Breaking News Events

[Nat]

Originally Posted by Truly Scrumptious

I also know I can’t be the only one reading this thread who is a survivor, so I guess my question to the other survivors is, do you believe this can be called rape?

I don’t. I can see why some people do, I can see that it’s coercion, I can see that it’s force, but for some reason, the word just doesn’t sit well with me. Somehow (for me) it seems to diminish the word rape, somehow (for me) it takes away some of the horror, somehow (for me) it allows a tiny bit of minimalization, and (for me) that can never happen.

I have also had the displeasure of enduring 2 transvaginal ultrasounds. Were they pleasant? Not one bit. Were they necessary? Turns out they were. Would I want to have another one? I’d rather have a root canal. Would I have one if medically necessary? Yes.

I'm a survivor. I don't have an issue with the use of the word "rape" in this context. It seems to me that women are being very intentionally punished with vaginal penetration for seeking medical services.

http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/articl...-says-delegate

[Cin]

Originally Posted by Nat

I'm a survivor. I don't have an issue with the use of the word "rape" in this context. It seems to me that women are being very intentionally punished with vaginal penetration for seeking medical services.

http://www.rhrealitycheck.org/articl...-says-delegate

I do see this as state sanctioned, or perhaps more accurately state mandated rape. However, what concerns me most is that beyond transvaginal ultrasounds there is a plethora of laws and bills being passed and proposed whose sole purpose is to weaken and ultimately eradicate the reproductive rights of women.

To narrowly focus on this one bill is, to me, short sighted when the Supreme Court’s decision regarding Roe vs. Wade pretty much makes all the bills the various states have been passing regarding abortion unlawful.

The Supreme Court decision is very clear “FOR THE STAGE PRIOR TO APPROXIMATELY THE END OF THE FIRST TRIMESTER, THE ABORTION DECISION AND ITS EFFECTUATION MUST BE LEFT TO THE MEDICAL JUDGMENT OF THE PREGNANT WOMAN'S ATTENDING PHYSICIAN.” The state has no right to interfere in this at all, in any way, with the exception of making sure the physician is licensed in the particular state where the abortion is to take place. The decision of the woman's physician as to what is necessary is final.

Not until the second trimester is the state allowed to promote its interest but even then it is only in regards to the health of the mother. It is not until the third trimester that the state can promote its interest in the potentiality of human life. It seems to me these states who have passed laws placing restrictions on abortion in the first trimester are not operating within federal law. So I wonder why is this not the approach being taken?

[Cin]

Oklahoma moves toward making an embryo a legal person.

Considering the overwhelming rejection of the "personhood" concept -- that a fertilized embryo is a full person under the law -- by the voting public of several states, including Colorado (twice) and even Mississippi, you'd think the extremists behind this movement would finally see it as futile. But some speculate that their end-game is to get such an abortion ban passed so that it ends up being challenged legally, and thus challenging Roe, which would stand on shaky legs given the makeup the Supreme Court.

Now they've found a potentially far more successful way to get these measures made into law: find states with extremist GOP legislatures, and let them pass there. Case in point: Oklahoma, where a personhood bill may become state law very soon after passing both legislative chambers.

Reuters reported on Thursday, February 16:
The Republican-controlled state Senate voted 34-8 to pass the "Personhood Act" which defines the word person under state law to include unborn children from the moment of conception.

The measure now goes to the state House where pro-life Republicans outnumber Democrats by more than a 2-1 margin.

Oklahoma's Republican Governor Mary Fallin, who signed every anti-abortion bill sent to her last year, did not issue a reaction...

The consequences of passing "personhood" are obviously manifold, which explains: by defining "conception" as the start of personhood, such measures threaten the legal standing of everything from in vitro fertilization to the morning-after pill to miscarriages to many kinds of birth control -- and this particular bill has no rape or incest exceptions.

In a less legal sense, it pathologizes women who struggle with fertility (are their bodies murderers?), and contrary to its name, makes them into less than full persons. If this bill gets signed into law, it will be the first genuine personhood law that goes into effect.


Iowa considers a bill making abortion a felony punishable by 10 years in jail.

During the first wave of the "war on women" in 2011, Iowa banned most abortions after 20 weeks. But now a new bill is up to vote thanks to one of the most extreme members of that state's elected Tea Party officials, and it's one of the most draconian yet -- a full-on ban that scrubs out all references to abortion in Iowa law and sends everyone involved in providing abortions off to jail.
The bill:
would eliminate all mentions in Iowa law to allowing abortions, such as references to parental notification when pregnant teens seek abortions and in regard to health insurance coverage.

The bill would amend the code to make feticide -- performing or causing an abortion -- a Class A felony at any time during a pregnancy, not only after the second trimester. A Class A felony is punishable by up to 10 years and fine of no more than $10,000.

Kansas considers letting doctors lie to patients seeking abortions.

The entire year for reproductive rights in Kansas has been extremely rough. Last summer, the state came perilously close to shutting down the three remaining abortion providers in the state; a move that would have effectively banned abortion in Kansas, even though abortion is legal in the United States. The proposed law would have required abortion providers to conform to ridiculous standards for things like room temperature and the size of janitorial closets (not a joke).

Those plans may have been thwarted, but now state lawmakers are considering several new pieces of anti-abortion legislation that are even broader and more nefarious. Planned Parenthood of Kansas spokesperson Sarah Gillooly called one of the bills "the largest and most sweeping overhaul we've seen to date," which is saying something in Kansas. Worse yet, most lawmakers only learned of that bill's existence six days before the legislation went up for debate last week, giving the impression that Republicans were trying to ram the legislation through.

Supported by anti-choice groups like Kansans for Life and Republican lawmakers including Rep. Lance Kinzer, the recent legislation includes a dizzying array of abortion restrictions. Among them, via the HuffingtonPost and the Kansas City Star:

· Women would be required to undergo a sonogram and listen to the fetal heartbeat before receiving an abortion.

· Physicians would be exempted from malpractice lawsuits if they withheld information that could prevent an abortion. In other words, a physician could choose not to tell a woman something important about her own health if the doctor thought the woman might seek an abortion because of that information. If the woman then suffered health problems, she would have no legal recourse. (Though it is little consolation, her family could still sue the doctor if she died.)

· Abortion providers would be required to inform women of a link between abortion and breast cancer and reproductive health problems -- links that have been widely discredited over many years by the medical establishment.

· Providers would be required to inform women that fetuses can feel pain at 20 weeks, another widely discredited myth anti-choicers have been propagating for years.

· Physicians would no longer be eligible for tax credits and exemptions for abortion-related insurance, drugs and expenses.

· Groups that perform abortions would be banned from providing sexual education materials for teenagers in schools.

The above examples make it clear that the GOP is continuing to throw anti-women measures against the wall to see what sticks -- and thus attempting a piecemeal chiseling away of women's bodily autonomy. The result is that even if the more extreme provisions go by the wayside, women's rights continue to be siphoned off. Even more insidiously, what we have is an attack from all sides with a very clear aim, which Melissa Harris-Perry described chillingly last year:

Women who can't control their fertility will be unable to compete for degrees or jobs with their male counterparts. Likewise, without affordable childcare women would be less likely to work outside the home. And without basic rights to organize, women teachers, nurses and other public sector workers would be compelled to accept lower wages and harsher working conditions, shoving many women out of the workforce altogether.

In other words, this isn't just a war on women's bodies, but on women's participation in the public sphere.

Full Story Here

[Cin]

Instead of Being Disgusted by Poverty, We are Disgusted by Poor People Themselves
Empathy has crashed. No more cruel to be kind. We must simply be cruel.
by Suzanne Moore

She is there whenever I go the shops. Every time I think she can't get any more skeletal, she manages it. Wild eyes staring in different directions, she must have been pretty once. I try not to look, for she is often aggressive. Sometimes, though, she is in my face and asking me to go into the shop, from which she has been banned, to buy her something. A scratchcard. She feels lucky. "Maybe some food?" I suggest pointlessly, but food is not what she craves. Food is not crack. Or luck. She has already lost every lottery going.

An addict is the author of their own misfortune. Her poverty is self-inflicted. All these hopeless people: where do they all come from? It is, of course, possible never to really see them, as their distress is so distressing. Who needs it? Poverty, we are often told, is not "actual", because people have TVs. This gradual erosion of empathy is the triumph of an economic climate in which everyone, addicted or not, is personally responsible for their own lack of achievement. Poor people are not simply people like us, but with less money: they are an entirely different species. Their poverty is a personal failing. They have let themselves go. This now applies not just to individuals but to entire countries. Look at the Greeks! What were they thinking with their pensions and minimum wage? That they were like us? Out of the flames, they are now told to rise, phoenix–like, by a rich political elite. Perhaps they can grow money on trees?

Meanwhile, in the US, as this week's shocking Panorama showed, people are living in tents or underground in drains. These ugly people, with ulcers, hernias and bad teeth, are the flipside of the American dream. Trees twist through abandoned civic buildings and factories, while the Republican candidates, an ID parade of Grecian 2000 suspects, bang on about tax cuts for the 1% who own a fifth of America's wealth. To see the Grapes of Wrath recast among post-apocalyptic cityscapes is scary. Huge cognitive dissonance is required to cheerlead for the rich while 47 million citizens live in conditions close to those in the developing world.

This contradiction is also one of the few things we in the UK are good at producing. I heard a radio interview recently with a depressed young man with three A-levels (yes, in properly Govian subjects) who had been unemployed for three years. The response of listeners was that he was lazy and should try harder. Samuel Beckett's "fail better" comes to mind. Understanding what three years of unemployment does to a young person does not produce a job, any more than the scratchcard will change a crackhead's life. But pure condemnation is divisive. This fear and loathing of those at the bottom is deeply disturbing.

Three years ago I was on a panel with Vince Cable at The Convention of Modern Liberty, when Cable was still reckoned a seer for predicting the recession. He said then that the financial crisis would mean civil liberties would be trampled on. But what stuck in my mind was a sentence he mumbled about the pre-conditions for fascism arising. Scaremongering? The emotional pre-condition is absolutely this punitive attitude to the weak and poor.

Our disgust at the poor is tempered only by our sentimentality about children. They are innocent. We feel charitable. Not enough, perhaps, as a Save the Children report tells us that one in four children in developing countries are too malnourished to grow properly. Still, malnourishment isn't starvation, just as anyone who has a mobile phone isn't properly hard-up. Difficult to stomach maybe, but isn't all this the fault of the countries they live in?

At what point, though, can we no longer avoid the poor, our own and the global poor? Or, indeed, avoid the concept that frightens the left as much as the right: redistribution, of wealth, resources, labor, working hours. Whither the left? Busy pretending that there is a way round this, a lot of the time.

The idea that ultimately the poor must help themselves as social mobility grinds to a halt is illogical; it is based on a faith for which there is scant evidence. Yet it is the one thing that has genuinely "trickled down" from the wealthy, so that many people without much themselves continue to despise those who are on a lower rung.

The answer to poverty, you see, lies with the poor themselves, be they drain-dwellers, Greeks, disabled people, or unemployed youth. We will give them bailouts, maybe charity, and lectures on becoming more entrepreneurial. The economy of empathy has crashed, and this putsch is insidious and individualized. No more cruel to be kind. We must be simply cruel.

The argument that there is enough to go round is now a fairytale, like winning the lottery. Poverty is not a sign of collective failure but individual immorality. The psychic coup of neo-liberal thinking is just this: instead of being disgusted by poverty, we are disgusted by poor people themselves. This disgust is a growth industry. We lay this moral bankruptcy at the feet of the poor as we tell ourselves we are better than that.
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/02/16-3

[Kobi]

BOISE, Idaho—Republican lawmakers in a handful of states are opening another front in the war against President Obama's health care overhaul, seizing on the hot-button issue of birth control with bills that would allow insurance companies to ignore new federal rules requiring them to cover contraception.

Measures introduced recently in Idaho, Missouri and Arizona would go beyond religious nonprofits and expand exemptions to secular insurers or businesses that object to covering contraception, abortion and sterilization.

"In its present state, the health care bill is an affront to my religious freedoms," said Idaho Republican Rep. Carlos Bilbao, who is sponsoring the bill.

The ACLU counters, saying such bills discriminate against women.

"Each time more entities are allowed to deny contraceptive coverage, the religious beliefs of some are imposed on others, and gender equality is undermined," said Monica Hopkins, the ACLU's Idaho director.

The bills echo a separate proposal in Congress sponsored by Missouri Republican Sen. Roy Blunt, allowing insurance plans to opt out of the requirement on contraception coverage if they have moral objections.

The measures are a direct challenge to a recent Obama administration decision that seeks to guarantee employees of religion-affiliated institutions reproductive health coverage, which includes contraception.

The controversy erupted nationally this year when the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and other religious groups protested a new Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act rule that required church-affiliated universities, hospitals and nonprofits to include birth control without co-pays or premiums in their insurance plans.

Their opposition led Obama to modify the rule with changes that shift the burden from religious organizations to insurance companies, a solution that did little to satisfy the opposition and led to the statehouse challenges.

The bills, proposed by Republican lawmakers in conservative states, stand fair chances of passing.

As the issue shifts battlefields from Washington, D.C., to state capitols, it offers conservative lawmakers an opportunity to make it more difficult to obtain contraceptives they oppose on moral grounds.

Also, it provides another opportunity for opponents of "Obamacare" to renew the fight they see as a test of states' rights.

Idaho was the first state to pass a law requiring its attorney general to sue over the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Arizona also joined the 27-state constitutional challenge that's pending in the U.S. Supreme Court.

In Missouri, some Republican officials have filed a lawsuit separately.

Americans "confront unprecedented government threats to their religious freedom, in particular from the federal government's newly enacted mandates relating to health insurance," said Gary McCaleb, a lawyer from the Alliance Defense Fund, an Arizona-based Christian nonprofit.

Planned Parenthood opposes the measures, arguing that they seek to meddle in essential women's health care that's helped reduce infant and maternal mortality.

"We're going to work to make sure women have access to this benefit no matter where they work," said Rachel Sussman, a Planned Parenthood senior policy analyst. "Only a few states are moving forward with this, and we think they're going to soon find out it's bad politics ... and it's bad health care."

Sussman said it's too early to say whether her group would file a legal challenge to these measures, should they pass, because they conflict with a federal law.

Ron Johnson, executive director of Catholic Charities Conference in Arizona, said at a hearing recently that passing the state law would give Arizona standing to sue the federal government over the regulation.

But constitutional scholar David Gray Adler, who directs the University of Idaho's McClure Center for Public Policy Research, says that should the measures pass, states will likely struggle to assert their laws over the federal rule.

"If the federal program provides that women can have access to contraceptives through insurance programs, states will be required to uphold the federal law. That's the implication of the supremacy clause -- federal laws trump state laws."

The U.S. Justice Department could sue to block the laws should they pass, he said. "Historically, the federal government has gone to court to compel states to follow federal law."

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/wa...est+news------

[Cin]

Truthout's editor and columnist William Rivers Pitt's letter to his mother on her birthday. It's too long to post the whole thing but here is a tiny excerpt I found particularly well said. It is newsworthy in that it he covers a lot of things that are happening in the news and provides lots of links so I figured it would fit here. I really think it is worth a read.

To My Mother
I know you pride yourself on being up on current events - it must be in the genes - but I wanted to make sure you are fully up to speed on what The Bastards have been up to lately, because they have been busy in a way I have never actually seen before in my life. Every part of what has been happening in American politics of late is entirely familiar, the stuff of old nightmares, but I have never experienced such a barrage of unrestrained hatred, filth and nonsense to compare with this. It's as if The Bastards took 100 years worth of anti-woman sentiment, condensed it into a dense nugget of hate-crack, and hit the pipe. Hard.

[Truly Scrumptious]

Congress passed the Violence Against Women Act in 1994, and it’s been reauthorized without a hitch twice since then. Now that it’s up for reauthorization again, however, Senate Republicans have suddenly decided to use it as part of an anti-gay and anti-immigrant crusade. Every single Republican member of the Senate Judiciary Committee voted against reauthorization, with Ranking Member Chuck Grassley (R-IA) taking the lead against the bill:

The objections, led by Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) and a few conservative organizations, are not over the VAWA as a whole, but over a few new provisions in the reauthorization — specifically, protections for LGBT individuals, undocumented immigrants who are victims of domestic abuse and the authority of Native American tribes to prosecute crimes.

Story here:

Grassley holds domestic violence victims hostage

[Kobi]

Originally Posted by Miss Tick

I do see this as state sanctioned, or perhaps more accurately state mandated rape. However, what concerns me most is that beyond transvaginal ultrasounds there is a plethora of laws and bills being passed and proposed whose sole purpose is to weaken and ultimately eradicate the reproductive rights of women.

To narrowly focus on this one bill is, to me, short sighted when the Supreme Court’s decision regarding Roe vs. Wade pretty much makes all the bills the various states have been passing regarding abortion unlawful.

The Supreme Court decision is very clear “FOR THE STAGE PRIOR TO APPROXIMATELY THE END OF THE FIRST TRIMESTER, THE ABORTION DECISION AND ITS EFFECTUATION MUST BE LEFT TO THE MEDICAL JUDGMENT OF THE PREGNANT WOMAN'S ATTENDING PHYSICIAN.” The state has no right to interfere in this at all, in any way, with the exception of making sure the physician is licensed in the particular state where the abortion is to take place. The decision of the woman's physician as to what is necessary is final.

Not until the second trimester is the state allowed to promote its interest but even then it is only in regards to the health of the mother. It is not until the third trimester that the state can promote its interest in the potentiality of human life. It seems to me these states who have passed laws placing restrictions on abortion in the first trimester are not operating within federal law. So I wonder why is this not the approach being taken?

So I wonder why is this not the approach being taken?


Excellent question! I presume there are many different answers and a collaboration of perspectives is needed to sought the entire thing out.

My thinking based on what I am seeing is this is occuring because the GOP, especially the tea party folk, have changed strategies. And, the strategy is so simple, it is fucking brilliant and very scary.

What the GOP appears to have done is multifold. They have:

1. They have the coagulated power on the state level to push a moral agenda. We elected them. We elected a lot of them. They now have the power to push their agenda. The power was tested, the power is holding, the power is forging ahead.

What is simpler than to become the majority that makes the rules?

2. Learned to not attack the top of a ladder but to start at the bottom rung and work their way up i.e. cant attack Roe vs Wade but they can push the issue making the abortion process more burdensome on a state level.

3. They have added states rights vs federal rights into their moral agenda. And they are forging ahead, I think, to force the issue for a showdown with a President they consider to be beatable and a Congress that is sympathetic to their cause.

4. They are taking a very sexist path by focusing on issues essential to women. Why would you do that? Well lets see....if you think women are weak and stupid thus an easy target, it's a reason to go that route. If you think women have gotten to big for the common good, you might want to take that route. If you think women were made to be barefoot and pregnant and need to be shown the way back to where they belong, this is a good way to do it. If you think your rights and privileges as a man have been unfairly compromised, makes sense to go after those you believe have wronged you.

5. There is, to me, an inherent, implicit, racism thing going on as well between a POC president and a white GOP. Exploring it could take pages. I think it suffices to say, white privilege is rearing its head in a different way.

What is essential is to look at not only what is happening but in what context did it happen.

1.We had an unhappy country burdened with debt and an economic meltdown of historic proportions. People were hurting and angry.

2. People wanted "change". Understandable. Problem is, we didnt define the type of "change" we wanted. We just wanted something different that would restore all we had lost. Kind of, be careful what you ask for cuz you just might get it. We definately have change but not necessarily what people were envisioning.

3. We elected the first POC and the Tea Party got their foot in the door at a time of great upheavel in this country. Again, this could go on for pages.

I am sure there are many more things that were and are going on that are just not coming to mind. The point is, this didnt happen in a vacuum. Circumstances were such that this power struggle was easily created. It is also an election year. It is reasonable to expect the power struggle to escalate. There is a lot at risk for all sides. And, voters are notorious unpredictable and unaware of what is going on around them.

Just to touch on the Virginia law being conceived as stated mandated rape. I understand your rationale. At a different point in time, I might even have seen it similarly. Nowadays, I try to see things from more than one perspective so I dont get locked into a certain mind set. So, let me ask you this:

Appearing on the FBI website, the new definition of rape says: “Penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.”

So, if we are saying the requirement of a transvaginal ultrasound prior to an abortion is state mandated rape, arent we also saying the ultrasound tech performing the test is a rapist? Are you comfortable with saying someone just doing the requirements of their job is a rapist?

[Cin]

Originally Posted by Kobi

So, if we are saying the requirement of a transvaginal ultrasound prior to an abortion is state mandated rape, arent we also saying the ultrasound tech performing the test is a rapist? Are you comfortable with saying someone just doing the requirements of their job is a rapist?

No, I am not comfortable saying the techs performing the requirements of their job are rapists. I'm just not comfortable saying that. They perform transvaginal ultrasounds all the time. IT is not rape. In my opinion the rape falls squarely on the shoulders of the politicians passing these laws, as well as the state mandating this procedure be done for no medical reason. So to me those are the people responsible for rape.

However, I am saying that it is not a requirement of the tech's job to perform these ultrasounds. It's not the tech's or the physician's job to follow any other laws put into play by various states regarding first trimester abortions. I am saying by law it cannot be a requirement of their job. I am saying that it is against federal law. I am saying that at some point you take responsibility for the orders you follow.
This is the law of the land-

“FOR THE STAGE PRIOR TO APPROXIMATELY THE END OF THE FIRST TRIMESTER, THE ABORTION DECISION AND ITS EFFECTUATION MUST BE LEFT TO THE MEDICAL JUDGMENT OF THE PREGNANT WOMAN'S ATTENDING PHYSICIAN.”

No other law is valid. People have to stand up and do the right thing. I think the moral choice is clear. However, I don't think anyone will agonize over this. I might be wrong, but it seems that physicians and techs are just falling in line and complying with whatever the state mandates. And when it comes to choosing their job or their beliefs, well jobs are not easy to come by so who can judge? Yet I believe what needs to happen is for physicians and techs to challenge these laws as unconstitutional.

[Toughy]

So, if we are saying the requirement of a transvaginal ultrasound prior to an abortion is state mandated rape, arent we also saying the ultrasound tech performing the test is a rapist? Are you comfortable with saying someone just doing the requirements of their job is a rapist?

Yes I am because they are rapists. The techs can say no I will not do this.

What does the AMA have to say about this? What about all the other health care professional organizations. What does the Nurses Associations have to say about this. What about radiologists and the techs organizations?

The health care field actually has an obligation to say no to this. Their silence over the years has been unbelievable and it goes back decades. I think there are only a few (less than 5) medical schools that even teach abortion procedures. GYNs can graduate and get licensed and not know how to do abortions. It's shameful.

And you have Rick Santorum saying states have the right to outlaw contraception...yes make use of contraception a criminal act.

Something like 28 states have laws on the books mandating free contraception for women. These laws were made law in republican controlled states. It was all good until Obama wanted to mandate free contraception.

Somehow I am reminded of the book Backlash by Susan Faludi.

[Kobi]

Tick, I think or trust you know I pick your brain on stuff like this cuz we both tend to pull things apart to see how they work so to speak. Seems we need to get past our initial knee jerk emotional reactions in order to be very clear on what exactly we are facing. The only way, to me, to do that is to keep poking at it, look at it from different perspective and different angles, to keep bouncing thoughts and ideas off one another so we can expand the depth of all that is part of any issue.

Originally Posted by Miss Tick

No, I am not comfortable saying the techs performing the requirements of their job are rapists. I'm just not comfortable saying that. They perform transvaginal ultrasounds all the time. IT is not rape. In my opinion the rape falls squarely on the shoulders of the politicians passing these laws, as well as the state mandating this procedure be done for no medical reason. So to me those are the people responsible for rape.



Appearing on the FBI website, the new definition of rape says: “Penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.”

Seems the definition of rape requires very explicitly defined "penetration". The one doing the actual "penetrating" by definition is the tech not the law makers.

If penetration wasnt so clearly defined as a specific act/action, my head might have more wiggle room here.

I think there is a very appropriate, specific word to call this. I'm just not sure rape is it.

It is illegal and unconstitutional. We agree.




However, I am saying that it is not a requirement of the tech's job to perform these ultrasounds. It's not the tech's or the physician's job to follow any other laws put into play by various states regarding first trimester abortions. I am saying by law it cannot be a requirement of their job. I am saying that it is against federal law. I am saying that at some point you take responsibility for the orders you follow.
This is the law of the land-

“FOR THE STAGE PRIOR TO APPROXIMATELY THE END OF THE FIRST TRIMESTER, THE ABORTION DECISION AND ITS EFFECTUATION MUST BE LEFT TO THE MEDICAL JUDGMENT OF THE PREGNANT WOMAN'S ATTENDING PHYSICIAN.”

No other law is valid. People have to stand up and do the right thing. I think the moral choice is clear. However, I don't think anyone will agonize over this. I might be wrong, but it seems that physicians and techs are just falling in line and complying with whatever the state mandates. And when it comes to choosing their job or their beliefs, well jobs are not easy to come by so who can judge? Yet I believe what needs to happen is for physicians and techs to challenge these laws as unconstitutional.

By law you are saying people shouldnt be put in this position and they shouldnt. But, they are. Federal law vs state law vs common people just trying to do their jobs. It sucks.

Yes, we all need to step up and do the right thing....as we see it. Now, here is the dilemma I see and another example of the absolute brilliance of the GOP strategy.

If I was a tech or an MD who performed abortions in these states, I would have, conceivably, an ethical dilemma. I have no idea what my legal options would be i.e. restraining or, stay order etc. But, lets presume I dont have a way to hold off enforcing the law.

As a health care professional, I would have a choice. I can abide by the law or I can deliberately break the law or I could challenge the law....for a small fortune.

If I abide by the law, I might have my own ethical dilemma to wrestle with every single time I did a procedure.

If I deliberately broke the law, as idiotic as it is, I am now opening myself up to criminal prosecution. I am now facing criminal charges, legal fees, possible loss of my license to practice, and jail time. Not only am I, personally and my family, in a quandry now, everyone I employ and I serve are also likely in limbo land as well. So, how does my decision to live my conscience affect those around me?

If I am a tech employed by someone who insists we go by the letter of the law, I can refuse and in refusing, I might myself unemployed. Will I choose to take responsibility for what I feel is right even when it means my job, my income, my health insurance, my home, my way of life etc? What a freakin horrible position to be put in.

If I own a facility that does abortions, for the sake of my business, my employees, and my ethics I may STOP doing abortions altogether. Bingo!

If I am someplace like Planned Parenthood, I could foresee many many millions of dollars being spent to defend myself in court for one reason or another as a result of this. Might I be put in the position of having to weigh the costs of performing abortions vs the costs of other services we provide?
Bingo 2!

I might even decide to shutdown my practice in a hostile state and move it someplace more accepting. What happens to those I used to serve if the service isnt available anymore? Bingo 3!

I am not even going to address the blame the victim shit that is bound to happen i.e. the "if women only did this or that or didnt do this or that" we wouldnt even have an abortion issue to deal with.

What a fucking brilliant strategy. Brilliant.

How do you counteract this? Good question.

[Corkey]

I have trouble with the whole "it's my job" thing. It is as though to have a job in this field one has to put their better judgement on hold to follow some of this law. Um no one doesn't, the Hippocratic oath says first do no harm. So which is more important to a health care professional? Secondly who is going to enforce this "law"? Just how much time will one get for disobeying this "law"? Who will go to jail for this?
I'm with MissTick on this one SCOTUS has said that they will not revisit Roe V. Wade, so it remains the law of the land, therefore trumping state law. Like I said earlier, someone is going to have to sue these states.

[Cin]

Originally Posted by Kobi

Appearing on the FBI website, the new definition of rape says: “Penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.”

Seems the definition of rape requires very explicitly defined "penetration". The one doing the actual "penetrating" by definition is the tech not the law makers.

If penetration wasnt so clearly defined as a specific act/action, my head might have more wiggle room here.

Well speaking of wiggle room, it appears to me that the supreme court decision regarding first trimester abortion is ever so clearly defined and there doesn’t appear to be any wiggle room at all. Yet, they’re doing the wiggle coast to coast in every state in the union. So I don’t have any qualms doing a little wiggle of my own and laying the blame for the state mandated rape squarely at the feet of the politicians and the state.

By law you are saying people shouldnt be put in this position and they shouldnt. But, they are. Federal law vs state law vs common people just trying to do their jobs. It sucks.

I’m not saying they shouldn’t be put in the position. I’m saying they can't legally be put in this position.

Yes, we all need to step up and do the right thing....as we see it. Now, here is the dilemma I see and another example of the absolute brilliance of the GOP strategy.

If I was a tech or an MD who performed abortions in these states, I would have, conceivably, an ethical dilemma. I have no idea what my legal options would be i.e. restraining or, stay order etc. But, lets presume I dont have a way to hold off enforcing the law.

As a health care professional, I would have a choice. I can abide by the law or I can deliberately break the law or I could challenge the law....for a small fortune.

Well, that’s my dilemma. Why would they have no way to hold off enforcing an unlawful law? It should be a no brainer. No one should be deliberately breaking federal laws.

If I abide by the law, I might have my own ethical dilemma to wrestle with every single time I did a procedure.

Well, see that’s the thing. You would not be abiding by the law. The federal law is clear, no state interference in first trimester abortions.

If I deliberately broke the law, as idiotic as it is, I am now opening myself up to criminal prosecution. I am now facing criminal charges, legal fees, possible loss of my license to practice, and jail time. Not only am I, personally and my family, in a quandry now, everyone I employ and I serve are also likely in limbo land as well. So, how does my decision to live my conscience affect those around me?

Again, you would be deliberately breaking federal law if you do what the state is asking.

If I am a tech employed by someone who insists we go by the letter of the law, I can refuse and in refusing, I might myself unemployed. Will I choose to take responsibility for what I feel is right even when it means my job, my income, my health insurance, my home, my way of life etc? What a freakin horrible position to be put in.

Again if you follow the letter of the law you must refuse.

If I own a facility that does abortions, for the sake of my business, my employees, and my ethics I may STOP doing abortions altogether. Bingo!

If I am someplace like Planned Parenthood, I could foresee many many millions of dollars being spent to defend myself in court for one reason or another as a result of this. Might I be put in the position of having to weigh the costs of performing abortions vs the costs of other services we provide?
Bingo 2!

I might even decide to shutdown my practice in a hostile state and move it someplace more accepting. What happens to those I used to serve if the service isnt available anymore? Bingo 3!

I am not even going to address the blame the victim shit that is bound to happen i.e. the "if women only did this or that or didnt do this or that" we wouldnt even have an abortion issue to deal with.

What a fucking brilliant strategy. Brilliant.

How do you counteract this? Good question.

Well it’s only a brilliant strategy if people do not stand up against it. It is illegal. And if everyone, physicians, techs, facilities, everyone involved in women’s reproductive services, stands up together and cries foul, then it wouldn’t stand a chance of working. But if most accept this then ya, it’ll work. But really it’s not that brilliant, they only win if we roll over and decide to lose.

[Kobi]

Originally Posted by Miss Tick

Well speaking of wiggle room, it appears to me that the supreme court decision regarding first trimester abortion is ever so clearly defined and there doesn’t appear to be any wiggle room at all. Yet, they’re doing the wiggle coast to coast in every state in the union. So I don’t have any qualms doing a little wiggle of my own and laying the blame for the state mandated rape squarely at the feet of the politicians and the state.

I’m not saying they shouldn’t be put in the position. I’m saying they can't legally be put in this position.

Well, that’s my dilemma. Why would they have no way to hold off enforcing an unlawful law? It should be a no brainer. No one should be deliberately breaking federal laws.

Well, see that’s the thing. You would not be abiding by the law. The federal law is clear, no state interference in first trimester abortions.

Again, you would be deliberately breaking federal law if you do what the state is asking.

Again if you follow the letter of the law you must refuse.

Well it’s only a brilliant strategy if people do not stand up against it. It is illegal. And if everyone, physicians, techs, facilities, everyone involved in women’s reproductive services, stands up together and cries foul, then it wouldn’t stand a chance of working. But if most accept this then ya, it’ll work. But really it’s not that brilliant, they only win if we roll over and decide to lose.

Tick, I'm telling ya, I love your brain. All excellent points. Now, if you remember a post you made a couple of pages back r.e. info from the Guttmacher Institute:

BACKGROUND: Since the mid-1990s, several states have moved to make ultrasound part of abortion service provision. Some laws and policies require that a woman seeking an abortion receive information on accessing ultrasound services, while others require that a woman undergo an ultrasound before an abortion.

Mid 1990's? Thats 17 years of fuckery so far. Lots of fuckery and who is responding to this? I dunno yet.

Toughy has raised excellent points as well. What are the professions affected by this doing in response? I dunno yet.

To not clutter up the breaking news thread anymore, I will make a separate thread for this in the "in the news" category.

The more I read and learn, the more this is really pissing me off. This is crucial shit for women. So, I hope some other curious folks who like to delve into things join me in the "Assault on Womens Sexual and Reproductive Rights" thread.

[Lady Pamela]

A wonderful and incredible piece of news.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/0...6pLid%3D136921



.

[Toughy]

you gotta love Rick Santorum.....notice the town in Georgia Santorum was when he made these remarks

http://start.toshiba.com/news/read.p...ps=1018&page=1


Santorum questions Obama's 'world view,' not faith
By STEVE PEOPLES Associated Press The Associated Press
Sunday, February 19, 2012 9:16 PM EST

CUMMING, Ga. (AP) — Rick Santorum on Sunday condemned what he called President Barack Obama's world view that "elevates the Earth above man," discouraging increased use of natural resources.

The GOP presidential candidate also slammed Obama's health care overhaul for requiring insurers to pay for prenatal tests that, Santorum said, will encourage more abortions. <snip>

[Nat]

http://www.cnn.com/2012/02/19/politi...ing/index.html

The government shouldn't make health care providers fully cover prenatal tests like amniocentesis, which can determine the possibility of Down syndrome or other fetal problems, Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum said Sunday.

Santorum, an outspoken opponent of abortion rights, told the CBS News program "Face the Nation" on Sunday that amniocentesis "more often than not" results in abortion.

"People have the right to do it, but to have the government force people to provide it free, to me, is a bit loaded," he said.

....

[Corkey]

http://news.yahoo.com/trip-ifactory-...-abc-news.html

iPod factory report tonight on Nightline

[Cin]

Outrage: Congress Gives States the Go-Ahead to Drug Test for Unemployment Benefits (and Stick Taxpayers With the Bill)
As part of a deal to extend the payroll tax cut and unemployment benefits through 2012, Congress will allow states to drug test people applying for those benefits.

As part of a deal approved Friday to extend the payroll tax cut and unemployment benefits through 2012, Congress has given its okay to allow states to drug test people applying for those benefits. The move, initially opposed by Democrats, came after the Democratic leadership bowed to Republican pressure in its eagerness to get the bill passed.

Republicans had initially called for drug testing for everybody seeking unemployment benefits, but Democrats balked before backtracking and agreeing to allow testing for those who lost their jobs because of drug use and those applying for jobs in industries where drug testing is prevalent.

It's worth noting that people fired from their jobs for drug use are fired "for cause" and not laid off for lack of work, and thus are ineligible for unemployment benefits anyway. But the provision allowing for drug testing in industries where it is common could expose hundreds of thousands of unemployed workers to drug tests before they could receive unemployment checks. None of those workers was laid off because of drug use.

The deal effectively moves the burden of drug testing from employers, who freely decide whether they think testing has more benefits than costs, to state governments and their taxpayers -- at least in those states that decide to use the new tool. Drug testing is also more likely to be imposed on lower skilled workers than on white collar workers because those sectors are where drug testing is most prevalent now.

Democratic lawmakers downplayed the extent of drug testing about to be foisted on laid-off workers, while Republicans said they would be widespread. The bill requires the Labor Department to draft regulations to determine who will be subjected to drug testing. Those subject to drug testing will be those unemployed workers "for whom suitable work as defined under the state law is only available in an occupation that regularly conducts drug testing as determined under regulations issued by the Secretary of Labor," a Democratic staffer explained to the Huffington Post.

"I think it's a small percentage," Rep. Sander Levin (D-MI), ranking Democratic in the House committee overseeing unemployment insurance, told the Post.

But Republicans cited employer surveys to argue that drug testing would be widespread, with one survey reporting that 84% of employers required drug tests for new hires.

"That's total nonsense," said Levin. "No way 80%."

But while Democrats and Republicans quibbled over how many jobless workers would be forced to endure the intrusive and humiliating ritual, the Drug Policy Alliance was clear and concise in its opposition to the move.

"This policy is a terrible one-two punch to the gut for thousands of struggling Americans," said Bill Piper, the group's national affairs director. "Congress has paired a generous taxpayer subsidy for corporations that drug test with a slap in the face for those struggling to find work, feed their families and keep their homes. The American people have a right to be upset over being forced to subsidize the violation of their civil liberties, when they try to access a program that they pay for with every paycheck. Drug testing is expensive and ineffective, and distracts from evidence-based policies that actually reduce the problems associated with drug use and misuse."

[Cin]

Why is the ACLU Helping the Richest Americans Buy Our Elections