The Funny Papers

David Horsey, Adam Zyglis, Clay Bennett, Gary Varvel, Jack Ohman, RJ Matson, Michael de Adder, Marc Murphy, Mike Luckovich, Gary Huck, Nick Anderson, Christopher Weyant, Bill Day,

Ron DeSantis Chooses Guns Over Women's Rghts

I never thought Florida could sink lower—though, to be fair, it’s been sinking figuratively and literally, for years now—after last week’s announcement allowing Floridians to openly carry a weapon without a permit and with no training; in the land of Stand Your Ground the blood will soon flow.

But also last week the Florida High School Athletics Association [FHSAA ] announced its decision to require student athletes to give their schools detailed information about their periods if they choose to sign up for a sports team.

In October the FHSAA changed its annual physical form for student athletes to a digital version and this new form includes optional but detailed questions about students’ menstruation cycles, including when they got their first period, when they had their most recent one, and how many weeks pass between periods. Previously, only one page of the paper form—on which a pediatrician would sign off on a student being allowed to play—would be submitted to a school. But the entire digital form will now be submitted.

Oh, it’s optional, okay them  guess I got all riled for no good reas—and then this: the FHSAA has since changed the optional requirement to mandatory. The recommendation now goes before the FHSAA board of directors, which will meet in late February to make the final decision.

While students’ medical history is necessary for doctors, should the athlete be hurt while playing their sport and require medical attention, but no one knows why any school would need menstrual cycle information other than Ron DeFacsist’s anti-transgender bias and pregnancy and abortion information.

And controlling women’s bodies.

There are parents, and doctors, who worry that schools will use the menstrual data to monitor students for late or missed periods, a possible sign of pregnancy, or to out transgender students by watching for girls who don’t get periods or boys who do.

Florida school administrators say the information will stay private, but there’s no guarantee it will. The platform that hosts Florida’s new digital athletics form are not owned by medical institutions and therefore are not subject to health privacy laws. If subpoenaed for someone’s data, particularly in a state where abortion has been made illegal, companies would be required to hand it over.

Florida has been subjugating women and gender minorities since Ron DeSantis was elected; the state has banned abortion after 15 weeks, forbidden transgender girls from playing on girls’ sports teams, and barred Floridians from using Medicaid to pay for gender-affirming treatments.

Funny, or sad, Florida has given all the freedom in the world to people who want guns, but keep restricting the freedoms of women.

Remember, though, women vote, guns don’t.

Cast a goddamned vote and vote Blue.

New Republic

The Funny Papers

Steve Breen, Marc Murphy, Drew Sheneman, Ted Littleford, Deb Milbrath, Randy Bish, Bill Day, John Cole,  Nick Anderson, Michael de Adder, Ed Hall, Jack Ohman, David Horsey, Walt Handelsman, Guy Parsons,

Tuesday Thought #1

The GOP In Texas Paases A Bill Allowing Doctors To Lie To Pregnant Women

There are times when I play the devil’s Advocate in political discussions, saying that it isn’t just the GOP that’s horrid, there are awful Democrats, too.

Then I hear stories like this one ...

If you’re a woman and you live in Texas and you think you’re pregnant and you go to the doctor, the GOP-controlled Texas Senate just passed a bill that would ... wait for it, it’s truly disgusting ... would allow your doctor to withhold that information—that you’re pregnant—if the doctor believes you might choose to have an abortion.

Yes, thanks to the GOP, it’s gonna be legal for doctors to lie to their patients, thereby forcing the patient to do what the doctor thinks is best.

Even more disgusting, Texas Republicans are pretending that this is a “wrongful birth” bill meant to prevent doctors from being sued by their pregnant patients.

This wrongful birth bill—Senate Bill 25 ... on its way to the Texas House—prevents parents from suing their doctor if their baby is born with disabilities, even if that doctor discovered the condition during routine prenatal testing and failed to inform the parents.

So, then, what’s to stop an anti-choice doctor from keeping a pregnancy a secret, forcing a woman to carry a child to term, not because she chose it, but because her doctor chose it?

But, hey, it’s Texas and it’s the GOP, so we know a woman doesn’t have a voice.

Or a choice.

Especially when Republicans and doctors are allowed to lie.

Daily Kos

Photo Credit: Bill Day

Minute Rant: Tennessee University Wins The Right To Ban Gays And Pregnant Women

I’ve often joked about how backwards Tennessee is — and, in fact, some readers of this here bloggy thing who live in Tennessee have often confirmed how backwards the state appears — and here I am, doin’ it again …

Up there to Tennessee, Carson-Newman University has been granted the right by the federal government of this country to ban students who go against their interpretation of Christianity. The waiver allows the school to ban pregnant students, women who have had an abortion … I can’t imagine how they’ll prove that if the problem arises, single mothers, LGBT students and anyone else who does not fit their wacknut religious ideology.

I mean, seriously, did Jesus hang out with hookers and lowlifes, but The Gays, single moms and pregnant women aren’t good enough for this school?

But apparently university President Dr. Randall O’Brien wasn’t thinking about Jesus when he filed for a Title IX exemption from the federal government:

“This is who we are as a Christian university. These are our religious principles. And in a changing world, we would like to reaffirm that this is who we are and who we intend to be.”

Bigots. Homophobes. Judgmental asshats. That’s who they are; and I don’t think Jesus or God is too pleased with that.

source: Raw Story

Good News!! Homophobia Is A Myth, Y'all!!

Ryan Bomberger  is one of those rightwingnuts I lambaste and criticize and, well, yes, make fun of, on my little bloggy thing here, but something Bomberger said recently really has my dander up, and I wondered how best to show him how wrong he is, yet again.

See Ryan Bomberger, who is rabidly anti-choice, was speaking at the Values Voters Summit and began his tirade by criticizing the NAACP and their, in his words, “radical pro-abortion actions.” He ranted that legal abortion is a plot to realize black genocide, and asked that the NAACP’s acronym be changed to stand for the “National Association for the Abortion of Colored People.”

Outrageous, yes, and idiotic, and that had me raring to go at him, but then he took on The Gays and claimed that the fight for equality in this country is increasing “hostility towards Christianity in this country.”

I guess Bomberger never met a gay Christian, Baptist or Catholic. But then he added, that he believes homophobia is nothing but a myth, and explained his love for gay people by comparing The Gays to kleptomaniacs:

“The absurdity of terminology like homophobia; so for the people who cohabitate, if you don’t agree with that behavior are you a cohabiphobic? Or if you disagree with someone who has a habitual stealing problem, are you a kleptophobic? That’s the insanity of this; tolerance demands anything but tolerance, just complete formality to someone’s sense of poll-driven morality.”

Wow. Homophobia is a myth. And apparently a myth strong enough to kill people, like Matthew Shepard, to maim people like Scott Jones, to force gay people to hide away, and deny themselves. It’s a myth y’all, come on out of the closet, there’s no danger here. No one’s out to get you, to beat you, kick, stab or kill you, deny you housing, fire you from your job, turn you away from their motels and receptions halls. It’s a myth.

And then I saw this story, about a man who was flying from Perth to Brisbane, Australia, and when he went to pick up his bag at the luggage carousel, he sound his bag stamped with the words: “I am gay.” Jetstar, the airline the man was using for travel, has said they are investigating the matter but it’s highly doubtful we’ll ever find out who did it.

And yet the man whose luggage was vandalized, well, he understands homophobia now in a way that he perhaps never did, because he’s a straight man, who Tweeted that image of his suitcase last weekend:

"Utterly disgusted to find my luggage front and center on the @JetstarAirways luggage carousel looking like this."

He also has a blog, One Sleepy Dad, upon which he wrote of his experience:

“Having missed out a night's sleep, I am quite tired at this moment and ask that any mechanical language errors below be treated kindly.

Yesterday I tweeted a photo of my luggage after a Jetstar flight from Perth and it has caused quite the stir on social media. It has burst out of my own digital echo chamber and has been reverberating around the world for the past 24 hours.

I would like to point out that Jetstar has contacted me and offered a very sincere apology. For which I am grateful.

They are also conducting a "serious" investigation that I am assisting them with. Their PR machine is making all the right noises and saying all the right things. I have set no expectations of Jetstar with regards to their procedures or outcomes.

I have also been approached by media of all forms from around the globe but I have not offered any comment or answered any questions. Whatever you read/hear/see is based purely on the content of my Twitter feed and the posts in this blog. In the age of soundbites and limited column inches, I am not confident that anything I say won't be used out of context for the sake of time/space limits. Also, I can't keep up with the requests so I apologise if you don't get a personal and polite decline to your queries.

What I would like to share with you is what happened from the point where my luggage is on the carousel. I won't speculate as to what happened in the lead up.

My suitcase was the first bag on the carousel. The entire flight's passengers were shoulder-to-shoulder looking for their bags and I'm pretty sure that most people would've seen mine rattling along the rollers. I saw a big red case approaching and excused my way through the throng in order to retrieve it. I noticed some white bits on the side and turned back, apologising to the people who I had just pushed passed. "False alarm," I said to one gent. Then I realised that it actually was my bag and that the white bits were the sign you see in the image above.

I plucked the suitcase off the carousel and had many eyes look me up and down. I was taken aback by the slogan but thought I had thick enough skin to ignore the leering. My connecting flight was about to board so I had to speed through the terminal to check in with Qantas. As I dragged the case through the terminal, I looked back at the people I had passed and they too looked at me differently. My luggage was a scarlet letter.

I am a white heterosexual male. This trifecta of privilege means that I'm not routinely subjected to prejudice. But for a few minutes I got to walk in the shoes of a gay person in a public place. For no good reason I had had a slur marked over my luggage. I was degraded. I was shamed. I was humiliated.

For me, this was only a few minutes of one day of my life. If what I felt for those few minutes is extrapolated out every day over a lifetime, then I can fully understand why our gay friends feel persecuted and why they have such high rates of suicide. It is unacceptable.

It is said that words can't hurt you. That it is true. But it isn't the words that hurt, it's the intention behind them. "I am gay" was not emblazened across my luggage as a celebration. It was used as a pejorative. It was used to humiliate. It was used as a slur.

Some people have been commenting that it's probably just some loser in backrooms making a distasteful joke. Or that Jetstar has a culture of homophobia. Unfortunately, the mistreatment of our gay friends spans society. It goes all the way up to our political leaders and includes such luminaries as our Prime Minister. Our laws ensure that homosexuals are not afforded the same rights and dignities that many of us straight people take for granted every day.

Until our political/religious/community leaders acknowledge and address these inequalities, until we de-normalise prejudice, we can't expect the "losers" to follow.

As for the people calling me a whiner and telling me to toughen up, I would like to quote Lieutenant General David Morrison: The standard you walk past is the standard you accept. 

This incident isn't about me, it's about what we as a society find acceptable.”

Funny, that; how a myth works, eh? Maybe Ryan Bomberger should have to experience walking through a crowd with a sign that says he’s gay and see how he feels about his myth.

Bomberger: Homophobia A Myth

One Sleepy Dad

Religious Zealots Lost At Sea For Months After Leaving US Because Of The Gays

Hannah Gastonguay, her baby Rahab,
husband Sean and their 3-year-old daughter Ardith

Hannah and Sean Gastonguay don’t like The Gays; they also don’t like the fact that women have the right to choose an abortion for themselves. So, like any good American, the Gastonguays packed up their toys, and their two children—baby Rahab and 3-year-old Ardith—and got the eff outta the United States. They decided to 'take a leap of faith and see where God led us' because they believe they needed to flee their homeland because of what they see as government support for homosexuality and abortions and restrictions on their religious freedom. 

However, neither Gastonguay seems to know the front end of a boat from their asses, and yet they thought it smart to load up their little family onto a boat and sail from San Diego to the Polynesian island nation of Kiribati—a distance of over 3,300 miles. Naturally, as happens when fools with no experience take matters into their own hands, the Gastonguays were recently rescued after being lost at sea for three months.

Almost as soon as they left port, the family encountered storms and rough weather, that tossed their tiny ship—do I hear a song coming on … ?—and, with their limited nautical knowledge, and sever lack of common senses, they drifted for months and were running low on supplies before they were picked up by a passing tanker. 

They were taken to Chile are expected to be flown home courtesy of the U.S. State Department. I know, thank god for government, right? I mean, you can decide that you loathe where you think your government is headed, when that government seeks equality for all its citizens, and lets its female citizens choose what to do with their own bodies, but it’s good to have government when you’re stranded in a foreign country with no way home.

Hannah Gastonguay, a mother who deserves to lose her children after subjecting them to the whims of her and her wack husband, said they chose Kiribati because 'we didn't want to go anywhere big' and she and her husband believed the island to be 'one of the least developed countries in the world.'

Again, they had no knowledge of the island, and no real knowledge of how to sail there, but they stuck their kids in a boat and set sail.

Hannah said her entire family—and I guess she meant her eight-month-old and her three-year-old—was fed up with government control in the U.S. and because, as Christians, who belong to no particular faith, they don’t ‘believe’ in 'abortion, homosexuality, in the state-controlled church.' She suggests—because she doesn’t know much—that government regulation interfered with religious independence.

So, Hannah, Sean, Sean’s father, Mike, and their two infant children set off for places unknown, with no plans, no experience, no knowledge. Within a couple of weeks they encountered ‘storm, storm, storm.' The boat was damaged and the little family decided to set course for the Marquesas Islands, but instead found themselves taking more and more damage, leaving them unable to make progress.

They had been at sea for over two months, and were down to 'some juice and some honey' and the occasional fish they caught, but had seen no other boats. But, they had faith that ‘God would see us through.'

A fishing ship came into contact with them but left without providing assistance, and a Canadian cargo ship came along and offered supplies, but when they pulled up alongside it, the vessels bumped and the smaller ship sustained even more damage.

Eventually, their boat was spotted by a helicopter that had taken off from a nearby Venezuelan fishing vessel, which ended up saving them. The captain of that ship was incredulous at finding a family at sea, asking them, "Do you know where you're at? You're in the middle of nowhere."

They spent five days aboard that ship before transferring to a Japanese cargo ship, where they spent almost three weeks before landing in Chile. The Chilean newspaper Las Ultimas Noticias reported the story of their arrival:

'They were looking for a kind of adventure; they wanted to live on a Polynesian island but they didn't have sufficient expertise to navigate adequately,' police prefect Jose Luis Lopez, who took the family's statement at San Antonio, told the newspaper.

Hannah Gastonguay said the family will now 'go back to Arizona' and 'come up with a new plan.'

I would hope it doesn’t involve a dumbass move that could endanger their small children, and if it does, I hope the U.S. government steps in and removes those children from their moronic parents.

source

Random Musings

Well, since New Year's Day is the big football day, and since Carlos and I are such fans, we plopped ourselves in front of the TV and watched every single......

Yeah, we went to see Les Miserables, starring Hugh Jackman and his Huge Ackman.

I'm still trying to digest it.

Don't get me wrong, i loved it; Anne Hathaway's I Dreamed A Dream was heart-wrenching. But it's not your father's musical. No big show-stopping numbers; the singing was so intimate and yet the story was so big, you were really drawn into the film. Sometimes with musicals, the singing tends to stop the show, but not in this case. It really moved the story along,

Plus, well, as shallow as I am, Eddie Redmayne--on the right, up there--as Marius was delicious to watch. Of course, then we had to watch My Week With Marilyn because Eddie was in that, too, although the revelation was Michele Williams, so perfect as Marilyn.

So, perhaps John Boehner, who last cried when he became Speaker of the House, might shed a few more tears. It seems even his own party is fed up with Boehner and many want him removed as Speaker.

Cue the waterworks.

Throw a little, well, not so little, Chris Christie ire into the mix--he's annoyed that Boehner and the GOP have failed to act on allocating funds for Hurricane Sandy Relief-- and Boehner really might have a reason to cry this time.

New Years Eve, because I loves me some Broadway, we watched Live From Lincoln Center on PBS. The show, One Singular Sensation, was a tribute to Marvin Hamlisch, and was planned well before his sudden passing last year, but went on anyway as a tribute to his music.

I appreciate Hamlisch's talent, but I watched because it featured Audra McDonald, one of the Great Voices I have ever heard. I'd listen to her sing the Phone Book, seriously.

Plus, well, as shallow as I am, it also featured delicious Latino-American, and openly bisexual, hunk, Raul Ezparza.

Out there to Michigan way,  Governor Rick Snyder, a Republican, of course, signed a bill that creates new regulations for abortion clinics and doctors. This bill requires doctors to screen patients to make sure they haven't been "coerced' into having an abortion, because, you know, women are like that; they can be easily manipulated and make the choice for abortion as easily as they decide what shoes to wear.

"To be screened for coercion is a reasonable thing," Snyder said. "It is really a question of women's health and safety."

Actually, it's a chance to make a woman feel like she doesn't have a choice in her own decisions regarding her body.

Hilary Clinton, who, if you believe FoxNews and the Wingnut Faction of the GOP, faked a stomach virus and a fainting spell, and a blood cot in her head just to avoid testifying about Benghazi, was released from the hospital and headed home.

Get well, Madame Secretary. You'll need to be in fighting form when you win the White House in 2016.

Tennessee Invades Women's Privacy

Oh man, Tennessee is at again.

There is a new bill worming its way through their House of Representatives that would require--you read that right, but here it is with emphasis, REQUIRE--the state to publish the names of each doctor who performs an abortion and offer detailed statistics about the woman having the procedure.

Because, you know, women in Tennessee don't have any right to privacy.

Matthew "Asshat" Hill

The so-called Life Defense Act of 2012, which is sponsored by a Republican of course, one  Matthew Hill, would demand that the Tennessee Department of Health make public detailed information about every woman who has an abortion available to the public; information like her age, her race, the county in which she lives, her marital status, the amount of education she's received, how many children she has, where she got the abortion and how many times she has been pregnant. 

In other words, they will make public every iota of information about a woman and her private medical procedures, except for her name.

In addition, the report filled with all this private information will also contain the name of the doctor who performed the procedure.

Now, seriously, if anyone thinks they will be no repercussions against these doctors, or the women who had the abortion, by some Pro-Life nut, you might need to sit down and rethink.

Imagine you go to the doctor for something, anything, and all of your information, save your name, is made available to the public? is that a state in which you want to live?

Is it Tennesseans?

I've made angry comments about you in the past, and, well, been reminded that not all people in Tennessee are delusional backwoods wingnuts, but if you all continue to allow your legislators legislate hate and invasion of privacy and their own religious, moral views, then one day soon you won't have much of a say in anything, will you?

Do.Something.

source

The Catholic Church In Sacramento Stops Helping The Homeless

You gotta love the Catholic Church. You know, how they say they want to help children and the poor, and then punish those very groups to show how anti-gay they are. And they're at it again.

Out in Sacramento, California--where I grew up--the Catholic Diocese of Sacramento has announced that it will no longer fund programs at Francis House, a nonprofit agency that serves the homeless community, because the new director of Francis House supports abortion rights and marriage equality.

Yup, people will starve because of this.

The Reverend Michael Kiernan, the diocese's director of social services  said that the views of new director, the Reverend Faith Whitmore, clash with the...antiquated...teachings of the Catholic Church, making it "impossible for the diocese to continue funding Francis House" as part of its annual Catholic Appeal.

Um, no, it's still possible. You announce that you disagree with Whitmore, but in the spirit of Faith, in the spirit of 'God,' in the spirit of 'Jesus,' you will continue helping the homeless anyway.

But that's not how the Catholic Chutrchworks. They punish the innocent.

The Francis House, one of the largest homeless services agencies in the Sacramento region, is in its 42nd year, serving upward of 25,000 people. It's annual budget of roughly $500,000 has been helped for the last twenty years with donations of up to $10,000 a year from the diocese. But because someone in the Francis House has a different stance on certain issues, the Catholic Church will stop helping the homeless in Sacramento.

Again, how effing-Christ-like.

The Reverend Faith Whitmore took over leadership of Francis House last year after the death of executive director Gregory Bunker. A member of the United Methodist church, Whitmore has been a strong advocate of same-sex marriage. In 2008, during that short period in which gay marriage was legal in California, Whitmore defied church law by marrying same-sex couples. 

She calls the diocese's decision to discontinue its support disappointing: "I have never represented any of those positions on behalf of Francis House. I was speaking as an individual. So for me, this came out of the blue."

But, Reverend, the Catholic Church doesn't do "individual". They do goosestepping. They do hypocrisy. They do aiding and abetting pedophiles.

Maybe it's best for you to disassociate from them.

via The Sacramento Bee

Just a Thought: Indiana Congressman Thinks Women Lie About Rape

Up in Indiana, when the Legislature isn't voting to ban the already banned gay marriage, the Indiana House is also considering what would be one of the nation's most restrictive anti-abortion laws. The new bill will ban all private insurance coverage--I'll say it again, private insurance coverage--from paying for an abortion, and it would require abortion providers to tell women that the procedure carries a risk of breast cancer--although the American Cancer Society says there is no evidence of a link between the two--and that a fetus can feel pain.

Women will also be told that there are couples "willing and waiting" to adopt children and that those couples might pay for prenatal care and childbirth. And abortions would be illegal after 20 weeks, except to preserve the life of the woman.

But, before the law was passed, it's sponsor, GOP asshat Representative Eric Turner, objected to what he called a proposed "loophole" in the law, whereby in the cases of rape and incest, the victims of those crimes could proceed with terminating their pregnancy. In fact, Turner went so far as to say that women will fake having been raped in order to get free abortions:

"I just want you to think about this, in my view, giant loophole that could be created where someone who could--now I want to be careful, I don't want to disparage in any way someone who has gone through the experience of a rape or incest--but someone who is desirous of an abortion could simply say that they've been raped or there's incest."

Yes, Eric Turner thinks all women are so cavalier about abortion that they will blatantly lie about being raped, or being the victim of incest, in order to get an abortion.

This sent one of his colleagues, Congresswoman Linda Lawson--who was a sex crimes investigator for the Indiana police for six years--into a rage: "Women don’t make this up! My Goodness! This is the state of Indiana!"

Now, women in Indiana do not have the right to decide what to do with their own bodies. The Legislature has decided that Indiana women will have to pay high out-of-pocket costs for abortions, even if the procedure is necessary to save their life or the pregnancy is the result of rape or incest. 

How have we come to the point where a politician can call half the people, half the voters, in his state, liars? How is it that we've come to the point where women, all women, will stand by and let men dictate what they can and cannot do in terms of their own bodies?

Women are not so cavalier about abortion that they simply schedule it as part of their day. They don't squeeze it in between shoe shopping and Cosmos with the girls. I have known women who've chosen abortion, for their own personal reasons, and not one of them came to the decision lightly, or without careful thought. And not one of them ever felt the need to lie about their reasons for choosing to end a pregnancy. And not one of them, after the procedure, went out to celebrate.

How is it that politicians don't see this? Mainly because it's male politicians, who seek to control their women, all their women, of their state.

Once again, I'll say it: if the situation were reversed, and men were the ones who got pregnant, we wouldn't be having this discussion, because men would never let anyone, even a wingnut like Eric Turner, tell them what they can do with their own bodies.