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By David Edwards
Thursday, February 9, 2012 10:37 EST
Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum warned on Wednesday that President Barack Obama and other liberals are leading people of faith down a path that ends at the guillotine.
During a campaign event in Plano, Texas, the candidate charged Obama had an “overt hostility to faith.”
“When you look and see what the left is trying to do in America today, progressives are trying to shutter faith, privatize it, push it out of the public square, oppress people of faith, strip their charitable deductions away from them, trying to weaken them, churches — trying to say that anyone who believes in the value of Judeo-Christian principles,” Santorum explained.
“As we saw in the Ninth Circuit just this week, that if you believe that [same sex marriage is wrong] — this is what the court said — that if believe that, if believe what’s taught in Genesis, if you believe what’s practiced Biblically and a generation since then you are irrational. The only possible reason you could believe this, according to the Ninth Circuit, is that you are a bigot and that you are a hater.”
He continued: “They are taking faith and crushing it. Why? When you marginalize faith in America, when you remove the pillar of God-given rights then what’s left is the French Revolution. What’s left is a government that gives you rights. What’s left are no unalienable rights. What’s left is a government that will tell you who you are, what you’ll do and when you’ll do it. What’s left in France became the the guillotine.”
Santorum admitted that the U.S. was “a long way from that,” but if Obama had his way then “we are headed down that road,” citing the Obama administration’s decision to require nearly all private health insurance policies to cover family planning, including female contraceptives.
“Now is the time for America to rise up and say enough!” the GOP hopeful exclaimed.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/02/09/santorum-obama-leading-christians-to-the-guillotine/
Watch this video from CNN, broadcast Feb. 7, 2012
"Why is this Guy always claiming that the other side is doing what his Party is Guilty Of???"By David Edwards
Thursday, February 9, 2012 10:37 EST
Republican presidential... more
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The individual mandate was always a bad idea. Instead of recognizing that healthcare is a right, the members of Congress and the Obama administration who cobbled together the healthcare reform plan created a mandate that maintains the abuses and the expenses of for-profit insurance companies—and actually rewards those insurance companies with a guarantee of federal money.
Those who think that the for-profit (or even not-for-profit) insurance industry has to control any healthcare reform initiative have every right to be upset with the 11th Circuit’s ruling—which almost certainly will send the case of the Obama healthcare plan to the US Supreme Court.
But those of us who have no desire to perpetuate the insurance industry can and should recognize that the proper—and entirely constitutional—reform is an expansion of Medicare to cover all Americans.
There is no question that Medicare is a sound and popular program. (Just ask House Budget Committee chair Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin, who took an epic political beating when he proposed a scheme to replace the successful single-payer system with a voucher scheme designed to enrich insurance firms.)
While Medicare is exceptionally popular, polling shows that the individual mandate is not—according to recent surveys, roughly 60 percent of Americans oppose it.
It also passes constitutional muster.
As former Labor Secretary Robert Reich notes: [No] federal judge has struck down Social Security or Medicare as being an unconstitutional requirement that Americans buy something. Social Security and Medicare aren’t broccoli or asparagus. They’re as American as hot dogs and apple pie.”
“So if the individual mandate to buy private health insurance gets struck down by the Supreme Court or killed off by Congress, “ says Reich, “I’d recommend President Obama immediately propose what he should have proposed in the beginning — universal health care based on Medicare for all, financed by payroll taxes.”
The insurance companies would, of course, scream.
But let them complain.
Americans don’t need mandates. They need healthcare.
http://www.thenation.com/blog/162765/can-we-have-health-reform-without-individual-mandate-yes-its-called-medicare-allThe individual mandate was always a bad idea. Instead of recognizing that healthcare... more
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"Last year, political neophyte Rick Scott spent $73 million of his own money to bring the tea party's anti-government, pro-privatization agenda to the Florida governor's office. Today, the former executive pays just $30 a month for health care—and lets taxpayers cover the rest.
The governor, a proud bearer of the Republican Party's deregulation standard, has spent his first half-year in office decrying government waste: He's laid off thousands of Sunshine State employees, slashed their benefits, turned down (most of) the federal government's health care dollars, and put extra financial pressure on Florida retirees and Medicaid recipients. But Scott and his dependents pay one-fifth what a janitor in the state Capitol pays for health insurance…and less than 3 percent of what a retired state trooper pays for life-saving coverage."
(continues)
http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/08/rick-scott-pays-360-year-state-health-insurance"Last year, political neophyte Rick Scott spent $73 million of his own money to... more
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The Obama administration has declared that health insurers must cover birth control with no copays, as part of an expansion for women's preventative care. Breast pumps for nursing mothers, well-woman physicals, and counseling on domestic violence also must be covered with no copays. The new requirements will take effect on Jan 1, 2013.The Obama administration has declared that health insurers must cover birth control... more
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A report for the Institute of Medicine has recommended that birth control, sterilization and reproductive education be completely covered with no cost to patients under the health care reform law. In addition to these services, which help women avoid unwanted pregnancies and space births, the group also recommended covering HIV testing, breastfeeding support and well-woman visits for preventive care.A report for the Institute of Medicine has recommended that birth control,... more
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We're taking a daily look at some of the most popular stories from the Current community, and we've rounded up some highlights to share. Check them out and add your two cents:
Climate change bringing infection, hunger and illnessSubmitted by JanforGore
Climate change is affecting the environment -- but it could also have affects on our health, with an increase in infectious diseases, worsening existing illlnesses and causing hunger and political unrest.
The health of all humans is directly tied to how we, as communities, nations, and a global population, respond to the growing climate threat, says Ferber, a science journalist and Epstein, Associate Director of the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School.
Obama seeks more drilling in Alaska and Gulf of MexicoSubmitted by KB723
Under pressure to lower gas prices, President Obama announced new plans to expland domestic oil production in Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico.
The president, a Democrat, has pushed for reducing U.S. oil consumption and expanding renewable energy sources while also encouraging domestic oil and gas production -- an area Republicans want to expand dramatically.
In his weekly radio and Internet address, the president met some of those Republican demands, outlining ways to boost domestic drilling and streamline the process of issuing permits in Alaska.
Health Insurers Making Record Profits as Many Postpone Care! Corporate tyranny anyone?Submitted by kennymotown
Health insurance companies are heading into a third year of record profits as Americans facing tough economic times postpone medical care, or go without.
Yet the companies continue to press for higher premiums, even though their reserve coffers are flush with profits and shareholders have been rewarded with new dividends. Many defend proposed double-digit increases in the rates they charge, citing a need for protection against any sudden uptick in demand once people have more money to spend on their health, as well as the rising price of care.
Join the discussion -- or head over to the News group for more popular stories from the community.We're taking a daily look at some of the most popular stories from the... more
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By Lindsay Beyerstein, Media Consortium blogger
The Vermont state Senate passed legislation to create a single-payer health insurance system, Paul Waldman reports for TAPPED. Since the state House has already passed a similar bill, all that’s left to do is reconcile the two pieces of legislation before the governor signs it into law.
Waldman stresses that there are still many details to work out, including how the system will be funded. Vermont might end up with a system like France’s where everyone has basic public insurance, which most people supplement with additional private coverage. The most important thing, Waldman argues, is that Vermont is moving to sever the link between employment and health insurance.
Roe showdown
Anti-choicers are gunning for a Roe v. Wade showdown in the Supreme Court before Obama can appoint any more justices. At the behest of an unnamed conservative group, Republican state Rep. John LaBruzzo of Louisiana has introduced a bill that would ban all abortions, even to save the woman’s life. The original bill upped the anti-choice ante by criminalizing not only doctors who perform abortions, but also women who procure them. LaBruzzo has since promised to scale the bill back to just criminalizing doctors. This is all blatantly unconstitutional, of course,. but as Kate Sheppard explains in Mother Jones, that’s precisely the point:
The Constitution, of course, is exactly what LaBruzzo is targeting. He admits his proposal is intended as a direct challenge to Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 case in which the Supreme Court ruled that the constitutional right to privacy included the right to abortions in some circumstances. LaBruzzo says he’d like his bill to become law and “immediately go to court,” and he told a local paper that an unnamed conservative religious group asked him to propose the law for exactly that purpose.
Drug pushers in your living room
Martha Rosenberg poses a provocative question at AlterNet: Does anyone remember a time before “Ask Your Doctor” ads overran the airwaves, Internet, buses, billboards, and seemingly every other medium? Direct-to-consumer (DTC) drug advertising has become so ubiquitous that it’s easy to forget that it was illegal until the late ’90s. In the days before DTC, drug advertising was limited to medical journals, prescription pads, golf towels, and pill-shaped stress balls distributed in doctors’ offices–which makes sense. The whole point of making a drug prescription-only is to put the decision-making power in the hands of doctors. Now, drug companies advertise to consumers for the same reason that food companies advertise to children. It’s called “pester power.”
DTC drug ads encourage consumers to self-diagnose based on vague and sometimes nearly universal symptoms like poor sleep, daytime drowsiness, anxiety, and depression. Once consumers are convinced they’re suffering from industry-hyped constructs like “erectile dysfunction” and “premenstrual dysphoric disorder,” they’re going to badger their doctors for prescriptions.
That’s not to say that these terms don’t encompass legitimate health problems, but rather that DTC markets products in such vague terms that a lot of healthy people are sure to be clamoring for drugs they don’t need. Typically, neither the patient nor the doctor is paying the full cost of the drug, so patients are more likely to ask and doctors have little incentive to say no.
Greenwashing air fresheners
A reader seeks the counsel of Grist’s earthy advice columnist Umbra on the issue of air fresheners. Some of these odor-concealing aerosols are touting themselves as green for adopting all-natural propellants. Does that make them healthier, or greener? Only marginally, says Umbra. Air fresheners still contain formaldehyde, petroleum distillates, and other questionable chemicals.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about health care by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Pulse for a complete list of articles on health care reform, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, environment, health care and immigration issues, check out The Audit, The Mulch, and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.By Lindsay Beyerstein, Media Consortium blogger
The Vermont state Senate passed... more
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By Lindsay Beyerstein, Media Consortium blogger
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5z7FiBsR8OQ[/youtube]
How will the next generation of seniors pay for health care if Republicans privatize Medicare? The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) suggests some options in a darkly funny ad featuring a grandfatherly gentleman mowing lawns and stripping for extra cash. The ad will run in 24 GOP-controlled swing districts, Suzy Khimm reports for Mother Jones.
The ad is a riposte to Paul Ryan’s budget, which would eliminate Medicare and replace it with a system of “premium support”–annual lump sum cash payments to insurers. These payments would be pegged to the growth of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) +1%, even though health care costs are growing much faster than the economy at large. That means that real benefits will shrink over time. Seniors will be forced to come up with extra money to buy insurance, assuming they can find an insurer who’s willing to sell it to them.
Josh Holland of AlterNet predicts that the GOP is committing political suicide with the its anti-Medicare budget. The more ordinary voters learn about Ryan’s budget, the less they like it:
A poll conducted last week found that, “when voters learn almost anything about [the Ryan plan], they turn sharply and intensely against it.” And why wouldn’t they? According to an analysis by the non-partisan Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), the Republicans’ “roadmap” would “end most of government other than Social Security, health care, and defense by 2050,” while providing the “largest tax cuts in history” for the wealthy.
Holland interviews an economist who estimates that the Medicaid cuts in the Ryan budget alone would cost 2.1 million jobs.
Under the bus
The Democratic spin about the deal to avert a budget shutdown was that Democratic leaders held fast against Republican demands to defund Planned Parenthood. However, as Katha Pollitt explains in The Nation, the Democrats capitulated on other reproductive rights issues in order to save Planned Parenthood.
For example, under the budget deal, Washington, D.C. will no longer be allowed to use local taxes to pay for abortions. Democrats also agreed to $17 million in cuts to the Title X Family Planning Program, Planned Parenthood’s largest source of federal funding.
American women aren’t alone under the bus. Jane Roberts notes at RH Reality Check that the budget deal slashed $15 million from the U.N. Population Fund, and millions more from USAID’s budget for reproductive health and family planning. At least Democrats successfully rebuffed GOP demands to eliminate funding for the United Nations Population Agency.
Roberts observes:
And this is at a time when the whole world is coalescing behind the education, health and human rights of the world’s women and girls. What irony!
Blood for oil
Nearing the one-year anniversary of the explosion aboard the Deepwater Horizon oil rig that killed 11 workers, Daniel J. Weiss writes for Grist:
The toll of fossil fuels on human health and the environment is well documented. But our dependence on fossil fuels exacts a very high price on the people who extract or process these fuels. Every year, some men and women who toil in our nation’s coal mines, natural gas fields, and oil rigs and refineries lose their lives or suffer from major injuries to provide the fossil fuels that drive our economy.
Oil rigs are just one of many dangerous places to work in the fossil fuel industry, Weiss notes. Last year, an explosion at the Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia killed 29 workers. Nearly 4,000 U.S. miners have been killed on the job since 1968.
Natural gas has a cleaner image than coal, but natural gas pipelines are also plagued by high rates of death and injury–892 natural gas workers have been killed on the job and 6,258 have been injured since 1970.
Cheers!
Ashley Hunter of Campus Progress brings you an exciting roundup of the news you need about college and alcohol, just in time for Spring Break. In an attempt to discourage rowdy off-campus partying, the College of the Holy Cross is encouraging its students to drink on campus by keeping the campus pub open later and allowing students under 21 inside as long as they wear different colored wrist bands to show they are too young to be served alcohol.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about health care by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Pulse for a complete list of articles on health care reform, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, environment, health care and immigration issues, check out The Audit, The Mulch, and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.By Lindsay Beyerstein, Media Consortium blogger... more
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In traditionally insidious fashion, the christian right "preys" upon and exploits their loyal congregations. Would poor christians not have to be brainwashed to oppose universal health care which all people would benefit from? Can the wealthier "self professed" christian right truly be christians, when they oppose universal health care which would take care of all the poor's medical needs? To oppose caring for the poor is a very "UNCHRISTIAN" policy! In the following solicitation by Christian Care Ministry, @ Medi Care. org, the blood thirsty and sucking true nature of the christian corporatocracy is revealed in it's most parasitic form, right down to the indoctrination that those with the clinically declared "diseases" of addictions, should not be afforded medical care; another very "UNCHRISTIAN" policy.
"With options to fit every budget, and even an incentive available for our healthier participants"..., Medi-Share is for Christians who want their healthcare dollars to help fellow believers who are living the same lifestyles they are, based on biblical principles and service to others.... Christian Care Ministry is a not-for-profit ministry where the members make the rules---and their dollars don’t support unbiblical choices such as abortion, or drug or alcohol abuse.
Medi-Share is NOT INSURANCE. Health insurance comes with a contractual guarantee to pay your medical bills. For over 17 years our participants have been faithfully sharing medical bills on a non-guaranteed basis, trusting the Lord..."
http://mychristiancare.org/medi-share/
The preying upon vulnerable minds is particularly pronounced by the admission that Medi-Share does not come "with a contractural gurantee to pay you medical bills.". Again, is it any wonder christian corporatocracy has gone to such lengths to rally their congregations in the very unchristian opposition to healthcare reform? It's REALLY BIG BUSINESS for them!!!In traditionally insidious fashion, the christian right "preys" upon and... more
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Last week, House Budget Committee literally approved the end of Medicare as guaranteed affordable comprehensive health insurance for every retired American. The full House is expected to follow suit this week.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MQID6sV6m0&feature=player_embeddedLast week, House Budget Committee literally approved the end of Medicare as guaranteed... more
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By Lindsay Beyerstein, Media Consortium blogger
Vermont is poised to abolish most forms of private health insurance, Lauren Else reports for In These Times. The state’s newly inaugurated Democratic governor, Peter Shumlin, unveiled his health insurance plan in early February. If the state legislature passes the bill, Vermont will become the first state to ban most forms of private health insurance.
The bill is getting support from some unlikely quarters:
On February 24, the Republican Mayor Christopher Louras, of Rutland, urged the state to adopt the single-payer legislation, noting that more than a third of the city’s $7 million annual payroll is consumed by healthcare costs. “The only way to fix the problem is to blow it up and start over,” Louras said.
A very bad doctor
In the Texas Observer, Saul Elbein tells the bizarre story of small-town huckster Dr. Rolando Arafiles and the nurses who exposed him as a quack and paid with their jobs.
Arafiles came to work at Winkler County Memorial Hospital in 2008. Nurses Anne Mitchell and Vickilyn Galle noticed that patients were walking out of his office with mysterious liquids. Arafiles was selling untested dietary supplements.
Sometimes, he even took patients off their real medicine and directed them to buy his cure-alls, which he sold online, and promoted in seminars at the local Pizza Hut. He prescribed powerful thyroid-stimulating drugs to patients with normal thyroid levels, a potentially lethal practice. He was also performing “unconventional” surgeries, even though he wasn’t a surgeon.
The hospital ignored the nurses’ complaints, so they reported Arafiles to the Texas Medical Board. After the board informed Arafiles that he was under investigation, Arafiles got his golf buddy, the local sheriff, to issue a warrant to search the nurses’ computers. The hospital fired the nurses. The local prosecutor indicted them for “misuse of official information” but these charges fizzled out. In 2010, the two women were awarded $750,000 in compensation from the county, but they still haven’t found new nursing jobs.
What are they doing out there?
Lon Newman is the executive director of Family Planning Health Services, a Wisconsin health clinic that offers birth control and other reproductive health care, but doesn’t provide abortions, or even abortion referrals. Anti-choice protesters picket the clinic anyway, Newman reports at RH Reality Check. They carry signs with misleading slogans like “The Pill Kills” and “Stop Chemical Abortion.”
Newman wonders why, given all the pressing problems in Wisconsin, the nation, and the world, some people make it a priority to hang out at Family Planning Health Services and badmouth birth control:
There are so many struggles for freedom, social justice, and disaster relief right now, that I do not think it is justifiable to be blocking access to health care for our uninsured neighbors who want to delay childbearing so they can finish school or take a new job or even wait to have children until they can afford them.
South Dakota institutes 72-hour abortion waiting period
The governor of South Dakota signed legislation this week that will force women seeking abortions in the state to observe a 72-hour waiting period. As Scott Lemieux argues in TAPPED, mandatory waiting period legislation is based on inherently sexist assumptions. By instituting a waiting period, the state is institutionalizing the stereotype that women seeking abortions are acting irrationally and must be coerced into waiting.
Body positive
Body hatred hasn’t been this popular since the days of the hair shirt. Hundreds of millions of women, and no shortage of men, spend billions of hours and billions of dollars despising their bodies. A new movement is afoot to find the political in this very personal issue, Sarah Seltzer reports in AlterNet. This year, the Women’s Therapy Center Institute will hold a series of summits in New York, London, Sao Paulo, Buenos Aires, and Melbourne. In keeping with the theme of “Loved Bodies, Big Ideas” participants are discussing a range of ideas for helping to improve body image, including a so-called “reality stamp,” a seal of approval that would indicate that a photograph hasn’t been digitally altered beyond the bounds of reason. Come to think of it, a “reality stamp” could be useful for all kinds of politics.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about health care by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Pulse for a complete list of articles on health care reform, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, environment, health care and immigration issues, check out The Audit, The Mulch, and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.By Lindsay Beyerstein, Media Consortium blogger
Vermont is poised to abolish most... more
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If Congress thought it could eliminate Planned Parenthood's federal funding without hearing about it from Erin Gibson, then they don't know much about the feisty Texan. infoMania's "Modern Lady" correspondent takes on Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN), Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ) and their media mouthpieces for messing with an organization that provides women with affordable access to everything from contraception to cervical cancer screenings to great donuts. Please forward this video to your local Congressman. Or Congresslady - sorry, Erin!
For good reason, no woman has ever had the balls, moxie or delusion to claim the title of "the world's premiere basic cable expert on lady stuff."
Until now.
Meet Erin Gibson. She's freakishly tall, sort of smart, and willing to do just about anything to get a bemused chuckle.
Her segment, Modern Lady, on infoMania, is dedicated to reporting and commenting on what's happening on Planet Lady.*
*The asterisk next to "Planet Lady" is actually a typo.
For more Erin visit: http://current.com/shows/infomania/modern-lady/ and Current TV
infoMania is a half-hour comedy show that airs weekly on Current TV. Picture the ultimate office water-cooler, only with funnier co-workers who willingly stay up late imbibing all forms of media so you don't have to. Caveat: Bring your own water. Hosted by Brett Erlich and co-starring Sergio Cilli, Erin Gibson, Ben Hoffman and Bryan Safi, infoMania airs on Thursdays at 11/10c on Current TV.
Go to http://current.com/infomania for more, and make sure to check out our Facebook profile for special features at http://facebook.com/infomania.
Current Media, the Peabody-and Emmy Award-winning television and online network founded in 2005 by Al Gore and Joel Hyatt, engages viewers with smart, provocative and timely programming -stories that no one else is telling in ways that no one else is telling them. Current's programming shines a light where others won't dare and boldly explores important subjects -- opening minds, sparking conversations and forming deep connections with its viewers. The channel's audience is comprised of affluent, curious, social and connected adults who crave the kind of entertaining, enlightening, witty and informative programming found on Current's TV and online properties. Current is now available via cable and satellite TV in 75 million households worldwide - 60 million households in the US - through distribution partners Comcast (Channel 107); Time Warner ; DirecTV (Channel 358 nationwide); Dish Network (Channel 196 nationwide); Verizon and AT&T. In the UK and Ireland, Current is available on BSkyB (Channel 183) and Virgin Media (Channel 155), and in Italy, Current is available on Sky Italia (Channel 130). Viewers can also find Current online at www.current.com.If Congress thought it could eliminate Planned Parenthood's federal funding... more
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Need a Purchase, Refinance, or Home Equity Mortgage? View & Analysis current interest rates for a variety of mortgage products, and learn how Todaymortgage can help you reach your financing goals. Search low mortgage rates on home loans from our network of accredited lenders. All the information and advice you'll need to find the best mortgage with the lowest interest rate even if you're a first-time buyer or have credit problemsNeed a Purchase, Refinance, or Home Equity Mortgage? View & Analysis current... more
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By Lindsay Beyerstein, Media Consortium blogger
The South Dakota House of Representatives will soon vote on a bill that would expand the definition of justifiable homicide to include killing to protect the life of a fetus. The plain language of the bill would appear to legalize the murder of abortion providers for performing legal abortions on women who request them.
Kate Sheppard explains in Mother Jones:
The bill, sponsored by state Rep. Phil Jensen, a committed foe of abortion rights, alters the state’s legal definition of justifiable homicide by adding language stating that a homicide is permissible if committed by a person “while resisting an attempt to harm” that person’s unborn child or the unborn child of that person’s spouse, partner, parent, or child. If the bill passes, it could in theory allow a woman’s father, mother, son, daughter, or husband to kill anyone who tried to provide that woman an abortion—even if she wanted one.
“The bill in South Dakota is an invitation to murder abortion providers,” Vicki Saporta, the president of the National Abortion Foundation told Mother Jones.
The bill’s sponsor, Rep. Phil Jensen, vehemently denies that his bill would legalize the murder of abortion doctors, Sheppard reports in a follow-up post. Jensen did not return Mother Jones’s calls for comment before the original story ran, but he now claims that he simply wants to update the state’s fetal homicide legislation.
Jensen’s stated intent is irrelevant, however. The plain language of his bill expands the category of “justifiable homicide” to protect certain people who kill to save a fetus.
There is no question that many radical anti-choicers will interpret this legislation as a license to kill. If this bill becomes law, it is only a matter of time before one of these terrorists travels to South Dakota to test that interpretation.
As Jodi Jacobson of RH Reality Check notes, the bill codifies the same legal argument that anti-choice terrorist Scott Roeder deployed unsuccessfully at his trial for the assassination of the prominent late-term abortion provider and pro-choice activist Dr. George Tiller. Technically, the bill would only protect people who killed to “protect” a fetus being carried by their partner or family member, not strangers like Roeder who killed to “protect” fetuses in general, but the veiled threat to abortion providers is clear.
The bill cleared the legislature’s judiciary committee by a party-line vote of 9-3. The legislation is co-sponsored by 22 state legislators and 4 state senators. The full state house is scheduled to vote on the bill on Wednesday.
Steve Benen of the Washington Monthly sees the legislation as a sign of a “radical turn” in the culture war.
“Birth or Die Act” advances
Meanwhile, at the federal level, the anti-choice bill H.R. 358 passed the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Miriam Perez reports for Feministing. H.R. 358 is controversial on two fronts. First, it appears to create an opening for hospitals to refuse abortion care and abortion referrals, even when a woman’s life is at risk. Second, the bill would effectively end private insurance coverage for abortion as we know it.
Fruitwashing
You’ve heard of “greenwashing,” the marketing trend where companies repackage their old polluting inventory as planet-healthy products? The latest corporate marketing gambit is to convince consumers that sugar, starch, and red food dye are good for us, a process dubbed “fruitwashing,” by Brie Cadman of change.org.
Cadman takes food giant Kellogg’s to task for touting the “real fruit” in its frosted mini Pop Tarts, now available in 100-calorie packs. Of course, these rosy toaster pastries contain only a minuscule amount of fruit.
Kellogg’s is a repeat offender when it comes to fruitwashing. The box of the company’s Frosted Mini Wheats Blueberry Muffin cereal features photos of real blueberries, but the actual “blueberry crunchlets” in the box are made of sugar, soybean oil, red dye #40 and blue dye #2.
Play with your food
In an article called “Why Playing With Your Food is Serious Business,” Carol Deppe of Grist argues that processed fare is driving us to overeat by cheating us out of our instinctive drive to interact with our foods before we eat them:
I also tend to overeat the delicious bean soup on that day I effortlessly thawed a portion from the freezer, compared with the day that I made the soup from scratch myself. The act of preparing food seems to actually be one of my satiety mechanisms. That is, to avoid overeating, to feel satisfied with normal, healthful amounts of food, I have to play with my food.
A highly processed diet enables us to practically inhale our calories, leaving us unsatisfied.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about health care by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Pulse for a complete list of articles on health care reform, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, environment, health care and immigration issues, check out The Audit, The Mulch, and The Diaspora. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.By Lindsay Beyerstein, Media Consortium blogger
The South Dakota House of... more
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Elliott Gould warns us not to believe the myths about single payer health care. “Single payer is no more socialized medicine than the police department is socialized crime fighting,” he says. California OneCare is publicly financed, privately delivered health care, and poll after poll has shown that not only do doctors and nurses want it, but so do two-thirds of the people.Elliott Gould warns us not to believe the myths about single payer health care.... more
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Ed Asner explains what your health care premiums pay for–and a lot of it’s not health care. About 30% goes to paperwork, advertising, lobbyists, obscene executive salaries, and profiteering. That’s why we need single payer, California OneCare.Ed Asner explains what your health care premiums pay for–and a lot of it’s... more
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www.facebook.com/AmericansforHealthcare
AMERICANS FOR HEALTHCARE
"Equal access to affordable quality healthcare for all Americans"
AMERICANS FOR HEALTHCARE (AFH) is a HEALTHCARE RIGHTS MOVEMENT by the
people and for the people to attain healthcare justice for all Americans. AFH is a nonpartisan
movement of WE THE PEOPLE who are citizens of the United States of America.
AFH clearly recognizes and appreciates the value in all of the solutions that are being
proposed to solve our common goal of achieving affordable quality healthcare for all
Americans. Our movement is nationwide. AFH seeks the active involvement of every
American citizen in our people's movement for healthcare rights.
AFH will accomplish our mission by:
• Uniting tens of millions of Americans, including healthcare professionals and
informed and caring citizens, around our people's movement for equal access to
affordable quality healthcare for all Americans.
• Gaining national media exposure from galvanizing national public sentiment stemming
from the moral outrage of the collective voices of tens of millions of Americans.
• Achieving our goals, AFH will massively, peacefully and lawfully assemble at the
National Mall, in Washington D.C. With the support of tens of millions of Americans,
AFH will be invited into Congressional legislative meetings in order to collaborate on
further comprehensive reform initiatives and build upon current healthcare reform
laws.
• Influencing Congress by withholding our votes from all politicians who do not support
the collective will of our grassroots people's movement for healthcare rights and
justice for all Americans.
"United we Stand; Divided we Fall. “
Americans for Healthcare LIKE OUR PAGE.... affordable, accessible, quality healthcare for all Americans. We are ready for some healthcare justice. We are seeking committed volunteers, please commit 10 or more hours a week to helping us achieve our mission. An Americans for Healthcare Volunteer application can be completed at: http://tinyurl.com/4hxtkoa
WEBSITE IS NEARLY COMPLETE!www.facebook.com/AmericansforHealthcare
AMERICANS FOR HEALTHCARE
"Equal access... more
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Be a vegetarian,avoid fast/Junk Food,eat two meals and a heavy breakfast and have a good sleep.
Eschew Tobacco, Drinks and intoxicants,Be a vegetarian,avoid fast/Junk Food,eat two meals and a heavy breakfast and have a... more
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As any health administrator knows, health insurance is central to the American health care system. Health insurance, though, has been a politically charged topic for decades. Efforts to overthrow the current health insurance system in the U.S. have met with failure; even the health care reform legislation passed in 2010 doesn’t end the health insurance system as Americans know it. There are changes to the way health insurance companies do things, but nothing to dramatically alter the way the system functions. And, of course, there is a fight underway to repeal the health care reform bill.
link:http://onlinemha.com/2011/the-history-of-health-insurance-in-america-the-ultimate-web-guide/As any health administrator knows, health insurance is central to the American health... more
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