Hail Satan!

From Joe.My.God:

All of Teabagistan went into an uproar last night after a handful of pro-choice activists allegedly chanted "Hail Satan" as a group of anti-abortion activists sang Amazing Grace in the rotunda of the Texas Capitol.

(I'm sooo stealing 'Teabagistan'.)

He says he watched the video a couple of times and could only hear 'Hail Satan' once. Me too.



So once again demonstrating their absolute humourlessness and pathological thin-skinnedness, fetus fetishists are going nuts.

And now 'Hail Satan' is trending on Twitter.

A small assortment of samples. First, the non-humour-impaired.

"Hail Satan" is trending. Good for him! He's a hard-working guy who doesn't get enough credit.

— God (@TheTweetOfGod) July 3, 2013

#HailSatan Because the modern GOP isn't enough like The Crucible.

— LOLGOP (@LOLGOP) July 3, 2013

Now the frothing mad.

Vid: TX abortion backers chant "Hail, satan!" Photo: child holds vulgar sign http://t.co/HG0hXcq16b #stand4life #prochoiceviolence

— Jill Stanek (@JillStanek) July 3, 2013

And a representative from Faux News.

Abortion supporters chant 'Hail Satan' http://t.co/XcqrSekqu1 Catholic League says maybe it's time for a mass exorcism.

— toddstarnes (@toddstarnes) July 3, 2013

Yep. Time for a mass exorcism.

Of misogynist Vatican Talibanis and their enablers and allies.

ADDED: According to Joe.My.God. the smear was started by RAPEpublican representative Scott Sanford. Text of his tweets are there, but they've been deleted from his time-line. What ignorant cowards these dinosaurs are.

Some decent folks live in Texas but...

its reputation as an extreme right-wing, christian fundamentalist, patriarchal, xenophobic, misogynist, homophobic, violent hell-hole is mostly well-deserved.

When Louise (of _Thelma and Louise_) wanted to make a run for Mexico, she wanted to avoid Texas.  Except for the enlightened city of Austin and environs, that is the correct approach to this reactionary US state.

DJ! has many, many blogposts about the Texan political climate and its dominant anti-Choice practices.

This judgement was recently pronounced there:

On Christmas Eve 2009, Ezekiel Gilbert, 30, shot Lenora Ivie Frago, 23, in the neck. She was paralyzed; seven months later, she died due to complications from that injury. On June 6, 2013, Gilbert was acquitted of that crime. He was acquitted because he claims she accepted $150 for escort services but did not have sex with him, which means that he was just defending his property. This acquittal shows the dangerous use to which such common "self-defense" laws can be put.[...]

Gilbert claimed he believed that sex was included in the $150 fee he paid to Frago as an escort; thus, when Frago did not have sex with him, he considered her a thief. Gilbert was probably also concerned about his inability to recover the money, as it would have required admitting to attempting to solicit a prostitute. As such, his attorneys successfully argued, the Texas law permitted the murder.

Criminal prosecutors Matt Lovell and Jessica Schulze, on the other hand, disagreed. Even with the Texas law, they argued that Gilbert's behavior was not protected. The law, they said, only protects "law-abiding" citizens; it does not protect those attempting to force the commission of an illegal act, such as prostitution, as would have been required of Frago.

Obviously, prostitution is illegal in the majority of the United States, which means that these people — if Frago was a prostitute, as is claimed – were already committing a crime. Also, admittedly, punishing Gilbert will not bring back this poor young woman. However, those facts to not obviate the problems with a law that justifies murder by the supposed theft of $150.

There you have it. This is even more callous than "Stand Your Ground" laws, which, as Florida recently demonstrated, works exclusively for men and people of pallor.

Grand merci to @godelnoodle and @godammitkitty for the link.

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose ...

That means the more things change, the more it's the same old, same old.

In March last year, I wrote a response to George Zimmerman shooting and killing a black kid, claiming that it was self-defense and using the Stand-Your-Ground law in Florida as justification.

It was entitled Aileen Wuornos is My Homie. 

I wondered what would happen if women in the US started MASSIVELY using Zimmerman's pretext.  It's obvious that law is supported by the NRA lobby; they often exploit concerns about women's safety as a rationalization for demanding gun-owners rights be sacred, and blahblahblah Second Amendment.

Well, wouldn't you know it but some dickheads in the NRA and/or the RAPEublican Party decided to spin an awkwardly expressed opposition to gun-toting college students, then piled on the politician who uttered the words as if the first-term Democrat was worse than Todd Akin.

They created the #LiberalTips2AvoidRape meme for their twitter campaign; it unleashed thousands of RWNJ typically humour-challenged, tone-deaf tweets.

I looked at some of them, vaguely remembered my Stand-Your-Ground post and zipped this one off:

This of course, reminded me of a particular scene in the movie _Thelma and Louise_ which isn't available on YouTube, where Louise confronts the man who sexually assaulted Thelma.  She demands that he stop hurting her friend; he becomes quite aggressive and threatening.  She shoots him, and that's when Thelma and Louise become fugitives from justice.

So I sarcastically tweeted this:

If you remember men's reaction to that scene, most felt that Louise's action was over-the-top and unwarranted.

Anyhow, I'll check my twitter account in the morning to see if anyone has responded to my counter-spin.

Update: fernhill reminded me that the implicit Rules of Patriarchy demanded that Thelma and Louise die for their transgressions.  So, "Stand-Your-Ground" is okay if you're a gun-toting white man but not if you're a woman defending yourself against a violent spouse, a potential rapist or a stalker.

Religion-based hate crimes against women...

This happened.

The leader of a dissident Amish sect was sentenced on Friday to 15 years in prison for a series of bizarre beard- and hair-cutting attacks on other Ohio Amish that drew national attention.

Samuel Mullet Sr., 67, the leader, was sentenced in Federal District Court in Cleveland for coordinating assaults that prosecutors argued were motivated by religious intolerance. Fifteen of his followers, including six women, were given lesser sentences, ranging from one year and one day to seven years.

The breakaway Amish were convicted of multiple counts of conspiracy and hate crimes, which carry harsher punishment than simple assault.

Prosecutors had asked for a life sentence for Mr. Mullet. Defense lawyers claimed the government was blowing out of proportion personal vendettas that Mr. Mullet harbored against former followers and other critics, and thus did not deserve a long sentence.

[...]Judge Dan Aaron Polster told Mr. Mullet and his co-defendants that they were being punished for depriving victims of a constitutional right, religious freedom, whose fruits they enjoyed themselves as Amish through exemptions from jury service and other laws.

The trial of the 16 defendants, including three of Mr. Mullet’s sons, unveiled a tiny sect in thrall to its leader, who in the name of purity abolished Sunday church services and punished men for ogling non-Amish women by confining them to chicken coops. Testimony also detailed how Mr. Mullet pressured married female followers to have sex with him, including a daughter-in-law.

[...]In handing Mr. Mullet 15 years, Judge Polster said he oversaw his flock with “an iron hand” and that he was “a danger to the community.”

Could abortion criminalizers who justify their violent actions with their own twisted interpretations of religious text, be prosecuted for their hate crimes against women who choose to terminate a pregnancy, and their health care professionals who provide medical support?

Some of the more extreme antiChoice terrorists have been brought to justice, but those who incite them to such actions, remain at large.

What if the sustained campaign of threats and legal intimidation carried on by fundamentalist christian politicians as well as failed ones like Randall Terry were scrutinized under the laws that brought Mullet to trial?

I wonder if there's a district attorney anywhere in the US brave enough to go down that road?

Why does Alabama hate women?

Yesterday my co-blogger provided an overview of the abject anti-Choice situation in the US.

Today, there's news via state media and triumphallists at Lies-Site regarding a decision from the Alabama Supreme Court.

The Alabama Supreme Court ruled today that the state’s chemical endangerment of a child law also pertains to unborn children.

The law was intended to target situations in which children were exposed to conditions such as methamphetamine labs, but women also have been prosecuted for harming their children by using drugs during their pregnancies.

The court’s ruling upheld the convictions of two of those women, Hope Ankrom of Coffee County and Amanda Helaine Borden Kimbrough of Colbert County.

While the law itself makes no mention of unborn children, the court held in its decision that “the plain meaning of the word ‘child’ in the chemical endangerment statute includes unborn children.”

Alabama is one of the most chemically polluted regions in the US.  The rate of miscarriages and mutagenic birth defects is disgusting.  The poverty level, the lack of educational and employment opportunities as well as the shameful absence of adequate health services in that state, are shocking.

Funny how that goes. Hundreds of "unborn" are affected by the greedy, profitable corporations that malevolently poison the air, the ground and the water of Alabama yet the state chooses to criminalize and prosecute individual pregnant women.

Perhaps some enterprising folks should help women and families, who provide care to children with birth defects caused by environmental "chemical endangerment", to lawyer up for the purpose of litigating against corporations that have damaged fetal development in those gestated and born in Alabama.

If that were to start happening, you can bet that "christian" legislators aka wealthy businessmen & politicians, would tweak the application of their Supreme Court decision, to ensure that corporate entities be exempt from any form of accountability, fetal harm and endangerment be damned!

Note: I had considered posting photographs of infants and babies with mutagenic birth defects, à la SUZYALLCAPS for blunt force emotional manipulative effect; after perusing some Google images, I could not.

The RAPEublican Train Wreck

While all the paid pundits are huffing and puffing about what went right for Obama and wrong for Romney, I'd like to offer my humble opinion.

The RAPEublicans' social policy was idiotic and DOOMED.

Federally, and in many state houses, they've been waging a relentless War on Women, culminating in an astonishing attack on contraception.

Elsewhere, several of their Neanderthal candidates fatally flapped their yaps on rape and magic lady parts.

They doubled down on Teh Geys, just as support for equal marriage grew to be the majority view.

They ignored all demographics except angry white men -- among whom, admittedly, they did well -- characterizing the rest as 'takers, not makers'.

They continued -- or didn't refute -- the moronic Tea Bagger demonization of Democrats in general and Obama in Islamic-atheist-babykilling particular.

Romney himself lied and lied and lied. And when he wasn't lying, he wasn't forthcoming with any details -- or tax returns.

In short, the RAPEublicans wrote off or pissed off just about everybody but white men.

Deliberately.

(The Democrats weren't such geniuses themselves, but made some smart moves. This is a fascinating account of both campaigns and what they did and didn't get right.)

There's much hoo-hawing on the toobz today about shifting demographics, but there's one demographic that has not shifted. Women still make up just over half the population.

And they voted for Obama. The so-called gender gap was 18 per cent, up from 12 per cent in the 2008 election.

For me, the Republican campaign was the proverbial slow-motion train wreck. It couldn't succeed.

As far as I could see, they had only two aces in the hole: REALLY low voter turn-out and/or MASSIVE vote tampering.

As the WaPo story details, the Dems had a brilliant get-out-the-vote strategy and it worked a treat.

But despite that good work, I think some of the turn-out can be attributed to voters mortally offended at being dissed so thoroughly.

I think millions of Americans said to selves: 'OK, mutherfuckers, you don't want me and people like me to vote? I've got something to say about that.'

And they did.

Or as luna said last night:

Nobody can beat a coalition of Big Bird and big vagina.

— Luna (@Heading_West) November 7, 2012

Image source

US presidential election

The country to our immediate south has a different way of electing a federal government leader aka president for a 4-year term.

This Youtube hints at the complexity of their voting ballots.

Nonetheless, it would appear that, just as the Cons attempted to influence the voting outcome with the systematic targeting and suppression of non-CPC supporters, the RAPEublicans under the tutelage of Karl Rove are also using dirty tricks, such as giving people false information.  Robocalling is but one tactic.

Twice in the last few weeks, voters in Maricopa County, Arizona – Home of Sheriff Joe Arpaio – were sent notices by election officials telling them to vote on November 6 in English and November 8 in Spanish.

Ohio Secretary of State John Husted, who is doing everything in his power to avoid counting votes, apparently defied federal courts yet again on Friday when issued an order that could invalidate legal provisional ballots.

Steve Rosenfeld reports, “Democrats in Denver are worried that their top local election official—who is running for county commisioner as a Republican—is not planning to deploy enough voting machines to easily accommodate polling place voters on Tuesday, particularly in racially mixed areas where Democrats are expected to do well.”

Florida Governor Rick Scott has also been a leader in making it hard to vote, leading to scenes like this – described as a 9-hour wait in what is obviously not a GOP stronghold.

Some excellent overviews, here and here.

Old-school ballot-box fraud at its most egregious was localized and limited in scope. But new electronic voting systems allow insiders to rig elections on a statewide or even national scale. And whereas once you could catch the guilty parties in the act, and even dredge the ballot boxes out of the bayou, the virtual vote count can be manipulated in total secrecy. By means of proprietary, corporate-owned software, just one programmer could steal hundreds, thousands, potentially even millions of votes with the stroke of a key. It’s the electoral equivalent of a drone strike. [...]

Meanwhile, the new millennium, far from delivering a democratic promised land, presented Americans with the debacle of the 2000 presidential election, whose fate hung absurdly on “hanging chads”—the little pieces of punched-out ballot so contentiously examined during the monthlong recount. Few Americans knew (and many still do not know) that a faulty computer memory card triggered this fiasco. Late on Election Night, Al Gore’s total in Volusia County, Florida, suddenly dropped when one precinct reported 16,000 negative votes. Fox News was immediately prompted by Florida governor Jeb Bush to call the election for his brother. On his way to a 3 a.m. public concession, Gore changed course when a campaign staffer discovered that he was actually ahead in Volusia County by 13,000 votes.
 
But the damage was done. Gore was cast as a sore loser in a hostile media environment. His effort to obtain a recount was described by Sean Hannity on Fox News as an attempt to “steal the election.” Meanwhile, George W. Bush invoked his duty to get on with the business of running the country. The rest, as they say, is history.

My prediction for the outcome is predicated on the RAPEublicans' manifest bottomless proclivity to cheat, lie and steal, as well as their deep financial resources from billionaires like the Kochs who would rather fund Romney and other GOP candidates than pay taxes for the public infrastructures they use or remunerate their workers fairly.

A stale-mate.  

In poll after poll, county after county, voting results will be invalidated, then challenged by both parties as countless errors, deliberate misdirection, illegal procedures and outright fraud are exposed.

A clear *winner* will not be declared tonight. There may be days of acrimonious accusations and quite possibly, zealots like Tea Party Hatriots will lash out violently.  It will be ugly, and a perfect reflection of what US politics has become.

You Don't Own Me

Yes.  Sing it, women!

Funny.  I was thinking of this very song recently.  

Lesley Gore.  One of the original Riot Grrrlz in music.

And. Also this, too. via Sherry's tweet.


from Pat's tweet, merci!

World War on Women

Women's rights are in peril again -- now in the UK too.

The new Minister for Women, Maria Miller, who has the gall to call herself 'a very modern feminist', wants to lower the legal abortion limit from 24 to 20 weeks.

Prime Minister David Cameron and Home Secretary Theresa May also back a reduction to 20 weeks.

And now the new Minister of Health, Jeremy Hunt, is going even further. He wants to lower the limit to 12 weeks.

Note that this Minister of Health backs homeopathy, or as a science blogger put it, 'he believes in magic'.

And of course there, as here, women's rights are considered a frippery, subject to a free fucking vote.

And there, as here, women's rights are always open for negotiation. Abortion came up in the 2010 election, not long after a similar reduction in the time limit was voted down in 2008 but only because Labour's deputy leader, Harriet Harman, whipped her party members, demonstrating again why people call her Harriet Hardwoman.

To add insult to injury, 40 Days of Harassment has slithered across the pond. Abortion clinics are under siege from Christian nutters, who learned from their USian counterparts.

This is at least the second year the UK has been invaded by clinic harassers. Last year I started following someone calling herself @40daysoftreats, who countered the fetus fetishists' efforts by encouraging people to bring treats for clinic workers and patients. Insults outside, Jammie Dodgers inside.

Natch, the Brits are appalled. There, as here, sane people watch what's going in the USian War on Women in slack-jawed wonder, thinking: 'That can't possibly happen here'.

Oh yeah?

The UK rightly prides itself on its abortion law. It's been legal there since 1967, albeit with some conditions.

Conditions that sane people would like to see liberalized, not CONservatized.

Viz, the first comment here by Josh Kutchinsky.

UK law should be brought in line with that of Canada in relation to abortion, i.e. repealed so as to decriminalise abortion.

I am more pro-life than many who usurp the name but not the meaning. I would provide good sex and relationships education. I would provide support and counselling. I would provide contraceptives and knowledge as to how to use them properly. This is how to reduce all abortions not just control some in order to increase the number of back street ones or encourage self administered procedures. Numbers of foetuses aborted would be reduced, number of women dying reduced, number of unwanted, malnourished, sick and dying children reduced. Respect for women as autonomous human beings to be treated with dignity and equality and not patronised and infantalised would be much increased. That's really pro-life.

Yep. That's what I would call pro-life too.


ADDED: A call to arms from a British blogger, who warns that anti-choice will win if pro-choicers aren't prepared. A lesson we've learned well in Canada,eh?

Confronting Delusion

There's a brilliant opinion piece in Psychology Today that exposes and guts every single odious anti-Choice, so-called pro-life right-wing rhetoric and sexism perpetrated upon women.

Utilizing a philosophy, or rather a ruse, grounded in a fundamental religiosity and self-declared moral high ground, pro-lifers claim abortion is an affront to the sanctity of life. If one truly asserts for the sanctity of life, though, it needs to be without glaring exceptions, otherwise it smacks of hypocrisy.

Congressman Akin is hardly alone among rank-and-file Republicans. Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney’s Vice Presidential running mate, is a vociferous advocate for subjugating women’s rights. In October, Mr. Ryan cosponsored and voted in favor of the "Protect Life Act" act – an incredibly paradoxical name for a bill that would allow hospitals receiving federal funds to deny a woman an emergency abortion, even when one is needed to save her life. Ryan’s extreme views on women’s reproductive health don’t stop there: He is opposed to abortion in all cases, even for victims of rape and incest, and would ban the most common form of birth control.

These are provocative positions for a potential VP and beg a number of questions: Shouldn’t the health and life of a mother be equally cherished? If a mother with children is denied a life-saving abortion, her surviving progeny will be left motherless. What of their potential futures?

Moreover, does the veneration of life terminate once a fetus is born? Given conservative efforts to disband the EPA and their resistance to specific environmental safeguards that protect the life of a child – like limiting extremely harmful mercury emissions, among others[vii] – one must begin to wonder if this debate is even about human life. Do pro-lifers only cherish life prior to birth? Once the baby is born, does it become less precious? And why do conservatives consistently vote to degrade children’s wellbeing for the sake of profit? If it sounds all too bizarre, it is. What’s really going on here?

It's the US christian Sharia right-wing and fundamentalist assault on girls' and women's rights, aka the War on Women, which Con CPC MP Stephen Woodworth brought to Canada when he introduced M312.

Merci to atheist mommy for the link.

ReThuglicans in My Vagina

Republicans, Get In My Vagina! from Kate Beckinsale

... and the horse you rode into town, Texas antichoichers!

A federal judge on Monday temporarily blocked a new Texas rule that would have excluded Planned Parenthood clinics from offering women's health services for the poor in the state because the organization provides abortions.

The ruling by U.S. District Judge Lee Yeakel in favor of Planned Parenthood means thousands of women enrolled in the Texas Women's Health Program who go to its clinics will not be required to find new healthcare providers, at least for now.

"The court is particularly influenced by the potential for immediate loss of access to necessary medical services by several thousand Texas women," Yeakel said in a 24-page ruling.

The preliminary injunction is a big win for Planned Parenthood, which has been under siege in several states by abortion opponents. In the past year alone, states including Wisconsin, North Carolina, Tennessee and Indiana, in addition to Texas, have all moved to block Planned Parenthood from receiving taxpayer money.

From here.

The War on Women's Reproductive Rights continues in the US; this is one small victory.

A Stunning Achievement in Goalpost Shifting!

In arguing with conservatives, all of us sane people have encountered the 'moving the goalposts' schtick.

Elected misogynists in Arizona have achieved a magnificent feat in that department.

They've wrestled those goalposts into a Time Machine.

The new anti-abortion bill, dubbed the 'Life Begins at Menstruation Bill' and considered (so far) the most draconian in the land, has many dandy punishing, shaming, panty-sniffing elements, but this is breathtaking.

[The bill] sets the gestational age as beginning on the first day of a woman’s last period, rather than at fertilization. Which, in practice, means that a virgin can get pregnant and instead of barring abortions after 20 weeks as the law states, actually cuts the time to 18 weeks.

Who gives a shit what the facty-sciencey people have to say about gestational age?

Canadians may snicker at such shenanigans but looky here. On April 26th, we in Canada are going to be treated to a weighty debate on When the State Can Get Up Your Hoo-ha Life Begins.

Go to ARCC and take action.


Image source

Goal Dollies: As only one set is needed to move all your goal posts and by using dollies you can save thousands of pounds and at the same time do the job better.  The clever design allows goals to be moved sideways as well as backwards and forwards by a single person.

 

Humpty Dumpty Initiative in Canada

Personhood initiative in Oklahoma.

Who does this remind you of?

I asked Skerbitz what he thought of the “war on women” rhetoric that had lately taken root. He replied, perfectly on-message, “We believe our first and foremost duty is to protect the rights of all people, including the unborn, including unborn women.”

Born women, you’re on your own.

Oh yeah. Our own Personhood Promoter.

@AntoniaZ When we allow any law to say that some human beings are not human we endanger everyone's rights #TellAntiChoiceMPsEverything

— Stephen Woodworth (@WoodworthMP) March 14, 2012

We've gotta stop this in its tracks. We do NOT need a War on Women here.

Online petition approaching 2,000 signatures. Sign and pass on if you haven't yet.

Woodworth's Wank

While the jury deciding on a name for Stephen Woodworth's abortion debate gambit may still be out, I have decided what I'm going to call it: 'Woodworth's Wank'.

I suppose it could be called 'The Fetus Lobby's Wank' because they are all panting to join the circle, but hey, this is personal.

It's a wank because it serves no purpose other than the gratification of the participants.

It's a wank because -- if successful -- it will create a mess that others will have to deal with.

And it's a wank because it has nothing to do with Reality® (I know, I know, another one of those 'liberal' concepts).

And it is not just a 'discussion' as Woodworth the Wanker insists. It is the opening of The Wedge and look what that has wrought in the Excited States.

RESIST!
• Sign the petition opposing it.
• Check out the Facebook page.
• Send a letter to your MP.
• Include ARCC's counter arguments to aid your MP's thinking.

Canadian women have fought too hard and too long to go backwards.

The Giantess Has Awoken

It is very gratifying to see US women politicians pushing back against insane new abortion and contraception laws with satirical proposals of their own. See here and here.

But now the giantess has awoken and has taken to social media to vent her ire mockery.

Some are calling it #ProjectTMI and, like our Canadian #TellAntiChoiceMPsEverything, women are schooling CONmen about the yuckier bits of being female and/or asking sarcastic questions of 'expert' male politicians.

US women are using the hashtag #mybodyyourchoice, which I think is brilliant, playing off the old feminist slogan while playing into what CONmen believe is their Right.

As with any of these organic thingies, it's going off in all directions. Some are using governors' and legislators' Facebook pages to ask ingenuous questions like: 'When I have a period, it's red, not blue like on tv ads. Is something wrong with me?' (Actually, I think that one came from a Canadian contributing to #TellAntiChoiceMPs.) Stuff like that.

An off-shoot I really like is Government Free VJJ with the tag line:
'If we knit you a uterus, will you stay out of ours?'

It has knitting and crocheting instructions for items like the Snatchel, Womb (fave word of TheoCons), Felt Cervix, Happy Uterus, and the Knitted Vulva, with glow-in-the-dark clitoris 'so she's always easy to find'.






The site includes suggestions on what to do with the resulting art. They're working on arranging hand-delivery to congressional offices.

These measures are desperately needed as we are discovering just how hilariously sadly ignorant the men who want to regulate our lady parts are about said bits.

Rachel Maddow makes hay with the fact that ReThugs actually don't know what's in their anti-abortion legislation.

The War on Women is raging now in the US. Here in Canada it is just warming up with Stephen Woodworth's private member's motion yet to receive its first hour of House debate in April.

But it is certainly ON.

Our evul goal here at DJ! is to have made the subject so toxic, so risible, so ridiculous to even consider in the 21st century, that only the hardest of hardcore Fetus Fetishists will have the gall to rise in the House and pretend to seriously discuss it.

To end on a hopeful/wishful note: Do we in Canada have a female pol with ovaries enough to make and hold a sign like State Senator McIntyre? Any nominations?

Tit-for-Tat in the War on Sex

Mother Jones has a round-up of mocking legislation proposed by US women politicians and their allies to highlight the 'inherent sexism' of the War on Women.

A couple of bills recognize the personhood of eggs and sperm, creating 'egg persons' and 'sperm persons'.

Others propose mandated unnecessary procedures -- like rectal exams, patronizing educational videos, psychological exams, and my fave, an affidavit from a spouse confirming impotence -- for men wanting dick-stiffening drugs.

Others seek to restrict access to vasectomies except for men risking death or serious bodily harm, or to outlaw vasectomies altogether because they leave 'thousands of children . . . deprived of birth'.

I really like the ones requiring that men or the state bear the costs of children born to unwilling women.

Oklahoma: When a zygote-personhood bill came before the state Senate, Sen. Constance Johnson penned an amendment declaring that ejaculating anywhere outside a woman's vagina constitutes "an action against an unborn child." Bonus: Johnson also suggested that any man who impregnates a woman without her permission should pay a $25,000 fine, support the child until age 21, and get a vasectomy, "in the spirit of shared responsibility." In response to the same bill, state Sen. Jim Wilson proposed an amendment requiring the father of an unborn child to be financially responsible for its mother's health care, housing, transportation, and nourishment during pregnancy.

Texas: Contesting a bill mandating sonograms before abortions, Rep. Harold Dutton unsuccessfully offered three amendments in a row. The first would have required the state to pay the college tuition of children born to women who decide against an abortion after seeing a required ultrasound image. The second would have subsidized the children's health care costs until age 18. When that failed, he lowered the age to 6. That didn't fly, either.

You won't be surprised to learn that all these tit-for-tat bills or amendments have failed. But the rectal exam one failed by just two votes.

I'd love to see an avalanche of such legislation.

ADDED: Best one yet from Ohio. Eight humiliating steps men required to go through for Viagra scrip.

Okay, have you stopped laughing yet? I mean, can you imagine men subjecting themselves to a stress test every 90 days, let alone getting a paramour to put in writing that his junk’s busted?

The Ohio state legislature is controlled by Republicans. So, Turner’s bill most likely isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, if at all. Still, it’s brilliant in how it forces us to focus on the absurdity of many of the reproductive health measures littering the legislative landscape by zeroing in Ohio’s heartbeat bill. Asked yesterday by MSNBC's Chris Jansing if she were serious, Turner said she was.

Sauce for the Gander

Since the TeaBaggers took over so many state houses in the US, the Fetus Lobby has been revelling in an orgy of abortion restrictions.

Lately, though, female politicians have been pushing back. The birth control idiocy going on now seems to have revved things considerably.

We've reported on a few of them. Mostly, they are amendments to draconian legislation aimed at women's reproductive health. The push-back is aimed at men's health and sexuality.

One from Virginia would mandate a physical including rectal exam for men wanting prescriptions for limp-dick syndrome. File that one under 'unnecessary medical procedures intended to punish and humiliate'.

Another from Georgia asserts a state interest in men's reproduction and bans vasectomies.

House Minority Leader Stacey Abrams added, “The Republican attack on women’s reproductive rights is unconscionable. What is more deplorable is the hypocrisy of HB 954’s author. If we follow his logic, we believe it is the obligation of this General Assembly to assert an equally invasive state interest in the reproductive habits of men and substitute the will of the government over the will of adult men.”

Similarly, a female state senator in Oklahoma proposed an Every Sperm Is Sacred amendment.

any action in which a man ejaculates or otherwise deposits semen anywhere but in a woman's vagina shall be interpreted and construed as an action against an unborn child.

And there's more. In Florida, state senator Eleanor Sobel introduced EIGHT amendments to what opponents are calling an 'omnibus anti-choice bill'.

In that bill are requirements for abortion providers to undergo regular ethics training and for clinics to be wholly owned and operated by licensed doctors.

Sobel's amendments are rather pointed.

In response to the ethics training provision of the bill, Sobel introduced an amendment requiring that a “legislator who offers to vote or who votes on legislation relating to human reproduction must annually complete a minimum of 3 hours of continuing education related to ethics.”

Much like a measure recently introduced in Georgia in response to anti-abortion legislation, Sobel also offered an amendment that regulates vasectomies and treatment for erectile dysfunction.

According to her amendment:

A vasectomy or treatment for erectile dysfunction may not be performed except with the voluntary and informed consent of the patient, or in the case of a mental incompetent, the voluntary and informed written consent of his court-appointed guardian. Except in the case of a medical emergency, consent to a vasectomy or treatment for erectile dysfunction is voluntary and informed only if the physician orally, in person, informs the patient of the nature and risks of undergoing or not undergoing the proposed procedure or treatment which a reasonable patient would consider material to making a knowing and willful decision at least 24 hours before the vasectomy is performed or the treatment is provided.

Sobel also introduced an amendment that would require that CPCs [crisis pregnancy centres, aka Fake Clinics] be “wholly owned and operated by one or more physicians who received residency training in performing dilation-and-curettage and dilation-and evacuation procedures or by a professional corporation or limited liability company composed solely of one or more such physicians.”

She didn't even get to present all her amendments, which were characterized as 'designed to waste time' by a ReThug.

Um. No. They are designed to mock and ridicule.

Weirdly, Sobel thought she was entitled to speak not only because she is a duly elected state senator, but because:

Sobel pointed out to the committee that she had the right to say something as “the only woman in the committee.”

Wow. One woman. An improvement over this though.



ADDED: Great minds and ganders.

Contraception and the Culture War

Since Obama made his contraception rule 'adjustment' on Friday, there have been further developments.

The wannabe xian martyrs worked themselves into a righteous snit shrieking about 'war on religion', 'war on religious freedom', yadayada. Others called Obama a dictator. There were many raucous rounds of 'pregnancy isn't a disease, birth control isn't health care'. People flinging the word 'entitlement' around. Men -- presumably, some at least not 100% celibate or 100% gay -- were whining about fairness. And, of course, that old reliable saw 'Pay for your slutty sex yourselves, you slutty sluts!'

Our own Max Pointy couldn't resist. (Check the comments for a taste of the idiocy.)

In other words, the usual reaction to anything having to do with sex, women, and/or pregnancy and religion.

And then the Republicans fell into Obama's cunning trap. They doubled down in their opposition to accessible contraception.

Not only did they go there, they are now supporting an amendment that would allow women's employers to decide what kind of health care coverage they get.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is putting his weight behind Sen. Roy Blunt's amendment to the Affordable Care Act that would allow employers to deny coverage not just for contraception but for any treatment or any condition they claimed was contrary to their religious beliefs.

So, we go from a bunch of old guys in dresses, to a bunch of old guys in Washington, to one's own employer telling women what they can and can't do with their lady-parts.

Well-played, ReThugs! We now have you out in the open as anti-sex, anti-women, anti-healthcare, pro-employers' and -oldguysindresses' religious rights.

On a subject so uncontroversial even the political deadheads have woken up.

Like me, Andrew Sullivan is chortling.

As for politics, the Republican fusion with the Vatican is also, it seems to me, a terrible mistake for the party. Obama’s greatest skill is in getting his opponents to overreach and self-destruct. And this issue could not be more tailor-made to benefit the candidate with real potential pull with far-right-wing Catholics and evangelicals: Santorum. If the GOP really makes this issue central in the next month or so, Santorum (whose campaign claims to have raised $2.2 million in the two days following his victories last week) is by far the likeliest candidate to benefit. It could finally unite the Christian fundamentalist right behind him—especially since Romneycare contained exactly the same provisions on contraception that Obamacare did before last week’s compromise was announced. That’s right: Romneycare can now accurately be portrayed as falling to the left of Obamacare on the contraception issue. This could very well be the issue that finally galvanizes the religious right, especially in the South. Imagine how Santorum could use that on Super Tuesday. In fact, it could be the issue that wins him the nomination. And do you really think that would hurt Obama in the fall?

Um. I rather think not, Andrew.

And this morning, more fun stuff! Two of the five female Republican senators have broken with their party and announced that they are in favour of Obama's contraception rule.

Andrew thinks that this could be the end of the so-called culture wars. That may be waaay too much to hope for, but I think it's going to signal the end of the ReThuglican party in its current virulently misogynistic form.

Humpty Dumpty Initiative in Mississippi

The Humpty Dumpty Initiative is up for a vote next week.

A fledgling movement that seeks to add fuel to the national debate over abortion appears poised to score its first major victory Nov. 8 in Mississippi, where a constitutional amendment would declare that human life begins the moment an egg is fertilized.

The so-called personhood proposal—also known as Amendment 26—is backed by both Republican and Democratic leaders in the conservative state and has substantially outraised its opposition in funding. Mississippi is considered favorable ground because it is dominated by socially conservative Republicans, already has some of the U.S.'s strictest abortion laws, and has only one abortion clinic serving its population of 2.9 million.

The proposed amendment, one paragraph long, says any reference to a person in the state constitution will be defined as "every human being from the moment of fertilization, cloning or the functional equivalent thereof."

It is intended to challenge Roe v. Wade, but its immediate effects will be devastating. There are no exceptions for conception resulting from rape or incest. It would ban common sorts of contraception -- the morning after pill, IUD, even the pill itself. It would deny abortion to women with life-threatening illnesses. It would open the door to the criminalization of miscarriage. It would threaten in vitro fertilization. It would necessitate every state law that contains the word 'person' being reviewed and perhaps rewritten.

And so on.

Here's Frances Kissling, president of Catholics for Choice for 25 years, on the irony that it may be the great state of Mississippi that inflicts this travesty on its people.

Mississippi is perhaps the last state with any standing to extend personhood to fetuses. A fertilized egg in Mississippi, should it be born, has one of the worst prognoses for a dignified life in the United States. What will that fertilized egg, once it is born, discover about how Mississippi treats persons?

The state ranks last among all states in health and third for the highest rate of diabetes and high blood pressure . It has the lowest per capita personal income and an unemployment rate of 10.6 percent. It is the last in academic achievement. More than 1 out of 5 people live in poverty. The state is second in the nation in terms of the imprisonment ratio (749 prisoners per 100,000 people.) If you are black, your chances of dying at birth or shortly thereafter are pretty high: fourteen out of every 1000 black infants ( 6.8 for whites) born die in childbirth or the first year of their lives. Your mother is more likely to die delivering you than mothers in 44 other states. If fertilized eggs could be afraid, surely the thought of being born in Mississippi would be traumatizing.

And now meet the nutbars men behind Mississippi's initiative.





More on the 'Conceived in Rape' tour.

On November 8, keep your fingers crossed, because there are at least 30 other USian states crafting or considering this kind of virulently misogynist legislation.