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Archives for June 2013

Open Thread 6/24

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– Power of Ridicule

– In petitions: The General has a petition to investigate that pervert Rep. Michael Burgess, and The Transit Riders Union wants to save Metro from devastating cuts.

– I’ve been riveted by the abortion hearings in Texas. I probably would have missed a lot of it if not for Jessica Luther

– Capitol Lake has mud snails.

– A bicyclist has died in Woodinville (Seattle Times link)

– I am very sorry that white people began experiencing great violence in 1860. But for some of us, war did not begin 1860, but in 1660. The brutal culmination of that war may not have allowed us to ascend into a post-racial heaven. But here is something I always come back to: In 1859 legally selling someone’s five-year-old child was big business. In 1866, it was not.

I *do* know the way to San Jose

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Greetings from San Jose! I’m here in the Bay Area for the annual Netroots Nation meeting. Something like 3000 political activists, writers, bloggers, operatives, and practitioners are here.

Yesterday, I attended a panel called Science Under the Rug: How Government and Industry Hide Science. Among the panelists was Penn State climatologist Michael Mann, whose research in the 1990s led to the now widely known hockey stick chart of global mean temperature. The emphasis in this panel was on the determined anti-empirical efforts of climate deniers, the gun lobby, opponents of choice, and the like. Too often, the opponents in separate fields are the same groups, or at least groups funded by the same corporate and/or ideological groups. They certainly share techniques to try to undermine science, to drive wedges into our understanding of the world around us.

Lunch today (sponsored, BTW, by the Sierra Club) was accompanied by a Q&A with Nancy Pelosi. If nothing else, she’s a tough, gutsy woman. It isn’t easy to defend the complexities of the NSA mess — especially against some of the more extreme of purity trolls, which abound in this crowd — but she did exactly that. She turned the crowd toward her side by decrying the privatization of security (Snowden worked for Booz Allen Hamilton, not the NSA).

The Netroots Nation 2013 meeting celebrates the turnaround of California in the last few years. Once saddled with a $40 billion deficit, the state is now solvent, even booming. I’m sure it’s merely a coincidence that this reversal occurred as soon as Jerry Brown took the corner office in Sacramento from Ahnold, as soon as the state legislature achieved a super-majority of Democrats in both houses. Yes, there was a bit of help from the glacially-improving US economy, but still…

At the opening plenary session on Thursday, the location of Netroots Nation 2014 (NN14) was announced. There’s great excitement that, between July 17 and 20, we’ll get together in Detroit. It will be an important year in Michigan — an open seat in the US Senate (due to the retirement of the Senate’s finest combover, Democrat Carl Levin), a wildly unpopular Governor (Scott Walker-wannabe Rick Snyder), and other important political races. On top of that, of course, there’s the symbolism of going to the symbol of America’s collapsing middle class, decaying infrastructure, and other deep socioeconomic woes. If NN14 can be, in some small way, part of bringing Detroit back from the brink, then it will be the most meaningful event in the organization’s existence.

[UPDATE: 5:30pm] In the closing session, we’re hearing Ignite talks from many progressives. Among them — Seattle’s own Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner, CEO of MomsRising and spouse of former State Senator (45th LD) and recent Republican candidate for Lieutenant Governor Bill Finkbeiner. I knew that she was to Bill’s left, but not this far in the correct direction.

Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza!

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Maddow: Gov. Scott Walker (R-WI) black-lists petition signers.

The G.O.P. War on the Needy™:

John Oliver: Is Paula Deen suffering from ‘adult onset racism’ (via Crooks and Liars)?

White House: West Wing Week.

More Skirmishes in the Republican War on Women™:

Ann Telnaes: Dick Cheney’s short-term memory.

The GOP War on Same Sex Couples™:

Robert Reisch: The quiet closing of Washington, D.C.

Ann Telnaes: Beating the drums of war.

The GOP War on Immigrants™:

John Oliver: Let’s just fucking ignore Sarah Palin!

The G.O.P. War on the IRS™:

Colbert ends his feud with Ahmadinejad.

Sharpton: Glenn Beck announces tea-party as the “new civil rights movement!”.

The GOP War on Islam™

John Oliver on sad Obama.

Security State:

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

Is There A Budget Yet?

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No, as of when I started writing this at 5:00. So, we’re still a few weeks out from a budget shutdown in Washington. I thought we were supposed to have something. I don’t see any reports that there’s a snag, so who knows? If we run out of time without a budget, well, terrible things:

During a briefing Thursday, the Governor’s chief of staff Mary Alice Heuschel said that 34 state agencies would shut down completely, including the Governor’s office, the Auditor’s office and the state Lottery. The Governor, himself, would remain on the job.

The plan calls for 24 agencies to shut down partially, including the Department of Ecology, Employment Security, Fish and Wildlife and the Health Department.

“The Department of Corrections estimates that approximately 3,000 of their 8,000 employees would be [laid off] and they’re an agency that has federal mandates to continue a large portion of their operations,” said Brown.

Services for the needy would be cut back, including child care subsidies and food and nutrition programs.

Twenty-five state agencies would remain open, including colleges and universities and departments that don’t rely on the operating budget for funding.

But you know, Rodney Tom probably won’t personally suffer, so who cares?

Open Thread 6/21

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– If we put a fund together, I bet we could get enough to change the Tacoma Dome to the “HorsesAss.Org Awesomedome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

– Police are warning about a woman posing as a DSHS employee to steal money from very vulnerable victims, and detectives believe there could be many more targets who have not yet come forward, possibly because of the language barrier between themselves and police.

– 8 Ways Not To Be An “Ally”: A Non-Comprehensive List (h/t to my friend M on Facebook)

– I don’t know what else to say. I’m not surprised, because I am a white person who has been a white person her whole life (!) and thus I have spent a lifetime interacting with other white people who presumed that, because we are both white, we are both fans of racist humor. Or cool with racial slurs. Or will definitely agree about their solid and totally original theories on some ancient racist narrative.

– I was just talking to someone from West Seattle about cycling on the Spokane Street Bridge, and now there’s a counter.

– Please — that’s only 45 words. That’s not even a blog post — it’s almost a Tweet. Clearly trivial.

– Fun Facts are my favorite Tom the Dancing Bug, and Fun Facts About New York City is my favorite in a while.

Quote of the Day

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They didn’t get results and they put the blame on somebody else. It’s another day in the unproductive life on the Republican Congress where they bring bills to the floor that are going nowhere and they blame other people for their lack of success. As I say, another day in the amateur hour of the Republican Congress.

— House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi after the G.O.P. Farm Bill went down in flames, prompting infighting and finger pointing among the House Republicans.

State’s Rights and the Will of the Voters

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Here’s another post about the vote to restrict abortion. Now I’m thinking of the GOP cries of state’s rights and the will of the voters. Usually, when there’s a discussion of Roe, some conservative will inevitably say that if Roe is overturned it will go back to the states. That it’s just a state’s rights issue. But I think Washington State is a good example of why they don’t mean it.

Specifically, I’m thinking of Initiative 694 that would have banned third trimester abortions. I happen to remember making calls for NARAL, and can remember when it lost. So it seems to me that to the extent that you can tell the will of the people from one vote over a decade ago, the state’s rights Republicans should be saying that Washington doesn’t want restrictions on abortion.

But of course the vote by Washington State Republicans in Congress to restrict abortion rights beyond what Washington State voters rejected puts the lie to the state’s rights claim. They don’t care about Washington’s rights to write our own abortion laws, they want the big mean Federal government to override it.

Also, Pregnant Women* can Feel Pain

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Darryl has written about the science (or lack thereof) behind the recent vote to ban abortion at the federal level due to fetal pain. A fetus can’t feel pain, so basing abortion policy on that is going to result in bad policy. But there is someone in the decision to have an abortion who can feel pain, the one who is pregnant.

Even when it goes well, and the child is wanted, pregnancy is often a miserable, painful experience. As is childbirth. That’s might be one reason why more than 60% of the people who seek an abortion have a child: they know what they’re getting into.

So no, if the people who voted for this were concerned about pain, they would have voted to protect abortion rights. The fact that they see imaginary fetal pain as more important than the actual pain of the pregnant woman is really all you need to know.

[Read more…]

Ignoring science, Reichert, Hastings, Herrera Beutler, and McMorris Rodgers vote to kill women

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Yesterday, Washington state’s Republican delegation joined the House Republicans and voted in favor of a bill that would severely restrict women’s access to safe and legal abortions. Bill H.R. 1797 goes under the Orwellian title “Pain-capable unborn child protection act.”

The bill goes to some lengths to argue that the fetus (referred to in wingnut-speak as “unborn child”) feels pain by “no later than 20 weeks after fertilization.” The claim is scientifically dubious. Recent reviews conducted by bona fide scientists (rather than, you know, wingnuts) cast doubt on this assertion.

For example, in a recent review article, Bellieni and Buonocore (2012, Journal of Maternal, Fetal, and Neonatal Medicine 25:1203–1208) weigh the anatomical, endocrinological, behavioral, and electrophysiological evidence. They cautiously conclude:

Our data show that there is consistent evidence of the possibility for the fetus to experience pain in the third trimester, and this evidence is weaker before this date and null in the first half of pregnancy.

Less ambiguity was found in a 2010 “Working Party” report by The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists titled “Fetal Awareness”. Their conclusions are rather concrete. From the summary…

In reviewing the neuroanatomical and physiological evidence in the fetus, it was apparent that connections from the periphery to the cortex are not intact before 24 weeks of gestation and, as most neuroscientists believe that the cortex is necessary for pain perception, it can be concluded that the fetus cannot experience pain in any sense prior to this gestation. After 24 weeks there is continuing development and elaboration of intracortical networks such that noxious stimuli in newborn preterm infants produce cortical responses. Such connections to the cortex are necessary for pain experience but not sufficient, as experience of external stimuli requires consciousness. Furthermore, there is increasing evidence that the fetus never experiences a state of true wakefulness in utero and is kept, by the presence of its chemical environment, in a continuous sleep-like unconsciousness or sedation. This state can suppress higher cortical activation in the presence of intrusive external stimuli. This observation highlights the important differences between fetal and neonatal life and the difficulties of extrapolating from observations made in newborn preterm infants to the fetus.

These recent reviews summarize the broad scientific literature relying on hundreds of previous scientific studies and empirical observations that weigh in on all sides of the argument. The House Republicans relied on cherry picking a handful of papers that favor their position. They come to a “scientific conclusion” for the bill using amateur methods unworthy of an undergraduate term paper, let alone a House bill!

The bill prohibits abortions after 20 weeks post-fertilization, and provides limited exceptions:

  • To “save the life of a pregnant woman whose life is endangered by a physical disorder, physical illness, or physical injury…not including psychological or emotional conditions.”
  • If “the pregnancy is the result of rape,” but only “if the rape has been reported at any time prior to the abortion to an appropriate law enforcement agency“
  • If “the pregnancy is the result of incest against a minor” but only “if the incest against a minor has been reported at any time prior to the abortion“

The scientific record is clear on another aspect of abortion: “Abortion-related deaths are more frequent in countries with more restrictive abortion laws”. The more restrictive the laws, the higher the rates of abortion-related maternal mortality.

The World Health Organization estimates that there are about 20 million unsafe abortions annually. The practice result in about 68,000 unnecessary deaths to women, and an additional 5 million women who suffer long-term health complications from the unsafe practices. The public health consequences of anti-abortion laws are profound.

Republicans, by voting for Bill H.R. 1797, have ignored (in fact, abused) science, and have voted, essentially, to kill women.

And I am sad to see that Washington state’s G.O.P. delegation, Dave Reichert, “Doc” Hastings, Jamie Herrera Beutler, and Cathy McMorris Rodgers, all voted in favor of killing women.

Death is a pretty harsh punishment for unintentionally getting pregnant…particularly for women who were too embarrassed to report a rape, or girls too ashamed to report incest.

You know what…It’s time to get rid of these puritanical women-killing fucking troglodytes!

I’m Alive

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This is a preloaded post from the library. I think I get my computer back Wednesday afternoon, so hopefully I won’t have been too out of the loop to start posting again. They called late today and said that they can get it back, but you never know for sure until you’re there.

In the back of my mind, I had been worried that all of the mayoral candidates would answer the questions all at once with my laptop in the shop, but not to worry Kate Martin is still the only one to answer.

I don’t know if I’ll be back in a groove to do an Open Thread on Thursday morning, but you can consider this one.

Drinking Liberally — Seattle

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DLBottlePlease join us this evening for a “bonus budgetary projection” episode of the Seattle Chapter of Drinking Liberally.

We meet every Tuesday evening at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. Starting time is 8:00pm. Some people show up earlier than that for Dinner.




Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out another DL meeting over the next week. Tonight the Tri-Cities chapter also meets. The Longview and Lakewood chapter will meet on Wednesday. And for Thursday, the Spokane and Tacoma chapters meet.

With 204 chapters of Living Liberally, including seventeen in Washington state, four in Oregon, and two more in Idaho, chances are excellent there’s a chapter meeting near you.

Burning down the house

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The Army Corps of Engineers, which is responsible for environmental review for civil works projects that affect navigable waters—projects like the Gateway Pacific Terminal—“will not take into consideration the green house gases that will be emitted when the coal is burned in Asia.” In testimony before Congress, a Corps spokesperson, described the effects as “too indirect” and therefore outside of the scope of their mandate.

If not the Engineers, then who will be the champion for Mother Earth?

Perhaps, Capitalism and the “Invisible Hand of the Market” will save Her from us? I mean, in the long run, higher profits will be made from an increasingly high-functioning, orderly, safe and healthy world!

Or not….

Bob Watters is with SSA Marine, the company that wants to build the Gateway Pacific Terminal.

He says climate change has no place in the environmental review.

Mother Earth…you are soooooo fucked.

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