The Friday Photo
October 4, 2013
Screen shot taken by Jami Mays, Athens, Georgia, after completing her enrollment in the new insurance exchange.
Category: health care
Terrorists in plain view
Filed under “funny but true.”
WE PETITION THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION TO:
Designate the Republican party a terrorist organization
for repeatedly threatening the full faith & credit of the U.S.A.
Designate the Republican party a terrorist organization, since repeatedly
threatening to default on the full faith and credit of the United States
over and over again every time you don’t get what you want is essentially
economic terrorism.
Created: Sep 18, 2013
Issues: Budget and Taxes, Criminal Justice and Law Enforcement,Economy
SIGNATURES NEEDED BY OCTOBER 18, 2013 TO REACH GOAL OF 100,000
97,474
TOTAL SIGNATURES ON THIS PETITION
2,526
If you’re logged in, but having trouble signing this petition, click here for help.
Is this the beginning of the Blame Game?
Today’s EPA ruling isn’t the reason Plant Washington won’t ever be built. It will, however, serve to drive home the fact that this project has always been an exercise in bad business decisions in addition to the environmental and health impacts it would have on our area.
Supporters will say the EPA’s carbon control rules killed the plant. That will hardly be the case. The plant has never had a demonstrated need, and at every turn plant supporters have seen their weak arguments only grow weaker.
I’ve made plenty of mistakes in my 52 years, and I’ll make plenty more in the future. Opposing Plant Washington isn’t one of them.
Doc, I’d like a prescription for two old bathtubs
He couldn’t get the General Assembly to pass a bill restricting state employee insurance funding to cover abortions, so Governor Nathan Deal worked another Back Room Deal and got insurance companies to stop covering abortions for state employees. It sort of begs the “Never you mind, missy” about medical procedures that are still legal and safe for women.
This closed door tactic earned Governor Deal a much deserved award from Planned Parenthood. Our Governor is Planned Parenthood Action’s Gynotician of the Week! 
As Planned Parenthood Action points out, Deal earned his B.A. and his law degree at Mercer University. But he lacks a medical degree and I bet he hasn’t even played a doctor on TV. “Never you mind, missy” a gynotician (a politician who feels more qualified than women and their doctors to make women’s health care decisions resulting in a combination of the words gynecologist and politician) knows way more than a woman and her board certified, state licensed doctor do about the best health care decisions for her.
Deal follows last week’s recipient, North Carolina’s Governor Pat McCrory and his attempt to assuage women protesting outside the governor’s mansion by offering them cookies after he signed a bill restricting abortion access which he clearly said as a candidate he wouldn’t sign. McCrory walked away to a chorus of “Hey Pat that was rude! You wouldn’t give cookies to a dude!”
What I wonder is if there are any back room deals to add old bathtubs as part of the 
state employee health insurance coverage plan. I don’t watch a lot of TV but it sure does seem like some men who need erectile dysfunction (ED) medicines (covered by state employee health insurance) also like a nice soak in an old bathtub outside with a woman in a tub next to them (can’t see their wedding rings from that distance so I can’t call them married).
And what about men in same sex partnerships? This could really run the price up on old bathtubs if every sexually active man got two tubs with his ED meds.
If the state continues to cover men’s prescription erectile dysfunction drugs, we might see some job creation for plumbers installing all these outdoor tubs and architecture salvage companies could see the demand soar for old bathtubs (I’m only guessing that because based on the number of commercials I’ve seen there must be A LOT of men who need these drugs).
Governor Deal I hope you enjoy all the accolades you’re receiving for dialing back access to health care for the women you work among every day in your office and the taxpayer-funded mansion you live in now. Some of those women might be willing to help you pack your bags after the election next year.
Regards-
Missy
When a tax credit becomes a poll tax
The North Carolina Legislature’s slash and burn budget includes eliminating a $2,500 tax credit for families with college students by tying it to voter registration. SB 667 will require college students to vote at home if their parents claim them as a dependent and receive a $2,500 state tax credit. Students who register to vote where they attend college will also be required to move their vehicle registration 60 days prior to voting.
Connecting college tuition tax credits to where a college student votes and pays taxes on their vehicle sure does seem like a poll tax to me. Why would the Republican controlled North Carolina Legislature want to do this? Could it be because counties with heavy student populations where students traditionally vote Democratic (think Appalachian and Chapel Hill) could see students turn out in heavy numbers and threaten Republican control of state and Congressional seats? Is this a back door effort for legislators to add tax dollars to some counties via car taxes while taking it from others? Nope. It is a poorly veiled effort to control what would be legal student voting via a family’s checkbook.
Fortunately thousands have packed Halifax Mall outside the state legislature on Mondays to shine a bright light on the efforts to roll the clock back decades, if not centuries. Doctors in their white coats, faith leaders in vestments, teachers, retirees, attorneys, and hundreds of other tax paying, voting citizens have come forward to be arrested.
Wake County law enforcement officials went to work today knowing today is Moral Monday 12. Come rain or shine, the citizens will be there to peacefully demonstrate for a state that values equality, fair pay for teachers, Voting Rights, clean water and air, and a woman’s right to make her own health decisions.
Checking in at mid-year
This year I decided to be physically present in my beliefs by showing up. I started 2013 with wise and funny women at the North Carolina coast. Being Present has led me to stand silently while same-sex couples requested, and were denied, marriage licenses in Decatur. Being Present has taken me to a TEDx conference, the nation’s largest Climate Change action in DC, and a ribbon-cutting for the Dublin High School solar energy installation.
Next week I’ll Be Present with Guilford College alums at an unofficial Guilford College Reunion organized by alum Tom Dawson. We’ll come together in Raleigh, North Carolina at Moral Monday outside the state Capitol. Tom’s call to gather includes:
Why: This is not an official college reunion. Our truest reunion will always be in the field helping others.
We’ve seen so many Guilford friends representing their communities and the highest principles of their education and selves. Let’s meet up for a common purpose and represent together. This is a good way to connect across communities and bring out people who haven’t come to a Moral Monday yet, but are concerned about North Carolina.
When: 5:00, July 22 rain or shine
Where: Come to the word “Awed.” You can find it under the you are “a child suitable to be awed” inscription on the Public Instruction Department building on the left side of the commons facing the general assembly. Closest streets are the North Wilmington and East Lane Streets.
Who: Guilford alumni, students, faculty, kids, partners, friends, it’s complicateds, Quakers, strangers you meet on the street who have that certain “glow” about them. It’s a big field. Let’s fill it.
What: Wear Guilford colors if you like. If the spirit moves us, lets form a “Silent Bloc.”
My sister, Guilford College ’88, and her sons will go with me to Raleigh. She’s already working on a sign to carry. I’ll probably make mine with my nephews after I arrive.
It is important to me that I stand with my family for them, for my friends in North Carolina, for my high school and college alma maters, and for the millions who call the Old North State their home. I’ll be in the best of company.
“With justice for all”
DOMA struck down http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/12-307_g2bh.pdf
And on Prop 8 from SCOTUS Blog: There will be much further discussion and analysis about how the decision in Perry affects other couples in California. For the time being, we will say this: the Supreme Court has dismissed the appeal challenging a final order from the trial court. It would appear, then, that the order will go into effect. And it appears that this final order purports to prohibit the Attorney General and the Governor from enforcing Prop. 8.
There could well be new challenges to the scope of that order. But for the time being, the order appears to be in effect and to prevent enforcement of Proposition 8 statewide.
Move over Broun, Price, and Gingrey
The loudest Republican members of the Georgia Congressional Delegation have managed to make our state the laughing-stock with jewels that have included:
- Paul Broun, MD (Medical College of Georgia) saying to the Baptist Church Sportsman Group over dinner last September, “All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the Big Bang Theory, all that is just lies straight from the pit of Hell.”
- Phil Gingrey, MD (Medical College of Georgia) defended former Senator Todd Akin
(R-Missouri) after Akin said that pregnancies only result from “legitimate” rapes. Even Scientific American had to weigh in on exactly how wrong Gingrey’s medical information is.
- Tom Price, MD (University of Michigan) said in regards to making birth control accessible for low-income women through Obamacare, which he opposes, that he isn’t aware of one woman who can’t afford birth control. Price said, “Bring me one woman who has been left behind. Bring me one. There’s not one.” (Price voted to defund Planned Parenthood and eliminate funding for contraceptive three times in 2011. )
And now, Senator Saxby Chambliss, who has decided not to run for a third term in the Senate, showed his true colors on the crime of rape in the military forces during a hearing earlier this week. According to a report issued by the Pentagon, three rapes occur every hour across our military forces. Every hour. Every day. 24/7. The Enemy Within is an eye-opening article on the expanse of rape culture within our armed forces.
Chambliss wants to explain away the criminals who rape by saying the problem is due to a “hormone level created by nature.”
That’s like telling a child things happen “just because.”
Rape occurs for all kinds of reasons, but none of them are acceptable, and all the men who carry out these crimes of violence are criminals. Rape is rape. Plain and simple. It is a crime whether it happens on our streets, in office buildings, parking lots, a woman’s home (Saying No to your husband is ok. Marriage isn’t a license to have sex when your spouse says No. It is called spousal rape, and it is a crime), and in our armed forces.
Chambliss also said, “We’re not doing our job” in regards to military rape. That’s obvious. Attributing the fact that three violent crimes of rape occur every hour in our armed forces as the result of “hormones” is not going to adequately address this problem.
A culture change, among both our civilian and military communities, is required to reduce these stunning crime rates. Suggesting that testosterone pollution is the cause is not going to solve the problem.
And in doing so, Chambliss insults and minimizes every victim of rape.
Rings and licenses
The Friday Photo
A weekly photo inspired by art, community and spontaneity
March 29, 2013
I got this ring almost 29 years ago. It has a lot of miles on it.
There are millions just like it, some brand new and waiting to be exchanged, others worn thinner after decades of doing all the things that make up our adult lives.
The day I got my ring I also signed a marriage license in North Carolina to go with it.
This week we’ve heard a lot about who should, or should not, be able to get a marriage license.
What real benefits do we gain as a country because we deny consenting adults the right to be legally married anywhere within our borders?
And who are we fooling if we think we are better for it?
We need to be honest about who cares for our seniors
Last week in Chicago the American Society on Aging held a conference packed with ideas and best practices focused on the growing numbers of seniors across our country. Speakers included Janice Lynch Schuster, who guest blogged here recently.
In her comments Lynch Schuster shared these eye-opening data from the Family Caregivers Alliance on who cares for the aging and what impact that work has on the caregivers:
- Right now, 44 million people—2/3 of them women–care for someone who is over 50
- About a third of those are caught in the tragedy and frustration of providing dementia care. And a remarkable one-third care for multiple older adults.
- The average caregiver is a 48 year old woman who is married, works outside the home, and earns $35,000 a year.
- Many of these caregivers are old themselves: and the older they are, the harder they longer they work at providing care. Those over the age of 75 are at it full-time.
- Caregiving hurts women. We report higher levels of depression, anxiety, and stress. A quarter have health problems stemming from their caregiving duties. We develop more hypertension, have lower perceived health status; poorer immune function; slower wound healing; and we die more quickly.
- We take a career hit: 1/3 decreased work hours; 1/3 passed up an assignment, promotion, or training; 22% took a leave of absence; 20% switched from full-time to part-time work; 16% quit entirely.
- We take a financial hit to our pension prospects, retirement savings, and Social Security benefits. This adds up to a total loss of more than $325,000 for women (and about $280,000 for men).With that kind of money, you could buy a really good long-term care insurance policy: But it gets the caregiver little that is tangible in return.
As pointed out in the data here, the women are doing the heavy lifting (literally and figuratively) for our elders.
Lynch Schuster likens the care of our seniors to a trend which will, and should, become another rallying point among women, families, and eventually men.
She says this about the demands and expectations which take a toll on women:
“A word about men: Statistics indicate that more men are becoming family caregivers—but for any number of reasons (cultural, social, gender, whatever), the actual hands-on work overwhelmingly falls to women, and men focus more on things like financial management and hiring aides.
Like childcare, caregiving to adult family members is women’s second shift. Early feminists wanted the movement to open up society—to let men change diapers and take paternity leave and allow women be CEOs and secretaries of state—and caregiving will have to do that too. But first, we need to make it more prominent.”
She’s right. The burden falls on women. She’s also right when she, and others, say that women need to organize and speak up now. We won’t, can’t, and shouldn’t have to bear the weight of caring for our elders alone. And as the data indicate, before too long the majority of caregivers will become those who need care themselves.
Sign on to improve elder care here. And share this information (because none of us are getting any younger).
Innovative idea for an aging country
Georgians over the age of 65 make up 11 percent of our state’s 9.9M citizens. Over 110K Georgians are 85 and older. Rural Georgians have fewer choices to care for the oldest among us. We lack a strong network of programs like Meals on Wheels, day care programs, home health providers, and nursing and retirement homes.
How will we adequately and compassionately care for all our elders in Georgia and across our country?
Janice Lynch Schuster, poet, award winner writer, and advocate for aging populations, has a suggestion for providing affordable and high quality care for our elders. Her post is reprinted here with her permission.
Caregiver Corps: Tapping A Nation of Caring People
By Janice Lynch Schuster
I recently participated in a Twitterchat (#eldercarechat), where someone raised the question of what we want government to do to improve the lives of the nation’s 60 million family caregivers. Someone suggested creating a Peace Corps-like program to recruit new graduates to serve family caregivers. I immediately volunteered to launch a petition to do just this, and wrote one on the White House website, which encourages civic engagement.
My petition is very short. It seemed to me that in the context of trying to raise interest and garner signatures, I needed to be to the point (http://wh.gov/GURc). It reads:
We petition the Obama Administration to: Create a Caregiver Corps that would include debt forgiveness for college graduates to care for our elders. More than 60 million Americans are family caregivers. They face challenges: Health suffers. Finances suffer. Families suffer. Aging Boomers will overwhelm our caregiving resources. Let’s create a Caregiver Corps, that would marry college debt forgiveness with programs that place recent graduates with families and aging services providers. Let’s bridge the generational divide that promotes ageism. Let’s do it!
One of my Twitter followers admonished me for my lack of detail. Without it, she said, no one would take me seriously. The idea is in its early stages, and would require thoughtful analysis and number-crunching by experts. But in the meantime, here’s the general idea for it.
Why We Need a Caregiver Corps
Several demographic trends are creating a future that will leave families and our beloved elders overwhelmed, exhausted, and bankrupted by the challenges of living with old age-that is, living past 80–with multiple chronic conditions that will, no matter what they do, kill them. In any given year, some 60 million Americans serve as family caregivers to another adult, someone who is either old, disabled, or both. (And millions more care for children and young adults who live with serious disabilities, and face even more challenges in terms of education, employment, and so on.)
These families will run square into a medical system that is not prepared to care for them in the ways the need most. These individuals might sometimes need rescue and cure—but they will more often need long-term supports and services, and help with things like transportation, hygiene, and food. And while they’ll have plenty of access to ICUs and new hips and knees—they will be shocked and disheartened by the costs of all the things they will need to pay for on their own: private-duty nurses, for instance, and home care; transportation and food and skilled nursing care.
Unless these families spend-down to become Medicaid beneficiaries or have adequate long-term care policies, their costs will be out of pocket. And those costs will be beyond reach for most middle-class Americans.
In the meantime, the social services agencies meant to serve aging Americans continue to 
be devastated by short-sighted budget cuts. Sequestration alone, one estimate suggests, will eliminate 800,000 Meals on Wheels in the State of Maryland.
And there will be few people to provide the hands-on care that these adults will need. The nation faces a profound shortage of people trained in geriatric care, from geriatricians to nurses to direct care workers. These shortages stem, in part, from the relatively low pay geriatricians earn, and the outright unlivable wage direct care workers receive. By one estimate, by 2030, when all of those Boomers are in their dotage, there will be one geriatrician for every 20,000 older adults.
A Caregiver Corps: Hope—and Help–for Us All
What’s a country to do? Launch a Caregiver Corps, a program modeled on similar valuable, successful, and long-lived efforts, such as the Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, VISTA, and Teach for America. The program could recruit volunteers: high school graduates not trained for the workforce; college graduates facing a tough economy and huge undergraduate debt; and older adults, those healthy enough to want to remain in the workforce and contribute to others’ well-being.
Volunteers could sign up for a year or two. In exchange for their service, they could earn tuition credits to cover the cost of college; they could receive some degree of loan forgiveness, to lessen their burden of debt; they could be paid a stipend that acknowledges the value of their work. They could be assigned to community-based organizations that serve older adults, such as Area Agencies on Aging, non-profit health care institutions, social services agencies, and others.
While volunteers could offer enthusiasm, compassion, and insight, they could also learn the kinds of skills required to care for an older adult and his or her family. They could learn about the public policies that affect that care. They could acquire medical and nursing skills—the kind of skills family caregivers use routinely in their daily routine. They could be exposed to older people, and bridge the generational gap that splits our country on this demographic. In the end, they might even be inspired to pursue a career that features caring for one another.
That, it seems to me, is something Americans have always done best—and will have to do more, as we all reach our own old age. Developing people who have the skills, resources, and motivation to help us in our self-interest. And it is in theirs, too. Millennials face the highest unemployment of any group in the country, and finding ways to become marketable, employable adults is critical to their own security and future.
So, let’s try it. Let’s create a Caregiver Corps. Let’s get the Administration to think about it, and weigh in. It’s time, really, to move forward. We need 150 signatures to push the petition to the public pages of We the People. Please take a moment to add yours:
Janice Lynch Schuster specializes in writing about aging, caregiving, and end of life issues, and is a co-author of an award-winning book on the topic, Handbook for Mortals: Guidance for People Facing Serious Illness (Oxford University Press, 2012).
Be The Lorax
There is no time to wait.
Be The Lorax wherever you are.
A tribe of 40,000 strong
Washington County, where I live in Middle Georgia, is small, about 20,000 people living in a county with white clay, rolling hills, and woods filled with deer.
Yesterday I watched the area at the Washington Monument fill with twice as many people as those who call Washington County home to make their concerns about our natural resources, climate, and health, clear to the country.
I met fellow tribe members from Burlington College in Vermont on the DC Metro Sunday morning. The young man who chatted with me was wearing a tie, I suspect because the day was planned to be of historic proportions.
A father with his young son, perhaps four years old, wearing a Forward on Climate button, navigated Union Station. Travelers from New York and New Mexico jockeyed for hot coffee before setting out in the bitter cold for the Washington Monument.
On our way to the monument we walked past a small group of people wearing bright yellow t-shirts. 
They weren’t smiling, and they seemed to want to debate and record people rather than participate. Clearly they weren’t there because of passion, and their sad, plain flyer with pro fossil-fuel data identified them as the hired hands the industry pays and outfits for events which threaten their profits.
We streamed in with signs and banners. We came by car, train, bus, and plane. Great-grandchildren perched on the laps of their elders in wheelchairs. Children carried cheerful signs with bright suns and flowers, lettered in the distinct print young children use.
We bounced on our toes to warm our feet. Couples held gloved hands. Before long we were a sea of fleece and down jackets.
And we marched, this river of people from across North America. Women from First Nations walked in front while men towards the back kept a steady beat on a large handmade drum. So many people, so many colors, shapes, ages, and reasons for being there to say, together, that the old ways must change.
We walked away from the yellow t-shirted few, greeting the people around us while we chanted and smiled. I walked with two women from Canada, then students from Earlham College and Appalachian State. New Yorkers opposed to fracking wore their signs over their chests and backs. Three men carried wooden numbers on tall stakes spelling out 350.
We cheered and chanted in front of the White House, calling for the President to make good on his words about Climate Change and how we will fuel our country. He had escaped the bitter cold for a weekend in Florida, but we were sure our voices were heard.
Our message was clear and our voices were strong. We made history yesterday standing shoulder to shoulder for the future we want for the youngest who were among us.
First World whining
The Friday Photo
A weekly photo inspired by art, community and spontaneity
February 15, 2013
I’ve taken allergy meds twice a day along with a calcium and Vitamin D tablet for years. No big deal.
Two years ago I had to add Tamoxifen once a day to my pill regime. That really got under my skin when I realized there were too many pill bottles to fuss with when I traveled.
I caved and got a weekly pill reminder box. Less than three months into my second half century I was filling a pill reminder just like the one my grandfather had used. I felt so middle aged.
I loathed filling the box. I wouldn’t do it when I exhausted the week’s meds. I would trudge to the cabinet and open the bottles doling out one pill at a time from three different bottles twice a day.
Late last year I spent a weekend with powerful and mindful thinkers to help a friend find a better way to be the author, artist, business owner, teacher, parent, daughter, wife and advocate she is/wants to be. Fabeku Fatunmise shaped and led our discussions. Fabeku is a Force Field of Super Powers, and his life’s work is grounded in helping other people find their Super Powers (we all have Super Powers but most of us, including me, cover them up with a bunch of stuff we think is “more important.”)
Early last month, on a Sunday, Fabeku posted an online comment about doing the things you must do (pay the light bill, etc) but not letting yourself be weighed down by those things. If you’re going to pay the light bill, pay the bill so you can get on to the things that make your life Kapow, where your Super Powers can shine.
Kapow! I finally got it. Instead of dreading filling that stupid pill box each Sunday and hating every second it took (seconds, not hours, why was I so chewed up about it anyway?) I decided to look at the box as a First World blessing.
I’m not taking 20 pills a day to keep a full-blown case of AIDS under control. I’m not battling mental illness and hoping the meds keep me in balance.
I’m taking Tamoxifen because cancer is behind me now, not in front of me.
That isn’t a First World problem. That is a First World blessing.
Kapow!
Customers abandon Whole Foods in lockstep
Earlier this month Whole Foods CEO John Mackey spoke with National Public Radio (NPR) as a book Mackey co-authored, Conscious Capitalism, was released. For years Mackey has said he thinks the healthcare reform laws are a form of socialism, but he took it up a notch and told NPR he thinks, “it’s more like fascism.”
The next day on CBS This Morning the Whole Foods founder tried to dial back his rhetoric and “bad choice of words.” Customer’s weren’t buying it.
Mother Jones followed the NPR and CBS features with a January 18 email interview with Mackey. 
He seized the opportunity to set off Whole Foods customers with his comments on Climate Change, which included, “climate change is perfectly natural and not necessarily bad.”
Mackey is pretty egalitarian in his ability to alienate customers who know they are paying premium prices to shop at Whole Foods (also called “Whole Paycheck” by customers).
My friend Karen Bonnell sent this email to Whole Foods, which she is allowing me to reprint here:
Dear Whole Foods Market,
I am writing to tell you I must end our love affair. Your (CEO’s) recent comments that Obamacare is “like fascism” and now, saying that Climate change “is not necessarily bad” shows me beyond any shadow of doubt that you don’t have a clue about things most important to me. So, it is adios, and I and my pocketbook will shop elsewhere.
I bet the lines are shorter at Whole Foods these days. That’s the way conscious capitalist consumers behave.
The NRA must stop using our children as pawns
Being the President’s child in the White House can’t be easy. Now the NRA is dragging the Obama’s daughters into the politics of gun control by producing a web video criticizing the President as “elitist” because his daughters have security details at school.
Clearly the NRA is so desperate now that it resorted to using the President’s own children in its campaign to arm our society to the teeth with assault weapons and magazines.
Disgusting.
The NRA is losing the grip it has had on Americans for too long. We don’t need assault rifles and we don’t need high-capacity ammo magazines. Finally citizens are saying it.
What we do need are laws and procedures which will help reduce the all-to-easy access to guns.
And we have to couple that with increasing the access to mental health services so that people who need care can get it before they reach a crisis. Our mental health care delivery system is not set up to help patients and families until they reach the breaking point.
Congress and state legislatures have the power to make it harder to get a gun. New York did it last night and Governor Andrew Cuomo said after signing the legislation, “We put rules in place that actually protect innocent people in society. That is what the State of New York is doing today. It says common sense can win and good people can win. And you can actually get government to work and get good things to happen. You can overpower the extremists with intelligence and with reason and common sense.”
If Congress and state leaders won’t act, the President has Executive Authorities to make changes in gun ownership that Americans are calling for. He should use them.
Last night Lawrence O’Donnell reported on The Last Word that the NRA edited its video and took the Obama girls out of it during his broadcast. The NRA’s video begins at 2:00.
Scientific American: “Gingrey is a bad doctor, says science”
After Mitt Romney’s 47 Percent video went viral in the fall, pundits thought politicians might dial back their comments in group settings where they might be recorded.
Rep Phil Gingrey (R-11th District) didn’t get that memo (or doesn’t care), and last week in front of a Cobb County Chamber of Commerce group in Smyrna, Gingrey defended former Missouri Rep Todd Akin’s statements about “legitimate” rape. Gingrey also added that as an ob/gyn (trained at the Medical College of Georgia) he tells women trying to conceive, “Just relax. Drink a glass of wine. And don’t be so tense and uptight, because all that adrenaline can cause you not to ovulate.’”
The hailstorm of criticism which exploded after the Marietta Daily Journal‘s coverage ranges from a petition by a Gingrey constituent calling for his resignation to #philgringrey trending on Twitter. Then all those sciencey people, including women, started telling Gingrey he was just plain wrong.
A post on the Scientific American web site titled Gingrey is a bad doctor, says science, written by Cell and Molecular Biology PhD candidate Christie Wilcox, includes, “Gingrey is just wrong on all accounts, and so is Akin. There is no evidence to support the role of adrenaline-mediated prevention of ovulation due to rape. There is no science to support their insinuations that, somehow, rape victims are less likely to get pregnant. Their statements directly contradict reproductive science, and serve only to demean women who have already undergone a terrible atrocity. There is simply no excuse for such blatant ignorance and thinly-veiled misogyny, especially coming from the mouth of someone claiming to ‘know about these things.’ ”
Wilcox continues, “Here’s a tip for the GOP and republicans (sic) in general: stop citing biology to defend your misogynistic positions. At least stop claiming things to be true without a cursory look at the literature. It’s not hard to look these things up, boys, and you have a team of assistants to do such things for you. When you flap your lips without even the slightest clue as to what the science actually is on the subject, you look stupid at best. I’d say stop talking in general, but I think it’s good that the general public sees your positions for what they really are. On second thought, ignore my advice: keep on trucking. The baseless, unscientific lies that you tell will only serve to strengthen the people who run against you.”
That’s enough pressure to make a poor member of Congress forget his own medical advice. Instead of having a glass of wine and letting his own adrenaline levels subside, Gingrey took his Twitter account down:
Wilcox is right.
We’ve got less than two years to find good candidates to run against the waahoos Georgians are sending to Congress. It will take a lot of money to run against Republicans with big war chests. Based on the first few days of this Congress, I hope some smart people in both parties are thinking about testing the water.
I would say we couldn’t do any worse than who we have now, but I’m afraid, based our recent voting trends, that we could.
And they’re off!
The Georgia General Assembly session begins today. Last year brought us:
- Rep Terry England (R-Auburn), who compared women to farm animals, provoking a national social media campaign featuring Academy Award winner Meryl Streep, Kevin Bacon, Amy Poehler, Olympia Dukakis, and others
- Rep Kip Smith (R-Columbus) who was stopped for DUI during the session and quickly told the officer he is a state representative
- Senator Chip Rogers (R-East Cherokee), was shamed into resigning after the November re-elections for hosting an Agenda 21 meeting (an absurd theory involving the United Nations, urban housing, and mind control that gets ginned up periodically by the wing-nuts on the Right)
- Rep Doug McKillips (R-Athens, defeated in November) who championed access to abortion bills so medically unsound that doctors, who don’t usually show up at the Gold Dome, came down to the Capitol to oppose the bill. Women legislators also left the floor in opposition during votes. (A Georgia court delayed the law after three Georgia obstetricians filed suit.)
- Senator Don Balfour (R-Snellville) just stepped down from his powerful position as chair of the Senate Rule’s Committee after GBI investigations into his expense filing to the state (Balfour’s filing have been questioned in the past on numerous counts. It turns out that filing a request for expenses when you were actually out of the state with lobbyists isn’t o.k. after all , even though the ethics requirements for Georgia legislators are few and far between)
The list could go on because, just like a clown car, there always seems to be room for one more Bozo at Georgia’s General Assembly.
Being present
This year I will sign petitions, write letters, and call elected officials about the things that matter to me. And this year I will be more present in my beliefs by showing up.
I began yesterday in Decatur at a “We Do” event organized by the Campaign for Southern Equality. The couple in this video, filmed by the GA Voice, speaks volumes about why I want to be more present in what I believe:
Representative Clueless
As a matter of fact, we do understand.
You’ll find our voter turn out information
in your Binders Full of Women.