Month: April 2010

Jesus, Save Me From Your Followers

~ susie ~ 7 Comments

You know, for most women, deciding to have an abortion is already a heart-rending decision. Nothing like a little official coercion in the picture to make it even worse!

The Oklahoma Senate passed five abortion bills Monday night, which opponents have said will severely limit a woman’s ability to get an abortion and would entail some of the strictest anti-abortion measures in the country.

One of the bills would force a woman to get an ultrasound at least one hour prior to an abortion and be shown the image and given a detailed explanation of it, even if she wishes otherwise. A vaginal probe would be used if it would provide a clearer image of the fetus, which no other state requires; three others do require ultrasounds, but none force the woman to listen to an explanation of it.

State Sen. Anthony Sykes (R-Moore), the bill’s sponsor, said the measure was designed to provide women with additional information before having an abortion.

Other pieces of legislation also require clinics that perform abortions to post signs stating it’s “against the law for anyone … to force you to have an abortion,” forbid state exchange program insurance from covering abortions and prevent wrongful life and wrongful birth lawsuits.

One last bill would require the woman to first answer a lengthy questionnaire and provide information such as her age, marital status, race, education and reason for seeking an abortion. The doctor would then report this information – without the patient’s name attached, however – which would be compiled and put on a state web site and accessible only by certain government personnel.

The bill’s sponsor has said this would provide valuable information on who seeks abortions and why, in addition to helping create programs aimed at preventing abortions. Opponents of the bill, however, argue that this represents an unconstitutional invasion of privacy.

Jordan Goldberg, state advocacy council for the Center of Reproductive Rights (CRR), says she does not consider it “appropriate to use medical appointments and doctor-patient relationship to do fact-finding research gathering project at the expense of patient privacy.”

A letter to Gov. Brad Henry (D-Oklahoma) issued by the CRR arguing unconstitutionality of the bill stated, “nothing in the Constitution or the case law allows states to require women to justify their constitutionally protected decision to terminate a pregnancy.”

Of course, we can’t even have a national registry of who owns firearms, because that would be an infringement of gun owners’ constitutional rights. But this is different: It’s only womenfolk, and they probably don’t own guns.

And as you know, he who owns the guns makes the rules.

Intersexed

~ susie ~ 9 Comments

This can’t be good:

More than 80% of the male bass fish in Washington’s major river are now exhibiting female traits such as egg production because of a “toxic stew” of pollutants, scientists and campaigners reported yesterday.

Intersex fish probably result from drugs, such as the contraceptive pill, and other chemicals being flushed into the water and have been found right across the US.

The Potomac Conservancy, which focuses on Washington DC’s river, called for new research to determine what was causing male smallmouth bass to carry immature eggs in their testes. “We have not been able to identify one particular chemical or one particular source,” said Vicki Blazer, a fish biologist with the US geological survey. “We are still trying to get a handle on what chemicals are important.”

But she said early evidence pointed to a mix of chemicals – commonly used at home as well as those used in large-scale farming operations – causing the deformities. The suspect chemicals mimic natural hormones and disrupt the endocrine system, with young fish being particularly susceptible.

The chemicals could include birth control pills and other drugs, toiletries especially those with fragrances, products such as tissues treated with antibacterial agents, or goods treated with flame retardants that find their way into waste water. However, Blazer also pointed to runoff from fertilisers and pesticides from agricultural areas.

About 5 million people live in the greater Washington area, and 90% of them get their drinking water from the Potomac.

There is evidence that the anomaly is not confined to the Potomac, one of the largest rivers on America’s Atlantic coast.

News You Can Use

~ susie ~ 3 Comments

Something we should all take note of:

SAN MATEO, Calif. — Two years into a merciless downward spiral, Antonio Moore was threatened with living on the street.

He had lost his $75,000-a-year job as a mortgage consultant, his three-bedroom house with a Jacuzzi, his Lexus sedan. He could no longer pay even the rent on his cramped studio apartment — not on his $10-an-hour part-time job as a fry cook at a fast food restaurant.

Faced with eviction, he was staring last month at the imminent prospect of joining the teeming ranks of the homeless. His last hope was a new $1.5 billion federal program aimed at preventing that fate.

Days after Mr. Moore applied, a check for $775 was on its way to his landlord, enabling him to stay — at least for now.

Much like the Great Depression, when millions of previously working people came to rely on a new social safety net for their sustenance, a swelling group of formerly middle-class Americans like Mr. Moore, 30, is seeking government aid for the first time. Without help, say economists, many are at risk of slipping permanently into poverty, even as economic conditions improve.

The question is whether the modern-day safety net has enough money and the right initiatives to aid those who need it most. The answer could shape whether a considerable slice of the American population will recover from the trauma of recent years, and how long that will take.

The plight of people like Mr. Moore has little to do with the complex, intertwined causes of homelessness of decades past, like substance abuse, mental illness and domestic violence. The current surge stems directly from the recession: Millions have lost their jobs or suffered a sharp drop in earnings. They have drained their savings, losing the ability to pay their rent.

“Nationally, homelessness has now reached crisis proportions not seen since the Great Depression,” says Maria Foscarinis, executive director of the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty.

The severity of the situation prompted the Obama administration to create the Homelessness Prevention and Rapid Re-Housing program within the $787 billion economic stimulus package. The program rests on the assumption that intervention is the best course because once people become homeless, the odds and costs of regaining their lives escalate sharply.

“This allows us to reorient a system that is focused on fixing a problem after it happens to preventing the problem,” said Shaun Donovan, the secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, which oversees the program. “This is the single most important thing the federal government has ever done on family homelessness. It’s a transformative tool.”

Buying A College

~ susie ~ 5 Comments

This is a very scary story.

Shimer College, the “Great Books College of Chicago,” has just foiled a hostile takeover attempt and fired its president.

The small liberal arts school has weathered numerous crises since its founding in 1853, including a near-bankruptcy in the 1970s that forced it to sell its original campus in northwestern Illinois. But it has never come as close to destruction as during the last few months, when newly hired president Thomas Lindsay packed the Board of Trustees with 14 additional members who had a different agenda in mind for the college. With the tacit support of his narrow majority on the augmented Board, Lindsay initiated an increasingly authoritarian administration, contemptuously challenging Shimer’s tradition of shared governance and intimating that faculty and staff who did not go along with his program would soon be obliged to seek employment elsewhere. Investigation by concerned students and alums revealed thefar-right background of all the new Board members and of Lindsay himself, as well as the fact that virtually all of them were closely tied to a very right-wing and very wealthy anonymous donor.

After months of discussions, debates and protests, the crisis developed into an open power struggle, giving rise to national coverage (including a particularly mendacious article in the Wall Street Journal) and uniting virtually everyone in the Shimer community — students, faculty, administration and alums. Hundreds of alums signed an online petition calling for Lindsay’s resignation and on April 18 the Shimer Assembly (a body comprising all students, faculty and administrative staff as equal voting members) passed a unanimous resolution of no confidence (with three abstentions).

This virtually unanimous opposition, combined with behind-the-scenes arguments and negotiations, succeeded in converting two crucial swing members of the Shimer Board, which at a secret meeting on April 19 voted 18-16 to fire Lindsay, effective immediately.

It is unusual enough for a college president to be fired, but it is almost unheard of for this to happen as the result of an open and democratic process involving the entire community. This process has demonstrated the dynamism of Shimer’s community, and delivered a modest but exemplary blow against ongoing right-wing attempts to corrupt or take over academic institutions. At the same time, it opens up an unknown future. Will the tiny school be able to continue to carry out its innovative program after having bluntly rejected the strings-attached support of the wealthy right-wing clique?