Posts filed under ‘Repression’
“Bob’s For Jobs?”
This would be Virginia Governor Bob — let’s rape women with an ultrasound machine — McDonnell’s campaign slogan:
This is Not a Chicken
Wow. I love this graphic responding to the “personhood” amendment Republicans are introducing across the country. You know, the one that would make law the notion that a human being becomes a person the instant a sperm fertilizes an egg.
Bravo!
CNN Touts Tables Not Podiums as New Debate Strategy
Just got a tweet from Sam Feist at CNN touting a “sneak peek at the set for tomorrow’s AZ #CNNDebate. Note table not podiums.”
Tables not podiums? Really?
Who’s the moderator? Will CNN let the candidates lie, or not? That’s what matters.
Virginia Republicans Run Up Against Reality
When you live in the wingnut bubble, i.e., the only people you talk to are fellow wingnuts and the only radio and/or television you listen to or watch are fellow wingnuts, you run into problems when the things you do affect those who live outside of that bubble. And that, my friends, is what’s happening to the crazies in Virginia:
In the face of widespread criticism, Republican state lawmakers delayed a vote again today on a bill that would require women to undergo an [invasive] ultrasound before having an abortion.
SB484, sponsored by Sen. Jill Vogel, R-Fauquier County, was one of the targets of two protest rallies on the State Capital grounds that drew nearly 1,000 women on Monday. Republican efforts to restrict insurance coverage of contraception and abortion rights have been lampooned by commentators, including a skit on Saturday Night Live.
Some legislators suggested on Tuesday that they may attempt to soften [the invasive]ultrasound legislation. Two legislators — one a conservative Republican — speaking on the condition of anonymity, said one idea officials have discussed is making the [invasive] ultrasound optional rather than mandatory.
If you’re unfamiliar with the GOP sanctioned “small” government rape-with-what-amounts-to-a-dildo-bill, go here for more.
So, people in Virginia are pissed and Republicans are caught off guard. Gosh. Imagine that.
UPDATE: I just saw Kaye Korey (D), a Delegate to the Virginia House of Delegates (the name for their state legislature) on PoliticsNation on MSNBC. She said this is a blatant act of “moral arrogance” but that Republicans aren’t really backing down. She said they’re just waiting for the “media to focus on something else” before they sign this bill into law.
So, one guess as to what I’m going to do.
Bob McDonnell, Keep Your “Small Government” Hands Out of My Vagina
The party that claims to champion small government is at it again.
This month Republican majorities in both chambers in Virginia’s Legislature passed one of the strictest mandatory pre-abortion ultrasound bills in the nation — a measure that’s certain to require women seeking early-stage abortions to submit to being vaginally penetrated by a condom-covered electronic probe before the abortion is allowed to proceed.
The procedure is called a “transvaginal ultrasound,” and it’s the best and sometimes only way in the first stages of pregnancy for physicians to obtain images that “contain the dimensions of the fetus, and accurately portray the presence of external members and internal organs of the fetus,” as the bill requires.
Such ultrasounds are common medical procedures. But make no mistake. The proposed regulation, which Republican Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell previously indicated he will sign if, as expected, legislators send a final version to his desk next week, has nothing to do with the practice of medicine.
It’s designed to attempt to confront women seeking abortions with fetal images and the sounds of fetal heartbeats in hopes that they’ll change their minds about going through with the procedure. That’s why the law specifies that the ultrasound be performed “at least two hours before the performance of an abortion,” and that the results be offered to the woman before she signs off on going through with it.
Bob McDonnell is the Governor of Virgina and he’s expected to sign this legislation, meaning that if I lived in that state and I wanted an abortion, my doctor would be required to put this probe into my vagina:
Photo via: Allimaging.com
even if it wasn’t medically necessary. My doc wouldn’t have a choice, nor would I.
Men: How about if the government says if you want Viagra you get something stuck up your penis? No choice. It’s a done deal?
This is News? Really? REALLY?
If we didn’t click on headlines like this, “news” organizations wouldn’t publish them:
Geezus. Thoughts about the collapse of civilization come to mind.
Men Will Tell Women What to Do Tomorrow on the Sunday Talk Shows
After a week dominated by Republican men talking about eliminating women’s contraceptive rights, we’re headed into a talk “news” Sunday consisting of men — all of the scheduled guests are men — talking about ah, women’s contraceptive rights: Guest Lineups for the Sunday Talk Shows.
CAN YOU HEAR ME (SCREAMING) NOW?
Filed under: The”LiberalMedia?”
Women-Only Panel Testifies Before House Committee on Prostate Gland
Wrapping up the week, I’ve got to say I’m still ticked off about that contraceptive “hearing” Darrell Issa (R-Tool) held yesterday during which men — and only men — were allowed to testify:
I’m imagining what the men of America would think, say and write if a female House Democrat held a “hearing” on the issues men face with their prostate gland in front of a panel that looked like this:
Photo via: AnkaraScene.com
Ooo-yah.
They would be S-C-R-E-A-M-I-N-G.
Screaming About Birth Control — A Republican Staple for 60+ Years
Here is a fascinating article detailing the “long history of the war against contraception.” One of the big take-aways is that Republicans have been using contraception as a way to rally their base for more than 60 years.
It’s an indication of how few new ideas they have for what ail us now that they’re dredging up the same ol’ issues in 2012 that they used as far back as the 1960′s.
Too bad we’re so dumbed down that this isn’t common knowledge because it’s really pretty damn insulting.
About That Big Catholic Backlash Against Obama
Hey, what gives? We were told there would be a big Catholic backlash against President Obama over the contraceptive issue but oops, no esta aqui:
Via The New Republic
The big Catholic backlash against President Obama looks like a big nothing, at least for the moment. A new poll from Gallup shows that, among Catholic voters responding to survey, the president’s approval rating is 46 percent – down 3 percentage points from where it was last week, but not a statistically significant change given the size of the poll.
It’s possible Obama’s numbers among Catholics will deteriorate more next week. But given Obama’s decision Friday to tweak the policy and the support he’s now won among less conservative Catholic leaders, like Sister Carol Keehan of the Catholic Hospital Association, such deterioration seems unlikely. As Ed Kilgore says, “If [these] numbers are even remotely accurate, the effort to mobilize Catholics against Obama on this issue has simply failed.”
The real story here is about the approximately 430 American Catholic Bishops who were behind last week’s freak out and the extent to which they are out of touch with their parishioners.
Athens is Burning
People in Greece are reacting to economic cuts along the lines of what Republicans want to do here:
Photo: Louisa Gouliamaki/AFP/Getty Images
ATHENS, Greece (AP) — Greece’s parliament has approved an austerity and debt-relief bill, crucial for the country to avoid bankruptcy and remain in the eurozone.
Lawmakers voted early Monday in favor of the bill that imposes harsh new austerity measures in return for a euro130 billion ($171 billion) new bailout agreement and related deal with private creditors to shave euro100 billion ($132 billion) off the country’s national debt.
The vote occurred after extensive rioting and looting swept through the Greek capital.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is below.
ATHENS, Greece (AP) – Demonstrators set buildings ablaze and fireballs lit up the night sky in Greece’s capital on Sunday amid widespread rioting before a historic parliamentary vote on harsh austerity measures designed to prevent the country from going bankrupt.
The clashes erupted after more than 100,000 protesters marched to the parliament to rally against the drastic cuts, which will ax one in five civil service jobs and slash the minimum wage by more than a fifth.
At least 10 buildings were on fire, including a movie theater, bank and cafeteria, and looters smashed dozens of shops in the worst riot damage in years. Dozens of police officers and at least 37 protesters were injured, and more than 20 suspected rioters were detained.
See more photos here.
Remember When Catholic Bishops Were Thought of as Pedophiles?
This would be my Tweet of the Day, and I mean it in all seriousness: Notice how the media treated Catholic Bishops like saints this week?
Rick Berman, Millionaire Lobbyist, Gives We the People The Finger
Rick Berman gives us all a big freakin’ finger:
Big-time lobbyist Rick Berman creates nonprofit front groups to push corporate interests. Now he’s in an anti-union ad pretending to be an auto mechanic.
(Via.)
This is how brazen the corporatocracy is getting. They’re buying elections and they don’t care if we know it because we can’t do anything about it. They have the money and we don’t. Period. We’re on the outside looking in. Welcome to Campaign 2012!
(With special thanks to the activist Republican judges on the Supreme Court who brought us Citizens United.)
New Hampshire Republicans Hope to Eliminate Lunch Breaks
Photo: dylizi.blog.com
Do you think every single business can be trusted to give their workers a lunch break without it being mandated by law? You know, out of the goodness of their heart? Republicans in New Hampshire do: New Hampshire Republicans Propose Bill To Eliminate Workers’ Lunch Breaks.
Folks, if you think there are” too many government regulations” and that those regulations are strangling businesses, vote Republican, because this is what they mean when they say they want to undo those “job killing regulations.” They want to make it so businesses can do anything they want, including screw you out of a lunch break.
You think corporations run things now? Just wait.
About the U.N. Establishing a Global World Order
There are people out there who think programs that encourage bicycling are being orchestrated by the United Nations
Photo: Wikipedia
in an alleged secret long-term plan to establish a one-world government.
Pretty funny when we see that while citizens in Syria are being massacred by the hundreds by their own government, sadly, the 15 members of the United Nations Security Council can’t agree on what to do about it.
A U.N. Security Council effort to end the violence in Syria ended in acrimony and a veto by Russia and China on Saturday, hours after the Syrian military attacked the ravaged city of Homs in what opposition leaders described as the bloodiest government assault in the nearly 11-month-old uprising.
[...]
The Security Council voted, 13-2, in favor of a resolution backing an Arab League peace plan for Syria, which calls for Assad to cede power to his vice president and a unity government to lead Syria to democratic elections. But passage was blocked by Russia and China, which opposed what they saw as a violation of Syria’s sovereignty.
“ppl” Having Babies?
This would be my Tweet of the Day:
First of all Mr. King, “ppl” don’t have babies. Women. Have. Babies.
And about that supposed “dying civilization” due to “ppl” not having kids? Really? Tomorrow I’ll post some stats about how the planet is dying from overpopulation, not underpopulation. (I know, you and your crowd want to drown science in the bathtub and you think dumb is good. Hey, you’re a winner on both of those fronts!)
As for insurers? Don’t get me started.
Geezus.
New Logo for the Susan G. Komen Foundation
And here’s a heads up regarding a kickass post by a Kivi’s Nonprofit Communications Blog (Kivi is a PR consultant) about how the Komen Foundation essentially rebranded itself overnight on Tuesday. It went from what people thought of as an organization dedicated to women’s health, to what people now perceive as a right-wing political tool.
From the You-Can’t-Make-This-Shit-Up File
I come across so much mind-blowingly crazy stuff like this every day, my whole blog could be dedicated to it. I tend to shake my head and move on at most of it but sometimes I have to stop and scream. And I’m screaming now:
Alabama Republican Senator: Low teacher Pay Mandated by God
A Republican State Senator from Alabama claimed this week that keeping teacher salaries low is actually an order from the Christian deity figure, imparted in ancient texts written by Jewish tribesmen thousands of years ago.
Speaking at a prayer breakfast recently, Alabama state Senator Shadrack McGill praised giving pay raises to politicians, saying that it helps to prevent bribery. Then he shifted gears and went in the opposite direction with regards to teachers, arguing against a bill that would increase their salaries.
“Teachers need to make the money that they need to make,” he said, according to Alabama newspaper The Times-Journal. “There needs to be a balance there. If you double what you’re paying education, you know what’s going to happen? I’ve heard the comment many times, ‘Well, the quality of education’s going to go up.’ That’s never proven to happen, guys.
“It’s a Biblical principle. If you double a teacher’s pay scale, you’ll attract people who aren’t called to teach. To go and raise someone’s child for eight hours a day, or many people’s children for eight hours a day, requires a calling. It better be a calling in your life. I know I wouldn’t want to do it, OK?”
He continued: “And these teachers that are called to teach, regardless of the pay scale, they would teach. It’s just in them to do. It’s the ability that God give ‘em. And there are also some teachers, it wouldn’t matter how much you would pay them, they would still perform to the same capacity. “If you don’t keep that in balance, you’re going to attract people who are not called, who don’t need to be teaching our children. So, everything has a balance.”
Huzzah!
10, 15, 40 years ago, this wouldn’t have made the news. It would have been thought of as, literally, crazy; the rant of a religious nut.
Senators Call on Komen Foundation to Reverse Planned Parenthood Decision
I’m glad to see at least some Democrats making noise about the Komen Foundation’s hit job on Planned Parenthood. Maybe they learned something after having gone along with Republicans, like spineless sheep, in destroying ACORN.
Raising the stakes, the letter explicitly raises the possibility of “thousands” of women losing access to “potentially life-saving screenings because of a politically motivated attack.”
The pressure on the Susan G. Komen For The Cure Foundation to reverse its decision to cut funding to Planned Parenthood for breast cancer screenings for poor people — a decision which has caused an uproar among women’s groups and on social media — is about to get significantly more intense. Nearly two dozen Senators are set to enter the fray.
I’m told that some 22 Dem Senators have signed on to a very toughly worded letter urging Komen to reverse its decision, which Komen has justified by citing a new rule prohibiting it from funding any group under investigation by the government. (This has conferred legitimacy and signficance [sic] on the probe into Planned Parenthood that has been launched by anti-abortion GOP Rep. Cliff Stearns of Florida.)
More, including the letter, here.
House Republicans Protect Gas Industry, Arrest Director of Gasland at DC Hearing
This is horrifying. Welcome to police state USA folks:
In a stunning break with First Amendment policy on Capitol Hill, House Republicans directed Capitol Hill police to detain a highly regarded documentary crew that was attempting to film a Wednesday hearing on a controversial natural gas procurement practice. Republicans also denied the entrance of a credentialed ABC News news team that was attempting to film the event.
Josh Fox, director of the Academy Award-nominated documentary “Gasland” was taken into custody by Capitol Hill police this morning, along with his crew, after Republicans objected to their presence, according to Democratic sources present at the hearing.
[...]
“Gasland” received strong critical acclaim and takes a critical eye toward the practice of hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” a process in which several tons of highly pressurized water and chemicals are injected into the ground, allowing valuable natural gas to escape.
[...]
Fox had hoped to film Wednesday’s hearing for a follow-up to “Gasland.”
Fox did not have formal Capitol Hill credentials, but such formalities are rarely enforced against high-profile journalists. … The right to a free press is protected by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Documentary crews are almost never denied access to public meetings of elected government officials.
A separate ABC News crew, which did have official Capitol Hill credentials, was also denied access to the publichearing.
Republicans to all journalists and to America: Fuck the First Amendment. I mean seriously. This was a public hearing being held in the United States Capitol, a building owned by We the People, and the hearing was being conducted by people who We the People elected and who work for us! What the hell is going on around here?
If this isn’t a form of terrorism I don’t know what is.
Mitt Romney Campaigns For His Millionaire Donors
Who is Willard Mitt Romney campaigning for? You? Me? No. He’s campaigning for the folks who give to his SuperPAC, Restore Our Future, Inc.
Restore Our Future Inc.? A more appropriate name would be, Restore Rich People’s Future Inc.
Details here
The Susan G. Komen Foundation Joins Republican Effort to Destroy Planned Parenthood
The nation’s leading breast-cancer charity, Susan G. Komen for the Cure, is halting its partnerships with Planned Parenthood affiliates — creating a bitter rift, linked to the abortion debate, between two iconic organizations that have assisted millions of women.
The change will mean a cutoff of hundreds of thousands of dollars in grants, mainly for breast exams.
Planned Parenthood says the move results from Komen bowing to pressure from anti-abortion activists. Komen says the key reason is that Planned Parenthood is under investigation in Congress — a probe launched by a conservative Republican who was urged to act by anti-abortion groups.
So, conservative congressional Republicans launch a “probe” of Planned Parenthood and then they turn to the Komen Foundation and pressure it to withhold donations to Planned Parenthood because they’ve launched a “probe?” How deceitfully, viciously clever.
Are the Komen people that stupid? Don’t they get that Republicans want to destroy Planned Parenthood altogether because they want to impose their American Taliban-like beliefs on all of us; that they don’t want women to have the freedom to chose?
Cecile Richards, president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, has depicted Stearns’ probe as politically motivated and said she was dismayed that it had contributed to Komen’s decision to halt the grants to PPFA affiliates.
“It’s hard to understand how an organization with whom we share a mission of saving women’s lives could have bowed to this kind of bullying.”
Exactly.
And I say this to the Republicans conducting that “probe:” It takes two to get pregnant:
Remember When Voting Was Thought of as a Sacred Right?
Remember when Iraq held its first election after the U.S. invasion and all of us, including conservatives like Bill Bennett, held their breath hoping the elections would be “free and fair?”
Let’s see many Americans color their right index finger purple in solidarity for the people voting in free elections in Iraq. Americans should watch closely the voting in Iraq.
I think it will do us all good to see democracy in action.
We watched from a high and mighty place back then because after all, we were the United States of America, where everyone has a voice, everyone has a vote and voting is sacred and respected above almost all other rights.
Well, that was then, this is now. Since then, the people in Bill Bennett’s Republican party have pushed through extraordinarily repressive voting rights laws in several states and now the international community is focusing attention on one of our most deeply held rights and traditions:
A wave of restrictive laws passed in Republican-held state legislatures will mean that a disproportionate number of ethnic minorities, people with disabilities, the elderly and the young, will find voting difficult and in many cases impossible.
Among the legislation is a requisite that aspiring voters present a state-issued photo identification card to cast their ballot. That would affect around 21 million people who do not have the ID.
The apparent reason for the ID requirement is to prevent voter fraud, yet an extensive analysis by the US Justice Department.found that incidents of vote fraud are exceedingly rare and that the new laws would not solve the eligibility issues.
Some analysts say the restrictions would have a severe impact on the country’s presidential vote in November, favouring the Republican candidate.
Al Jazeera’s Rob Reynold travelled to the state of Wisconsin, where he spoke to one woman whose right to vote may have been stripped by the new restrictions.
(Via.)
Fundamental rights in the United States are under assault people. We are facing an emergency.
Newt Gingrich attended a rally in The Villages, Florida yesterday and he said something about how he isn’t going to stand around while President Obama presides over America’s decline. Time to look in the mirror Newt.
Global Warming — The Video
No wonder Republicans want to do away with government. It produces hippie, socialist videos like this that rely on hocus pocus, commonly referred to by pot smoking liberal tree huggers as “science:”
The global average surface temperature in 2011 was the ninth warmest since 1880.The finding sustains a trend that has seen the 21st century experience nine of the 10 warmest years in the modern meteorological record. NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in New York released an analysis of how temperatures around the globe in 2011 compared to the average global temperature from the mid-20th century. The comparison shows how Earth continues to experience higher temperatures than several decades ago. The average temperature around the globe in 2011 was 0.92 degrees F (0.51 C) higher than the mid-20th century baseline.
Poor, Suffering Chevron
This would be our Tweet of the Day:
Poor thing.
By the way, those subsidies come out of We the People’s pocket, as in Our Tax Dollars. We pay Chevron because, according to our screwed up tax code, it can make $51,00o every minute of every day of the year and still claim it needs our tax dollars to stay alive and be a “job creator.”
Mayor Who Mocked Latinos Gets Buried in Tacos
What an asshat. And yes, he’s a Republican:
East Haven, CT Mayor, Joseph Maturo, Jr. (R) /Jessica Hill, AP
The office of East Haven’s [CT] mayor was blasted with prank phone calls and a delivery of hundreds of tacos Thursday after his now-famous quip that he would address accusations of anti-Latino bias by eating tacos, a remark that left emotions raw in the town’s large Hispanic community.
Mayor Joseph Maturo Jr. has apologized several times but resisted calls for his resignation over remarks he made to a television reporter following Tuesday’s arrests of four town police officers, men described by one FBI official as “bullies with badges.”
[...]
A federal indictment accuses the four police officers of assaulting people while they were handcuffed, unlawfully searching Latino businesses, and harassing and intimidating people, including advocates, witnesses and other officers who tried to investigate or report misconduct or abuse.
The taco flap came after a reporter for New York’s WPIX-TV asked Maturo on Tuesday, “What are you doing for the Latino community today?”
Maturo’s response: “I might have tacos when I go home; I’m not quite sure yet.”
[...]
Many residents were still angry Thursday in East Haven, where 38-year-old Jose Tapia, a cook originally from Ecuador, joked, “We’ve got tacos!” as he left a bakery with a bag of bread.
“I took it as a joke, but deep inside, it’s the true version of racist, that comment,” he said.
Wow. Maturo is the ultimate in insensitive. He’s going to do something for the Latino community by eating a taco? I can’t decide whether to laugh or cry. I’m leaning toward cry. Unreal.
But hooray to the folks who sent all those tacos!
The United States Drops 27 Points in Freedom of the Press Index
Botswana, Namibia, Papua New Guinea and Niger are among the countries that rank higher in press freedoms than the United States in a new index released by Reporters Without Borders:
“Crackdown was the word of the year in 2011. Never has freedom of information been so closely associated with democracy. Never have journalists, through their reporting, vexed the enemies of freedom so much. Never have acts of censorship and physical attacks on journalists seemed so numerous. The equation is simple: the absence or suppression of civil liberties leads necessarily to the suppression of media freedom. Dictatorships fear and ban information, especially when it may undermine them.
[...]
“This year’s index finds the same group of countries at its head, countries such as Finland, Norway and Netherlands that respect basic freedoms. This serves as a reminder that media independence can only be maintained in strong democracies and that democracy needs media freedom.
[...]
Led by President Yoweri Museveni, Uganda (139th) launched an unprecedented crackdown on opposition movements and independent media after the elections in February. Similarly, Chile (80th) fell 47 places because of its many freedom of information violations, committed very often by the security forces during student protests. The United States (47th) also owed its fall of 27 places to the many arrests of journalist covering Occupy Wall Street protests.
Read more and see how other countries rank, here.
Time to hit the refresh button on what “they” tell us, that the United States is the worldwide beacon for freedom of the press.
