Saturday, March 26th, 2016
Adam Gopnik, Staff Writer - The New Yorker
Stephan: On a number of occasions I have written about my sense that we are living in the late Roman Republic, because once again hubris, greed, imperialism, and corruption are destroying the very essence of the state.
Here is a well-written essay that discusses this in a very visceral way.
Now that we are in possession of an honest-to-God demagogue on the classical model, old portents of doom seem pertinent.
Credit: Stefano Dal Pozzolo/contrasto/Redux
The Roman Forum is—along with the Parthenon and the Egyptian pyramids—one of the mandatory sites for reflection on the passing of great powers, the impotence of architectural grandeur, and, these days, on the windfall profiteering of cold soda in places that attract mass tourism. Having come to spend a few days in Rome—for a book festival, the modern author’s equivalent of those pilgrimages that set ancient authors travelling from one marvel to the next—I found myself wandering through the nicely cleaned-up archeological site and brooding. It remains one of the most powerfully empathetic activities a New Yorker can engage in. It’s so exactly like walking through the future ruins of the corner of Fiftieth and Fifth: instead of the Basilica of Maxentius, the Temple of Saturn, and the […]
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Saturday, March 26th, 2016
DAVE PHILIPPS, - The New York Times
Stephan: Increasingly when I run these stories about the reality of Republican governance, I come away feeling I need to take a shower. There is a scumminess, a nastiness to so much of it. North Carolina where a rural black child has less of a chance of reaching their first birthday than a child born in Botswana in Africa, has a legislature that has no time for that, but calls a special session for hate. They are obsessed with where people go to the bathroom. It's really quite creepy. Here's the story.
And notice this: these same creepy people who bray endlessly about supporting small government, when it comes down to it, become moral dictators intruding into the smallest details of people's lives, imposing their psychoses on local government.
Think about it: a transgender man for all intents a woman goes into the women's toilet, a multi-stall bathroom, goes into a stall and closes the door. How would the other women know what was between her legs? Or a transgender woman comes into the bathroom, goes into a stall and closes the door. Would I personally have knowledge of her lack of a penis? This transgender thing is an obsession not an issue.
Oh, and don't miss the minimum wage amendment to this bill.
North Carolina lawmakers gathered on the House floor for a special session on Wednesday.
Credit: Gerry Broome/Associated Press
North Carolina legislators, in a whirlwind special session on Wednesday, passed a wide-ranging bill barring transgender people from bathrooms and locker rooms that do not match the gender on their birth certificates.
Republicans unanimously supported the bill, while in the Senate, Democrats walked out in protest. “This is a direct affront to equality, civil rights and local autonomy,” the Senate Democratic leader, Dan Blue, said in a statement.
North Carolina’s governor, Pat McCrory, a Republican, signed the bill late Wednesday night.
The session, which was abruptly convened by Republican lawmakers on Tuesday, came in response to an antidiscrimination ordinance approved by the state’s largest city, Charlotte, last month. That ordinance provided protections based on sexual orientation, gender expression and gender identity, including letting transgender people use […]
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Saturday, March 26th, 2016
Stephan: When I was a young man, I lost one dear friend to a back alley abortion, and almost lost another, a lovely woman who survived but could never have children. I was not the father in either instance but it left me with the clear conviction that there must be decent reproductive healthcare, and a woman should have absolute control over her own body, as should a man. If one does not control one's body, at a fundamental level one controls nothing, and is always a serf of the state.
So here is some good news and reproductive healthcare, albeit it may only be temporary. It will depend on the Supreme Court; that's one of the reasons why this election is so important
The exterior of Reproductive Health Services in Montgomery, a reproductive health clinic that would have been affected by hospital admitting privilege requirements struck down by a judge.
Credit:al.com
An Alabama judge has permanently stripped from state law a requirement that abortion providers have admitting privileges at local hospitals. (emphasis added)
U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson issued the ruling Friday. He ruled against the state in 2014 in a lawsuit filed by providers, but the latest development extends that decision to all abortion clinics.
In his decision, Thompson said the impact of the law would be enormous. Many of the state’s abortion clinics would close if the law were enforced, he wrote.
“The staff-privileges requirement would make it impossible for a woman to obtain an abortion in much of the State,” he wrote. “It is certain that thousands of women per year–approximately 40 percent of those seeking abortions in the State–would […]
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Saturday, March 26th, 2016
Doug Livingston , Staff Writer - Akron Beacon Journal
Stephan: This has become an election run by the asylum inmates. When you go down the yellow brick road of Open Carry here's what happens when you get to Oz. A Republican convention of racist, angry armed White men caught up in the heated emotions of politics. What could possibly go wrong?
I am quite sure it won't happen, the Secret Service Director is a person with an IQ in triple digits; the service will not permit it. That isn't the important point though. It is that thousands of Republicans think this is a great idea. Perhaps they should let them do it. Maybe that is what it would take to awaken America to the gun death epidemic that takes 33,000 people a year; and makes it more likely you will be shot by a toddler than a terrorist.
Cleveland skyline taken from Edgewater Park in Cleveland.
Credit: AP/Mark Duncan
Support has more than quadrupled overnight for a petition to allow firearms at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland.
The petition, filed by “Americans for Responsible Open Carry,” was filed Monday on Change.org, an online forum. By Wednesday, 630 supporters had signed the request to carry firearms in and around Quicken Loans Arena, which will host the 2016 Republican National Convention from July 18-21.
With a goal of 5,000 signatures, the petition topped 5,300 by 6 p.m. Thursday.
The Ohio Republican Party, which is sending one of 50 state delegations to Cleveland this summer to nominate the party’s next presidential candidate, said it was not aware of the petition.
Nor was the host committee overseeing the convention, although it noted that the Secret Service, in conjunction with Cleveland, Cuyahoga County, state and federal authorities, is handling security for the event.
“They are coordinating and will be continuously refining security plans leading up to the national convention,” said Alee Lockman, […]
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Michael Corcoran, - truthout
Stephan: In my opinion the most important thing going on in any state election is going on in Colorado. Corporate media doesn't cover it, so you may not even know it is happening. I am speaking here of Amendment 69 to create universal single payer health care in the state.
Having discovered that the world did not end when marijuana was legalized, Coloradans thought let's break another myth and do single payer healthcare. Make sure every person in the state participates in universal public healthcare.
This excellent article describes the issues, and it also details how the Rightists who profit so massively from our current Illness Profit System, are doing everything they can to stop it. Because if it succeeds in one state it will spread, even if there is no federal level change. Or if Red Value states do not change. If Colorado can pass Amendment 69, and it can be shown a single state can do this, I predict it will quickly spread through all the Blue value states. It will become a major factor in the Great Schism Trend.
Why do I say this? Because when you put the politics aside, and just make policy on the basis of data single payer -- an improved medicare for all basically -- democratically overseen government run healthcare is always cheaper, more effective, and more efficient. Are failure to acknowledge that is the reason why we pay more than any other country in the world, by a significant margin, yet have such lousy outcomes in so many areas of healthcare. If Colorado passes Single payer and it goes into operation, just as with marijuana legalization it will soon be seen as the superior model.
If you live in Colorado do what you can to make this happen. If you live aside of Colorado make a donation to the groups listed in the report.
The Colorado State Capitol in Denver, Colorado Credit: Jason Miller
Colorado’s efforts to become the first state to pass a public, universal health care system are facing stiff opposition from right-wing organizations, many of which are funded by or affiliated with brothers Charles and David Koch.
As expected, these moneyed interests are doing everything they can to stop the state from amending its constitution with a ballot referendum, Amendment 69, which would implement a statewide version of “single-payer” health care. If approved, ColoradoCare would cover every resident, regardless of employment or ability to pay. In October, organizers submitted enough signatures to put the amendment on the ballot. The vote will take place on Election Day this year.
If the opposition groups succeed, they would not only be depriving Colorado of universal health care, but also would be serving another destructive blow to single-payer activists across the country. The single-payer movement saw a similar effort […]
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