I has opinions
Bravo to MSNBC for being the only real news station left. I already liked them for 1) actually giving relevant and well-rounded analysis of REAL NEWS and 2) hitting hard by not pussyfooting around tough questions. This just makes me like them even more:
Click to viewNow regardless of what you think about sex ed or who you're voting for, you can't deny that an education plan made to teach kids how to avoid predators is a really good idea. The ad is ridiculous, as is this man's defense of it-- what district in their right minds would go out of their way to twist it and start teaching pre-k kids how to put on condoms?
Although honestly I think sex ed needs to start at that age-- at my private school they started giving us picture books to take home and discuss with our parents starting in first grade. They showed how eggs become fertilized and how babies gestate using dogs and cats as examples, although they conveniently circumvented actually talking about sex. Knowing how babies are made is extremely important and far from inappropriate as far as I'm concerned, and since it had nothing to do with people sex or birth control, all the parents at my school supported it and participated. But I digress.
Here's Planned Parenthood's ballsy ad made in response to McCain's:
And here's some background about the bill, for anyone curious.
Here's the Defenders of Wildlife EXTREMELY ballsy ad attacking Sarah Palin for her support of aerial hunting, the pussiest sport known to man:
I don't know if anyone else read Julie of the Wolves when they were a kid, but I loved it. I must've read it a dozen times. So my comment is: NOOO AMAROQ, KAPUGEN YOU FUCKERRRRR.
And lastly, something that's been making my blood boil for the last few months since it emerged (very quietly) into the news. There's a proposal from the Bush administration that would allow individual health care groups to decide what they believe an abortion is. By that I mean, things like IUDs, the patch, the pill, the ring, etc. could all be defined as abortions and as such women's access to them could be restricted.
To make things even better, they're also looking to have government money support "pregnancy crisis centers" or, if you want to be more accurate, "pregnancy guilt centers." These are strict pro-life groups that reach out to poor, young, scared pregnant women and try to "help" them through their issues by guilt tripping them away from abortions and adoption by doing such wonderfully disgusting things as making them hold baby booties while they talk to them.
It's not much, but there is a 30-day comment period to let people say exactly what they think of this bullshit. You can submit a comment through Planned Parenthood here.
And before anyone tries to get on my ass for Planned Parenthood having an interest in getting women to have abortions, pregnancy crisis centers are often also against adoption and this HHS regulation would prevent access to MANY different kids of birth control that DO. NOT. CAUSE. MISCARRIAGES. There's really no defense of the methods of pregnancy crisis centers, or of purposefully inserting politics into basic health care.
So anyway, I uh, I'm just scared shitless of the kinds of things that are coming about in America. It's almost like someone out there is actively trying to make the world a worse place. And what scares me most is that people routinely buy into it and vote against their own self interests all the time.
Cut so that I don't put a huuuge entry on everyone's f-list, particularly because I'm not sure how many people actually agree with me on these issues and there are few things I hate more than having to wade through other people's political upchuck to get to other stuff on a page when I don't feel like getting morally outraged.
A summary:
-MSNBC rocks-- see a Democratic strategist with a backbone lay some shit down. Aww yeah.
-Planned Parenthood sets the sex ed record straight.
-The Defenders of Wildlife attack Palin's history of supporting the pussiest form of hunting ever with government money. Plus the page to donate and get their ad played in more cities.
-Help get your voice heard on the proposed Health and Human Services regulation that would allow individual health care providers to define abortion (letting IUDs and birth control pills, among other things, to be considered abortions) AND give government money to "pregnancy crisis centers" whose goal is to eliminate adoption and abortion through emotional manipulation of pregnant women.