Debra Kahn, Anne C. Mulkern, - Scientific American/Climatewire
Stephan: For me 2016 has been a year in which it has been irrefutably demonstrated on the basis of data that Republicans are either unwilling or unable to create a wellness oriented society. One only has to look at Brownback, Jindal, Snyder, Scott, McCrory and the others to see how they degrade the lives of the people they govern. In contrast we have Democratic governors such as Dayton, Inslee and, particularly, Jerry Brown.
Here is an example of what I mean.
California Democrat and Governor Jerry Brown
A legislative effort to extend California’s climate change policies past 2020 is proving more difficult than policymakers had bargained for.
A top aide to Gov. Jerry Brown (D) said yesterday that he is committed to cementing the state’s climate goals in law or by voter approval but that it might not happen until 2018.
“Let’s be clear: We are going to extend our climate goals and cap-and-trade program—one way or another,” Nancy McFadden, Brown’s executive secretary, said in a statement on Twitter. “The governor will continue working with the Legislature to get this done this year, next year or on the ballot in 2018.”
Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de León (D) sought Tuesday to back away from expectations that lawmakers would pass 2030 emissions targets this year in the waning days of the state’s legislative session. Negotiations over S.B. 32 also floundered last year; the bill’s sponsor, state Sen. Fran Pavley (D), is termed out this year (ClimateWire, Aug. 4).
McFadden referenced negotiations with oil companies as […]
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Nina Liss-Schultz, Assistant Editor - Mother Jones
Stephan: In contrast to Jerry Brown of California we have Rick Scott of Florida, one of the cretinous Rightists. Here is how he governs.
Florida Republican Governor Rick Scott
Last week, Florida authorities reported the first cases of local Zika transmission, which means that Zika-infected mosquitos are now in the continental United States. The cases prompted the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to warn pregnant women against traveling to the part of Miami where the cases were found, the first advisory of its kind in the United States.
Florida Gov. Rick Scott, who’s been preparing for this situation for months, issued a similar message: “For women who live or work in the impacted area and are either pregnant or thinking of becoming pregnant, I urge you to contact your OB-GYN for guidance and to receive a Zika prevention kit.”
In June, after congressional squabbles blocked federal funding for Zika prevention and response, the Republican governor announced that he’d allocated more than $26 million in state funds, part of which would pay for CDC Zika prevention kits that consist of two kinds of mosquito repellent, tablets that kill mosquitos in water, and condoms. In late July, Scott said […]
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David Ferguson, - The Raw Story
Stephan: In addition to its governor, the outstandingly unimpressive Rick Scott, Floridians also elected Marco Rubio as one of their senators. It seems to have gotten lost in the Presidential miasma that the Republicans in Congress have been blocking funding to develop a vaccine for the Zika virus. But Rubio, a notably inferior -- in terms of actual work accomplished -- Republican senator has taken the matter one step further. Truly disgusting.
Florida Republican Senator Marco Rubio
Florida Sen. Marco Rubio (R) said on Saturday that pregnant women who are infected with the Zika virus — which is believed to cause severe and debilitating birth defects like microcephaly — should not be allowed to terminate their pregnancies.
In an interview with Politico‘s Mike Caputo, Rubio said, “I understand a lot of people disagree with my view — but I believe that all human life is worthy of protection of our laws. And when you present it in the context of Zika or any prenatal condition, it’s a difficult question and a hard one. But if I’m going to err, I’m going to err on the side of life.”
Microcephaly involves severe deformities of the brain and skull and babies born with the condition begin their lives critically ill. Their care can run into hundreds of thousands of dollars or more in the first year of life alone.
“Obviously, microcephaly is a terrible prenatal condition that kids are born with. And when they […]
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Saturday, August 6th, 2016
Stephan: Pope Francis makes what I think is the relevant point about Muslim terrorists. The bitter truth is you are 150 times more likely to be killed in a non-terrorist gun incident than you are by a terrorist. The specific numbers: 2,961 terrorist deaths occurred on American soil from 9/11/2001 through 12/31/2014. In that same time 462,000 Americans killed themselves with a gun, or were killed by someone else, frequently someone they knew. Yet we constantly see our public figures running around with their hair on fire about terrorist threats, and strangely silent about the gun death epidemic that is the hallmark of American culture.
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Pope Francis at Polish Nazis Death Camp
Credit: VOAnews
ABOARD THE PAPAL PLANE — Pope Francis said he doesn’t like singling out violence carried out by Muslims because people of all religions are guilty of deadly crimes.
He told reporters the situation was like “a mixed fruit salad” and that there were “violent people in all religions.”
“I do not like to talk about Islamic violence because every day when I skim the papers … I read about violence in Italy: this one who killed the girlfriend, another killed the mother-in-law … and they are all baptized Catholics,” he said aboard a Rome-bound flight from Poland on Sunday.
“If I talk about Islamic violence, then I also have to talk of Catholic violence. Not all Muslims are violent, just like not all Catholics are violent,” the pontiff added. “It’s like a mixed fruit salad. There is a bit of everything. There are violent people in all religions.”
Pope Francis was responding to a question about an ISIS-linked attack […]
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Saturday, August 6th, 2016
Nicole Knight Shine, - Rewire
Stephan: Sadly the Roman Catholic Church is not uniform in its socially progressive views and no where is this more evident than in the policies of Catholic Hospitals in the U.S.. One out of six hospitals in America is now under the control of the Church, and many are rural or small town hospitals; often the only medical facility readily accessible to local patients. Because we don't have universal healthcare, only an Illness Profit System with copious religious exemptions Americans, particularly female Americans, have very iffy healthcare when it comes to OB/GYN issues.
I have been following this trend for several years because I find it very alarming. Here is the latest.
“What doctors told us is sometimes for abortion … there was a sense of, ‘You’re on your own,’” said Dr. Debra B. Stulberg, assistant professor of family medicine at the University of Chicago.
The patient learned she had brain cancer in her first trimester of pregnancy. She needed chemotherapy and abortion care.
“I’ve got a woman whose life is threatened by brain cancer,” her doctor, an OB-GYN at a Catholic hospital, told authorities there. “I need to do a termination.”
Catholic hospitals follow religious directives that generally bar certain types of health care, including abortions, except when the patient is in imminent danger.
The hospital refused the treatment, telling the OB-GYN to refer his patient elsewhere.
“They said, ‘Go take her to another hospital. Take her to another place. Those places are available to you. We don’t have to do it here…’,” the OB-GYN explained.
The case is among many contained in a new paper, “Referrals for Services Prohibited in Catholic Health Care Facilities,” which will be published in the September issue of Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health. The study explores whether Catholic hospitals make timely referrals, provide complete […]
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