Making ripples via A6U571N.

Yesterday was Women’s Equality Day — and the 89th anniversary of women winning the right to vote with the passage of the 19th amendment.

I spent an hour yesterday on a call organized by the White House regarding health care and inequality of coverage and services for women. It’s an important issue, especially since women have the most to gain from better health care provision. 

It was important enough to the WH that Secretary Kathleen Sebelius from Health and Human Services, Melody Barnes who is chairperson of the WH Domestic Policy Council and Tina Tchen, Deputy Director of the White House’s Office of Public Engagement were all on the call.

The interesting thing?

It seems activist women are less than certain about a Democratic commitment to fighting for reproductive health rights.  Every question except one was about reproductive health issues and the current mishmash of bills.

At one point, I asked about "reproductive conscience" issues and whether the Administration would be pushing for express language in the health care bills preventing prescription refusals or refusals of medical care under standard practice guidelines.  Sec. Sebelius explained that the President had issued an EO rescinding the overly broad "conscience rule" from the Bush years back in February which she thought was sufficient.

They are also currently working on rules dealing with allowing for conscience objections while making certain that health care is not compromised.

Does that mean care and reproductive rights will again be compromised?  She didn’t say, but I’ll certainly be following up on that.

When I reiterated that, living in a rural state like WV, women could be severely limited in where they could get health care, and that poorer women, especially, might have difficulty with transportation to another clinic or pharmacy miles away from their home? Sec. Sebelius indicated that she understood that very well, and that was certainly being taken into consideration. But those issues were being tackled separately from the health care bill itself.

And then?

Tina Tchen from the White House Office of Public Engagement stepped in to say that it wasn’t "productive to talk about issues outside the health care process."

In other words, don’t muddy our waters by asking inconvenient questions?

Pardon me if I don’t take that suggestion to heart. (more…)

Pro-Choice cat via lotusmonger.

Scott Roeder, who shot Dr. George Tiller, links himself to Operation Rescue in a jailhouse interview.  Color me shocked:

In a phone interview Friday, Roeder said he was upset at the president of Operation Rescue, Troy Newman, who had condemned the killing and said his organization had nothing to do with Roeder.

“He said that I never was a member and I never contributed any money,” Roeder said. “Well, my gosh, I’ve got probably a thousand dollars worth of receipts, at least, from the money I’ve donated to him.”

Do tell, Mr. Roeder. What other connections did you have with Operation Rescue through the years? From whence did you draw your inspiration to drive over to Dr. Tiller’s church and shoot him in cold blood?

For a real taste of the illogical and convoluted internal justifications, the NYTimes Magazine had a lengthy piece on how Dr. Tiller’s murder has diminished fundraising hopes for pro-life groups because some of their ardent supporters now think murdering someone for performing a legal medical procedure is the more effective solution. 

Boo hoo, cry me a river, because that’s both sane and logically consistent, isn’t it?

Especially since Randall Terry, Operation’s Rescue’s attention-seeking mouthpiece, says he’s not responsible for people thinking they are murdering for the lord.  That’s despite statements out of his own mouth, as recent as last week wherein Terry "exalt[s] in warning of “random acts of violence” and violent "reprisals against those deemed guilty"" for daring to think about putting reproductive services in a health care bill.

No contraception for you, slutty womenfolk.  But the viagra is still a-okay!

McJoan points out the political non-penalty for Terry and his ilk:

There’s a larger issue than just Terry’s dangerous crazy here, though. He’s doing the Republican’s dirty work. If any liberal organization went anywhere near this crazy, you know Democratic members of Congress would be falling all over themselves to apologize from the floor of the House. Look what happened with MoveOn and the "Betrayus" ad. When are Republicans going to denounce this?

I’m not holding my breath. Because I’m not exactly seeing journalists — or Democratic leadership, frankly — asking about the GOP’s accountability for using people like Terry to push their political agenda forward. 

As always, Digby nails it:

Controlling other people’s sexual lives and women’s bodies is the agenda. There’s no point in pretending otherwise. You can search for common ground but I can’t find any with people who believe these things. And every inch you give them only encourages them to take another mile. It’s a losers strategy.

It’s no one’s damned business what goes on in someone else’s bedroom — or what difficult choices individuals have to make in incredibly painful situations in their lives. (more…)

God hates sinners via danny.hammontree.

Randall Terry is at it again.  Because apparently the half-skull poster of Sonia Sotomayor and exhortations to his unstable flock about the Angel of Death weren’t nearly enough to get him the fundraising haul attention he needed.

In any polite society, his brand of dangerous stoking of the fires of hell would get him shunned by decent people.

In fact, it’s well past time that GOP lawmakers were asked — clearly and without any ambiguity — what they think of Terry’s fire and brimstone violence stoking on behalf of their policy agenda. 

Because they cannot have it both ways any more that Terry can. 

Using Terry’s dangerous rhetoric to push the Republican policy agenda makes them just as responsible for the ends of those means as Terry is. 

Either you embrace the violent ends that result from this and take responsibility.  Or you denounce it for what it is:  dangerous violence stoking rhetoric that poses a public threat, and is designed to scare public officials into inaction through threats of violence and retribution against their safety.

Just like it was designed to do with Dr. Tiller.

Here, though?  Terry gets time at the National Press Club to spew his vile, violent venom:

Randall Terry, Founder of Operation Rescue, and other local pro-life advocates will hold a press conference at the National Press Club (529 14th Street NW, Washington, DC) on Tuesday, July 21, at 2:00 P.M. Mr. Randall Terry to discuss what he and other pro-life leaders will and will not do if healthcare passes and includes paying for child-killing, and what convulsions follow.

"Let all those in government be warned: They cannot order people to pay for the murder of babies, and betray God Himself, without horrific consequences." — Randall Terry (more…)

Since the murder of Dr. Tiller in Kansas, I’ve struggled to speak up effectively about choice in this country. Feministe has some ideas about how to put your money where your choice is. But it seems to me there should be more we can do.

Other than a propensity for equivocation and Blue Doggery, Sen. Ben Nelson’s response to Dawn Johnsen’s OLC nomination has puzzled me. His primary objection — based on a footnote written in a 25 year old legal brief of which Johnsen was not the primary author — seemed like thin gruel for a principled stand on the merits. And the latest from Nelson’s press secretary? Johnsen worked for NARAL. No. You are kidding me –a pro-choice president in a pro-choice country nominated a pro-choice attorney to an office where she won’t even be dealing with abortion issues. And that’s objectionable. It’s a mystery.

My most vivid memories of Bea Arthur were of her groundbreaking role in Maude.

She was sassy, saucy and brash. And, as I kid, I loved her for her deadpan delivery of a good straight line at just the right time. She cracked my granny up every week.

But most of all, I loved her — and the incredible folks who wrote the show, including the genius that was

Sam Brownback, Catholicism concern troll, judging and then asking not to be judged for it.

Not certain it works that way, Sam. If you fundraise for Jesus based on a big, fat lie, just how many levels of blasphemy and deadly sin have you committed?

Holy roller, my ass…who died and made you Pope?