Rights? What are you talking about?

Last week I posted a link to a debate about whether the Catholic Church is a force for good in the world. To me it's not a close call, but possibly the strongest argument in favor of the Catholic Church is the work it does for social justice: opposing war and the death penalty, supporting orphaned children, feeding the hungry, and the like. Why, they're so committed to social justice that they're pushing the health care reform bill in Congress, right?

Yes, with a big "but". They have supported health care legislation, but as we now know, they were willing to pull the plug on the whole thing without the Stupak amendment: no abortion for anyone who gets subsidized health insurance or health insurance through the public option or purchased through the insurance exchanges. And if the Congress wouldn't knuckle under to the bishops, no health care for anybody.

Now, an analysis by the George Washington University School of Public Health predicts that if the Stupak amendment becomes law it will affect not only women who receive insurance under the new law, but it will lead all insurance companies to drop abortion coverage.


"Under national health reform, millions of women, including women who are covered by small employers (as employees or spouses or dependents of employees) as well as those who are currently uninsured, will receive their coverage through health insurance exchanges. By barring the sale of subsidized products that cover medically indicated abortions as part of a broader package of benefits, the Amendment can be expected to cause the industry to re-design its offerings in order to avoid violating the legal restrictions on abortion applicable to exchange products that receive subsidies," said Professor Sara Rosenbaum, JD, lead author and Chair of the Department of Health Policy. "The Amendment also can be expected to chill efforts to develop supplemental coverage for medically indicated abortions, because it appears to prohibit the joint administration of both a basic and supplemental product," Rosenbaum noted.

Jeffry Toobin has an editorial about this issue in this week's New Yorker, and he has it exactly right. In a point that is often overlooked, he points out that the right to abortion is not simply a question of health care. "But, as Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg observed not long ago, abortion rights “center on a woman’s autonomy to determine her life’s course, and thus to enjoy equal citizenship stature.” Every diminishment of that right diminishes women. With stakes of such magnitude, it is wise to weigh carefully the difference between compromise and surrender."

Who else is supporting rights for women? Cosmopolitan. Yes, the "17 Tricks to Keep Your Man Begging for More" Cosmopolitan. In their current online version they are providing a link to a petition to support abortion rights for all women.

Don't think you're going to need an abortion, or don't think you're going to be relying on subsidized insurance? It still affects you, so sign the petition and push your legislators to get on board with this. The game is now in the Senate. 35% of all women are likely to need an abortion at some point in their lives. This issue is of vital importance for everyone.

When the Emperor Was Divine

When the Emperor Was Divine by Julie Otsuka


My rating: 2 of 5 stars
I read this for my book group, and we are discussing it on Wednesday, so it's possible my views will change. As it is, though, I wasn't impressed. Rather than being a real novel, tracing the lives and struggles of believable people, this book seemed to be essentially a didactic YA novel intended to illustrate what happened. I didn't see much of interest in the characters or their reactions to their experience.

I know that Vermont chose this as the Vermont Reads book this year. I question whether it makes sense to select what is essentially juvenile fiction to ask all the readers in the state to read and discuss. I just don't think there is enough to it for that.

View all my reviews >>

Mr. Deity and Death

Could be worse.

The Intelligence Squared Debate - Christopher Hitchens and Stephen Fry vs. The Catholics (Part 1/5)

The question is whether the Catholic Church is a force for good in the world. I would think it's a pretty easy question, but the two speakers on the "pro" side are so weak that it's even easier than it should be. Still, if you watch, you will probably agree with me that Hitch and Fry have the better of the argument.

Daniel Hauser is alive and cancer-free

Almost six months ago we posted here about Daniel Hauser, a teenager in Minnesota whose parents were trying to deny him the cancer treatment that might save his life. Fortunately for Daniel, a judge took custody of him, appointed a guardian, and required him to undergo the treatment.

Now that his treatment is finished, Danny's physicians reported that their tests show no evidence of the Hodgkin's lymphoma that was first diagnosed last winter, Zwakman said. Earlier, they had warned that the cancer probably would kill him if it went untreated.

Even the family appears to consider this good news:

"He's one happy boy now," family spokesman Dan Zwakman said. "His smile is back, his energy is back, and he may be out harvesting corn for the dairy cows this afternoon." Zwakman met with the family after Danny's final radiation treatment Friday at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis.

They appear to attribute his recovery not to the medical treatment he has received, but to dietary supplements and a strict diet. Still, we can all be glad that this boy's parents were not allowed to kill him.

The end of the world

Three big elections today. The governor's race in New Jersey. The governor's race in Virginia. A special election for House across the lake in New York. If you've been reading the press reports, you know what these elections mean, right?

Exactly. If the Democrats lose these elections it means that Obama is all washed up, the Democratic Party might as well close down and surrender, and the Republican Party is now on top again, probably permanently.

All from three data points.

This is obviously nonsense. We are looking at three different elections, with three different sets of issues and personalities, and at least three different sets of reasons for whoever wins winning.

Let's take Virginia first, since we already know that the Republican won there. Virginia is a traditionally Republican state, and last year was the first time a Democrat won the presidential vote there since 1964. Although he was looking to succeed a Democratic governor, Creigh Deeds apparently ran a weak campaign, and wasn't able to generate the kind of turnout that Obama generated just a year ago.

Former DNC Chairman Howard Dean told TPMDC that Deeds "just did not run the kind of campaign we'd all hoped for," in part because he was a surprise winner of the primary.

"He had a lot of ground to make up in terms of finances," Dean said.

So Deeds lost, but nobody is surprised by that.

Next, let's look at New Jersey, the state where I grew up. Democratic incumbent Jon Corzine is trailing challenger Chris Christie and the AP has called the race for Christie. Still, in this race that has been personally nasty, the outcome is much more likely to be determined by who voters dislike more, Corzine or Christie.

Finally, in the NY-23 House race, a three-person race has been reduced to a two-person race, with Republican Dede Scozzafava dropping out and throwing her support to Democrat Bill Owens, leaving the conservative field to Conservative Party nominee Doug Hoffman. This is a district that never elects Democrats, and might not elect one this time. What we see here in microcosm, though, is the meltdown of the Republican Party, and Dede Scozzafava the latest victim of the purge of the Republican Party by the right wing extremists. Whatever happens, it doesn't look like bad news for the Democrats.

One final note about what this means for Obama. Exit surveys have asked voters what they think of Obama's performance so far. In Virginia, 50% of the voters say they disapprove of Obama's performance and 49% saying they approve, so he's basically breaking even there. In New Jersey, underscoring the impression that the election is being decided on personalities, 58% of the voters say they approve of Obama's performance, and even 25% of them are voting against the Democratic incumbent.

So are today's elections a referendum on Obama's performance? Like other myths that have been retailed as conventional wisdom lately (read: the public has rejected the public option) this clearly appears to be false. Instead, what we see is that neither Creigh Deeds nor Jon Corzine had the unprecedented combination of personal appeal, campaign organization, and a historic move for change that Obama was able to generate to put them over the top.

Maybe it's premature to measure Obama for his coffin.

President Obama Signs Matthew Shepard Hate Crimes Bill Into Law

A great step by Obama, another promise kept.

And I can't help but ask: what are the odds McCain would have done this?

Tell me there's no difference.

Mr. Deity and the Identity Crisis

Confused about the Trinity idea? So are Mr. Deity and the Boy.

This is the best Scientology has?

This is rich. I don't know if I can think of another religion that tells its adherents to refuse to discuss the tenets of the religion, can you?

Handy Religion Chooser

As with so many great ideas, I got this from PZ Myers, who in turn got it from grrlscientist.

Where do you fit in?

Soupy Sales - "The Mouse"

Soupy Sales, 1926-2009.

Bill Maher makes Bill Frist look smart

How hard is that? Pretty hard, right?

A lot of people, liberals especially, get ideas from Bill Maher. In truth, he does have some good ideas, but much of what he says comes in a reactionary context.

His vaccine thing is an illustration of this point, and of how dangerous it is to let someone like him, without a well-formulated framework of thought, guide your own thinking.

Take this discussion on the H1N1 vaccine. It sounds appealing. Right now a lot of people are skeptical of the government, and of this particular vaccine, and not all of them are anti-vaxxers. But listen to what Maher says at just about 0:45 of this video. "I would never get a swine flu vaccine, or any other vaccine."

"Or any other vaccine."

He'd rather take his chance with measles, which used to cause hundreds of deaths per year in the United States before the vaccine was developed?

Or polio, which infected almost 60,000 people and killed more than 3,000 in the United States in 1952 alone? Or would he rather be one of the 440,000 people in the United States at risk of developing post-polio syndrome?

Or perhaps he'd rather be one of the 300-500 million people who died of smallpox in the 20th Century.

Or maybe he just figures that he won't get one of these diseases, and when he has kids he won't get one of them, so if it means he's subjecting other people to them, well that's just too bad.

There are always too many reasons to distrust government. So don't. Listen to the scientists, not the comedians.

Illegal anti-gay discrminiation

Slate has a piece this afternoon about how the New York City police continue to arrest people under an anti-cruising law that was voided as unconstitutional way back in 1983.

It's true. [I]n the 26 years of this law's odd posthumous career, district attorneys brought 4,750 prosecutions and judges convicted 2,550 defendants. For violating an imaginary law, these defendants paid a decidedly non-imaginary $70,000 in bail and $190,000 in court fees and fines. In the last 10 years, NYPD officers also issued 9,693 citations, forcing citizens to pay $71,000 in fees. The criminal records of these victims have never been expunged and the fees and fines have not been refunded.

The city was sued in a class action last year, and the NYPD brass told the police to cross out the relevant section in their copies of the Penal Code. Yet they're still arresting people.

This raises a couple of questions. First, what of the illegal conduct by public officials up and down the line, from beat cops up to the assistant district attorneys who prosecute those cases? How can an ADA justify signing a complaint alleging that the defendant violated a law that doesn't exist?

Odds on whether any of those ADA's have been brought up on ethics charges? My bet would be the same as yours: zero.



Another question that occurs to me, though, goes all the way out of New York to Minneapolis, and Senator Larry "Wide Stance" Craig. Sure, the crime he was charged with and convicted of was disorderly conduct, not cruising. Still, the essence of the crime was not hypocrisy, much as we wish it was, but looking for sex with another man.

If we are rightly outraged about what has happened to thousands in New York, what should we think about one confused senator from Idaho?

Local author makes good

My friend Kevin Brown has been working on a series of local mysteries for years. The first one is out, and today he got a nice write-up in the Times Argus about it.

History mystery

For Montpelier writer Kevin Macneil Brown, the abandoned roads, overgrown paths and historic waterways of New England offer up stories both real and imagined. The protagonist of his recently self-published mystery novel, "Compass, Water, Stone and Time," is historian and trail runner Liam Dutra. When an ancient, tattered journal comes his way, the quest for answers leads him to the surprising connections between an 1866 rebellion by Irish Republicans in Vermont and a series of present-day murders taking place in the shadows of nearby Irish Hill Ridge.

Brown has written articles exploring nature, history and outdoor adventure for New England magazines and newspapers. He also performs with the local country-rock band Rusty Romance.

His book is available at Bear Pond Books in Montpelier and other local stores.

Mr. Deity and the Science Advisor

Sure, "Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny" makes you sound smart, but so what?