Being Pro-Life

Last week I read The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood for the first time.  It was published in 1985, and found itself suddenly on the best seller list after the election of Donald Trump.  In this dystopian future, corporate greed and science run amok have caused massive infertility.  Religious extremists have banned pornography and forced those women who are capable to breed for the higher class of women who are infertile.  Ironically, Mary McCarthy reviewed it in the Times in 1986 and found it "powerless to scare."  I imagine if I had read it in '85 it would have made me angry.  Now that I am older and have an adult daughter, in the era of Trump when every day results in another horrific attack on liberties, it made me enormously sad.

At the same time, I happened upon an essay by Gloria Steinem from 1980 entitled, "If Hitler Were Alive, Whose Side Would He Be On?"  Gains by women in the Weimar Republic, increased freedom to work and access to abortion, were immediately eradicated by Hitler.  In the U.S. in 1973,  Roe v. Wade produced an immediate backlash, with the first anti-abortion law, attacking the poor by denying Medicaid funding for abortion.  We have seen that the anti-abortion movement, which never goes away, becomes more fervent whenever women's rights grow.  During the Obama presidency, we saw gains in access to contraception along with victories in the fight for employment equality.  The Trump backlash, led by old white men like Lindsey Graham, grows in fervor as the women's rights movement has taken on renewed energy, and the #MeToo movement seeks to hold men responsible for sexual assault and harassment.

So here we are in 2018 with minorities and the poor being attacked by the federal government, from DACA to Muslim immigrants, to attempts to do away with the minimum wage.  And front and center are the legislative assaults on women's reproductive rights.  Right-wing states' rights advocates are pushing federal twenty-week abortion bans, falsely named "pain-capable."  Personhood bills are cropping up like kudzu, along with new and improved twisted bills like "dismemberment abortion ban," which would prohibit second trimester abortions.  Be horrified but don't be surprised to learn that Trump appointee Scott Lloyd proposed something called an "abortion reversal" in order to stop a teenage detainee from completing an abortion already in progress.

And conservative darling David Brooks weighed in last week, offering his unsolicited advice to Democrats, suggesting that we go along with the twenty-week abortion ban because it affects so few women and we could trade them for something else we wanted to get done, I assume something more important than those few women wrestling with the tragedy of fetal abnormalities.  

Under the heading, With Friends Like These...: Bernie Sanders campaigns for an anti-abortion candidate.  And in 2018, we in South Carolina have a Democratic candidate for governor who proposes registering pregnant women "so the state can track their offspring and offer services if their children are not thriving."  This in a state that refused Medicaid expansion and wants to enforce work rules for anyone seeking public assistance.  I shudder to imagine what "services" would be offered.

I have talked ad nauseum about the twenty-week abortion ban, and its basis in false science.  I have ranted about a movement that calls itself "pro-life" but opposes health care for all and gun regulation.  A movement that claims to be for the family but cheers on the separation and deportation of immigrants.

How did we EVER allow this movement to get away with calling itself "pro-life" anyway?  The evil wordsmiths of the right wing have created fabrications of language that would make George Orwell blush.  Paul Ryan's "American Health Care Act" was designed to take health care away from millions of Americans.  Whenever you hear a republican talk about "gun safety" you can bet they are going to get behind whatever jackass bill the NRA hands them, and that bill will allow (or require) more guns in public places, across state lines, on college campuses, in elementary schools.

And you can bet that they all call themselves "pro-life."

It is time to take back the label "pro-life."

I am pro-life.  I believe women and children -- and men for that matter -- should all have good health care.  We live in a country of great wealth, that few of us see.  Without leaving the Koch brothers homeless we could increase their taxes and provide health care for all.

I am pro-life.  I believe that guns and gun owners should be registered, that background checks should be required.  I believe that guns do not belong on the streets, and assault weapons do not belong anywhere outside of a licensed shooting range.  I believe that police officers as well as children playing in their front yards or attending school as well as someone drinking in a bar deserve the right to be safe from an unstable individual with a gun.

I am pro-life.  I believe that women have the right to decide how to care for their bodies, privately and with the advice of a licensed physician.  Period.  In a country where "a man's home is his castle" and George Zimmerman was allowed to "stand his ground" and shoot an unarmed teenager and collect his gun on the way out of the courtroom, you are NOT allowed to legislate a woman's contraception or pregnancy.  There is not an abortion epidemic; there is an epidemic of violence against women, and attacks on reproductive freedom are part of that assault.  There is nothing "Christian" about the "Christian right."  They more resemble the Taliban than Christianity.

I am pro-life.  I respect the right of women to choose to give birth.  I completely respect and admire women who choose to give birth despite fetal abnormalities, or other hardship.  It takes a strength I don't have, and nobody has the right to make that decision for the pregnant woman.  I do not respect those few who have said that they made a mistake by having an abortion, so they choose to prevent other women from making their mistake.  Likewise, if there is a God, she/he made it so that if you choose to have an abortion, you get to do it again when you're ready, so stop talking about all the babies we could have had in the world.  If I had not had an abortion in 1973, I would not have my two wonderful children today. 

There are a lot of different rationales for being anti-abortion.  Those billionaires who fund our right-wing legislators mostly don't really care about abortion; they mostly like the distraction it causes while they pillage and plunder workers and the environment.  Lindsey Graham knows it is a dog whistle that will keep his right-wing base from championing a more extreme primary opponent and keep the big donors happy.

Right-wing Christians entertain so many twisted rationales for their beliefs that it would be impossible to generalize.  Fact free and projected from their own needs and fears, you can find the Rapture Ready, those that believe pregnancy is God's punishment for sex, and those that believe that the fetus is a little tiny baby with an erection that can pleasure itself and feel pain and that is going to be cut up into pieces with full awareness during an abortion.  If that latter image horrifies you, that is exactly its intent.

The anti-abortion movement is mostly powered by those who will keep poor and minority women -- and girls -- from being able to determine their own lives.  This is why, despite all the moaning about killing babies, these same people oppose free contraception, accurate sexual and reproductive health education in the schools, and health clinics like Planned Parenthood that provide reproductive care apart from abortion.  It is the 21st century rendition of keeping them (us) barefoot and in the kitchen.

And this is not just about women.  Smart men know that preventing women from controlling their own reproductive lives can throw an entire family into turmoil.  Not able to work to their potential.  Inadequate time or finances for the rest of the family.  The stress of having to live with a pregnancy; the stress of knowing there are options out there, but you have been prohibited from taking them.

In America, we are prohibiting women from options that are available to the rest of the developed world.  In Canada, Justin Trudeau has recently reaffirmed his commitment to reproductive rights, despite conservative protest.  When we take part in the phony dialogue about when abortion is acceptable, we are agreeing that women are incapable of determining their own paths.

When I was young, Catholics were taking a lot of crap for their large families, and Prescott Bush worked to support Planned Parenthood; later, George H.W. Bush crusaded in Congress for family planning funding.  Back then, they knew that unwanted pregnancies were a drain on resources, but now we have a government that believes it is worth the waste to keep the poor struggling.  With government assistance cut down to bare bones, a poor woman won't get contraceptive care, and when she gets pregnant, can't get an abortion, so she -- and her child -- will spend their lives living hand to mouth.  They won't be able to hold a job much less keep their children well fed and healthy.

Pro-life?  Bullshit.  It is time to take it back.  Time to say:  I am pro-choice because I am pro-life.

It is time to stop drawing lines in the sand for pregnant women to struggle with.  It is none of your damned business.  Embryos and fetuses are not cute little miniature babies.  Viability is the false argument that began it all.  It doesn't matter if it is viable if it is inside a woman's body.  Late term abortions are rare and occur when there are severe fetal anomalies.  Only a woman should make that decision.  Using science or religion to create legislation to control a woman is unacceptable.  We are not incubators.

If you want to save lives, make gun safety laws, provide health care and good education, make sure the poor all have a roof over their heads.  Don't invent an epidemic that doesn't exist so that you can win elections.

For those of you who would like to learn more -- and I hope you do -- here are two excellent books:

Pro:  Reclaiming Abortion Rights by Katha Pollitt

Life's Work: A Moral Argument for Choice by Dr. Willie Parker

The Thing About Health Care

First of all, let me just say that “health care” and “health insurance” are two different things.  But somewhere along the way, we have started to call health insurance, health care.

I remember the days when a health insurance plan did not necessarily provide a person with health care.  There were abominable deductibles and co-pays, and lots and lots of health care that just wasn’t covered.  Remember that?  It wasn’t so long ago.

And then, to republicans’ great consternation, Obamacare required minimum standards that were actually standards and not rip-offs.  The complaint from the right-wing was not at all about quality of care, it was about… freedom of choice.  That’s right.  The government was telling you that you would no longer be allowed to buy a sub-standard health insurance plan.

Shortly after the ACA became a real thing, I heard a guy at the optometrist’s office complaining to the receptionist about his Obamacare.  “I do get more stuff covered,” he admitted, grudgingly.

But now the good old days are coming back.  We consumers will once again have freedom of choice, by which I mean freedom to choose health insurance that you can afford even if it doesn’t really provide adequate health care, and even the freedom to be uninsured.  "Boy howdy!" as Rachel Maddow would exclaim.

And then there is the current big debate among the majority lawmakers over tax credits.  What tax credits mean is that when you pay your taxes, you will get a credit for a certain amount to go towards payment for health insurance.  So, if your health insurance costs $3,000 a year, you would have to pay $3,000 less in taxes.  Sounds good, right?

But suppose your income is so low that you only owe $1,000 in taxes?  What happens to that other $2,000 of health insurance cost?  That, friend, is what our lawmakers are bickering about.  The less evil among them believe the government should pick up the other $2,000, while the Ted Cruzes and Paul Ryans -- we know who you are -- believe we should just go suck eggs.

Until the ACA came along, Medicaid covered low-income seniors, children and the disabled.  If you were an adult working, say, at McDonald's, and you were most likely not earning a living wage, you most likely couldn't afford health insurance and you did not qualify for Medicaid.  For much of the country, Obama's Medicaid expansion changed that, providing federal dollars to cover those whose earnings put them somewhere between a rock and a hard place.

Republicans saw the injustice in providing health insurance to the working poor, however, and got the Supremes to agree that governors could decide whether or not they would take the free money.  And some of those anti-tax governors just could not go along with taking tax dollars, especially if they weren't going to benefit big corporations.  Here in South Carolina, where Nikki Haley refused to accept the Medicaid expansion, that meant you qualified if you earned less than $12,000 a year, and had less than $7,300 in savings.  So I am thinking (and this whole thing is about as clear as earwax) that if you are a low-income worker in SC, the good news is you may be no worse off after Congress and Trump get done with health insurance.

Sadly, that will be true for a whole lot more Americans.  And for those of us whose income qualified them for health insurance through the ACA, tax credits will mean a lot more of us will be falling through the cracks.  The good news about this, though, is that those fools will probably also repeal the mandate, so if you can't afford health insurance, you won't get fined for not being able to buy it.

The republican congress did not show up much in the eight years of Obama's presidency.  Mostly they were there to block any proposals made by the president and congressional Democrats.  That meant filling their time with lots of votes to repeal Obamacare.  These days I have heard more than once that they are like the dog that caught the car.  And I am really proud to say that, beginning with the Woman's March on January 21, we have been a big part of their problem.

We have shown up at town halls, made phone calls, protested, marched, written letters to the editor, and pretty much kept legislators awake nights wondering how they can sneak this travesty by us while we are watching their every move.

Apparently, even the Americans who voted R have finally woken up to see that something they need badly is being snatched out of their hands.

There is a lot of crap flying these days.  We are trying to fight as much of it as we can.  There are bad things that will happen.  For awhile, corporations will be having a big party, overindulging and then throwing up all over our country.  The rich will get richer and the poor will get poorer, until those of us who have been buying the stuff that make the plutocrats fat can't afford it anymore.  It happened in 2008.

But this time we anticipated it, and we didn't just let it get reported in the news.  We took to the streets, and we are fighting it.  I don't know if the republicans are going to be able to turn health care into the tragedy it was before the ACA, or if they will just mangle it beyond recognition.  I do know that their decision will take them down.

And then we get to build it again.

The Orange-Haired Dog CAN Learn New Tricks

Kellyanne Conway, Trump's newest campaign manager, is indeed the woman behind the man.  She is shrewd.  She tells him what he needs to do in that soothing manner that women have when attempting to tame their abusive, raging partner.  You know, the manner that makes the beast want to change and feel flattered for his cleverness at the same time.

She does it well.  Listen to his recent speeches.  He is not only reading well-written speeches off the teleprompter, he is reading them flawlessly, more so than W. did in his day.  His message is no longer about rage, it is about what he can do for the American people.  You know, those folks who have been mistreated by Obama for eight years.

The Trump method of projecting his hate (back in the day, we used to say he's so good at projection you could run a film through him) seems to be working.  If Hillary calls him a bigot, he calls her a bigot.  I know, it seems simplistic, and it is, but for those who have been fed small doses of anti-Clinton rhetoric for decades, this is just what they are primed to hear.  The first few times I heard it, it made my head spin; now it is just more noise.  And that is what gives it power.

And here is something that I realized just today, an hour before I heard that the gap between Trump and Clinton continues to narrow.  It is the thing we have been missing, as Conway trains Trump to appeal to the more rational of his supporters.

I was scheduling my next appointment at my rheumatologist's office.  I don't even know the nice woman's name, but as she scheduled my appointment, we were commiserating about getting on Medicare, and the expense of the drug benefit plan.  She said to me, well, we may not have to worry about it depending on who gets into office in the next couple of months.

It took me aback, and not just because we have never had a political conversation of any sort.  The best I could respond was that it wasn't likely that Congress would want to spend any money to make drugs more affordable for us.  But with that small exchange, a light went on.

I have not been listening to the new Donald Trump, really.  And neither has the media.  But those long-time republicans out there have been listening carefully.  In the beginning it was the absurd message that getting rid of Mexicans would get us all better jobs.  But it has lately become a list of all the things Donald Trump will give us if we elect him (his newest theft from the Democrats is the line that he will even help those of us who don't vote for him).

The new Donald Trump isn't claiming he will make us millionaires like him.  But he is promising that he will give us good-paying jobs and take care of us in retirement.  He is going to protect the cops and the rest of us from criminals.  And he will make sure we all have good health care.

It doesn't matter a whit that he is not offering any kind of plan, financial or otherwise, as to how he is going to do that.  People are hearing what they want to hear.

So maybe Trump isn't going to build a wall or get rid of Muslims (nudge-nudge, wink-wink, the "deplorables" know he can't say it now, but he'll do it once he gets elected).  Maybe he is just going to be a reincarnation of Bernie Sanders, making sure we all have all kinds of security.

And TODAY Trump lays out his plan to give us all affordable childcare!  No matter that republicans have fought any kind of assistance for childcare whenever a Democrat has brought it up.  No matter that he has no idea how he will fund it.

No matter.  All those middle class republicans who have been feeling dealt a bad hand are hearing that help is on the way.  And Donald Trump is a businessman, and a millionaire, so he will know how to get it done.

This is what the Democrats need to tune in to, quickly.  When he is attacked by Hillary for his gang of deplorables, Kellyanne and her crew will twist it around quite satisfactorily so that it sounds like Hillary is the meanie.  And sure enough, Trump's speechwriter will have his candidate stand up to defend all those good Trump supporters.

Trump, the man of the people.  He thinks he is, and now he is convincing America.

I imagine that Hitler's speeches had that same ring of, "I will take care of you all."  And if you believe strongly enough, you can almost miss the sound of the jackboots.  

"Pain-Capable" Is Back and as Devious as Ever

Anti-abortion legislation is the bread-and-butter of the right wing.  Followers are rabid and loud.  My guess is it is a much smaller group than they seem, but they seem bigger because they just. won't. stop.  They show up at Planned Parenthood clinics, ACLU meetings, statehouses and Congress.

One might think that the right-wing, so concerned about governmental invasion of privacy in the Affordable Care Act, would be opposed to anti-abortion legislation that would control medical care and enforce it through invasion of privacy in those same medical records they have claimed to be protecting.  Or right-wingers that go ballistic (yeah, it's a pun but it's not that funny, is it?) over the suggestion of background checks much less registration of gun owners for fear they would invade the privacy of those who seek to wield deadly weapons would look askance at these bills.  Or how about those freedom-of-the-marketplace right-wingers who are now fighting to prevent private pharmaceutical and health insurance companies from offering birth control and abortion services?

These right-wingnuts are the same people who block attempts to feed the poor, including the pregnant and children, much less provide health care or adequate housing.  Life seems a little less precious to them when it comes to protecting it after birth.

Here in South Carolina, on Tuesday, an infant died.  Less than a month old, with a 17-year-old mother, who has been charged with murder and child felony abuse.  What social services might have prevented this tragedy?  And, what's worse, who among our lawmakers even cares?

So once again Congress and our own state legislators are force-feeding us the 20-week abortion ban, which, despite proven science, is misnamed the "pain-capable unborn child prevention act."  This is a win-win for these cruel and creepy lawmakers.  Whether the bill passes or not, they are allowed to act morally superior, get lots of publicity, and garner the support of the most vocal, persistent and vicious of us.

Neither new Senate leader Mitch McConnell nor our own Senator Tim Scott care about the suffering of the poor, the hungry children, the emotionally disturbed who are forced to bear children without a support system.  And here in South Carolina, during the holiday season, our own Wendy Nanney couldn't wait to introduce the 20-week abortion ban.  The national organizations are all over this, helping write the laws that allow others to invade the privacy and personal lives of women; they are there to corrode liberty in each state and nationally.

The thing is, we should also be all over this.  Not just because it seeks to impose government control over what should be women's private health care and reproductive decisions, although that is more than enough.  This bill speaks lies and deception from its very name.  First of all, "pain-capable" -- what the hell IS that?  Apparently, it means that a fetus is "capable" of feeling pain, if only...?  How about a fetus is capable of feeling pain if the mother does not get the proper nutrition?  Or a fetus is capable of feeling pain if a pregnant woman is not properly housed, or has to work in unsafe conditions, or has to breathe polluted air?

Actually, no, a fetus still is not capable of feeling pain under those conditions.  However, a pregnant woman is capable of feeling pain in those circumstances.  And if a pregnant woman brings her pregnancy to term, an actual baby is likely to feel pain with inadequate nutrition, health care, environment.  It seems that all those right wingnuts stop caring whether there is pain once a living being is actually capable of feeling it.

And actually, abortions at twenty weeks are very rare, and most often done in wanted pregnancies, when serious health problems arise.  To hear the wingnuts talk, you would think droves of women sit around pregnant for five months and then impulsively decide they'd rather not have that baby.  We need to yell bullshit to the false, deceptive presumptions that give these bills air each legislative season.

I for one get tired of fighting for the rights that women were guaranteed when we had a Supreme Court that considered individuals and not their own personal biases.  I hate to think about it, because there may well come a day when our daughters will be denied those rights, in fact, have been gradually losing them over the past decades.  But, you see, those on the other side love nothing better than that good old self-righteous fight.  If they lose, they lose nothing, and it feels good to bash others.  And if they win, they will be smug and smarmy about it for awhile, and then redraw that line so we have to fight them or lose another freedom.

So we need to be louder, and more persistent, and angrier than all those who are once again standing up to defend their right to take away a woman's freedom and privacy.

Getting Away with Lies

Yesterday, the Post & Courier had an opinion piece by Dave Schwartz.  You may not know him; he doesn't even have a wikipedia page.  But this is just the way his employer, David Koch, of the Americans for Prosperity, likes it.  Anonymity allowed him and his brother, the other Koch, to get away with years of control of our legislators, until investigative journalists like Rachel Maddow forced them out of the shadows.

So we have this new guy who comes into town and spreads lies about bad government and good corporations, bad taxes and good job creators, and then moves on.  He has been State Director for AFP in Maryland, then Virginia, and now South Carolina.

The opinion piece in the Post and Courier is an example of the dirtiest of dirty work, full of blatant and absurd lies, like calling the American Legislative Exchange Council "non-partisan."  He argues, predictably, that it is our high state taxes that is the cause of all our ills.  If only we had low taxes like Florida, Georgia and North Carolina, we would have -- that's right -- job growth and prosperity.  And he sites that other "non-partisan" group, the Civitas Institute, for research that states that SC has the highest tax rate and the "lowest take-home pay in the region."  The Civitas Institute, for those of you who aren't aware, is that North Carolina group of right wing-nuts who, despite Schwartz claim that they are non-partisan, describes themselves as "North Carolina's conservative voice."  A voice that is funded by Art Pope, who as NC budget director engineered the cutbacks that have devastated North Carolina in recent years.  He has just resigned; we might want to keep an eye on him to see where he will be going to spread his dysentery next.

Anyway, to get back to Dave Schwartz and the Post & Courier.  He has made claims in that piece that are totally fabricated, made to scare and anger readers.  We know he is disseminating lies.  We know that our governor bribes businesses to our state with tax giveaways, that our education system suffers as a result, that too many of our workers are not paid a living wage.  We know that the reason our economic growth in SC is lower than much of the rest of the country is that our yahoos in the legislature and our governor are wasting our resources working to cut services to the poor, deny voting rights to seniors and minorities, and ensure that workers are not allowed to fight for a living wage.  We also know that big corporations are favored over small businesses, and that because the wealthy who profit in our state are not made to contribute, our education, health care and infrastructure resembles that of a third world country, where the lines are clearly drawn between the rich and the poor, and those in the shrinking middle struggle every day to access the American dream.

We should not allow Dave Schwartz and other Koch and Pope minions to get away with disseminating lies without fear of contradiction.  When we see an article online, let's quickly comment.  Let's write letters to the editor pointing out the fallacies and distortions, and correcting the misinformation.  Let's not complain among ourselves, or ignore these outrages.  They will not go away.  They will invade and erode, so that truth becomes fiction.  They snuck into North Carolina like body snatchers and left its government wasted and its people devastated.

It is hard to believe that we have elections coming up in a few months.  Interest has been pretty lackadaisical, considering all we have at stake.  Our Democratic politicians and candidates aren't screaming loud enough, they aren't showing enough outrage.  Shouldn't one of those candidates be writing an Op Ed in the Post and Courier denouncing Dave Schwartz's ridiculous claims?

Somebody, anybody, everybody, please, speak out.  And let's start with the fact that he is misrepresenting who he is and what his organizations stand for. 

Our Nanny State

My husband has cancer, and so far chemo isn't helping.  I only bring that up because he has been dealing with pain for nearly two years.  Increasing doses of Oxycontin do nothing to alleviate the pain, only increase his dependence on Oxycontin.

He has been left, at age 76, to skulk around trying to find connections to procure weed in order to ease his pain.  And this pisses me off.  Our legislators, drinks in hand, are quick to point out that marijuana is too dangerous to allow us simple folk access.  Meanwhile, they whine about having to clean up the air we breathe and the water we drink, claiming that the polluters would suffer if forced to clean up our living space.

In defiance of the facts, we are encouraged -- encouraged -- to bring guns into bars, schools, pretty much anyplace except the state and US capitols that these idiots inhabit.  And because facts would prove the need for gun control, they pass laws preventing the collection of data about gun control.

On the other hand, they are concerned enough for our bad behavior that they allow cameras on every street corner and permit police to invade our houses in search of illegal poker games and, of course, medicinal marijuana.

Just as much psychotic legislating goes on regarding our health care:  laws that grant the government the right to monitor our decisions about our bodies, while denying health care to pregnant women and infants.  Death panels?  Not from Obamacare, but from our own legislators, the ones whose stated goal is to protect us from the evils of providing health care to all.

Here we are, listening to bullshit about freedom from the people who are attempting to limit our choices, curb our freedom to live in pursuit of life, liberty and as much freedom from pain as possible.  These are the people who are all too quick to make laws that deny us our rights while granting them to corporations.  Regulate the people, not the banks, or the pharmaceutical industry, or Monsanto, or the Kochs.

So why do they get elected?  In the beginning, this time around, in the 70's, our good lives had some setbacks, and the fearmongers turned us against ourselves.  They had been waiting for their moment, and it came, and so they preached the evils of unions, and regulation, and ungodliness.  And they found a teflon coated actor to lie to us, and the American people bought it.  Morning in America.

And as corporate America became more powerful, even those of us who knew they were wrong began to believe we could not win.  We stopped voting, we stopped fighting.  Our unions compromised themselves out of existence.  Our politicians leaned ever more to the right in order to not fall off the sinking ship.

You don't have to look too closely to see the hypocrisy.  On the one hand, control the individual, with the Patriot Act, with electronic spying, with laws that make our lives more dangerous and on the other hand pass laws that prohibit us from making decisions that would keep us safe.

Meanwhile, my husband would just like to be able to buy some grass so he can get a little rest from the pain.

Getting Slammed and Fighting Back

Here is the difference between Democrats and Republicans:  we Dems -- the ones who volunteer and vote -- are doing okay, but we know that there are others who are not.  We understand that we will all do better when we all do better.  We also empathize with those who are struggling.  We see ourselves in them.  Republicans, on the other hand, are focused on getting the most for themselves.  Capitalism, Christianity, even democracy are twisted to their own needs.

So when it comes to getting out the vote, when it comes to firing up the electorate, the republican party knows how to make it meaningful for their voters.  Even if they have to lie.

They make it about jobs, and don't mention that those jobs will underpay and offer no security.  Nikki Haley is running on all those jobs she brought into the state, but neglects to mention that our tax dollars paid for giveaways to those corporations so that they could pay less than they would elsewhere.

On the republican side, the mantra is to cut taxes.  Well, everything else is going up but our taxes, so it makes sense, doesn't it, that what we get for our tax dollars is going to be struggling schools, poor highways, inadequate medical care.  But with the millions of dollars that goes into campaigns, most voters only see the message that their candidate will provide jobs and cut government.  A simple good/bad message.

I just watched the documentary film, Koch Brothers Exposed, and although I have lately been working hard to take our state and country's downward spiral in stride, I have to admit that it brought me to tears.  The Koch brothers, having done their dirty work in attempting to segregate schools and controlling the universities and state government in North Carolina, have set their sights on South Carolina.  They now have three offices in the state, the newest one in Mount Pleasant.  They are of course, going to work to cut taxes, thereby making our government even more ineffective, and continuing the push to privatize education.

Our Supreme Court (and I use the word "our" quite loosely) has made it clear that money talks and the rest of us can just do what we are told.  Shovel money into banning women's reproductive freedom, and the Supremes are all for it.  While corporations have become people and as such have unfettered freedom of speech, as in the ability to buy candidates and elections, the rest of us have lost our own religious liberty, along with the right to the health care we are paying for, equal opportunity in education, and the right to vote.  All with the blessing of the evil Scalia and his right wing-nuts, bought and paid for by the Kochs.

More depressing even than that is that all nine justices voted to allow abusive demonstrators access to abortion clinics, as a freedom of speech issue, apparently not recognizing the irony that we the people can get nowhere near the justices themselves to engage in our own freedom of speech.

So it's been a tough time.  The greedy and powerful are able to control the uninformed and insecure.  We need to fight fire with fire.  We need more wealthy supporters who understand the cost of increased poverty, underemployment, poor education, poor health, low taxes and an unfair tax system.  We need politicians that understand that voters need to know exactly how this bad system affects them.  Sadly, those with health care have been led to believe it will cost them more if others are insured.  They need to see in black and white how much emergency care is costing them, and the jobs that come with health care expansion.  Most of us can't see how bad roads risk lives, but give them dollars and cents of how much wear and tear on their car will cost going over those potholes.  Compare the cost of increasing the prison population versus improving schools.

It saddens me that we have as a nation become so self-absorbed that we are unable to see that what affects one affects us all.  That insecure politicians can be bought so easily.  That the wealthy who now control our elections find it so easy to appeal to the lowest common denominator among us.

But the Koch brothers don't waste their time worrying about the way things should be.  They look at what we are, and they use it.  If we are made vulnerable by our fears and insecurities, then we need our progressive candidates to understand what we are afraid of and explain to us what they can do to help.

The Real Perverts

Some twenty years ago, I was with my family in New York City.  It was Christmas season, and we annually celebrated my daughter's December 2 birthday by going to the city for a play, dinner, and of course to see the holiday sights.  She was somewhere around five years old.

We were approaching the line to see the famous window displays at Lord & Taylor.  As we approached I saw there was a commotion; some yelling on the sidewalk at what looked to be a street vendor.  As I got closer my mouth fell open in horror.  It was a woman standing by a table with a huge poster depicting a woman in full hideous, heart-wrenching bondage.  As I attempted to get my small child away from this scene I did yell something to the effect that she should be ashamed of herself, which of course, was the kind of attention she was seeking.

The purpose of this display was to point out to the public the abuses of pornography.  I would have been fine with that intent and her first amendment right to such a protest.  But it was abhorrent that she chose to do this where children were passing.  To my mind, she was as much a part of the pornographic culture as what she claimed she was protesting, but in a more deceitful and emotionally disturbed way.

This is what I see happening with all the nation's focus on abortion.  It has nothing at all to do with protecting life.  There is in fact an inverse relationship of concern about life before birth to life after birth.  Those who most loudly support abortion bans are the least likely to want to care for the pregnant woman herself, much less the newly born infant.  Proof of this is the lack of support for health and nutrition programs, and our pathetic infant mortality rate, the shame of civilized nations.

If it is not about protecting life, what is the anti-abortion movement about?  For one thing, it is control.  It is forcing women who have unprotected sex to lose control over their bodies and their lives.  And the anti-contraception movement is about forcing women to not have protected sex, further losing control of their lives.

And the reason for the vehemence of the supporters of this cruel and ignorant cause has more to do with voyeurism and exhibitionism than just about anything else.  Imagine spending as much time obsessing about sex and a woman's body as our legislators have done.  It would be a diagnosable condition if the false moral imperatives were not celebrated as "Christian values."  The combination of the positive and negative attention that this crusade engenders is no less than thrilling to these self-appointed arbiters of a woman's morality.  And the ironic cherry atop this disgusting sundae (if you will...) is the legitimacy that it gives to the prurience of the crusader.

So, much as the woman who masqueraded her fascination for pornography as a protest, our anti-abortion protesters focus their lives, and their political campaigns, around matters of a woman's body.  Creepy?  You bet.  And isn't it time we saw these really dysfunctional people for what they are?
  

More About Bicyling and Pregnancy

Yesterday I wrote about the overreaching South Carolina Representative Wendy Nanney's idiotic bill which would require bicyclists and moped owners to get licensed and insured (with the exception of those expendables who are under 15), and her quick about-face after protestations by the cycling association.

It occurs to me that I may have sounded snarky (moi?!) in reference to bicyclists.  That was not at all my intent.  In fact, I believe that we need to make all our streets safe for cyclists.  Good for people, good for the environment.  I have driven too many times, half-awake, in the early morning, swerving to avoid a bicyclist at the last minute, not because they were not riding safely, but because of narrow roads where cars and bicyclers were forced to share too little space.

But the fact is, it is easier for those like Nanney to make laws fattening the pockets of industry, forcing new rules, paperwork and cost on her constituents, creating greater government bureaucracy, and with absolutely no contribution to insuring the safety and well-being of the public.  Easier than making sure that every new and repaved road has safe walking and bicycling lanes.

This is the way it is also for her fight against pregnant women.  Far easier, and apparently more satisfying, to make laws to force a woman to be pregnant than to ensure a better life for women.  The rate of teen pregnancies could be lowered by better education -- not just sex education, but an education that brings hope to teens for a good future.  Family planning, including contraception, would go a long way to provide families with financial and emotional security, so that wanted children will grow healthy.  Guaranteed health care and nutrition may eliminate the need for some of those twenty week abortions, and certainly reduce the rate of infant mortality -- a statistic of which Nanney should be embarrassed.

But, as the saying goes, when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.  And our representatives here in South Carolina, mostly see their job as making laws to make us do stuff that won't make our lives any better.  Getting a license to ride a bike on streets that aren't safe won't make cyclists any safer.  Making children and women get pregnant and stay that way rather than providing good education and health care is also the cheap way out.  And I mean cheap in the sense of quality as well as cost.

So my apologies to any cyclist that may have been offended yesterday.  It may not appear so at first glance, but you have a lot in common with those girls and women who have come under fire from our fierce and fanatical legislators.  And I will fight for your right to better roads if you will fight for a woman's right to reproductive health care.

    

Using Our Veterans

Tim Scott and Jim DeMint are like your grown-up children who take your money and ignore your advice; you don't hear from them all year and then send you a flowery birthday card telling you all the ways they love you.

It came as no surprise today to find emails from both proclaiming their devotion to our veterans.  I'll admit, I did not read them, because to be honest, whatever they say reeks of hypocrisy; the words never change, and it infuriates me.  So I'll spend my time sharing my thoughts with you rather than reading theirs.

These are two arrogant men who believe they have a special relationship with God.  They use their religion much the way they use our veterans.  Even Jesus had his differences with His Father, but DeMint and Scott have never had an opinion that God did not wholeheartedly endorse.

They both propound that they are fighting for "life" but resoundingly vote "no" to health care for all.  And they are against gun control of any kind; you have as much right to that assault rifle as to that 12-gauge you hunt deer with.

And they both hold two exceptions to how essential it is to reduce our debt.  The first is that no one with wealth should have to contribute a penny more than those without.  The second is that we should pay whatever the cost to arm ourselves.

Which brings me back to our soldiers.  These hypocrites have voted against jobs and training bills for veterans, health care bills for them and their families, help with housing.  They don't give a damn that soldiers who signed on have been sent over and over and over again, while their spouses have struggled alone to raise a family.  They speak of our need for military strength in terms of weapons, while ignoring a country fighting hunger, homelessness, poor education, inadequate health care.  That country, of course, being ours.

Yet they routinely send out the pretentious emails claiming their love of country and of the soldiers and veterans who have defended it.  And those who are fortunate enough to not have to endure the results of their cold-hearted congressional acts will wipe away tears and thank God for Jim DeMint and Tim Scott.

Back to Basics

The politicians agree that it's a "great country."  And the Supremes have told us that corporations are people.  I wonder if there continues to be a place for the actual humans who live here.

Because if we still have a place here, there are a few things we need.  In fact, things I always assumed I would have.

We need to be healthy.
We need to know that there will be food on the table and a roof over our heads.
We need to be productive, to do good work and be paid fairly for that work.

Each of us needs to know that our children will have those guarantees throughout their lives.

And we each need to be assured that our parents will have the same, the means to live their lives to the fullest, until the end.

But in this country, we struggle constantly to maintain those assurances.  And we struggle against those for whom capitalism is not just a way of living in this democracy, but the end itself.  When corporations have become people, we have become mere tools to a corporation and its profits.

And look at where it has taken us.

As the wealthy few own more and more of us and our country, our standard of living has sunk ever lower.  We of all civilized nations have determined that health care should be a commodity, in other words, for sale and not for certain.

Our system of education erodes as the rich attack the high cost of teaching our children.  Educating children, once thought of as a worthy investment in the future, has become one more item the corporation would like to snatch away, for a profit.

And sing praise to high productivity, which means corporations get more and more from each worker, who in turn is forced to concede wages, vacation, benefits.  Because it is no longer a source of pride that a corporation treat its workers fairly.  Somewhere along the Reagan years, we were all told that a corporation has no obligation to be moral; it's sole obligation is to increase profit.  And so it does.

So when the young man from Occupy Charleston said a year or so ago that it really is no longer about who wins the next election, he was right.

But this coming election does offer us a chance to change our path.  The choice is clear:  we can continue to allow corporations to profit from our lives, or we can demand that our lives be respected.  We can choose those who will be sure that our basic needs are not snatched from us by the powerful, for their profit.  And after that election, we must keep our eyes on that prize:  our liberty and our dignity.

Beware of the Falsely Sincere

Michele Bachmann's well-played personal disclosure regarding her miscarriage and her faith left me chilled to the bone.  Her sincerity is disarming.  She has become exceptional at modestly telling us what an upstanding, moral individual she is.


I find it appalling that she parades her Christianity about as though without it we are, all the rest of us, dirty.  Her morality tale of her miscarriage and her subsequent commitment to life is bullshit.


Let me share mine:


I was a rebellious teenager in a dysfunctional family.  I acted out sexually into my twenties.  I was irresponsible and careless.  I became pregnant.  Thankfully, our nation's leaders, its courts, were sane and responsible during that time, and abortion had become legal.  I did the right thing.


Hey, Michele, I did the right thing.  I had an abortion.  It was difficult, painful, but to have a child at that time would have been morally wrong.


Later, I had two wonderful children who are now adults.  I am thankful that I was able to wait until I had time to grow up.  I was not forced to pay, and make a child pay, and make my family pay, for my irresponsibility and immaturity.


Had I been forced to bear a child at that time, I would never have had the two wanted wonderful children that I later had.


And Michele, I too had a miscarriage.  It happened between the first and third wanted pregnancies, and it was heartbreaking.  But I was able to love my firstborn and be thankful for her, and I soon had a son that I loved with all my heart.


Unlike you, I had that experience without feeling the need to judge other women and condemn their choices.  That is what makes you a smaller person than me, although you have the wealth, power and persuasiveness to attempt to coerce people to follow your rules in their personal lives.  


And as the anger rises in me for your judgmental insincerity, I first of all want to say that neither your god or mine give you the right to decide what my morality should be.


Secondly, your fight to deny those with less than you financial security, good educations for our children, health care for us and our families, belies your pretense that you give a damn about children, born or "unborn".  Or, perhaps to reframe the thought, you only care about life until birth.


Shame on you.  Keep your pretend morality to yourself.

Blood from a Stone

Above:  Erskine Bowles having a good 

laugh over Alan Simpson's fake budget

cutting proposal.

So you thought you'd tightened the belt about as much as you could?  Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles beg to differ.

They are proposing cuts in Social Security and Medicare as well as Defense spending; while we're at it, let's "level the playing field" on taxation, so that even those who are holding on to their mortgage by a thread can forego the interest deduction that they count on.

In the middle of the craziness wherein the republic party is insisting we cut spending while not cutting taxes on their corporate cronies, these guys have tossed in the kitchen sink.  And they did it pretty much by sneaking in in the middle of the night and slipping it in the President's in-basket when he wasn't looking.

I am looking forward to the day that the Tea Baggers who gave the House back to their republic friends realize that the government is now seriously considering taking away their Medicare.

It should be an interesting time, if we are able to live through it.  There are people out there who have no idea what it is like to not be able to afford to send your children to the doctor, much less to college.  They don't get that without public transportation, some of us can't get to work, because we don't make enough to be able to afford a car with it's expensive accoutrements, like taxes, insurance, repairs, and don't forget, gas.  People that believe in Reagan's trickle down theory, because they are the tricklers, not the tricklees.  And we just put them in charge of our government, again.


If Reaganomics worked, we wouldn't have record foreclosures and more than 50 million Americans without health care.  If the Bush tax cuts worked, we would all have jobs and be earning a living wage.


The thing is, if you take away the safety net, as thin as it is, it is going to cost the government more to clean up the mess.


But the thing is, really, that this is about people.  People trying to work, trying to pay bills, trying to take care of their families, trying to make it to retirement age.


We aren't going to be ready to move forward until those who have the means contribute their fair share.  All those other cuts Alan Simpson, the tea baggers, and the republic party are proposing are trying to get blood from a stone.  It doesn't work.