The War On Women Continues

Tags

Entertainment, GOP, Mitch McConnell, Planned Parenthood, teabaggers, women's rights

Republican continue to demean the value of women. The latest? Oh that would be Oklahoma that bastion of women’s rights.

There, the Tulsa Planned Parenthood facility is being forced to close because the Oklahoma Department of Health has decided to cut off its funding. It did this by cancelling its contract with WIC, a federal program. The Oklahoma government claims it is purely a “business decision, but of course it follows similar moves in Texas and Arizona, also known for their vehement attacks on the organization that devotes 3% of its services to abortion.

This follows a number of strategies to starve the group out of existence in the past few years. In some states laws are passed that concern building maintenance that are so onerous and unrealistic that PPH cannot afford the renovations (extra mop closets for instance).

What makes this all so obvious, is that the Tulsa office does not perform abortions at all. One hundred percent of its, and ALL the affiliates in Oklahoma are devoted to preventive care and family planning.

We are talking about cervical cancer screenings, mammograms, contraceptive care here people.

The outrage continues as white men continue to exert their control over the bodies of women, white and of color.

…

Better news? Oh the GOP continues to feast upon its own flesh. Yeah, grotesque analogy to be sure, but they are into cannibalism.

Latest victim?

Why good old Turtle man Mitch McConnell. Seems he’s aroused the ire of your average Tea People group in Kentucky. They found his fiscal cliff negotiations and agreement, well, just totally totally unacceptable. All those rich Kentucky hill folks (rich in the fables they tell themselves about how riches will be theirs if we only listen to rich folks) are not up with the tax on the rich that old Mitch agreed to. So Mitch wants to withdraw into his shell and avoid the folks who want to make him into some savory turtle soup.

The group “For America” plans on running their ads against Mitch in the usual places. (For America–those people are sure talented when it comes to catchy names ain’t they?)

…

Just saw the Oscar nominations. As is so predictable, Lincoln leads the field. This is going to be a sad one. Hugh Jackman is nominated for best actor and should surely win for an outstanding performance, but of course he cannot win against the equally grand performance by Daniel Day-Lewis. They should give out two this year I say. Let my make a guess that in consolation, Anne Hathaway will win best supporting over our always beloved Sally Fields. Just guesses, I’ve seen nothing but trailers so far. I like to give opinions about things I know nothing about. You already know that.

…

Sorry, out of time today. The Contrarian has an eye appointment at the VA in El Paso this afternoon and we are heading down a bit early to eat before we hit the base. It’s a beautiful day here, hope it is where you are.

Related articles

• Planned Parenthood closing in W. Tulsa (kjrh.com)
• War on abortion targets reproductive health care for poor women (kansascity.com)
• Marsha Blackburn, Diane Black Offer Dueling Bills To Defund Planned Parenthood (huffingtonpost.com)
• Are Reproductive Rights on the Way Out? (blogs.forward.com)
• Paul Ryan signs on as cosponsor of new ‘fetal personhood’ bill (rawstory.com)

 

Okay, Just One Too Many STOOPID People Today

Tags

budget, Glenn Beck, GOP, John Boehner, media wackos, Planned Parenthood, Prosser, teabaggers, voter fraud, Wisconsin

Where to begin! It’s another freakin’ frackin’ Friday, and the world has gone mad. Well, not much more so than usual. But you know, some days, one’s patience simply has limits. Or as they say, “dang gum it, they went on stepped on my last nerve.”

Leading off the lunacy challenge is none other than perennial tin-hat man, Glenny Beckster. Now Glenn, safely put aside by the newsless entity ironically called Fox News, is ‘splainin’ himself real clear.

Why Glenn really never wanted that old job at Fox in the first place. He never expected to stay for goodness sake. He is like Paul Revere, who had to get off his horse and actually go fight the revolution, not just warn people atop his horse for-ev-a.

And get this, Apocalypse man says that us liberals are gonna be “crappin’ our pants soon and turning to Jesus and spending our time on our knees alternately calling for Jesus to save us and begging Foxy to re-instate the Beckster who will have been proven cor-rect across the board. He predicts that this will happen in a year, to this date. That is April 8, 2012.

Meanwhile, his cult followers will be hanging on every word, ready to champion his view of the world at 210° from level. Don’t expect Becky to go quietly into the night. Naw, he’s gonna do the pied-piper kinda thing. And when his cult goes over the cliff, well it won’t be such a big loss will it? After all, there are One too many STOOPID people today.

♦

Can’t say if it’s true, but we hear John cry-me-a-river Boehner is doing some of the tears again. He has decided to do the right thing by himself and tie himself to the wagon train known as the TeaParty Train of STOOPID. It now all comes down to the fact that the Democrats have agreed to the amount of the budget cuts, but Pense and the lunatics have a rider than one of the cuts has to be PPH.

Now, Boehner wants none of this, but as I said, he decided his own salvation at the temple of Tea is more important than the WHOLE DAMNED COUNTRY, so a shutdown is a comin’ they say. As we reported yesterday, PPH funding is almost exclusively for health screenings. And of course, this has nothing to do with budget cuts, and nothing to do with JOBS, oh did you forget John that that is what you were gonna do if given the House? Whew, well I guess when you spend half your day in the tanning booth, somethin’s gotta give. Instead of creating jobs, Boehner orchestrates a huge loss of employment for a million or more government employees. Way to go John!

So, I say, that the Beckian cult should move over on the cliff, cuz the TeaWagons are comin’ on over too. That’s won’t be too much of a loss will it? After all, there is just one too many STOOPID people today.

♦

Yesterday, in Wisconsin, the challenger for Justice Prosser’s seat was ahead with all votes counted, by over 200 votes, which would make a recount automatic.  Foxy Noise was busily grousing about “reports of voter fraud” in the way they always do with when “wrong” candidate wins. Suddenly, this just in, a miraculous number of votes were “found” and gave the victory for Prosser with a more than 7,000 lead.

County clerk Kathy Nickolaus claims it was her mistake. But things are indeed fishy. Ms. Nickolaus, who previously worked for Prosser, had been heavily criticized for her failure to update to new equipment used throughout the state,and for keeping results on her own private computer. This same woman was, years ago, granted immunity from prosecution in electioneering irregularities in which a number of people were ultimately indicted.

And then, to top it off, she has been guilty of election mistakes in like about three previous elections where she made mistakes, sometimes giving the victory to the “wrong” person.

FOX is not talking about voter fraud any more. Gosh, I’m surprised. Aren’t you?

No doubt we haven’t seen the last of this one. Make room at the cliff! This woman may soon be running full tilt for the edge. And couldn’t we take the loss? After all, there is just one too many STOOPID people today.

♦

And to finish things off. Today is a day that will go down in the annals of recorded time, as the day of birth of my beloved, the Contrarian. Today said husband is 61 years old. He spent yesterday in his barca lounger lamenting his loss of youth, and today he sits and contemplates, as he says, his sudden wisdom.

He is definitely not part of this post title. He is not heading over any cliff; he is one fo the good guys.

Happy Birthday Parker! Many. Many, Many more, my love.

Related Articles

• Katy S: Oops! Republican Clerk’s 7,500 Extra Votes for Prosser | The Progressive (progressive.org)
• Corrected tally in Waukesha County gives Prosser 7500-vote edge – Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (news.google.com)
• Glenn Beck’s Brain (the1955hudson.com)
• Jon Stewart’s Definitive Glenn Beck Parody on Beck Leaving His Show (VIDEO) (themoderatevoice.com)
• Boehner Cries Amid Shutdown Showdown (blogs.abcnews.com)
• Fight over Planned Parenthood money blocking deal to avert federal government shutdown (oregonlive.com)
• Abortion, Spending Divide Leaders Trying to Avert Shutdown (businessweek.com)

Can I Have an Extra Day Please, with Sugar?

Tags

abortion, brain, budget, cosmology, David Barton, Eric Cantor, evolution, founding fathers, History, medicine, Mike Huckabee, Planned Parenthood, psychology, soul, teabaggers, women's rights

Everybody has those kinda days. When you get up already behind. This is usually the result of “sleeping in”. I’m a 7 am kinda person. I find that a humane time to arise. Some days, I don’t quite make it. Thus, I’m behind.

Tomorrow, I’m shopping, so I’m not sure I’ll get to blogging.

The Contrarian, however, puts his time to good use. He’s a thinker. Remember his desire to hold a thinkathon? Much easier than having a walkathon he thought.

When he thinks too much, well, I usually get concerned. His latest “breakthrough” is a humdinger.

The Contrarian has long pondered the existence of the soul. That has led him to toil in the backyard of the differences between humans and other animals. That place, he contends is where one might locate the seat of our divine connection. With me so far?

The places tred by medical men and women, philosophers, and theologians. What of the soul?

And, as I said, he thinks he has had a breakthrough.

He asks this question:

Is there any other animal but humans who react with distaste to the fart?

I know, its blasphemous. It’s crazy. It’s absurd, illogical, and downright unpretty. It is the Contrarian. Don’t blame me. I’m just reporting the news.

♦

If’n you didn’t know, the right-wing religious are, as you know, against abortions. And they are very against Planned Parenthood, and they devise all manner of nasty things to “prove” that PPH should be shut down. One of their more ingenious methods is to claim that PPH is about the business of genocide of the African-American population. This because statistically more black women obtain abortions than white or Latino.

Now the fact that this has to do with poverty and lack of access to medical information and contraception at the same level as their more wealthy white counterparts is ignored. No, it’s so much easier to suggest that PPH has as an unstated goal, the destruction of an entire people.

I imagine that the NAACP and other African-American groups are so grateful to the white folk for being so concerned for them. Yes, I guess we can all be grateful to those benevolent white people.

♦

Roger Ebert talks about what he understands as the Universe and evolution. It’s a lovely piece. Makes ya feel all warm inside for reasons I cannot explain. Least it do for me.

♦

See, now we know that serendipity is real. I mean, after writing about the Contrarian and his “breakthrough” I come across this article: Natural History of the Soul. Nicholas Humphrey argues that spirituality is essential to consciousness. Read it in The New Humanist. Humphrey is an evolutionary psychologist, and he’s written a book called Soul Dust: The Magic of Consciousness. Looks like a very interesting read.

♦

If there were any question about the agenda of Mikey Huckster, read on. It seems Mikey attended one of those uber right-wing  conferences, one that featured pseudo-historian David Barton and his revisionist history of the founding of this country. Why Mikey was just adoring of said Barton and said the following:

 “I almost wish that there would be, like, a simultaneous telecast, and all Americans would be forced–forced at gunpoint no less–to listen to every David Barton message, and I think our country would be better for it.”

Of course, in the “official” video of the event, the “joke” was scrubbed. And of course, Mikey meant every word, until he realized it wouldn’t play well outside his crazy base.

♦

Good news to report. I don’t have a link, but I’ve heard or read it in so many places that it is obviously true. The teabagger phenom is beginning to wane. Their unfavorables are now above their favorables. Which is all the more amusing since the Prez wannabes are all still dancing like marionettes to the teabagger tune, afraid to pirouette too far from the dark force. 

This is causing all sorts of problems with the budget. Word is that Boehner wants desperately to make a deal rather than shut down the government, but he dare not piss off the wonkettes, who are picketing in Washington, even as we speak. Well, we all knew this would happen didn’t we?

And who might you ask is riding to the rescue? None other than boy wonder Eric Cantor. Cantor has introduced a bill that will be voted on in the House on Friday, entitled, “Government Shutdown Prevention Act.” What it does it tell the Senate to act on the budget bill before the deadline and if it doesn’t the House passed bill will become the law of the land.

Yes, you heard that right. Cantor is simply tearing the Constitution up and making up his own new one. Yes, that’s some pretty strict construction there Mr. Cantor. Uh…do you dance too?

♦

What’s on the Stove? Fajitahs!

Related Articles

• Mike Huckabee thinks all Americans should be forced at gunpoint to listen to David Barton (heartchasms.wordpress.com)
• Huckabee Wants Barton to Teach All Young Americans [Dispatches from the Culture Wars] (scienceblogs.com)
• David Barton: Bad Preacher, Terrible Exegete (scotteriology.wordpress.com)
• Soul Dust by Nicholas Humphrey – review (guardian.co.uk)
• The Books Interview: Nicholas Humphrey (newstatesman.com)
• Anti-abortion billboard using Obama’s image raises ire (windsorstar.com)

Iowa’s Elmer Fudd Moment

Tags

abortion, el-Qaddafi, Fox News, GOP, Governor Walker, Iowa, Koch Brothers, Kraig Paulsen, Libya, Middle East, Planned Parenthood, right wing wackos, Sarah Palin, unions, Wisconsin, women's health, women's rights

The buffoonish Iowa legislature, in the guise of the House Republican majority, continues to waste the taxpayers money on crap that can never become law. Led by my very own representative, House Majority Leader Kraig Paulsen, the dipchits introduce bill after bill, pandering to the extreme right-wing nuttery that unfortunately infect this state as all others.

The latest? Why the noodlebrains in Des Moines, feeling most left out of all the fun, have introduced their own, “kill the unions” legislation, along with the usual public workers make way too much money compared to everyone else. Of course, as a U of I economics professor pointed out, it’s the same flawed kind of report, not controlling for educational level or job status. In other words, it compares public workers, most of whom hold degrees and comparable salaries with McDonald’s burger flippers.

The problem with Iowa’s sad Rethuglican “look at us” tactics? The Senate in Iowa is still controlled by Democrats, who simply table the bills in the wastebasket, and plea once again, “can we now get on to working on job creation and increasing the well-being of our citizenry?”

***

Everyone continues to watch events in the Middle East. No one knows where it will all end. I suspect it will be uneven. Each country is unique in makeup, political orientation, religious zealotry and so forth. Of particular concern  at this point is Libya, where crazy man (given the nuts in America these days, he looks strangely saner than usual) Muammar el-Qaddafi, a man intent at this point in hiring every mercenary in the world to destroy the people of his country rather than leave with his stolen billions.

I never understand these demagogues. They hang on to the bitter end when they can sit on the seashore with margaritas the rest of their live long days, with all manner of bimbos to fawn over them. Why do they do this? Is power that seductive?

***

I don’t know if you are aware, but one of the most offensive arguments the wacko right levels against Planned Parenthood is that it has as its real aim the annihilation of African-Americans through the abortion of their babies. It is an ugly, racist, condescending argument, couched of course in “concern” for African-American women.

A large and awful billboard has been erected in Soho in NYC, “warning” that the most dangerous place for an African-American “is in the womb.” People in NYC are suitably enraged.

A way to define hidden racism here is the fact that the ad uses the term “African-American” a term that the far right detests as “pandering”  and “playing the race card.” They universally always refer to African-Americans as “black, and yes, small “b”.

***

Most in Wisconsin are now aware, if they weren’t already, that Koch Industries was a major player in the election of Walker. They poured thousands directly to him, and through front groups, ran millions of dollars worth of ads. They are reportedly again coming to his aid, since this union busting was a joint effort on their parts. They are running up ads against the unions, through “American’s for Prosperity” their front Teabugger party.

Part of the new bill that Walker is trying to shove through, allows the “state” to sell off its utilities. Guess who is in line to buy? Guess who is already advertising to hire plant managers?

This just in. Governor Walker admits he was duped into a 20-minute phone conversation with a man he thought was David Koch. Follow the link to hear the conversation.  Snippets suggest that well, what we thought, is probably true.

***

Fox continues to blatantly LIE to it’s mostly senile viewers. They reported that a majority of those polled want unions to be ended. In fact, the very poll they cite says exactly the opposite. Sixty-one percent were against the Wisconsin attempt. Yet, Fox reported it as being 61% in favor of ending the unions. Ezra Klein reports the same figures, and wonders whether this is causing Governors like Scott in Fla. and Daniels in Ind. to back off.

***

Part of attacking the budget deficit seems to include screwing women, according to House Rethuglians and Teabuggers. I don’t mean that literally, although the act certainly sets up the issues that these creeps are trying to address in rather draconian fashion. And of course, wannabe Rethug players in the states, also chime in.

I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to call the Republican budgeting tactics, a “war on women.” See if you agree:

***

Oh, blastedly funny. You heard no doubt that Sarah Palin created a faux Facebook persona just so “it” could leave loverly comments on her real Facebook page? “ohhhh, Sarah, you are so brilliant, please run for President. You’re the kind of commonsense person we need….ooooh..”  Methinks Ms. Sarah won’t be livin’ this one down any time soon. The other stuff coming out in the new book about her, is amusing, and well, so Sarah. The woman reeks paranoia and narcissism.

***

Make sure you read OkJimm’s Eggroll Emporium to keep up on what’s happening up to the minute in Wisconsin.

What’s on the stove? Pot roast, roasted onions, carrots and rutabaga, mashed taters and gravy.

Related Articles

• Majority of American public supports union in recent GOP attacks (americablog.com)