I really hate having to come back to this over and over again. Let's get our abortion-and-health-care basics down folks. The Senate bill does nothing to change the standard we have lived by that no federal funding shall be used for abortion.
It's the anniversary of Roe V. Wade today and Scott Roeder's trial for the murder of Dr. Tiller has begun. I'd write more, but this week in politics has left my hamster wheel a little damaged, so I'm going to go have a Friday night and leave you with what they said ...
(Footage purchased from Sam Sumner, originally posted by Will Urquhart at Sum of Change)
As you may be aware, this weekend (tomorrow to be exact) marks the 37th anniversary of the passage of Roe v Wade, the supreme court decision that effectively legalized abortion nationwide. We have been working on a documentary about clinic escorts for some time now (tomorrow we will be making a big announcement about the film, sign up for our emails and you will be one of first to hear about it), so this weekend is a big chance for us to get some footage.
When I got back home from volunteering at the clinic, I saw an email from Operation Rescue announcing a press conference at the White House today. Luckily, I was able to track down a freelance videographer who sold us some great exclusive footage of Operation Rescue's President, Troy Newman, failing several times to name a single part of the current health care bills that allows for federal funding of abortion (although he knows for a fact it does, he just cannot tell you how):
Two Democratic senators unexpectedly announced their resignations on Tuesday. Sens. Byron Dorgan (D-ND) and Chris Dodd (D-CT) announced that they would not seek reelection when their terms expire in 2010. Hopefully, health care reform will already have passed by then, but the departure of these senators will have implications for health care policy.
As far as the Democratic majority in the Senate is concerned, the two resignations probably cancel each other out. As a relatively conservative 30-year incumbent, Dorgan was thought to be the only Democrat who could win a seat in conservative North Dakota. Dodd, on the other hand, is deeply unpopular for his role in the financial crisis, but hails from a deep blue state, so it should be easy to replace him with another Democrat. In fact, as Eric Kleefeld reports for Talking Points Memo, Dodd's resignation improves the Democrats' chances of holding that seat.
As Jodi Jacobson explains in RH Reality Check, losing Dorgan would be a setback for reproductive rights. While Dorgan has a mixed record on choice, "Given his state, Dorgan's voting record is pretty progressive on at least some issues otherwise driven completely by ideology," Jacobson writes.
Dodd is reliably pro-choice, but the pro-choice credentials of the candidate favored to take his place, Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, are even more distinguished.
Last year, Blumenthal sued the Bush administration over so-called "conscience clauses" for the Department of Health and Human Services which would have given employees more latitude to refuse to provide medical care that they disapproved of on religious grounds. (The Obama administration later reversed the rule.) In 1995, Blumenthal and the U.S. Department of Justice filed suit against two anti-abortion protesters under the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act. "Our goal was to defuse a volatile situation before it escalated into a bloodbath, such as the fatal shootings in Brookline, Massachusetts," Blumenthal explained at the time. Blumenthal and DOJ prevailed in court in 1997.
In other health care news, an unnamed Senate aide told the Wall Street Journal's Washington Wire blog that the Democrats are planning to streamline the passage of the health care reform bill by skipping the conference committee. Normally, the House and Senate versions of a bill are combined in conference. This time, Democrats may skip that step by hammering out a deal that is acceptable to the Senate, having the House pass that bill, and then having the Senate pass the same legislation. That way, Democrats can circumvent some procedural hurdles in the Senate.
According to Kevin Drum of Mother Jones, skipping conference has become routine for big Democratic bills. These days, thanks to stricter rules about what can be added in conference, the House and the Senate are more likely to reconcile big bills through the aforementioned "ping pong" process.
John Nichols of The Nation argues that skipping conference will leave progressives out in the cold. Until now, a lot of progressive energy has been focused on strengthening certain provisions of the Senate bill in conference. If the Democrats decide to skip conference, that means that all the power will be in the hands of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and a handful of their closest allies.
Finally, Monica Potts of TAPPED discusses a new study that purports to show that the so-called "g-spot" doesn't exist. Headlines are proclaiming that the g-spot is a myth. The results of the study have been misinterpreted in the general rush to proclaim that science has proven women wrong about their bodies. What the study really showed is that genes have little to do with whether a woman thinks she has one.
These results suggest that the g-spot isn't a unique organ encoded in our genetic plan, like a spleen or a kidney, but that there's no doubt that the front wall of the vagina exists, nor that some women report orgasms from stimulating that area. What other anatomical questions are investigated with surveys? Do you have a pancreas? Chances are you've never directly observed your pancreas. Whether you say "yes" depends whether you've read that humans have them.
Whether women agreed that they had g-spots had more to do with their age. Younger women, raised in an era where women's magazines assert that g-spots are a standard part of female anatomy, were more likely to believe they had them. What this study was really measuring was a general belief in the existence of g-spots, which has no genetic component. Belief in the pancreas has no genetic component either, but it doesn't follow that these organs are mythical.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about health care by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Pulse for a complete list of articles on health care reform, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, environment, health care and immigration issues, check out The Audit, The Mulch, and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.
Coverage originally posted by Will Urquhart at Sum of Change
Last week, we joined pro-choice activists from all across the country on Capitol Hill. They came to support health care reform and the public option, and they came to fight against the Stupak amendment and any bans on women's reproductive health coverage. The program began with rally, after which, the groups headed to scheduled meetings with their legislators. We tagged along with a group from Sister Song in New Orleans and joined them for the visit with Senator Mary Landrieu's office.
We have extensive coverage of the day's events, with plenty of full speeches.
I remember that at the turn of the century (ha! I've always wanted to get to write that) it seemed like you couldn't read a news outlet anywhere that wasn't running articles on Islam 101 and the institution of Sharia law in some country. In one such article I read, a clerical commentator, iirc, was talking about why the veil was such a big deal to newly instituted Islamic governments.
He said, roughly, that it was because it was a lot easier to prove your piety by insisting that women cover themselves than it was to give up banking with interest.
I've always thought of that story when people go tediously on about the huge, innate cultural differences between Us and Them. It isn't only that women haven't been able to vote in the US for even a full 90 years, that we're only at about the 150 year mark for meaningful property rights for married women, that the states never ratified the Equal Rights Amendment, that women get paid less than men, etc. It's also because still today, our rights and health are often the first bone offered up on the altar of bipartisan consensus.
For the sake of people who believe that undifferentiated cell balls are people, the Democrats routinely ignore the interests of those who believe that women are people. Hence, the uterus remains the only organ that the state can require any adult living or dead to donate the use of for anyone else's sake.
The health financing reform fight has been no exception to this trend, and I don't know if I'm even capable of conveying how angry it makes me that Obama's signaling he's willing to gut reproductive health coverage in even private insurance plans, and almost certainly to exclude it from any public option, just so he can stake a claim to being the "last" president to deal with health care.
If you like the coverage you have, you can keep it. Probably. Unless you're a chick.
Public Christians in US politics can easily prove their piety to peers by punitively, and only, making life harder for women. They are not asked to prove moral fitness by driving out moneychangers, helping the poor, showing mercy, clothing the naked, exemplifying forgiveness, showing hospitality to strangers, being humble, keeping prayer private, sheltering the homeless, ministering to prisoners or feeding the hungry. Indeed, if indifferent cruelty is a spiritual virtue, then majorities in Congress are surely bound for heaven. Such as it would be. Whatever faith that is, it isn't in the Bible, a book I've had to read through cover-to-cover at least twice.
Which also therefore qualifies me to inform you that 'the b*tches got it coming' is neither in the Gospel, which isn't the law, nor the Constitution, which is. Read up.
Yesterday, Sonia Sotomayor became the first Latina and the third woman ever nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court. She is currently a federal judge on New York's 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals. Born to Puerto Rican immigrant parents and raised by her mother in the housing projects of the South Bronx, Sotomayor went on to attend college at Princeton and law school at Yale. George H.W. Bush appointed her to the U.S. District Court in 1991 and Bill Clinton "promoted" her to the 2nd Circuit in 1998.
By Lindsay Beyerstein, The Media Consortium MediaWire blogger.
The $825 billion economic stimulus package is finally taking shape as House committees finalize their contributions to the bill. The good news is that healthcare spending will be a major part of the stimulus: $87 billion has been set aside to help states pay for Medicaid alone.
How do the Bush Dogs stack up on reproductive rights issues? Mostly bad, especially compared to the rest of the Democratic caucus. Not as bad as they could be, especially compared to the Republican caucus.
I used two voter scorecards to evaluate them on, the most recent available from NARAL Pro-Choice America (2007) and the Planned Parenthood Action Fund (2006). The NARAL 2007 House scores were based on two 2007 votes, one partially repealing the global gag rule and the other and one preserving federal funding to support Planned Parenthood in providing family planning services to low income families, with possible voting scores of 0, 50 and 100%. The PPAF 2006 House scores are based on a composite of 11 votes and/or issue positions, which you can look at by clicking on any representative's name at the link, and giving a more nuanced view of a member's stance on reproductive justice.
I'm including here only the scores of the Bush Dogs. Scores of other House members were tabulated separately but from the same references, means were calculated without the inclusion of those marked NA, or otherwise indicated below.
