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Drinking Liberally — Seattle

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DLBottlePlease join us for a pre-Independence Day celebration 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 Bellingham and Lakewood chapters will meet on Wednesday. And for Thursday, the Spokane and Tacoma chapters meet.

With 203 chapters of Living Liberally, including sixteen in Washington state, four in Oregon, and three more in Idaho, chances are excellent there’s a chapter meeting near you.

Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza!

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Susie Sampson’s Tea Party Report: GOP Invades Netroots Nation.

Behind the Scenes with The President & The First Lady at Gorée Island:

Same old party: Part 1.

Sam Seder and Cliff Schecter: Justice Scalia’s hypocrisy.

DOMA Dies:

Ann Telnaes: Shooting the messenger.

White House: West Wing Week.

Darrell “Grand Theft Auto” Issa’s “Scandals”:

Adam Burke: The death of political comedy.

John Fugelsang and friends: Rick Perry & Chris Christie.

Ann Telnaes: Aiding and abetting journalism.

Where is Jon Stewart?

Thom: The Reagan Revolution is an utter failure.

Mark Fiore: Wiretapping Saves!

Kimmel: The week in unnecessary censorship.

Killing the Voting Rights Act

Thom: More Good, Bad, and Very, Very Ugly.

Susie Sampson’s Tea Party Report: Fetal masturbation .

WA’s “pot czar”: Federal govt. should sign a treaty with state.

#StandWithWendy:

Pres. Obama: sweeping climate change plan

Mental Floss: Drinks.

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

Rick Perry calls for killing women and girls and how Democrats can stop him

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Following last night’s remarkable events in the Texas Senate chamber—an eleven hour actual filibuster followed by public disruption right down to the last second–Rick Perry has called for another special session. This one may have but a single piece of legislation on the table—the highly restrictive abortion bill the Republicans were unable to pass yesterday.

As I recently discussed, restrictive abortion laws translate into deaths of more women and teenage girls. It is not opinion, it is long established fact. In the U.S., restrictive abortion laws are also illegal—the Supreme Court has ruled them unconstitutional. The Texas law, besides restricting abortions to before 20 weeks, will effectively shut down most of the abortion facilities in the state.

If it passes, women and teen girls in Texas will die—because of the law.

What can Texas Democrats do about it? A filibuster is out of the question. Special sessions can be as long as 30 days!

But a Democratic walkout could work–that is, they can engage in a quorum block. The Texas Senate has 32 members, the Lt. Governor plus 31 Senators. The two-thirds quorum requirement means that the absence of 11 members shuts down voting. Currently the Texas senate is composed of 12 Democratic and 19 Republican Senators. This means that a group of 11 Senators is sufficient to shut down voting.

They might even flee the state like they did in 2003 during a highly unusual “mid-decade” redistricting move by Republicans. Eleven Democratic Senators fled Texas during a third special session:

…the minute it became clear the GOP was going to force the issue in the Senate by voting on a rule change, he said, the 11 executed their escape plan and broke the quorum. They grabbed bags already packed in their offices and boarded SUVs that took them to the airport, where two jets were waiting to fly them to Albuquerque.

The Democrats checked into a Marriott hotel in Albuquerque. The senators didn’t hide. They decided to call themselves the Texas Eleven, and even developed a logo – a silhouette of Texas inside the symbol for New Mexico under the words, “Never, Never, Never Quit.”

Eventually, one Democratic member, Senator John Whitmire, relented and returned solo to the chamber. The quorum block failed.

Sen. Whitmire is still in the Texas Senate (in fact, he is the longest serving member). So, Democrats would need a solid block of the other 11 Senators to pull off a shut down.

But Democrats were successful in blocking a quorum in 1979 that prevented a change in the Texas primary that would have benefited a Republican candidate. The story is told by former Lt. Gov. Bill Hobby (R):

The whole thing was a fiasco. In protest, twelve “Killer Bee” senators flew the Capitol to break a quorum. The “Worker Bees,” who stayed behind, spent each session haranguing the absentees, since we didn’t have the quorum necessary to transact any business. And we were in the very last weeks of the session with lots of legislation in the pipeline.

Before long, the Worker Bees put a call on the Senate. This action required all absentees to return. The Worker Bees sent the Texas Rangers to net the Killer Bees wherever they had flown. The fact was, for several days the Killer Bees had been hived up in Dora McDonald’s small garage apartment. Dora McDonald, Sen. Carl Parker’s chief of staff, lived only blocks from the Capitol. Her guests passed the time playing cards, arguing, and listening to each other snore. The Worker Bees continued to harangue them from the Senate floor.

One senator, Gene Jones, left the hive — he wanted to see his granddaughter. The Rangers heard that Jones was home in Houston. Photo in hand, they knocked on his door. A man who looked a lot like the picture opened the door. The Ranger asked him if he was Jones. He said yes. They arrested him and took him to Austin. He was Jones all right, but not Gene Jones. They had arrested Gene’s brother, Clayton. When the knock came at the door the senator had jumped over the back fence and stayed lost for another day.

The other possibility is for the House Democrats to flee the state. In fact, 52 Texas House Democrats fled the state earlier in 2003 during the regular session, as well. Of the 150 member House, a 2/3rds quorum is required, so that if 51 members are absent, the House shuts down. Currently there are 55 Democratic members and 95 Republicans. So…this isn’t out of the question.

Ultimately, it would be great if the Senate and House joined forces and every Democratic legislator left the state. They would likely endure fines and ridicule, but they would be saving lives of women and teen girls.

That kind-a makes it worthwhile.

Republican voting fraud in Texas!

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The Texas Tribune has the scoop on the incredible happenings in the Texas Senate on Tuesday evening. Essentially, state Sen. Wendy Davis, D-Fort Worth, engaged in an 13 hour filibuster of a draconian anti-abortion law. The Texas Senate rules allow such filibusters, but they can be stopped if the person doing the filibuster wanders off topic or leans too much on the desk (really!). With less than two hours to go in the special session, another Senator objected to Davis’ speech, which had “wandered” to the seemingly unrelated topic of the implications of Texas’ 2011 abortion sonogram law for this new law.

Sure seems like bullshit to me, but the advantage of being the majority party is you get to push almost everything in your favor.

From there, it didn’t go well for Republicans. There were a long series of procedural moves, the gallery onlookers periodically disrupted proceedings, and finally Senators engaged in a chaotic series of exchanges.

As the midnight deadline approached, protesters started screaming, effectively shutting down the ability to communicate on the floor. In the final minutes, Republicans hustled to conduct a vote that most Democrats weren’t even aware was happening. The final votes appeared to occur after the midnight deadline. (The deadline is not just a Senate rule, but a legal deadline for the special session, as I understand it).

This brought new issues to resolve:

State Sen. Dan Patrick, R-Houston, told the press, “we started voting before midnight,” and therefore, it counted. But state Sen. Royce West, D-Dallas, said, “the session is over with…it’s over with at midnight,” and so, the vote didn’t count.

Okay…I suppose it could be true that a vote started before midnight might be legally able to continue until after the midnight deadline. Fine…they win in a legal overtime, I suppose.

Not so fast. Despite Sen. Patrick’s confidence in being able to conclude a vote started before midnight, apparently not every Republican was convinced. Here are screenshots of the Senate log (click to enlarge image):

The first one [right] shows the last actions on SB 5 taking place after midnight. And the second [left], taken 9 minutes later, shows the dates changed to 6/25:

TexasGOPVoterFraud

You’re fucking kidding me! Those fucking Texas Republicans fraudulently manipulated the time stamp to make it appear as if voting was complete before the Midnight deadline?!!!?!! In Texas, such actions might go by some folksy euphemism like , “cow paddy fence mendin’.” To the rest of us, this sure looks like organized voting fraud bullshit!

Why am I not surprised by Republicans fraudulently manipulating the election record in their favor? (Whenever you hear a Republican talking about voting fraud, it’s projection.)

And why am I not surprised the Party of Stoopid™ thought they could get away with this fraud without anyone noticing?

Update: Perhaps recognizing they were busted by screenshots, the Republicans fold…

Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst stepped down from the dais after ruling that time had expired on SB 5, telling the senators, “It’s been fun, but, um, see ya soon.”

Supreme Court killed the Voting Rights Act—what are the implications?

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The Supreme Court has struck down Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act. The act empowered the Justice Department with a veto (pre-clearance) over changes to voting laws in a handful of states and some localities with a history of discrimination in voting. This act was most recently renewed by Congress and signed into law by George W. Bush in 2006:

…every single Senate Republican and the vast majority of House Republicans voted for it. But today SCOTUS asked Congress to take another crack at regulations that would backstop states or counties if they passed laws that discriminated against the voting rights of any racial group.

So…that’s one thing. Superficially, it seems there is wide support in Congress to put into place some type of enforcement power in the Voting Rights Act. In theory, it should be easy for this Congress—even with a powerful obstructionist agenda motivating Republicans—to pass a new version of the law. But “theory” cannot really be trusted with the current crop of right wing Congressional nut jobbers. But…if they did rewrite the law, they could well improve it.

How can it be improved? Besides “updating” the outdated formula specified in Section 4, they could broaden the law to all states. Over the last decade, we have seen an alarming increase in state laws that disproportionately disenfranchise minorities, the poor, and non-native English speakers. Remember Karl Rove? The man was either delusionally paranoid or politically cunning in pushing the meme (with a big assist from intellectual fraudsters Hans von Spakovsky and John Fund) of widespread “voter fraud!” In reality, voter fraud is extremely rare, rarely organized, and in the rare instances it is organized, it’s usually committed by Republicans. (Okay…I made up the last “fact”…in reality, we cannot know because the sample sizes are tiny).

The result of Rove’s “fraudulent” fantasies is that Republican groups developed “model laws” that, if enacted, would disenfranchise minorities disproportionately. These model laws have been introduced in a number of non-Voting Rights Act states controlled by Republicans. Essentially, we are in a new era where many states not covered by the Voting Rights Act are at risk of disenfranchising minority voters—state like Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. The solution is for Congress to put some teeth into the 15th amendment and pass a Voting Rights Act that covers all states equally and significantly broadens protections for disadvantaged persons.

Yeah…whatever…that’s all pie-in-the-sky. Within hours of the SCOTUS decision several states have indicated they would go forward with their blocked or stalled voter ID laws. This does not mean they”ll succeed—after all, the 15th amendment is pretty fucking clear! But it means the Justice Department must now sue states to get the laws blocked. That process takes substantially more effort, so it is an imperfect solution.

In the long run, this court decision may well hurt Republicans. By further disenfranchising minorities, Republicans will fail at “winning the hearts and minds” and VOTES of minority and disadvantaged voters. It is a medium-term demographic disaster for Republicans. Related to that, Joshua Green points out:

Many of the GOP’s current problems stem from the fact that it is overly beholden to its white, Southern base at a time when the country is rapidly becoming more racially diverse. In order to expand its base of power beyond the House of Representatives, the GOP needs to expand its appeal to minority voters. As the ongoing battle over immigration reform demonstrates, that process is going poorly and looks like it will be very difficult.

The Supreme Court’s decision to strike down a central provision of the Voting Rights Act will […] intensify the Southern captivity of the GOP, thereby making it harder for Republicans to broaden their appeal and win back the White House.

That is…we have years of “Republican amateur hours” to look forward to in the House.

The final implications I want to discuss are the Constitutional ones. A reading of the ruling turns up very few specifics on why the Voting Rights Act is unconstitutional:

…[I]n Shelby, five conservative justices gutted the Voting Rights Act anyway, deeming it inconsistent with Constitution because, well, they said so. These jurists said the same law used to be perfectly constitutional, but somehow morphed into being unconstitutional without anyone noticing, and without violating anything specific in the Constitution itself.

That leads to the question, “When did it become unconstitutional to subject states to pre-clearance??

Oh wait…That was Scalia’s question about same-sex marriage…

If time can morph things from constitutional to unconstitutional because “things change” couldn’t today’s ruling have implications for, say, the first amendment. I mean, they didn’t have the intertubes, high speed laser printers, Twitter, wireless phones, or even electronically-enhanced megaphones when the First Amendment was ratified. “Free speech” was more akin to a lowly musket compared to the GG-95 PDW that is today’s high powered speech technology.

Hmm. Speaking of muskets and modern personal defense weapons…shouldn’t this ruling provide “ammunition” (doh!) for those who argue that the rights conveyed in the second amendment no longer apply because of technological change in weapons technology?

Holy shit…I think the conservative Justices have given us a living Constitution! Fucking judicial activists!

Drinking Liberally — Seattle

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Still no state budget. So….join us for an “imminent budget” edition of the Seattle Chapter of Drinking Liberally. Maybe by the time we go home….

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.

(Ummm…this one is a little NSFW….)

Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out another DL meeting over the next week.

The Tri-Cities chapter also meets tonight. On Wednesday, the Burien and Bellingham chapters meet. And on Thursday the Woodinville chapter meets. And next Monday, the Aberdeen, Yakima, South Bellevue and Olympia chapters meet.

With 207 chapters of Living Liberally, including seventeen in Washington state, four in Oregon, and three more in Idaho, chances are excellent there’s a chapter meeting near you.

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.

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.

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!

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.

Open thread 6/17

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  • A government shutdown and new revenue forecasts tomorrow. Two of 5 things to watch as Washington state lawmakers head into week 2 of second special session.

  • WSU researcher starts sperm bank: “”We are able to freeze and thaw well enough to make a whole generation of queens.”

  • The Freeway Blogger brings a little earth to the motorways of California.

  • Everybody panic! The NSA is tapping your face.

  • Uncertainty and worry for state employees as Washington State government shutdown looms (and special thanks to Rodney Fucking Tom for that).

  • Cool on the outside, Goldy is inwardly titillated by rumors of an NHL team for Seattle.

  • Better access to Sound Transit stations is in your future!

    • Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza!

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    Thom: The Good, the Bad, and the Very, Very Ugly.

    White House: West Wing Week.

    The New and Improved G.O.P. War on Women™:

    Thom: Even more of the Good, the Bad, and the Very, Very Ugly.

    John Oliver: Gaywatch…international edition.

    John Fugelsang: He’s 83, single and worth $11billion…..

    Young Turks: Ohio State Rep. Dan Ramos proposes a way to end Citizens United without going through Congress.

    ONN: Week in Review.

    Thom: More Good, Bad, and Very, Very Ugly.

    Maddow: Christmas in Texas and protection from the Gays.

    Susie Sampson’s Tea Party Report: Week in Review.

    NSAy What?

    Pap: America’s crumbling infrastructure.

    Stephen: Wall Street Journal’s Dorothy Rabinowitz crazy op-ed (via Crooks and Liars).

    White House: Celebrating Father’s Day.

    Maddow: The GOP’s obsession with sodomy, voodoo, satanism, racism & bigotry.

    Sharpton: Obama calls out Republican obstructionism

    Issa Idiot:

    Jeb Bush on those “more fertile” immigrants.

    John Oliver: On the media coverage of Edward Snowden.

    Politico Playback: The week in late night.

    Chris Hayes: Jan Brewer rips Arizona GOP apart over Medicaid expansion (via Crooks and Liars).

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

    Wisconsin Republicans impose non-medical* rape on rape victims

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    The “New and Improved” Republican War on Women™ moves to Wisconsin.

    Over eight hours Thursday, Republican lawmakers passed not only the ultrasound bill but two other bills restricting access to abortion and contraception. One bans state health care plans from covering abortions and exempts religious groups from the state requirement to provide birth control insurance coverage. The other prohibits sex-selective abortions and imposes fines on physicians.

    The ultrasound bill also requires abortion providers to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the clinic, which Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin says could force the closure of its Appleton-area clinic.

    During a contentious floor session Wednesday, the Senate also passed the ultrasound bill after Republican leaders cut off debate. Gov. Scott Walker has said he will sign the bill into law. The other two abortion bills now head to the Senate, where leaders say they might not get to them until this fall, after the summer recess.
    […]

    One of the amendments offered by Democrats that failed to pass would have specified that only an abdominal ultrasound could be required and not the more invasive vaginal probe.

    Holy fuck, where do they dig up these troglodytes?

    Among other horrible effects of these inhumane bulls, rape victims in Wisconsin will get a little bit extra rape, thanks to Gov. Walker and the esteemed G.O.P. men of the Wisconsin legislature.

    Your move, women of Wisconsin….

    * I updated the title to reflect the fact that an ultrasound is not medically necessary before the vast majority of abortions. Hence a bill requiring a medically unnecessary transvaginal ultrasound is, essentially, rape. The lawmakers who voted for this bill are rapists.

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