn - Winter, 2003): 87-105.
** From this sentence by crunktastic: "In this world, the global desirability of a Black girl’s ass excuses her allegedly less desirable dark complexion, full lips, and kinky hair." I know, I know; someone might argue that full lips are all the rage, but remember they can't be too full and they are much "better" on a non-black woman--hello, world's fascination with Angelina Jolie!
***paraphrased from a note or article posted by one of my friends for which I have searched desperately and cannot find. Please let me know if you know the citation. Update: Here it is! Thank you, checarina!
Friday Blogaround
This blogaround brought to you by hootenannies.
Recommended Reading:
Crunktastic: Disrespectability Politics: On Jay-Z's Bitch, Beyonce's 'Fly' Ass, and Black Girl Blue
Shark-fu: Klan Escalation in Missouri
Jennifer: Fear of a Black President? Solution: The Whitest Man in America, Mitt Romney.
Andy: More Than 70 American Mayors Announce Coalition to Support Marriage Equality
Phil: Fuck the Haters and Pass the Butter, Paula
Adrienne: Gawker Uses "Mail of Tears" for a Cheap Pun
Helen: Online Campaign to Stop Enforced Sterilization of TS/TG and Gender Variant People in Sweden
Do you read the Hathor Legacy's "Links of Great Interest"? Well, you should be! They are great!
Leave your links and recommendations in comments...
Feel the Homomentum!
Neat: "For the first time ever, all 100 firms on Fortune's Best Companies To Work For list this year have non-discrimination policies that include sexual orientation."
I'm not sure on what basis bestiness was determined, since the lack of a non-discrimination policy sort of makes a place not so bestish for people vulnerable to termination on the basis of their immutable identities, which makes me suspect these are best places to work if you've already got some measure of privilege,* but I shall set aside the cynicism for the moment, because this is actually good news of meaningful progress in one social justice sphere.
"It's been gathering strength over the 15 years that we've done the survey," said Milton Moskowitz, a co-author of the list. Similar progress has been made in benefits for same-sex domestic partners, which are now offered by 89 of the 100 companies listed, up from 70 five years ago.Too true.
"It's not surprising to me that the places that are ranked the best to work are also the ones that are going to respect and value their employees," said Michael Cole-Schwartz, communications manager at the Human Rights Campaign, an organization that advocates on behalf of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans.
------------------------
* By which I mean, it sort of seems like maybe this list should really have been previously titled "Fortune's Best Companies To Work For If You're Straight." And I doubt that's the only caveat to the bestiness. For instance, how many of these non-discrimination policies include protections for trans* employees...?
Primarily Stupid
![Republican presidential hopefuls, former senator Rick Santorum (L), former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney (2nd-L), former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (2nd-R) and Texas Rep. Ron Paul (R) participate in the CNN Southern Republican Leadership Conference Town Hall Debate in Charleston, South Carolina, January 19, 2012, in advance of this weekend's January 21, 2012 Republican presidential primary. [Getty Images]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v642/shakespeares_sister/shakes3/610x-42.jpg "The Four Bootstrapteers")
So, the Four Horsemen of the Crapocalypse had another debate last night, I'm not sure on what channel, and I didn't watch it because who fucking cares. I did watch some fun highlights this morning on the news, though! That and Google can make you an expert on anything—true fact! Here is my Executive Summary: Taxes, bootstraps, Jesus, Ronald Reagan, America, grandiosity, taxes, amen.
The "show-stopper" from last night's debate was Newt Gingrich's response when moderator John King asked him about the interview his ex-wife just gave to ABC News:
King: As you know, your ex-wife gave an interview to ABC News, and another interview at the Washington Post, and this story has now gone viral on the internet. In it, she says you came to her in 1999, at a time when you were having an affair; she says you asked her, sir, to enter into an open marriage. Would you like to take some time to respond to that?He then goes on to say a bunch of garbage about how interviewing his ex-wife two days before a primary is "as close to despicable as anything I can imagine." Ha ha okay, player. Let us not lose sight of the fact that this is the same dude who reportedly delivered divorce papers to one ex-wife while she was in the hospital recovering from cancer surgery and said ex-wife after she was diagnosed with MS. Newt Gingrich, I think you can PROBABLY imagine something closer to despicable, if you REALLY try.
Gingrich: No, but I will. [wild cheers and applause from the audience] I think, I think the destructive, vicious, negative nature of much of the news media makes it harder to govern this country, harder to attract decent people to run for office. And I am APPALLED that you would begin a presidential debate on a topic like that. [more wild cheers and applause; standing ovation]
Anyway! On the one hand, Gingrich has a point about asking a presidential candidate about private, consensual sexual behavior. On the other hand, this is the guy who led the impeachment charge against President Bill Clinton over a consensual blowjob. So if Newt Gingrich really doesn't like that his sexual peccadilloes are being brought up during a presidential primary debate, he quite literally doesn't have anyone to blame but himself.
Moving on...
Something something Ron Paul. Can you tell that I'm so over this guy? I'm so over this guy. I know that he and I share some pretty important views about foreign policy and the drug war, though we certainly stumbled to them from different directions, but I just don't give a fuck. He doesn't believe people with uteri should have bodily autonomy, he doesn't believe same-sex couples should be allowed equal rights, he doesn't believe the government should provide necessary institutional support to people with disabilities, he doesn't appear to believe that people of color are his equal, and he does appear to believe that poor people deserve their lot. He seemingly lacks the ability to empathize with anyone who is meaningfully different from himself, and that is not an acceptable characteristic for someone who wants to be the president of a diverse democracy.
Rick Santorum is still a sweater-vested bigot.
Mitt Romney offered an awesome retort to someone who asks him: "What will you do to support the 99% seeing as how you are part of the 1%?"
Romney, turning on the questioner with an ugly expression: Let me tell you something: America is a great nation, because we're a united nation, and those who are trying to divide the nation, like you're trying to do here and as our president's doing, are hurting this country seriously. The right course for America is not to divide Americans, and trying to divide us between one and other, is to come together as one as a nation. And if you've got a better model, if you think China's better, or Russia's better, or Cuba's better, or North Korea's better, I'd be glad to hear all about it! But [inaudible] America's right and you're wrong!Great answer! Anyone who thinks the cavernous disparity between the wealthiest 1% of USians and alllllllll the rest of us is a problem, is a STINKIN' COMMIE! Ha ha perfect. Willard, you are a genius.
Talk about these things! Or don't. Whatever makes you happy. Life is short.
Question of the Day
What's the most effective headache cure for you?
(If you prefer different cures for different types of headaches, or have a few different reliable remedies, feel free to elaborate.)
The most frequent types of headaches I get are dehydration headaches, so the best remedy is a glass of water.
About once every six months, I get a wicked migraine, and the only cure for those is lying in a cool, quiet, dark place all by myself, until it eventually subsides.
Photo of the Day
"Turns out, I'm a douchecanoe!"
Goodbye, Rick Perry. Tonight's debate won't be the same without you saying something very silly and/or forgetting something! I will miss you!
[Getty Images]
Quote of the Day
"The woman then proceeded to tell my husband and I that our marriage was not considered 'real' and she could not update the systems to reflect us as married."—Shane May, who has started a petition on Change.org to request that he and his husband, who were legally married in DC, be recognized as a family by the City of Cuyahoga Falls (Ohio) Natatorium, who rejected their request for a family membership.
This horrible, and equally common, bit of discrimination underlines: 1. Why the "states' rights" argument about same-sex marriage is not merely intellectually bankrupt garbage but also ethically untenable; and 2. How, despite the repeal of DADT, we continue to discriminate against gay soldiers: Shane's husband is an injured Iraq war veteran, and Shane is his caregiver. They were seeking a family membership because: "We do water therapy as well as light lifting at our local gym to help him get stronger and keep the pain levels down."
So Coty May came home injured from serving his country, only to be denied the very rights for which he was ostensibly fighting to protect.
You can sign the petition in their support here.
[Via Andy.]
News I Don't Want to Write About
Here is the news I don't want to write about today!
There is the interview with Marianne Gingrich, ex-wife of Newt Gingrich, which I did mention in today's Primarily Speaking piece, but is VERY BIG NEWS all over the internetz, where many people are fervently discussing how Newt is a marriage hypocrite for wanting an "open marriage," even though, as others have noted, retroactively asking permission to fuck someone on the side after you've been fucking them on the side for years isn't technically asking for an open marriage as much as it is asking the horse to go back in the barn and please kindly close the barn door after itself.
So, yeah, this is VERY BIG NEWS today, oh boy, but I don't personally feel like there's anything smart or interesting I can say about it, because this is how it looks inside my brain:
Marianne Gingrich: My ex-husband is a garbage nightmare with rotten walnuts where his decency should be.
Me: No doy.
In related news I don't want to write about, Rick Perry—who definitely dropped out today and I hope you are not too sad!—is endorsing Newt Gingrich. Great. Who cares.
There is various news about the wreck of the Costa Concordia cruise liner, including the captain's claim that "he was unable to lead the evacuation because he slipped and tripped into a lifeboat while helping passengers leave the stricken vessel." This whole situation makes me sad and infuriated. I hate the news coverage, I hate most of the responses I'm reading to what happened, and I hate that it happened at all.
There is the news that President Obama has "rejected a bid to expand the controversial Keystone oil sands pipeline." I only don't want to write about this news because I frankly don't know enough about it. It's good news, though, I think? You tell me!
There is this gross article in Slate, about whether small boobs are making a comeback. Ha ha. This is an especially fun conversation for a fat lady with giant boobs, because the "big boobs" that were supposedly more fashionable than small boobs are not actually "big" (but "medium") on any boob spectrum that encompasses a truly representative breadth of natural (and/or unnatural) diversity. It's just that he's writing about "sexy boobs," not the unacceptably large and always unfashionable boobs like I've got.
"Eww!"—Dudes who say they love big natural boobs, when they actually see big natural boobs.
There is the hawt news that my nightmare of a governor Mitch Daniels will deliver the Republican response to the President's upcoming State of the Union address. I'm so happy for you! It's so not fair that we Hoosiers get him all to ourselves! Now you can enjoy him, too! (P.S. Watch the veep slot!)
And finally, there is the report that American Idol is getting terrible ratings. Huh. Well, maybe it's the fact that the once-unique(ish) show now has a billion competitors, or maybe it's Steven Tyler being a lecherous creepazoid, or maybe it's the fact that "America" decided to draw the line under Scotty McCreery, because Jumps Sharko.
Talk about these things! Or don't. Whatever makes you happy. Life is short.
Daily Dose of Cute
So, earlier today, I gave Dudley and Zelda each a biscuit and then they wanted to go outside. So we went outside, biscuits in tow, and then the two of them commenced to be giant babies because they like to lie down in the grass to eat their biscuits, but there's icky crappy coldy snow on the ground! This is especially traumatic for Dudz, who is basically naked with no body fat to keep him warm, but nonetheless refuses to wear his coat and boots.
"I can neither run nor do my business in them! Shut up!"—Dudley.
So anyway, here is the worst thing to happen in the history of America (#LittleEdie), and please forgive my heavy breathing; I'd just been running around the yard with them before I started filming and I apparently will never learn not to hold the camera directly in front of my face.
Dudley and Zelda play with their biscuits in the snow, then carry them around, looking for a place to lie down. Dudley sits his skinny buttsy on the ground, then immediately stands back up, his biscuit hanging out of his mouth (vertically, natch). The dogs look at each other, like, "What now?"For those who can't view video, still pix of all the furry residents are below the fold.
Dudley spins in a circle, then trots toward me. Considers lying down several more times; looks confused. I laugh. "Dudley, would you like to take your bone inside?" He ignores me. "Do you wanna go inside?" He trots away. (It should be noted he knows what "inside" means, and he does NOT want to go there, despite its provided ease of biscuit-devouring.) He runs over to the grass bush (to which he is allergic) and drops his biscuit to the ground where he starts to munch it.
Meanwhile, Zelly stands in the middle of the yard with her biscuit on the ground. I laugh. "What about you, Zelda?" She picks up the biscuit, then drops it again and runs over to Dudz. She investigates what he's doing, then returns to sniff around for her biscuit. Dudley comes meandering back over with silly ears and half a biscuit. He looks pathetic. "Dudley," I say laughing, "I'm thinking maybe we should just go back in." He looks at me. "What do you think?" He trots away to the far side of the yard.
Zelda retrieves her biscuit out of the snow, wagging her tail at its discovery, and then finally lies down in the snow to eat it. Dudley stands on the far side of the yard, eating his bone with his back to me, just to make sure I know he can do it! Shut up!
"This is truly the saddest thing I've ever seen," I say. "Well, actually, it may be only the saddest thing I've seen since Agony Antler."
So Here's Some Good News
[Content Note: This post discusses sexual violence in the US military.]
The US military's truly abysmal record on preventing and prosecuting sexual violence among servicemembers is something about which I've written over the last seven years, rarely with anything resembling good news (unless the name Rep. Louise Slaughter was attached). But yesterday the AP reported that Defense Secretary Leon Panetta "has taken a personal interest in the problem [of sexual assault among servicemembers] and personally announced the changes in part because he wanted to focus on the issue a measure of attention he feels has been somewhat lacking in the department."
At the link, Representative Jackie Speier (D-CA) quite rightly notes that the measures being undertaken at Panetta's direction are insufficient, and much more will need to be done. Still: This is an important step in the right direction.
I want to quickly note that addressing the military culture in which servicemembers are assaulted by other servicemembers is not only important to protect those serving in the US military, but also because meaningfully subverting the rape culture within the military will decrease attacks on civilians committed by members of the US military, too.
Go here to sign the Change.org petition to Support Military Sexual Assault Survivors.
[H/T to Shaker Aeryl.]
Welcome to Your Backlash
[Content Note: This post discusses the encroachment on women's, trans men's, and genderqueer people with uteris bodily autonomy and the limitation of their reproductive rights and options, as well as the inherent violence of the anti-choice position and movement.]
Two stories arrived in my inbox in quick succession this morning:
1. Operation Rescue Launches Anti-Abortion Website: "Operation Rescue, an extremist anti-abortion group, has launched a website - abortiondocs.org - which lists the photographs and addresses of abortion providers, as well as maps to find their places of business. The website, which describes itself as the 'largest collection of documents on America's abortion cartel,' aims to list every abortion provider in the country." This is terrorism against abortionists and abortion-seeking people, or people who might ever have need of an abortion, plain and simple.
2. Long-Term Worldwide Decline in Abortions Has Stalled, and Unsafe Abortions Have Increased: "After a period of substantial decline, the global abortion rate has stalled, according to new research from the Guttmacher Institute and the World Health Organization (WHO). Between 1995 and 2003, the overall number of abortions per 1,000 women of childbearing age (15–44 years) dropped from 35 to 29; according to the new study, the global abortion rate in 2008 was virtually unchanged, at 28 per 1,000. This plateau coincides with a slowdown, documented by the United Nations, in contraceptive uptake, which has been especially marked in developing countries. The researchers also found that nearly half of all abortions worldwide are unsafe, and almost all unsafe abortions occur in the developing world."
On the one hand, these stories each deserve their own post, and I could spend the entire rest of my day writing 3,000 word pieces about each of them. On the other hand, they are part and parcel of the same issue, which is that the anti-choice position is inherently violent, whether it is forcing people with uteri who do not want to be pregnant to submit their bodies against their will to pregnancy and childbirth, or whether it is forcing people with uteri who do not want to be pregnant to seek out unsafe means of terminating a pregnancy—and there is nothing else to say but this: This is incompatible with freedom, if the word is to have any meaning at all.
This is an overtly misogynistic campaign to control the bodies of lives and women—and, by extension if not explicit design, a campaign that wants to wrestle away self-determination (and self-definition) from men and genderqueer people with uteri, too.
It is a violent backlash against the progress of feminism/womanism and gender equality. It is global, it is state-sanctioned in much of the world, and it is consigning people, mostly female people, to injury, to death, to lives they did not want.
This is not Woman's Work. The responsibility for turning this tide belongs to us all.
[See also: Misty's post. Respective hat tips to Shaker MinervaB and the Guttmacher Institute.]
Reproductive Rights Updates: New Hampshire, Ohio, Kansas, Texas
First up we have New Hampshire. Last year the state made news because it denied contract with Planned Parenthood (and thus, clinics couldn't dispense contraception). The federal government stepped in on that one. Well, enter round two of this.
A bill banning public funding of Planned Parenthood and other groups that provide elective abortions passed out of the New Hampshire House yesterday with a 60-vote majority, as Republicans rejected a report by the committee assigned to study the issue but fell short of the support needed to override a potential veto by the governor.First, "sovereign citizen"? What? Who talks like that? Second: problem! See, Medicaid covers abortion in very, very, very limited cases. Your legislation?
[...]
"For many New Hampshire women, Planned Parenthood is the only affordable option for health care. This legislation puts at risk basic access to cost-effective, preventive services such as cancer screenings, breast exams, access to birth control and other disease prevention services," said Jennifer Frizzell, Planned Parenthood of Northern New England's senior policy adviser, in a statement after the vote.[...]
Republican Rep. Susan DeLemus of Rochester was first to speak on the floor in support of the bill.
"As a sovereign citizen, I do not ever want to contribute to the stopping of a baby's heart with my tax dollars," she said.
The bill prevents the Department of Health and Human Services from entering into a contract with any organization that provides abortions not funded by Medicaid, which covers the procedure in cases of rape, incest or when the mother's life is in danger.So your tax dollars? Never funded any abortion at Planned Parenthood (or other clinic, office, or hospital) that wasn't already covered--and still covered & paid for--by Medicaid. Your "tax dollars", oh Sovereign Citizen, are STILL paying for abortion in the limited cases that they were already. Whooops! You don't know what you're talking about are supporting legislation that you appear to be ignorant of!
The House, in passing this bill, blew off its own committee (made up of a 2:1 republican majority) report that recommended killing it. The bill now goes to the Senate. Governor John Lynch is outright opposed to the legislation and the House did not provide a veto-proof vote.
***
In Ohio, the asinine "heartbeat" legislation is going to get another hearing in the state senate after the primaries:
COLUMBUS, Ohio — The leader of the Ohio Senate says hearings on a bill that would impose the nation's strictest abortion limit will resume after the state's March 6 primary.So now you know what I will be writing about come March!
Senate President Tom Niehaus (NEE'-hows) told reporters on Wednesday that his chamber would take up the measure after the primary contests. He did not further explain the timing or decision.
***
In Kansas, where abortion and draining the state of funds via lawsuits over legislation appear to be an obsession with certain legislators, the state House is moving forward with the odious "personhood" nonsense.
More than two dozen members of the Kansas House of Representatives have endorsed an amendment to the state constitution that would make abortion illegal in the state, potentially posing a constitutional challenge to the U.S. Supreme Court precedent set by Roe v. Wade.Same tired stuff there. BUT! Check out what they're putting ON THE BALLOT (emphasis mine):
The proposed amendment, which is expected to be introduced in the House this session, is the latest set of "personhood" legislation being weighed by state lawmakers. If passed by voters in November, the amendment would guarantee the rights of "life, liberty and pursuit of happiness" to individuals of all ages -- including the unborn -- by declaring that life begins the moment a woman's egg is fertilized.
An explanation of the measure that would printed on the ballot in November emphasizes that a vote against it would not amend the state constitution, meaning "the current federally mandated legal status of preborn humans would remain that of a class of human beings that can intentionally be killed."ON. THE. BALLOT. Gee, that's NOT AT ALL misleading, biased bullshit now it it?
The bill, however, has to pass by 2/3 majority before voters get to see that garbage nightmare of leading, emotionally-charged bullshit.
The article ends with noting:
Personhood efforts have recently been introduced in Virginia, Nevada, and Ohio. Similar efforts are also underway in California, Montana, Arkansas, Florida and Colorado.
***
Deep in the heart of Texas, poor, un- and under-insured people are SOL. This is according to a report released by the Dept. of State Health Services.
Following a legislative session where lawmakers slashed funding for family planning and targeted Planned Parenthood, the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) has released a much-reduced list of organizations that will receive state dollars to provide birth control, STD testing and cervical and breast cancer screenings for the state's poorest women.But at least Planned Parenthood is barely getting any money, amirite?!?!
Between now and March 31, 2013, 41 womens' health providers will receive a total of $12.4 million, down from 71 agencies in the last biennium.
[...]
In the last legislative session, lawmakers gutted family planning funding for all providers by two-thirds, from $111.5 million during the 2010-2011 biennium to $37.9 million over the next two years.
[...]
DSHS reported that 12 women's health applicants were denied funding because their regions were already covered by “tier one” providers. For instance, the Lone Star Community Health Center clinics in Montgomery County didn’t receive funding because their area is already covered by clinics associated with the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston.
Williams said even though Planned Parenthood clinics are not on the list of the agency's 41 official contractors, three Planned Parenthood chapters are receiving some temporary funding over the next few months. In those cases, either no one else from their regions applied, or other applicants didn't meet the criteria for funding. Williams said the state still has about $2 million available in its family planning budget, and has posted a request for additional applicants for that money.
“We want to make sure that we are adhering to legislative intent and that women are able to get care seamlessly,” Williams said. “The re-compete is to make sure other entities, such as associations, were aware of the opportunity to apply for these funds.”
[...]
Even among those who received a grant, there are concerns that the state cut too deeply into a program that used to serve 220,000 women every year. Under the current budget, DSHS estimates about 60,000 people will be able to continue to receive birth control and disease testing.
Lone Star Circle of Care, an FQHC with clinics throughout Central Texas, will receive $322,488 over the next 14 months — enough to cover only 20 percent of the family planning costs the clinic incurred in 2011. The state used to provide enough funding to cover between 70 to 80 percent of the clinic's services.
“It’s not enough compared to the demand we have for these services, so we’re seeking alternative sources of funding to cover the shortfall,” said Rebekah Haynes, Lone Star’s spokeswoman.
***
In related news, a new study that was published today in the Lancet shows that abortion rates--particularly unsafe abortions--are higher where contraception is hard to come by and where abortion has been made illegal.
Abortion rates are higher in countries where the procedure is illegal and nearly half of all abortions worldwide are unsafe, with the vast majority in developing countries, a new study concludes.All across this country, legislators are attempting to reduce access to contraception and eliminate abortion entirely (as a legal and safe procedure). They defy logic and science and general humanity. And they do not care.
Experts couldn't say whether more liberal laws led to fewer procedures, but said good access to birth control in those countries resulted in fewer unwanted pregnancies.
The global abortion rate remained virtually unchanged from 2003 to 2008, at about 28 abortions per 1,000 women aged 15 to 44, a total of about 43.8 million abortions, according to the study. The rate had previously been dropping since 1995.
About 47,000 women died from unsafe abortions in 2008, and another 8.5 million women had serious medical complications. Almost all unsafe abortions were in developing countries, where family planning and contraceptive programs have mostly levelled off.
[...]
Abortion rates were lowest in Western Europe 12 per 1,000 and highest in Eastern Europe 43 per 1,000. The rate in North America was 19 per 1,000. Sedgh [Gilda, senior researcher at the Guttmacher Institute] said she and colleagues found a link between higher abortion rates and regions with more restrictive legislation, such as in Latin America and Africa. They also found that 95 to 97 per cent of abortions in those regions were unsafe.
The authors defined unsafe abortion as any procedure done by people lacking needed skills or in places that don't meet minimal medical standards. Sedgh said some women in Africa resort to using broken soda bottles or taking strong doses of medicines or herbal drugs to induce abortions.
"It is precisely where abortion is illegal that it must become safer," wrote Beverly Winikoff and Wendy R. Sheldon of the Gynuity Health Projects in New York, in an accompanying commentary.
Experts said increasing birth control options for women in poor countries, like providing long-acting implants, would make a big difference.
"Wherever we have made better contraception available in the countries where we work, hundreds of women will walk hours to get it," said Dana Hovig, CEO of Marie Stopes International, a family planning organization. He was not connected to the study.
As an aside, none of these posts would exist if SOPA and PIPA were to pass. None.
Even in the Conservative Legislation Lab, Progress
Next month, Indiana will become the first state in the union to offer an LGBTQI license plate:
The new plates will be available beginning in February throughout the state and feature six hands in red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple, which is the logo of the Indiana Youth Group.With the help of Indiana's American Civil Liberties Union, the Indiana Youth Group got their plate on the third try. Blub.
That organization provides LGBT training for schools and service agencies and works to promote tolerance.
The specialty plate costs an additional $40 with $25 directly benefitting the group which provides training for schools and service agencies and works to promote tolerance.
The Indiana Youth Group had been trying to get the LGBT plate approved since 2010.
This is very big news in a state where "In God We Trust" license plates are used as standard plates.
If you would like to donate directly to the Indiana Youth Group, you can do so here.[H/T to Shaker TheCaptain.]
Top Chef: Texas Open Thread
"Hi there!"
Pop Rocks? Was there something about Pop Rocks? Is this Chopped now? Are Ted Allen and Aarón Sanchez and a gallon of Cacique and leeks and pig's feet in a pic-a-nic basket gonna show up next week? This show. I swear!
Spoilers below. Discuss!
