Sarah Palin, Health Care Reform, And Childless By Choice
Sarah Palin won't go away, but perhaps Stupak-Pitts will. Also, childlessness by choice comes out of the closet.
Sarah Palin won’t go away, but perhaps Stupak-Pitts will. Also, childlessness by choice comes out of the closet.
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Links in this episode:
Nancy Pelosi discusses Stupak-Pitts vote
Mitch McConnell talks about stalling health care reform out of existence
Sean Hannity exploits swine flu
Wanda Sykes on health care reform
Media Matters debunks the lies
On this episode, I’ll be interviewing author Laura Scott
about childlessness by choice.
Also, the Stupak-Pitts amendment and attempts to kill health care
reform, and Sarah Palin just won’t go away.
Kudos to the Center for Reproductive Rights for this pro-choice
ad called "It’s No Joke".
- no
joke *
Remember, the fight is far from over on the Stupak-Pitts
amendment. The Senate doesn’t have such a thing in their bill, and with effort,
we can keep it that way.
**********
And now for combining a topic I know is at the tip of your
minds, the Stupak-Pitts amendment, and a theme that’s dear to my heart,
disingenuous conservative nonsense.
Nancy Pelosi went to the JFK School of Government at Harvard to explain
the health care reform process, and when she was asked about how it came to be
that the Stupak-Pitts amendment was put to a vote, she explained the
reasoning.
- health
care 1 *
Now I don’t know about Bart Stupak’s opinions on health care
reform, though I’m sure you understand why I’m skeptical of the idea that he
was all gung-ho for it. Sure, he
voted for the final bill that he managed to amend, but he pretty much had to,
because he was selling the Stupak-Pitts amendment on the theory that he would
vote for a health care reform bill with such an amendment attached. It’s worth noting that Pitts did not
vote for the final bill, so he was amending a bill he had no intention of
supporting.
But if Stupak was sincere in his support for health care
reform while attacking women’s rights, he is what you might call a useful
idiot. As Pelosi explained, the
people really egging Stupak on were eager to kill the bill altogether. We don’t even need to surmise
this. They’re practically bragging
about it. Listen to Mitch
McConnell dissemble, but make it clear that he plans to kill the bill through
endless delays.
- health
care 2 *
People really don’t need this endless delaying. Once this bill is passed, it’s going to
take a long time for all of it to get implemented correctly, and so every day
that they stall is a day where people who are desperate for health care aren’t
getting it.
But even as Republican politicians dissemble while
expressing a desire to kill the bill, right wing pundits are waging all out
war. They will use anything to
wage war on health care reform, no matter how inappropriate, misleading, or
dishonest. For instance, right
wing pundits are making hay over the fact that Obama hasn’t managed to cure
swine flu yet, which they take as evidence that health care reform should be
jettisoned. Sean Hannity was up on
that rant.
- health
care 3 *
Like how he slipped in some paranoia about the detainees in
there? Like it’s not enough to
hold these people without trial or evidence, but now we have to take swipes at
their basic humanity?
Anyway, the point is that opponents of health care reform
have no shame. No shame at
all. The reason there’s a swine
flu vaccine shortage is because the private company that makes it wildly
underestimated how much they would need.
No telling why the manufacturers are dragging their feet, though it’s
worth wondering if the fact that vaccines aren’t profitable for pharmaceutical
companies might have something to do with that. But I’m just speculating. They may have just been ill-equipped to handle the amount of
vaccine they’d have to make, and bluffed about it to the government.
But if opponents of health care reform are willing to use
terrorism and swine flu, they’re sure going to be willing to use abortion to
stall health care reform. And
while I think many of the side benefits of the Stupak-Pitts amendment were also
appealing, such as stripping women of their already-existing coverage, at the
end of the day, I think Nancy Pelosi is right. This was always about stopping health care reform, by any
means necessary.
The good news is that Wanda Sykes has her own TV show now,
and she lays out the ridiculousness of this entire situation.
- health
care 4 *
**************
insert interview
**************
Sarah Palin, right wing nut and failed Vice Presidential
candidate, has decided not only to be a person who can’t take a hint and go
away, but someone who will grab that hint, crumple it into a ball, and wipe her
butt with it. It’s hard to miss
the Palin extravaganza that’s being rolled out because of her new book Going
Rogue. Full disclosure: I submitted a piece to the Nation’s new book
criticizing Palin called Going Rouge.
I won’t give it all away, but suffice it to say, I have some fun
imagining the thorn that Levi Johnston will be in Palin’s side as she
transitions from politician to her new status as somewhere between a reality
show contestant and an evangelical preacher.
Which is why I was gleeful when Palin went on Oprah’s show
and fielded a question about the soon to be Playgirl model and the father of
her daughter’s baby.
- palin
1 *
From what I understand, this is pretty much her
strategy. Deny that you’re going
to go on the low road so you can go on the low road pretending it’s the high
road. So deny that national TV is
a good place to talk about it, and then proceed to take a bunch of potshots at
this young man that’s become an uncontrollable thorn in your side. And have your dwindling followers
refuse to see what’s wrong with that.
It only promises to get better from here. Presumably, Palin wrote this memoir to
save her reputation as well as cash in.
I’m afraid that while she may make the money, her tour is really going
to backfire on the reputation front.
The less she talks, the more people can pretend she’s smart, and so a
whole book is going to do her in.
Already it’s been revealed that she’s a creationist. And of course, for those of us who
oppose her abstinence-only fundamentalist beliefs, this moment from the Barbara
Walters interview was full of win.
- palin
2 *
If you think about that statement for even a moment, you can
see why Palin and her abstinence-only ilk are not the people to put in charge
of educating the nation’s young about sexuality. You’re shocked that 17-year-old has sex? You’re devastated? While respecting that it’s not easy for
parents to adapt to their teenagers growing up, I have to say that people who
have a more realistic view of the world might be better equipped to put
together sex ed curriculum.
Shocked and devastated that human biology didn’t change when you had
kids isn’t really a good starting point.
Palin, of course, is staying in the spotlight in part
because she’s a hero to anti-choicers.
This is because she chose to have a baby after a Down’s diagnosis, and
therefore she believes others should not have that choice. Or any choice at all, no matter how
early in a pregnancy. People who
hold themselves as heroes like she does should realize that without choice, they
aren’t so special. They fade into
the background with the women who are forced to give birth against their
will. But logic has never been a
strong suit for the anti-choice movement, as you know.
If you want a full run-down of all the lies Palin tells in
her new memoir, and what the truth is, please check out Media Matters. Palin is pushing the thoroughly
discredited lie about how doctors kill babies they’ve already delivered, and they
have a thorough refutation.
Does Palin have a future as a politician? I’m skeptical. But I think David Brooks is going too
far here.
- palin
3 *
That is a man in deep denial. Leaning on Bob McDonnell, who
is on the record against women even having jobs, as some evidence that
Republicans are going to get serious now?
I’d like to think Brooks is joking, but honestly, he’s just
cracked. He wants to believe that
the Republicans are going to be able to kick the Christian right habit, and
he’s ignoring the fact that McDonnell is just as much a Bible thumper, if not
more so, than Palin. Seriously, I
can’t even believe we’re having this discussion.
**********
And now for the Wisdom of Wingnuts, minimizing rape while
kicking up hysteria edition. Glenn
Beck, in his search for new lows to reach down to, came up with this.
- glenn
beck*
I will point out that he, like many wingnuts, has a really
bad idea of how a metaphor works.
Within the space of 10 seconds, he moved the "American people" of his
imagination from the role of rape victim to role of rapist. Where are his sympathies again?