Michigan goes AntiChoice crazy

Taking a page or 60 from Kansas, Michigan is pushing through a massive omnibus bill that dramatically limits abortion access and threatens to shut down all abortion clinics in the state. And Republicans can’t move fast enough on it.

The 60 page bill was introduced last week, but today lawmakers already held a hearing on it and plan on sending to the full House for a vote. According to Laura Bassett, almost 100 people showed up to testify against the bill, but Committee Chair Gail Haines (R-Waterford) abruptly ended the hearing and cut off all testimony after a Michigan Right to Life spokesperson and a few others in support of the bill testified.

Hunh. Typical antiChoice fetus lobbyist closes the debate after their side got to spew their disinformation. Taking notes, MP Woodworth?

The bill tries to essentially take every popular abortion restrictions working their way through state legislatures and put it into one big horrible law. The bill would criminalize all abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy, with no exceptions for rape victims, the health of the mother, or fatal fetal anomalies. It would require health centers that provide abortions to have surgery rooms, even if they do not perform surgical abortions. The bill would also require doctors to be present for medication abortions and to screen women for “coercion” before providing an abortion. It would ban “telemedicine” abortions and would create new regulations for the disposal of all fetal remains.

From here.

Our reader k'in reminds us that Michigan used to have a proChoice governor, Jennifer Granholm.

Is this what women in Canada will have to endure, if Woodworth's *Kinder, Küche, Kirche* M312 recriminalizes abortion?

When she was pregnant with her second child, Jenni Lane of Ann Arbor, MI, was given a routine ultrasound at 18 weeks. Jenni, her husband, and their young daughter were delighted to learn they would be adding a baby boy to their family. But later that night, a phone call brought devastating news: the fetus Jenni was carrying suffered from a severe brain malformation.

Over the course of the next few weeks, Jenni visited specialists and genetic counselors to learn more about her son’s condition. When she learned that he was unlikely to even survive full-term, Jenni made the painful decision to terminate her wanted pregnancy, a decision she understandably describes as “incredibly difficult, and so deeply sad.” By the time her termination was scheduled, Jenni’s pregnancy was in the 21st week.

If Michigan’s extreme anti-abortion legislation — HB 5711, 5712, and 5713 — becomes law, women like Jenni will no longer be permitted to make such a decision.

Harbingers of a Majority, Part 2

From Rachel Maddow, shock doctrine as played out at a Michigan highschool for at-risk girls.



To our ultra-partisan Canadian readers, you really think King Steve wouldn't do EXACTLY the same thing here? Really?

What's Disgusting?

Union Busting!

First Wisconsin where union-busting won -- for the moment. Now it's breaking out all over the US.

The Ohio Senate has passed a bill that takes Wisconsin union-busting one step further, Reuters reports. The bill prohibits collective bargaining for nearly 62,000 workers and blocks 300,000 others (including firefighters, police, and public school teachers) from striking or negotiating about health care benefits. In Indiana, House Democrats, taking a cue from Wisconsin legislators, have left the state to prevent a vote on a bill that limits collective bargaining rights. Idaho has approved a measure to limit public school teachers' right to bargain collectively. Michigan is on track to approve a law that would allow the state to break union contracts. And union dues or collective bargaining are also on the line in Iowa, New Hampshire, Kansas, Tennessee, Colorado, Nebraska, Nevada, Oklahoma, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Washington, Alaska, and Arizona.

And you probably won't hear a peep about it from the corporate media.

So, while other bloggers are on important stories about Japan, Libya, Bahrain, Yemen, and Canadian politics, I'm trying to follow events in the US. It's not easy, but now that the action has moved to Michigan, Michael Moore is helping a lot.

A couple of days ago, he published an open letter to his fellow Michiganders. It's titled: Do Something.

Friends and neighbors,

The call has gone out and I'm asking everyone who can to take Wednesday off and head to the State Capitol in Lansing to protest the cruel and downright frightening legislation currently being jammed down our throats.

What is most shocking to many is that the new governor, who ran against the Tea Party and defeated the right wing of his party in the primaries -- and then ran in the general election as "just a nerd from Ann Arbor" who was a moderate, not an ideologue -- has pulled off one of the biggest Jekyll and Hyde ruses I've ever seen in electoral politics.

Governor Snyder, once elected, yanked off his nice-guy mask to reveal that he is in fact a multi-millionaire hell-bent on destroying our state and turning it over to his buddies from Wall Street.

He lists what Snyder has done in the past eight weeks. Then calls for a rally today.

Yesterday, however, AARP, American Association of Retired People, bussed in about 1,000 seniors to protest at the state capitol.

Tuesday's rally organizers said Snyder wants to provide a $1.8 billion tax cut for businesses and make up the lost revenue at the expense of seniors, low-income workers and children. They don't like his idea to end a tax break for the working poor or to deeply cut services such as public education.

I mean, really, you do not piss off the wrinklies.

Last night, some people tried to occupy the building, but left peacefully when they were asked.

Today's rally has just begun. And of course the corporate media is lalalala-ing its ass off. But you can watch a shitty live feed here.

On Twitter, I'm following the hashtags #MIUnion #MadMI #MadNation and #1u (one union).

The speaker now just said: 'This is just one battle in a very long war.'

Yup. And it may get scary fast if it spreads further.

UPDATE: Oh dear. I didn't know they were going to do this. They are going to try to get into the building. Numbers range from 2,000 to 5,000. Speaker warning about provocateurs, telling people to take photos with their phones.

UPPERDATE: It's still going on. More and more people. They go outside and listen to speeches for a while. Then they come back into the building. Amazing energy.

It Has Arrived

'When fascism comes to America, it will come wrapped in the flag and waving a cross.'

And creating emergencies that have to be fixed by draconian measures.

Last night, ReThugs in Wisconsin and Michigan stole democracy. In what is a doubtlessly illegal move, the Wisconsin 'Budget Repair Bill' that guts union powers was stripped of spending issues -- though it wasn't really -- to make it passable without a quorum. In other words, passable despite the fact that all 14 Democratic Senators are out of state to prevent just this.

And then it was passed.

One Republican voted against it.

In the video posted by Buckdog you can hear protesters shouting 'Shame' in the background.

Remember that the unions had already made all the financial concessions called for in the bill. But they wouldn't agree to having their rights fucked with.

Scott Walker, elected governor by 52% of voters, kept saying that the the bill was all about the budget. The people kept saying it was all about union-busting.

Unions called for an emergency rally this morning. The #WIUnion twitter tag is rolling like mad but it's clear that protesters are at the Capitol again. Locked out. State troopers are guarding the doors and riot gear has arrived.

Just now, people are tweeting that cops are dragging out the protesters who managed to get into the assembly area.

You think that's bad?

Over in Michigan -- Michigan for chrissake -- there is practically no opposition to the ReThugs and looky what they passed yesterday.

A day after facing hundreds of rowdy, pro-union protesters that filled the state Capitol, the Senate voted on Wednesday to grant broad new powers to emergency managers who oversee financially struggling cities and schools, including the authority to void union contracts and remove elected officials.

Got that? Remove elected officials.

And just for extra ReThug frothy fun, there are also new taxes on the poor and elderly. And, of course, it strips unions of collective bargaining rights.

Michael Moore was on the Rachel Maddow Show last night.

Watch.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

This is how it starts, folks.

ADDED: Good summary from the Guardian.

More abortion laws! Lots more!

I can't keep up. The Merkin healthcare debate and its obsession with abortion has whipped up state legislatures all over the Excited States into frenzies of fetus fetishizing. Abortion! We need more laws on abortion!

And they're getting them. Lots more laws on abortion! Some of them quite nutty. (The people at RH Reality Check do a good job of keeping up with the fetus fetishizing lawmakers in the US.)

Where to start?

How about Georgia? You may remember that a billboard campaign there linked abortion to genocide. Yeah, yeah, you've heard that one before, but wait, the Georgia campaign specifically links abortion to black genocide.

Well, now they have a brand spanky new law enshrining that idiocy.

Last week, the Georgia Senate gave sanction to a bizarre, destructive and racially condescending conspiracy theory. By a 33-14 vote, it approved a bill that purports to outlaw the attempted genocide of black Americans through abortion.

Under the bill’s language, a health care provider could be convicted of a felony and sentenced to up to 10 years in prison for performing an abortion “with the intent to prevent an unborn child from being born based upon the race, color, or gender of the unborn child or the race or color of either parent of that unborn child.”

(snip)

Until approval of SB 529, the dumbest legislation to pass the House or Senate this year had been a bill to outlaw forced implantation of microchips in human beings, which also passed the Senate. However, while it may rival the genocide-by-abortion bill in terms of weirdness, the microchip bill was at least largely harmless.

The abortion bill, on the other hand, puts the state Senate on record as endorsing the claim that black Americans are being targeted for elimination by health care providers. That’s absurd and flat-out wrong.

In Nebraska, where you might recall they are trying to outlaw abortion because of the unfounded claim of fetal pain, they've come up with another doozy.

Before an abortion, women are to be screened for 'potential post-abortion problems'. Well, what's wrong with that, you wonder?

Because the 'problems' they are concerned with are claims that abortion drives women insane.

Greg Schleppenbach of the Nebraska Catholic Conference said the bill doesn't call for drastic changes and would simply put pre-abortion medical consultation in line with normal medical practices in which patients are advised of risks.

"We're just saying that that if the abortion industry acknowledges risk factors exist, isn't it reasonable to screen people for them?" Schleppenbach said.

An official with the New York-based Center for Reproductive Rights said there was no connection between psychological problems and abortions.

The measure is in fact a drastic shift in abortion policy, added Jordan Goldberg, state advocacy counsel for the center, and the real intent is to establish a "vague and unconstitutional barrier" to abortions by scaring doctors who might perform them. Goldberg, who tracks abortion laws across the country, said she'd never seen anything like the Nebraska bill.

"I think there's a serious chance it will make doctors wary of performing abortions because they just don't know if they're complying with the law," Goldberg said.

You wanna make women insane, say to them: 'Sorry, honey, I think having an abortion would drive you crazy, so, no, you won't be able to have one.'

Now, more mandatory ultrasound bullshit from Louisiana. What makes this one a little different is that it is being pushed by a Democratic woman.

Senate President Pro Tem Sharon Weston Broome, D-Baton Rouge, said the bill is designed to make a woman "think twice about having an abortion. This is such a serious decision that a woman makes, the process should be exhausted with all the medical information on the procedure" available, she said.

In the privacy-invadingest state in the union, Oklahoma, they're busy taking apart a previous anti-abortion bill that was deemed unconstitutional on the technicality that it dealt with more than one issue and turning it into four anti-abortion laws, including the privacy-invading part.

The information includes race, education level, miscarriages, induced abortions, method of abortion, reason for the abortion and method of payment.

While the woman's name would not be included, the info would be published. As critics point out, some counties in Oklahoma are so underpopulated, it would be a doddle for busy-bodies to figure out who the local slut is.

On to Missouri for another omnibus fetus fetishist bill, dealing with coerced abortion and another stunning bit of privacy invasion.

The bill would also require prosecutors to be informed when an individual under age 18 inquired about an abortion, whether or not the woman completes the procedure.

Ask a question about abortion and get reported??!!! (The specious 'reason' for this is that they want to identify cases of possible child sexual abuse.)

Barriers, lies, shame, intimidation -- all the usual weapons. It's been a grand few weeks in the Excited States for fetus fetishizers.

And a very bad time -- and future -- for American women.

But wait! There are some grown-ups down there. In Michigan, no less, Bart Stupak's state.

Legislation moving to the state Senate would require Michigan emergency rooms to provide emergency contraception to individuals who are sexual assaulted.

Four bills, originally part of a 15-bill initiative promoted by Planned Parenthood, passed the Michigan House last week and would extend access to contraception, said state Rep. Mark Meadows, D-East Lansing.

“These are reasonable and applicable methods and laws, which would help prevent unwanted pregnancies,” said Meadows, who sponsored a bill in the package that would require crisis pregnancy centers to tell patients they do not provide information about birth control or abortion.

The bills need to gain the support of the Republican-led Senate to become law.

Other bills that passed include a bill requiring the Michigan Department of Community Health to educate the public about emergency contraception and a bill requiring all school districts to teach “medically accurate sexual education.”

We shall see whether the state-level Stupaks get their knickers in knots and stop this too.

Martyr or Zealot?

The Flint Journal interviewed a man who knew one of the two men shot today in Owosso, Michigan. The anti-abortion one, not the other one, the gravel company owner, whose views on abortion are as yet unpublished.

In fact, the man interviewed had known the anti-abortion guy for most of his life and worked with him at the Buick plant in Flint. He saw him outside the school -- and WTF is up with protesting abortion at a highschool? -- twice this week and heard that he'd been there all week.

"He was the kind of guy, well, if you want to say he was kind of radical, to do the things he was doing, with the demeanor he had to display the fetus on this big, full-color signs, you had to be a little radical. He's been all over the state protesting. He was committed."

Decaire said he would talk to Pouillon "from time to time," generally about their days in the shop.

"But he always had his abortion sign with him. He was known as 'the sign guy'."

Over at LifeShite, the canonization has begun.

Occasionally, as he was doing this morning, Pouillon was known to stand near Owosso high school to discuss abortion with the students there.

Occasionally, eh? (And pssst, he probably didn't stand, since he used a wheelchair and much is being made elsewhere of his handicapped status.)

You gotta hand it to LifeShite, though. The story admits to a few warts on the guy.

Court records published by local news reports show that Pouillon has been cited on charges connected to his pro-life activities, mostly minor infringements related to property laws, many of which were dismissed. In 2000, Pouillon was found guilty for stalking - a charge Zastrow [friend and fellow anti-abortion protester] says was unjustly brought against the veteran pro-lifer.

Oh, and look who else weighs in. Operation Scumbag, one of the main enablers of Dr George Tiller's assassin.

Operation Rescue president Troy Newman told LSN that Pouillon, who participated in Operation Rescue, was a "dear friend" and "always an encourager."

All the usual suspects are lining up to play martyr. Hop over to JJ's to read about the fetus fetishists' 'news conference'.