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Nauseating Piety

by The Reverend on March 20, 2012

in abortion,birth control,choice,contraception,culture wars,moral values,religion

W's speech writer and a darling of the Akron Beacon Journal editors, Michael Gerson….

It is extraordinary how far some will go to knit the random scraps and patches of events into the quilt of a narrative. So the Susan B.Komen controversy, resistance to the administration's contraceptive mandate, a stag party joke by Foster Freiss and a cruel epithet from Rush Limbaugh somehow add up to a Republican war on women, sure to provoke the political backlash of an entire gender.

It is extraordinary that a conservative Christian apologist, like Gerson, could have missed those 94 separate red-state-passed bills last year which limited a woman's legal right to choose. Don't you think that oversight is extraordinary?

You would think that in any opinion piece pretending to be objective about charges by progressives of a conservative war on women, the writer would include a reference to the 94 2011 state laws, the most ever in one year, limiting a woman's legal right to an abortion.

But, sadly, Gerson doesn't care about reality-based facts. He defends conservativism, and Christianity….that's his job….and the Beacon editors seem to think that's good enough for their readers.

Starting out with an entirely bogus premise is a well-used tactic by writers who are seeking to defend the totally indefensible.

Gerson acts as if the debate over the Susan B. Komen Foundation and their announcement to defund Planned Parenthood, and their later announcement negating their original announcement…Catholic Bishop complaints over offering contraception to non-church, female employees, funny man Foster Freiss and his one-joke wonder, and the 3 day use of the word "slut" by Mr. Conservative in describing a 30 year old female Georgetown student……have all been just random patches of non-related scraps ridiculously quilted together by wild-eyed liberals into some hodge-podge narrative which concludes that Republicans and conservatives are conducting a politcal war against women and women's rights.

The funny thing is….not funny haha, funny as in odd….is that all those individual scraps and patches which Michael Gerson suggests progressives have patched together in an extraordinary fashion to come up with the conclusion they have come up with….are all related to the same single topic.

Conservative efforts to limit the reproductive rights and choices of women in America.

The Komen discussion was over what? Whether Komen would continue to help fund Planned Parenthood. Some new Komen VP was offended by the 3% of PP's services which went for legal abortion….and so announced (later retracted) that they were ending their funding of PP. By their efforts, Komen….like so many Republican politicos and their media slaves….was trying to financially damage Planned Parenthood, an invaluable provider of reproductive health care services to millions of women.

What were the Catholic Bishops bitching about? Correct me if I'm mistaken, but I'm sure it was over Obama including no co-pay, preventative contraception prescriptions for women in federal health insurer exchange plans. This "debate", though misdirected into some pious claim over consciences, was over contraception and a woman's access and right to affordable contraception.

What was funny man Foster Freiss' joke to Andrea Mitchell about? Contraception…..and women's access to contraception.

And how about El Rushbo? What was the kernel of the story which motivated the defacto leader of the Republican Party to degrade Sandra Fluke for 3 straight days? Well, what do you know,….it was contraception….again.

So, Mr. Gerson, it surely looks to me like Republican attempts to deny or limit women's access to contraception and/or abortion IS the narrative. Limiting women's access to affordable contraception and limiting women's access to legal abortion IS the narrative.

And far from liberals floundering franticly around looking for stray conservative scraps to hastily and carelessly patch together, forcing some bogus narrative where none exists…..limiting women's access to contraception and legal abortion, and humiliating women with new unnecessary ultrasound restrictions before allowing women to have an abortion….are all part of the same concerted conservative political war against reproductive-age women.

That IS the narrative.

Pastor Gerson goes on, after stating his entirely bogus premise, to suggest John Locke was bigoted against Roman Catholics and blah, blah, historical cul-de-sac, blah…..religious liberty, blah, blah…..but none of it means a thing in the context of the article.

The facts here are not really that difficult to understand. Republicans, conservatives….Michael Gerson….have aligned themselves politically with the faith-basers. Movement conservatism must align itself with the faith-basers in order to stay electorally viable. After all….there's only so many voters in the top 1%.

Fundamentalist faith-basers worship a god who relegates women to second class status. Women are the temptresses, they are unclean, they must subordinate their lives to their male husbands, they must keep quiet in church, they are too inferior to serve as priests….and on and on I could go.

Fundamentalist religion has had a war going against women for at least 6 millenium. Now, because of political expediency, fundamentalist religion's faith-based war against women has become the Republican Party's war as well.

So, no….whether it's Komen, or Catholic Bishops, or Funnyman Foster, or the AM Radio Drugster….or 94 GOP state bills to limit a woman's right to choose…there's no liberal patchwork, no wild knitting of unrelated or incongruous talking points by progressives into some "somehow" narrative.

Instead, all of the efforts to limit a woman's access to contraception and abortion are just part of the finely and strategically woven, political whole-cloth blanket that the conservative pious wrap themselves up in anytime an election is near.

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{ 24 comments }

Voter ID Laws

by The Reverend on March 19, 2012

in Uncategorized

Why all the new voter ID laws?

The answer is simple….

“Every year,” Chait wrote, “the nonwhite proportion of the electorate grows by about half a percentage point—meaning that in every presidential election, the minority share of the vote increases by 2 percent, a huge amount in a closely divided country.” This explains, for example, why Colorado, Nevada, and Arizona are turning purple instead of staying red. “By 2020,” Chait writes, “nonwhite voters should rise from a quarter of the 2008 electorate to one third. In 30 years, “nonwhites will outnumber whites.”

Those numbers are extremely important in trying to understand why so many conservative-controlled states have been enacting stringent new voter ID laws in their respective states.

In 30 years…."nonwhites will outnumber whites."

Contrary to the childish rhetoric of so many would-be-deceivers who defend new voter ID laws, actual voter fraud….defined in this blog as a person purposely voting under another person's name…..is basically non-existent in the 50 states. Not even large enough to be a rounding error.

All one need consider to understand the dearth of voter fraud is the state of Indiana. When the Republican attorney general set forward in court a defense of Indiana's new voter ID law, not one Indiana voter fraud incident was presented as evidence that voter fraud was a problem needing fixing. Not one. Yes, the Roberts Supreme Court ruled that Indiana's ID law was constitutional….but then again, the Roberts Court has also bequeathed us with Citizens United. Some may consider that sentence a non-sequitor…..just not me.

From the inception of conservative-led voter ID laws…..this issue has been about a partisan political solution in search of a problem.

I see conservative-led voter ID laws as a byproduct of a desire by conservatives to stem the rising tide of minority voters in the U.S. Minority voters tend to vote more for Democrats than Republicans. If the votes of minorities can be suppressed by even the slightest of margins in close elections….conservatives see an advantage to be had over Democrats.

In this, Republicans are consistent. In Ohio, Wisconsin, and Michigan…..Republican governors conspired to gain a partisan edge over their Democratic opponents by attempting to gut public sector unions. As with voter ID laws, the goal of gutting public sector unions was to give Republican candidates a fighting chance, or even a small edge, in elections. Especially in close elections.

That's the conservative movement's short game plan. In light of the fact that in 30 years, whites will no longer be the majority in the U.S…..today's Republican efforts to suppress minority votes seems to me to be a kind of last ditch effort to….."take their country back." Yes, that's what that phrase has always meant. Palin's "real Americans"….and the Tea Party's often-heard battle cry about "taking their country back" are both code for….white conservatives are in danger of becoming a minority group in the U.S. and something needs to be done about it.

What I'm suggesting doesn't necessarily mean that conservatives or Republicans are racists or bigots. Not necessarily. Personally, I don't think that conservative state voter ID laws have been passed because conservatives or Republicans hate minorities, as such. But those laws do suggest that conservatives are becoming much more anxious and nervous about their coming minority political status inside a nation, they believe, was a gift from god to white Christian patriots.

If the short game by conservatives works to their advantage, and Republicans, by whatever means it takes, recapture the presidency and Congress, then, I suppose the long game plan is to enact draconian legislation which will delay, slow down, or stop the slow erosion of white electoral dominance before it's too late. Not because conservatives are racist….but because they want to continue to win national elections.

Instead of remodeling or reforming their conservative party by embracing a comprehensive immigration reform plan, instead of advancing new ideas, new programs, to help lift poor minorities out of poverty, instead of a conservative-policy makeover which embraces all Americans…..conservatives have been busying themselves trying to game the electoral process by passing state legislation which primarily deters minorities from voting.

In other words….Republicans have no long game plan. It's all a short game plan…..and if it doesn't work….the Republican Party of Lincoln will fade into irrelevancy. The gaping fissures opened up within the GOP this primary season are not an anomaly. In 2008, John McCain's candidacy was not enthusiastically embraced by the conservative movement. McCain understood the dangers of money in our political process, and realized that a comprehensive immigration plan was in everybody's interest. Recently, Johnny Mac has told his GOP brethren to drop their contraception-bashing for fear of turning off yet another demographic to his political party.

For conservatives, the problem with McCain….and now Romney….is that both men are seen as not being true conservatives. True conservatives would send 10 million undocumented Latinos back home, true conservatives would seek to gain political advantage with all legislation passed…. whether it's suppressing minority votes in South Carolina and Texas or attempting to gut public sector unions in Ohio and Wisconsin. Party over country. True conservatives would drown the federal government in a bathtub, giving states the sole power to fend off the coming surge of minority voters in whatever way they see fit…..and all in order to "take their country back."

None of this needs to be. Sadly, I don't see any turning back.

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Contraception Wars: Arizona Frontline

by The Reverend on March 16, 2012

in conservatives,contraception,culture wars,discrimination,health care,intolerance,moral values

As the Contraception Wars have broken out across the country, we've been repeatedly told that the core reason for the battles is "religious liberty" and "conscience". If the big, bad, Obama compels any employer, or any health insurer, to pay for contraception for female employees….all religious liberty in America is in jeopardy.

That has been the argument, if you call that an argument.

But, as the Contraception Wars have spread to the many states with Commander Rick Santorum directing the armies of the lord against the Dark Knight's godless sluts and prostitutes….the argument has morphed into something else.

Dateline, Arizona.

Arizona legislators have advanced an unprecedented bill that would require women who wish to have their contraception covered by their health insurance plans to prove to their employers that they are taking it to treat medical conditions. The bill also makes it easier for Arizona employers to fire a woman for using birth control to prevent pregnancy despite the employer's moral objection.

Now, read that paragraph again….because I know it's hard to believe.

I'm not exactly sure what the hell has happened down in Arizona. Could be the heat, I guess. Could be the drunken-looking crazy woman governor they have. I can't say for sure. What I can say for sure is that Arizona's recent ambush in the Contraception Wars has nothing to do with "religious liberty."

Under current law, health plans in Arizona that cover other prescription medications must also cover contraception. House Bill 2625, which the state House of Representatives passed earlier this month and the Senate Judiciary Committee endorsed on Monday, repeals that law and allows any employer to refuse to cover contraception that will be used "for contraceptive, abortifacient, abortion or sterilization purposes." If a woman wants the cost of her contraception covered, she has to "submit a claim" to her employer providing evidence of a medical condition, such as endometriosis or polycystic ovarian syndrome, that can be treated with birth control.

When Republican enthusiasts speak of "liberty" and "freedom"…..the Arizona bill is what they have in mind.

Freedom and liberty, to Republicans fighting on the front lines of the Contraception Wars, mean that god-fearing, commie-hating, boot-strapping conservative employers have the freedom to place themselves in between a female employee and her doctor. Before a slut female employee in Arizona can obtain clearance to have her birth control prescription filled, the prostitute she must first explain to her employer why she is taking birth control pills.

Arizona Tea-influenced Republicans really thought this new bill out. Not only does this "less government intrusion in our lives" bill insert an employer in between a woman and her doctor….it spreads freedom a bit further….

…the law would give Arizona employers the green light to fire a woman upon finding out that she took birth control for the purpose of preventing pregnancy.

This new expansion of women's freedom and women's liberty in Arizona will, of necessity, require the creation of a Bedroom Brigade to protect the interests of the Contraception Wars employer-generals.

Just think about it. Those double dealing sluts female employees may conspire with their (liberal) doctors to prescribe the pill in order to control monthly cramps….when what those female employees are really up to….is getting the patriotic, boot-strapping employer to pay for them to have sex with their husbands.

If the new law goes into effect, it will force female employees who can't afford to pay full price for birth control to share private, sometimes embarrassing medical information with her employer in order to get her prescription covered.

Ahh…liberty…..freedom. Fill your lungs with it and thank god you're an American. Where else could a major political party have the liberty to properly shame women when required? Down in Texas, the patriotic Republicans there voted to use the Shaming Wand to properly shame and humiliate women who wouldn't bend to the will of males. Not to be out done, Arizona is now spreading liberty to sluts women by making them go over their most private and personal female health issues with their Shaming Employer…..before receiving approval for a doctor's prescription.

Enter Rick Santorum's personal millionaire free speech provider, Foster Freiss. Funny man Foster told Andrea Mitchell a couple weeks back that in the old days, I suppose when men were men and women did what men said, or else….women found contraception to be very inexpensive. Sluts Women, according to Freiss, simply bought an aspirin and placed it in between her knees. Male authoritarian generals in the Contraception Wars may be unbearable pricks…but they sure maintain their senses of humor.

However, now with Arizona's new Shame the Sluts Employer Freedom law, won't a slut female employee have to discuss with her boot-strapping, conservative, god-fearing employer why she needs an aspirin prescription? And won't the Arizona Bedroom Brigade enforcers need to verify that, indeed, the slut female employee is using the aspirin in the way she explained she would to her employer….to relieve headaches…..and not to place those aspirins between her knees ala Foster Freiss?

The brilliance of this Arizona freedom and liberty legislation…..excuse me while I recite the Pledge of Allegiance….is found in the wellspring of newly found freedom and liberty lavished upon god's employers in the state of Arizona. Should the hypothetical Arizona slut female employee be found by the Bedroom Brigade to be placing those aspirin between her knees…abusing her limited rights to prescriptions in such a brazen fashion…..then, the godly employer, all freedomed-up with his new liberty, can justly fire that slut employee for unlawful use of a prescription.

To many conservatives…..that's what freedom and liberty look like.

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LittleJohn The Redistributor

by The Reverend on March 15, 2012

in economy,financial industry collapse,John Kasich,tax avoidance,tax cuts,Uncategorized

I've made no secret of my distaste for Ohio Republican Governor John Kasich. The man should have never been elected. His banty-rooster approach to his job led directly to the rallying of worker-supporting Ohio voters to bury SB5 in the supply-side dumpster where it belongs just a few months ago.

For some reason, Kasich never tires of self-aggrandizement, even when he bases it on faulty assumptions….

“Over the last 14 months, it’s pretty remarkable what’s been accomplished,” Kasich said, adding later, “This is an ongoing process. Frankly, almost every time I turn around, I find another piece of broken Ohio, so there’s so much more to do.”

I don't think there's anything "remarkable" about paying off state debt by reducing revenues to communities, cities, counties, and public schools. The misery is simply pushed downline to the common folk, as it almost always is. As far as Ohio having "broken pieces" goes….I would suggest that if anything is broken in Ohio, it was broken when Kasich and Co. went after public sector union workers with a vengeance.

Other than that, it was Kasich's Crowd, the Lehman Bros-Wall Street Crowd, who "broke" Ohio….and 49 other states, with their irresponsibility. It was the deep recession caused by runaway, irresponsible, gambling houses of greed which temporarily "broke" Ohio. When Ohio was temporarily broken, Kasich worked for those who did the breaking. Kasich did his best to break Ohio even more with his numerous attempts to sell investment paper to public sector Ohio groups…..investment paper that proved valueless when Lehman Bros, LittleJohn's employer, went bankrupt.

Now comes LittleJohn the Redistributor. Having already cut state funding to cities, villages, communities and schools by 50%, in many cases….to mop up debt created by the Wall Street raid on America…..Kasich is now ready to propose a new tax increase. Yep. Can you believe it? A Republican Tea Party governor is proposing a tax increase.

The new plan?

Kasich, a Republican, and members of his cabinet unveiled details of the budget plan Wednesday during a two-hour press conference.
….
Severance taxes levied on oil and gas production from horizontal hydraulic fracturing will increase, with build-in breaks during the first year or two of operation to allow drillers to recoup their upfront costs.
….
The governor also has proposed about $1 billion in income tax cuts — which represents a decrease of about 5 percent per family — over the next five years, with rates reduced in relation to the taxes collected through fracking.

That is what a regressive redistribution of tax responsibilities looks like. A case study on supply side taxation. Instead of Kasich using suggested fracking tax revenues to resupply the communities, cities, counties and schools he slashed to balance the budget……Kasich has suggested cutting the state income tax instead.

Because the richest Ohioans pay more, dollars-wise, in state income tax than the rest of us…..the richest Ohioans will be the recipients of the bulk, dollars-wise, of Kasich's income tax reduction.

The frackers will, naturally, pass any tax increases on to all consumers of fossil-energy. That energy increase will affect average-income Ohioans more than Ohio's richest as a percentage of their income….which is why Kasich has proposed it.

Often, the left is accused of wanting to redistribute wealth to the undeserving. Taking from the Randian "makers" to coddle the "takers." However, what Kasich is proposing is a classic case of regressive redistribution. Taking from the many poor and average families to reward the rich few. In effect, Kasich would lower state income taxes, primarily benefiting the wealthiest Ohioans, and make everyone who uses fossil fuels pay for it.

This is part and parcel of the totally misguided theory of supply side economics. The thinking is that if the rich "shakers" get all the tax and fiscal breaks, they will shake their entrepernuerial booty and lift everyone's boat. For 30 years it hasn't worked for average working families….but LittleJohn wants to beat that dead horse one more time. The thinking is that if Ohio income taxes are low, or zero,…..more ultra-rich "shakers" will move to, or remain in, Ohio, rather than beat feet to a no-income-tax state. There's no evidence that the rich migrate to no-income tax states by any significant measure…..but evidence has nothing to do with supply side economic dogma. It is entirely faith-based. Just believe.

Some may say, as they have misleadingly said in the past, that all Ohio income tax payers will benefit from a state income tax reduction. Yes, there is some truth to that claim….however, just as we saw with Bush's deep tax cuts of the 00's…..the wealthy few are the ones who benefit the most. The fact that the rich will benefit the most is the very reason why Kasich is proposing his regressive redistributionist plan.

More than likely, the increase on natural gas and heating oil costs will more than wipe out any state income tax reduction benefit for average Ohio families gained through Kasich's income tax reductions. That will not be true, however, for the wealthy few in Ohio.

Ohioans should raise their voices and reject this regressive Kasich plan.

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At War With Each Other

by The Reverend on March 14, 2012

in 2012 election,Barack Obama,conservatives,culture wars,disaster capitalism,GOP,GOP primaries,Mitt Romney,Rick Santorum,tax cuts

Rick Santorum took the two old Confederate states, Alabama and Mississippi, last night. But not by much. Santorum won Alabama by 34.5% to Gingrich's 29.3% and Romney's 29%. In Mississippi it was Santorum at 32.9%, Gingrich at 31.3%, Romney at 30.3%.

See a clear cut favorite in any of that data? I don't. When three GOP candidates split the primary vote in the South almost equally 1/3, 1/3, 1/3….among three mediocre candidates….it's no wonder that the bow-tied, dweebish, George Will has all but given up on Republicans taking back the White House this November.

Will, writing about GOP frontrunners, Romney and Santorum…..

Both are conservatives, although of strikingly different stripes. Neither, however, seems likely to be elected. Neither has demonstrated, or seems likely to develop, an aptitude for energizing a national coalition that translates into 270 electoral votes.

Mitt Romney still has a sizable delegate lead over Rick Santorum, but Mitt still has a long way to go before he can reach the magic number needed to win the GOP nomination. I'm thinking that likely voters in November, including Republican voters, are getting increasingly bored with the primary Drag-a-thon. Consistently, primary turnouts have been less than anticipated….this, in spite of the thousands of times conservative-leaning corporate media have told us how very, very enthused and excited conservative voters are this year.

Maybe they are sensing what George Will is sensing….defeat…..and so, are just staying home. Don't rightly know.

To explain what I think is happening in the GOP Drag-a-thon, I'm reminded of how losing football teams sometimes behave. In my youth, I witnessed first hand how some football teams behave themselves towards the end of a game in which those teams are losing badly. The losing players begin to fight amongst themselves….seeking to pin blame on this or that player on their team for the overwhelming butt kicking they are getting.

That's what I think is happening to the GOP team this year. Romney and Gingrich have been sniping, daily, at Mitt Romney. Romney attacks Santorum on a daily basis. Many establishment Republicans have mourned this divisive display in their primaries…..yet, it continues each week, and may continue that way until at least June….perhaps August.

But, why is this divisive in-fighting really going on?

Republican voters.

Conservative/Republican voters are not united in objective or purpose….other than in their bitter, hatred of Obama.

Half of the GOP electorate would revise public school textbooks to remove references to progressive and liberal leaders and/or policies that have enriched the United States. Half of the GOP electorate would teach creationism alongside of evolution. Half of conservative voters would end a woman's right to choose her own reproductive destiny…..including shuttering Planned Parenthood and making contraception much more difficult to obtain. Half of Republican voters would end most, if not all, unions in the country, and work to lower U.S. worker's hourly wage rates everywhere.

Half of GOP voters want prayer brought back into public schools. About half of all GOP voters would favor an oil drilling rig, or strip mining operation, on each and every parcel of publicly-owned land. Half of GOP voters would end all federal or state assistance to poor citizens…..reserving any government help for only the disabled. Half of Republican voters favor ending all affirmative action efforts, basically declaring that the only racism left in America is racism against majority whites.

The other half of Republican voters are embarrassed by their more, let's say, imaginative regressive brethren. This half of the Republican electorate only has one goal in mind. Make America's rich…richer. This half of the GOP would lower taxes further on the already wildly rich while stripping the non-rich of a portion of their promised Medicare and Social Security. This second half of the GOP electorate favors deep deregulation of our country's largest corporations, an end to the estate tax on the wildly rich, tax amnesty for "repatriated" corporate profits made in foreign countries, and as big of a reduction on corporate tax rates as they can force through.

Yes, there is crossover between these two halves of the GOP electorate, but I think the outlines are relatively accurate. One half of the GOP would take us backwards socially and culturally…..closer to where the Iranian ayatollahs have taken their populations than where Jefferson imagined our constitutional framework would take America. The other half of the GOP would continue the destructiveness of supply-side and deregulatory economics in order to push even more profits and share-of-national-income into the hands of the very few.

One half of the GOP electorate does not regard Mitt Romney as backward-thinking enough. Too moderate, too liberal….too willing to compromise with commies in the Congress…..and not mean-spirited enough to lambast that Muslim-Kenyan-anti-colonialist guy with sufficient passionate hate. The other half of the GOP voting-base is fearful that the 1% will be fatally threatened if the yahoo-element of their party's base insists on selecting a losing nominee from the cultural and social neanderthals.

The political fight so far this year hasn't been between conservatives and liberals, Democrats and Republicans. It has been between players on the same Republican team who realize they are losing the national electorate's support….and are squabbling and bickering amongst themselves.

And that's why George Will's bow-tie is in a bunch.

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"Highly Sensitive And Volatile"

by The Reverend on March 13, 2012

in media,women's legal rights

Yesterday's and today's Doonesbury comic strips appear on today's Akron Beacon Journal opinion (commentary) page. With this Editor's note…

Normally, the often-satirical Doonesbury comic strip by Garry Trudeau appears on the Beacon Journal's comic pages alongside Get Fuzzy and Garfield.

This week's series will appear on our Commentary page because the story line touches on a highly sensitive and volatile issue and because there will be graphic discussion that some will consider objectionable.

We made this decision after viewing the strip's story line and giving consideration to how readers are likely to engage the strip over several days. We feel that this content is more appropriate for the pages where opinions on issues of the day are offered.

Today we are publishing the Monday and Tuesday strips. The story line will continue through the week on these pages.

A substitute Doonesbury series runs in our comics section.

Good on the Beacon bosses for changing their minds on censorship. Although I don't buy one word of the emboldened portions of their explanation…..at least they reconsidered their roles as censors.

Let me remind those who regularly read the Beacon….that it was Beacon bosses who chose to move Doonesbury from the editorial-opinion pages to the comic strip page, in the first place. Then, if my memory serves me right, it was because of Garry Trudeau's relentless treatment of another "highly sensitive and volatile issue"….the Bush presidency, and specifically, the Iraq war.

Then, as now, the Beacon bosses were deeply concerned about "how (conservative) readers (were) likely to engage the strip". So concerned, that they moved a daily political comic strip to the regular comics page, next to…umm….Garfield and Get Fuzzy….so that political commentary readers did not have to "engage" Trudeau's brilliant work….at all.

Then, as now, Doonesbury's story line touched on "highly sensitive and volatile issues"…..the Bush-Cheney war of fraud, the war which should have never been, the war which killed 4500 U.S. soldiers and wounded tens of thousands more…..and all for no discernable reason. Then, as now, Trudeau was relentless in his comedic criticism of the Bush-Cheney regime. And because such a mockery of a GOP president might offend conservative readers who "engaged" the comic strip, the Beacon bosses transplanted Doonesbury to the comic page….. using the same "highly sensitive" and "volatile" nature of Trudeau's "graphic discussion" (read: unvarnished truth) as the excuse to move the comic strip.

And please…."graphic discussion"? Do you know what "graphic discussion" looks like? Yesterday's front page story about a lone wolf U.S. soldier in Afghanistan who went on a killing spree of civilians at 3 AM, murdering men, women and children at point blank range. That's what a "graphic discussion" looks like.

After Beacon Editors previewed the Doonesbury strip, they concluded…."Some will consider (it) objectionable". Isn't that also true of articles, commentaries, opinions and letters-to-the-editor the Beacon sees fit to print every day? Aren't there always….."some"…..who find something in the Beacon "objectionable" every day?

And is it not true that the Beacon bosses moved Doonesbury from the editorial-opinion pages, where it had always been found, to the comic strip page…..because conservative readers found the comic strip's take on Bush and Iraq, "objectionable"?

So, no, the Beacon's explanation today is as limp as a lasagna noodle….but…at least Beacon bosses dropped their censorship robes and agreed to print Trudeau's take on conservative politicians' efforts in multiple states to shame and humiliate women seeking to exercise their legal right to choose their own reproductive course in life.

To avoid appearing mean-spirited over this issue, I must say that the Beacon has continued to put out a quality newspaper during a time when newspaper readership is in decline. I realize that the newspaper business, especially now, must be an extremely challenging business. I have read the Beacon for almost 60 years, and I have always appreciated the enterprise. I only wish them continued success.

That said…..to Beacon bosses: Do yourselves a favor. Leave Doonesbury on the editorial-opinion pages…where it has always belonged. You know you created this situation in the first place by transplanting Doonesbury to the comic page….next to Garfield and Get Fuzzy…..where it never belonged. Doonesbury is a political comic strip and always has been.

So, leave it on the editorial-opinion pages.

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{ 6 comments }

Shameful Censors

by The Reverend on March 12, 2012

in choice,culture wars,media

I didn't know how the Akron Beacon Journal would deal with it. Now I know.

The editors of the Beacon have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are gutless.

Why?

Doonesbury.

The gutless editors at the Beacon decided that this week's truth-telling-by-comic-strip was just oh-too-controversial for it's child-like readership. So, they decided to not print this week's Doonesbury, in essence, censoring this week's Doonesbury comic strip. Odd. A newspaper….acting as a censor.

The bosses at the Beacon decided to print an older Doonesbury comic strip this week rather than print what many pearl clutchers and hand-wringers on the conservative right have warned would be just too controversial of a Doonesbury comic strip.

I'm sure that these Beacon censors would explain how this week's Doonesbury is just too….fill in the blank….graphic, adult, mean-spirited…..for children to see on the comic strip page. Of course, the real reason why the Beacon censored this week's comic strip page is because of the vivid truth it tells about the state of Virginia's radical new abortion-limiting law.

You know….truth may scare the children.

See anything that might cause emotional instability in any children who might happen to read today's non-censored Doonesbury comic? How about conservative adults? Is it likelier that the non-censored Doonesbury would cause emotional instability among conservative adults….or….children?

Who is more at risk? Who is more threatened by the truth portrayed in the non-censored Doonesbury strip……children or conservative/Republican adult readers? Children, who have no interest in Virginia's forced-pregnancy/shaming laws……or….forced-pregnancy-believing adults who just might experience a twinge of uncomfortable guilt if they were exposed to Trudeau's accurate portrayal of a shameful new forced-pregnancy-conservative Virginia law?

Today's Doonesbury…..the one censored out of the Beacon as, I guess, an example of how free Akron area residents are…..has two lines which conservative/Republican adults must be prevented from reading.

"Please take a seat in the shaming room."

The state of Virginia's new war-on-women's-freedom bill includes a new requirement of all women seeking a legal abortion in that state. Women must now endure a sonogram before obtaining a legal abortion. There's no medical reason for the sonogram other than the fig-leaf justification tacked on about determining the age of the fetus.

The real intent of the forced-sonogram…..and the more medieval transvaginal invasive sonogram first chosen for the law…..is to shame pregnant women seeking an abortion out of having an abortion. All the new imaging capabilities today in medicine have been eagerly embraced by forced-pregnancy conservatives as a means of shaming women who seek a legal abortion. In red-state after red-state…..forced-pregnancy governors and legislators have been busy creating jobs writing laws which would limit and shame all women who are seeking to exercise their constitutional right to choose.

"A middle aged, male state legislator will be with you in a moment."

Exactly. The argument over a woman's right to choose is exactly that….who's right is it to determine reproductive choices? Male legislators who will never experience pregnancy?

Male conservative politicians, and not just in Virginia, have inserted themselves needlessly in between a woman and her doctor. Big intrusive government efforts by a political movement which claims…um….government is too big and intrusive.

How appropriate, then, is Doonesbury's "a middle aged male state legislator will be with you in a moment?" Author, Garry Trudeau leaves the comic reader asking the question, 'what's a middle-aged male state legislator doing meddling in the legal abortion process?'

"Shaming room" and "middle aged male legislator will be with you in a moment". That's the entire 'too controversial' part of Monday's Doonesbury strip. Too controversial….dear me….to print. And did I mention that children might read it? And then what would northeast Ohio readers do? It would all just be too traumatic. Good thing that Beacon editors came to the rescue…and not a moment too soon either. Can you even imagine what might happen if Akron area students and adults….learned something that wasn't watered down into "both sides do it" weak tea?

By it's censoring actions, the Akron Beacon Journal has clearly demonstrated how cowardly they really are when it comes to freedom of the press. This is a low moment for the Beacon. Northeast Ohioans don't have to worry about the threat of Big Government censoring the press…..the press, apparently, is more than willing to do the censoring themselves.

Speaking of shame.

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Dimmer Bulbs

by The Reverend on March 10, 2012

in conservatives,disinformation,energy saving

In Da King's latest…..the Obama administration is pilloried over a $10 million contest award for a new fangled, super efficient, LED light bulb. The problem, according to King, other than what's viewed by him as a waste of $10 million, is the opening retail price of Philips Electronics' new bulb….$50 per bulb.

In the posting, mockery is reserved for Energy Secretary, Steven Chu's stated goal of producing new efficient light bulbs at prices "affordable for American families."

I agree with King that $50 is a high price tag….up front….for a new light bulb. However, as I will explain shortly….$50 per bulb is a genuine bargain for homeowners.

The backdrop of any story is important. The backdrop surrounding this $50 light bulb story can be best summed up by the girl with the faraway eyes, Michele Bachmann…

"I think Thomas Edison did a pretty patriotic thing for this country by inventing the light bulb," she said during a campaign stop in New Hampshire. "And I think darn well, you New Hampshirites, if you want to buy Thomas Edison's wonderful invention, you should be able to!"

Bachmann…..and this seems true of many conservatives….holds to the notion that conserving, in this case electricity, is, somehow, an infringement upon Americans "freedom." I heard this tune being played during the Bush presidency when gasoline rocketed up to $4+ per gallon. Some conservative talkers then were spouting off about their "liberty" to waste gasoline in huge, military-looking, passenger vehicles labeled Hummers. Somehow, Americans were different. They were entitled to own and drive the most inefficient vehicles…..and the reason most often given in support was that Americans were free.

Back to the bulb.

The following information is all available here.

The new Philips bulb lasts 30 times longer than typical filament incandescent bulbs. At $1 per incandescent bulb, comparative up front costs would be $30 for the old style bulb versus $50 for the Philips bulb. Plus the time spent in changing the incandescent bulb 30 times. However, as my source points out, the original Washington Post hit piece which King riffed off of….misled it's reader on the power usage comparison.

…then you have to add in the cost of electricity. Both types will provide about 30,000 hours of lighting. But a regular bulb burns 60 watts per hour or 1,800 kilowatt hours over the decade. The LED bulb burns a sixth of that or 300 KWH over the decade.

Even at a dime (per Kilowatt hour), the difference in electricity costs for the two competing lighting systems would not be $3 versus $18, but $30 versus $180.

One new Philips LED bulb at the full price of $50…without subtracting any power-company rebates available….plus 30,000 hours of electricity costs at $30 ….$50 pricetag + $30 for electricity = $80 total over 30,000 usage hours.

30 new incandescent bulbs would cost $30 at $1 per bulb….with no power-company rebates…..plus 30,000 hours of electricity to light those bulbs at $180. Total cost of 30 equivalent $1 incandescent bulbs would equal $210.

The question on everyone's mind? Which is lower, $80 or $210?

Now….consider….that's only the comparative numbers for ONE bulb. Change all your old Thomas Edison bulbs and…over time….you will save thousands of dollars. And that's even true at Philips opening high price at $50 per bulb, which will surely come down in time.

To illustrate how silly it is to mock the Energy Dept's contest and the $50 per bulb eventual-winner….

My wife's new employer is currently finishing up with replacing their old-style, commercial-flourescent lighting system with an Orion Systems, high efficiency, new fangled lighting system. It's not LED-based, yet the new lighting will save the company FIFTY PERCENT on electricity costs. The system costs approximately $8000 to buy and install with Ohio Edison rebating $4000…yes $4000. Mrs. Reverend says the quality of the new lighting, alone, is worth the change. But I've done some preliminary calculations, and I'm estimating that the company's $4000 upfront cost will be more than offset in a little over a year. After that time the company will be saving hundreds monthly.

Is saving money….losing freedom?

It pays to conserve energy. Simple as that. Any new energy-savings innovations are not threats to our freedom…for crying out loud….they are intelligent methods of SAVING MONEY ON ENERGY. For me, I want the federal government to stimulate innovation….and especially if, as is the case with the Philips bulb….consumers can save thousands of dollars over time on the products emerging from stimulating innovation.

It's been tough for opponents of Obama…I understand that….he's an excellent politician, unmatched by anyone on the GOP side. But conservatives who knee-jerk to embrace any and all new criticisms of the president…….replicating those criticisms without vetting the information behind the criticism….are only making themselves look more ignorant and out of touch with the real world.

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War-R-US

by The Reverend on March 9, 2012

in 9-11,Bush White House,disinformation,fearmongering,Fox,hubris,iran,Iraq,Israel,Mitt Romney,Newt Gingrich,pre-emption,Rick Santorum,war on terror

Eugene Robinson, in today's Washington Post..

Unless Ron Paul somehow wins the nomination, it looks as if a vote for the Republican presidential candidate this fall will be a vote for war with Iran.

GOP Senate Minority Leader, Mitch McConnell…

"If Iran, at any time, begins to enrich uranium to weapons-grade level, or decides to go forward with a weapons program, then the United States will use overwhelming force to end that program," McConnell said, according to an advanced text of the speech.
….
McConnell said the authorization for U.S. military against Iran would make clear that if Iran or its proxies retaliate against the United States or its interests, they would face an overwhelming response.

Santorum, Romney and Gingrich….

Santorum sharply criticized the joint offer by the United States, European countries, Russia and China to resume talks with Iran on its suspected nuclear weapons program as "another appeasement, another delay, another opportunity for them to go forward (with developing a nuclear weapon) while we talk."

Romney assailed the administration's go-slow approach on Iran, saying "the only thing respected by thugs and tyrants is our resolve, backed by our power and our readiness to use it."

….

"The red line is now," Gingrich declared to a standing ovation.

Israel's version of Dick Cheney, Bebe Netanyahu, yesterday…

“We cannot accept that Iran has nuclear weapons because that would represent a danger to the existence of our country,” the premier said in an interview on private Channel 10 television.

Is this what Bebe was really after?….

“In meetings the president had there was no such agreement proposed or reached,” White House press secretary Jay Carney told reporters, according to Reuters. Obama and Netanyahu meet in the Oval office for two hours on Monday and then had lunch together.

An Israeli official said earlier on Thursday that Israel has asked the United States for advanced “bunker-buster” bombs and refueling planes that could improve its ability to attack Iran’s underground nuclear sites.

Yes, we've actually seen this movie before….and not that long ago. 4500 U.S. soldiers are now dead because of that last movie, tens of thousands wounded. Our U.S. deficit was blown up by trillions, Iraq is a veritable hellhole today, and America and Americans are hated more today by Arab and Muslim middle easterners than when Bush announced his "mission accomplished."

To neo-conservative warmongers…..the lesson from Iraq is that we just need to start a war with Iran.

I'm not a strict peacenik…..close….but not 100%. But I do believe that every war that the U.S. has been involved in since WW2 has been an unnecessary war of choice. What the U.S. is involved in right now is not a war….it's, rather, a unilateral U.S. military expansion into any/all nations of the world…..justifying all of it by claiming 9-11 and "terrorism" as the excuse. It is unprecedented…..I believe it's entirely illegal….and it's harming our nation's future, not helping it.

I also realize that in a violence-loving, gun fetishizing, American exceptionalism-claiming country like the U.S., I am in the minority on this one. However, I must point out that I was not mistaken about the wrongheadedness of attacking Iraq in 2002…..and it is quite possible that I am not mistaken now about the even-more-wrongheadedness of attacking Iran.

There is no evidence that Iran has, or is even close to constructing, a nuclear weapon. No neo-con can point to any evidence that rebuts that claim. Even DNI Director Clapper has stated publicly that we do not have any evidence suggesting Iran has even made the decision to construct a nuclear weapon.

The latest info from the IAEA points to increased enrichment of uranium by Iran. However, the truth….rarely spoken by our war marchers in media….is that Iran is said to have moved from enriching uranium at 6% concentration (for nuclear energy rods) to 20% (medical isotope uses). In doing this, Iran is not in violation of anything. It requires 90% enrichment to produce fuel for a nuclear bomb……and yet neo-con screechers in the U.S. and Israel are pretending with their hysterical tough talk and macho-bullsh*t that Israel, America…someone…must attack Iran right now.

If you pay any attention to the Fox machine….all you hear is threatening talk about bombing, attacking, bunker-bustering….Iran.

In addition to Iran's current inability to make a nuclear weapon….which should be enough to stop a needless war in the near future…..how would the dynamic change in the middle east, if Iran actually did own a nuclear weapon?

Neo-cons and their fans tell me that if Iran obtains a nuclear weapon, Israel is history. Really? The Iranian mullahs would drop their nuclear bomb on Israel shortly after they perfected it? They would do that….why? Because the mullahs want all the people in Iran to be obliterated in a fireball of U.S. nuclear retaliation? Does that make any sense? It doesn't to me.

58,000 U.S. young men died in Vietnam……a war of choice. All for nothing. 4500 U.S. men and women died in Iraq…..a war of choice. All for nothing. Yet, neo-conservative warmongers in the U.S. just can't wait to send more U.S. soldiers to be killed in another war of choice.

It's a sickness.

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Subsidize This

by The Reverend on March 8, 2012

in 2012 election,abortion,birth control,choice,conservatives,culture wars,GOP,health care

This seems to be the mountaintop argument upon which self-radicalized conservatives want to plant their Freak Flag.

Today we are again invited to believe that to deny a taxpayer subsidy is to withhold a right. For no discernible reason, the Obama administration has decreed that all contraceptives must be provided “free” to those who want them (which of course means that everyone else’s insurance rates must rise).

Those are the words of Kathryn Jean Lopez of The Corner, Nation Review Online's breeder tank for a variety of highly contagious and lethal extremist-right mind viruses.

The argument….well, it's not an argument…..the fallout from the El Rushbo self-induced implosion has led the self-radicalizers on the right to congeal like a thin layer of scum around the thought, not argument, that the problem with President Obama's health care exchanges offering contraception on a no co-pay basis….is that taxpayers are subsidizing that contraception.

This…thought….was behind Limbaugh's three day long yuk-a-thon at the expense of the young woman, Ms Fluke. If you remember, the focus of Limbaugh's misogny was on the idea that no co-pay contraception equaled all taxpayers subsidizing women to have sex.

Of course, it's been demonstrated that up to 58% of women who take the pill..do so for other health reasons than to prevent pregnancy. But self-radicalized conservatives don't do facts….and don't much care about facts….much like the King of Talk Radio.

But I want to go after this "subsidy" notion. First, the disclaimer. I am not some expert on insurance….just as I am not an expert on much of anything else….but I know some stuff. The stuff I know about insurance is that "subsidizing others" is the central pillar of insurance.

Insurance is socialistic by it's very nature. An insurance company takes money from a pool of customers, counting on the likelihood that not all of those customers will file claims. Mountains of cash from insurance policies are used to subsidize the claims of, the insurance company hopes, only a limited number of customers.

You pay fire insurance to protect your home. So does everybody else in your vicinity. The insurance customers whose homes actually do burn down in your vicinity are reimbursed, made whole, with the subsidized monies paid into the insurance company by it's other customers. Now, sure…insurance companies invest insurance policy funds and make money with their customers money, for themselves….but when it comes to payouts, without the socialist pool of other customers providing the funds to subsidize claims of a few….insurance would not work at all.

The same is true with health care insurance. For only one example, take my by-pass surgery in 2002. The total bill was approximately $50,000. The total cost of my family-of-four-at-the-time's health insurance policy,….combining employer and employee share….was approximately $1200 per month. In effect, the tens of thousands of other United Health Care customers subsidized my open heart surgery. It could be said that the health insurer subsidized my surgery, but without the money from tens of thousands of other policy holders, the insurance company…um…couldn't subsidize anything.

The discussion, lame as it is, over no co-pays for contraception, must be viewed through this insurance-as-socialistic-subsidization prism. Just as others subsidized my heart surgery ten years ago, the majority of us who pay for health insurance policies today are actually subsidizing other health care customers who consume more health care than we do. In this way, the entire health care insurance industry is but a socialistic, 3 Musketeers-type of industry. All for one and one for all.

In ObamaCare, many more Americans will become eligible for Medicaid and even those who will not qualify for Medicaid under the new rules may have their health insurance subsidized by taxpayer monies. Conservatives, for political reasons only, have limited their focus to contraception. Conservatives have expressed their disdain for subsidizing one specific, and tiny, piece of overall health care coverage, access to no co-pay contraception. They have done this in order to stoke the always-burning fires of the "culture wars" in a general election year.

I say that because every aspect of health care coverage is subsidized, one way or the other. Why complain about contraception, when thousands of other prescription medicines will be subsidized by tax payer monies under Obamacare? Why not complain about taxpayer monies subsidizing HIV cocktail drugs? Respiratory therapy, surgery, and drugs for smoker-related illnesses? Penicillin-related drugs to combat STD's? A liver transplant for a life-long alcoholic? Knee and hip replacement/repair for an extreme-sports enthusiast?

Singling out contraception is the tell. The contrivance which has been the "debate" over denying no co-pay contraception in the ObamaCare insurance exchanges is the radicalized-right's attempt to revive their motley group of voters to defeat Obama in November. That's all it is and nothing more. Most Americans subsidize the health care of others every month of every year. Nothing new about any of that. Low or no co-pay contraception has been part of most health insurers policies for decades, policies even the Catholic Church have bought for their employees without a peep until the beginning of 2012.

Abortion talk, women-who-have-sex-out-of-wedlock talk, contraception-is-dangerous talk, and we-don't-want-to-subsidize-those-evil-loose-women-who-take-the-pill talk….has all been designed by the conservative megaphone screechers as an opportunity to rile up the angry, angry base in the hopes of knocking out Obama in November.

There's not one ounce of sincerity in any of it….except for the right's hatred of the current president.

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