US POLITICS: AMERICANS, PLEASE WELCOME YOUR NEW PRESIDENT... SCOTT BROWN!

this abortion debate has "nothing to do w/ anybody's moral convictions"

um...

are you trying to say anything other than "abortion is currently legal"?

I'm pro-choice and have even helped out friends who have had abortions, but to say that anti-abortion stance is "unscientific" and thus invalid is pretty silly. The reasons pro-lifers don't like the idea of abortion aren't just limited to fundamentalist Christian dogma, you know.

so many Democrats, on the evidence, are keen to turn matters of medical science over to a popular vote.

give me a fucking break j0hn, this isn't what i was arguing and you know it. drive by bullshit like this is conduct unbecoming.

That said it's funny and characteristically ironic that the political stance that says "Keep government out of my health care!" the loudest is also the one that most wants government to tell women what they can or can't do with their bodies.

cept for them it's not an issue of what 'they can and can't do with their bodies' but it's a moral issue about murder

Given how no one purportedly reads the bills in their entirety, how hard would it be to sneak de facto abortion funding in (without actually mentioning the procedure)?

Yeah but why can't we trust the free market on this matter? I thought it was the shining beacon of capitalism even more important than democracy!

the politicians don't read it, other people do

give me a fucking break j0hn, this isn't what i was arguing and you know it. drive by bullshit like this is conduct unbecoming.

OK I get overtime pay for this but it's iatee who keeps making the "but people are against abortion!" argt like it should have any bearing on anything - it's a right, that's settled law, the end

Bill! http://rules.house.gov/bills_details.aspx?NewsID=4606

re: sneaking abortion coverage in, they could call it something like coverage for "removal of growths/tissue that significantly affect the health of the patient" and it can cover everything from tumors to fetuses, but no one would catch it's implications until it's passed?

I actually don't want them to do that. I want the issue moved forward. Sneaking coverage in is also ceding the larger issue. I don't know how people closer to the front lines than me feel about it. The general idea though is to discuss medical procedures in a frank and honest way - you give credence to the "abortion is shameful" ppl if you try to sneak it through.

on a different subject (OR IS IT) yglesias posts a map of the ideological positions of different occupations and their giving habits:

http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/occupationsBIG.jpeg

the republican map is fringier, narrower and more concentrated on its own end of the map. the democratic map is wider, shallower, and has a funny double peak, one in the left, one right on the center. fascinating shit.

so, wait, no occupations are to the right of car dealers??

wait, so which is more conservative, car dealers or oil/gas barons

yeah I don't get it - the rightwing is composed of nothing but car dealers and oil/gas employees? that doesn't seem right

is "being Rick Santorum" an occupation?

dunno! the categories are a little weird. i wanted to see clergy on there, but their clout is not $$ clout anyway, is it.

xps

america loves its cars

also, do they mean hedge fund managers or the actual hedge funds themselves, because that has frightening AI implications

Maybe the social conservatives are giving to churchy things and pressure groups instead?

here's the explanation

http://abonica.wordpress.com/2010/02/19/ideological-rankings-of-occupational-categories/

I'd be more interested to see that done w/ 2004

obama-2008 isn't really that representative of a normal political year

Christ the font on that PDF is hard to read.

http://docs.house.gov/rules/hr4872/111_hr4872_reported.pdf

Obamacare must really be as close to a done deal as possible, because The Corner is in full panic mode.

yep

bring it on, motherfuckers

cept for them it's not an issue of what 'they can and can't do with their bodies' but it's a moral issue about murder

Eh, it's not even that, because with a lot of these jokers, when you start asking them what the various jail terms or other penalties (fines? execution?) should be for women, doctors and other parties, they start hemming and hawing "Uh, er, um, well, you know, I don't mean THAT." It really is about controlling what women do.

"but people are against abortion!" argt like it should have any bearing on anything - it's a right, that's settled law, the end

Nothing is ever settled. We could have a Constitutional Convention or just enact amendments to the Constitution and let's not forget that slavery was inscribed into our very Constitution once, too. They think it's murder and legitimizes fornication. Oddly, medieval canon law is against them: murdering a pregnant woman was only one murder.

This is a good place to argue for states rights/Federalism: let Alabama and N. Dakota et al., criminalize abortion and see how many people wish to stay there. The only way to settle this is either civil war and all its subsequent rancor or putting real pressure on these states. You want subsidies to keep America obese? Stop telling my daughter/wife/sister/friend what she may or may not do with her own body while the fetus is not viable. Fight for your principles, by all means, but know that California, New York, etc., will receive all your gays and all your victims of patriarchy 'cause your're such flaming assholes.

Oddly, medieval canon law is against them: murdering a pregnant woman was only one murder

this isn't that odd given the lack of prenatal medical knowledge in medievel times (ie it would be hard to argue that a fetus was alive when you couldn't even really prove there was a viable fetus in there to begin with)

meanwhile, idiots say idiot thing, film at 11:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/18/iowa-congressman-and-glenn_n_504633.html

Glenn Beck and Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) expressed harmonized outrage on Beck's radio program Thursday about news that the House might vote on the health care reform package this Sunday. Voting on a Sunday, they said, was offensive and heretical.

for as we all know, Jesus never healed on a Sabbath....oh wait.

Yeah, and there was that whole 'Terri Schaivo' thing on Palm Sunday 2005, too, but never mind that.

ha that cheered me up. if we're down to that level of complaining the donks might have this in the bag.

You mean the Sabbath that was changed from Saturday to Sunday by that venal, worldly child molestery known as the Vatican?

*throws shit grenade. runs.*

lol @ "child molestery"

I mean, petty squabbly shit like that... Why not just say that you just piss on Jews and Muslims and SDAs and whatnot?

Glenn Beck and Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) expressed harmonized outrage on Beck's radio program Thursday about news that the House might vote on the health care reform package this Sunday. Voting on a Sunday, they said, was offensive and heretical.

genuine lolz

Nothing is ever settled.

lol liberals

Live from the Catskills, it's JOE THE BIDEN

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lNyMu2xuAMI

"poor women who can't afford to take care of more children" = covered by Medicaid, which hasn't covered abortions for years (despite the fact that these are exactly the people who can't cover even the nominal cost of an early-term abortion)

all the current hoo-ha is over the insurance exchanges, which will mainly cover the middle class

just want to be sure we know exactly which women are under discussion here, i.e. not poor ones

in that particular discussion it seems like there's two issues: the first is that state legislatures can simply ban any abortion coverage on their own exchange if they choose to. i think reid put this in to mollify nelson. the second is that if even if abortion coverage is allowed on a particular state's exchange, people wishing to be covered for abortions have to pay via a separate check.

the first issue - about the state's ability to ban abortion coverage for largely middle-class people on the insurance exchange - seems fraught with all kinds of federalist questions which i am not qualified to speak about. clearly i think it would be a bad idea for states to enact this kind of ban. apparently something like five states already ban abortion coverage completely?

and i feel j0hn on the second issue - about having to pay with a second check - even if you're not being subsidized! it's not burdensome or complicated, frankly, but there's something symbolic about it that i think may be new. at least i'm not aware of any "two checks" policy in any health insurance scheme to date.

wtf is that jesse jackson sat next to o'reilly in the biden clip??

It is, and at one point there's a distinct 'talk to the hand' move on Jackson's part.

j0hn d you sir are a hero

on a different note, i guess we can all be happy that bipartisan bullshit is back

whoops http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_immigration

harmonized outrage

There's something kind of non-substantive about a good percentage of arguments amongst lefty types these days. Like John D paraphrase: "it's a shame that D's aren't better about defending abortion rights." And I'm pretty sure no one disagreed that it's not some kind of shame, but that they just think its wrong/pointless to expect anything else of the politicians they support/tolerate? Or they just disagree with giving voice to this disappointment or something?

im having trouble gauging your stance on the matter so this isn't directed at you, but expressing regret doesnt cut it imo and it doesnt bode well for national-scale reproductive rights that more than half of the posters on this supposedly predominantly lefty board are so nonchalant about throwing the issue under the bus

I only ever skim this thread these days, but John D otm basically.

I normally try to empathize with pro-lifers just cuz you know, they're people too, but lately I've come to the conclusion that placating their "concerns" is extremely corrosive to the whole idea of reproductive rights. Abortion IS a medical issue---the right to which has been enshrined in law, and which is rooted in a woman's inalienable privilege to decide what happens to her body.

Like what is this two checks business? And what, really, is the rational, medical argument for leaving abortion out? What if a woman has a complicated pregnancy and the only way to manage it/save her life is to induce an abortion? Will her preterm coverage suddenly bottom out? Like, if she didn't even WANT the abortion?

This ought to be obv, but the question of abortion's actual ~medical~ utility was resolved ages ago.

all the "gov't can't tell you what to do with your body" rhetoric in the world has zero impact on ppl who think another fully human body is involved; I think everyone should've figured that out by now.

so what

the main issue is that the govt HAS said that you can do what you want with your body---it ought to be settled, but the left keeps conceding that ok maybe it isn't there ARE some yucky abortions that maybe we should curtail

and while I firmly believe abortion is a feminist issue, the fact that it is medical is somethin the left maybe doesn't emphasize enough? then tbh it's also something the med establishment soft peddles a bit too---the OB sites for my clinical rotations were listed with their abortion services, in case students didn't want to rotate thru such depraved dens of iniquity. wtf