When people hate you, you have to LOVE HARDER. (Paraphrasing Van Jones here.)

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Some religionists and others who believe that discrimination against lesbians, gays, bisexuals, and transgender folk should be legal will of course appeal. The fight isn’t over.

But they’ll be met with legions of us who believe in our hearts that equal protection under the law means everyone is included. That’s who we are in America, that’s who we really are.

Cynematic blogs at P i l l o w b o o k.

Finally, some analysis of the data taken from voters as they left the polls in November, 2008, when the California anti-gay marriage referendum, Proposition 8, was on the ballot.

One big question after the election: Who moved? Six weeks before the
vote, Proposition 8 was too close to call. But in the final weeks,
supporters pulled ahead, and by election day, the outcome was all but
certain.

…

The shift, it turns out, was greatest among parents with children under 18 living at home many of them white Democrats.

…

The lesson: It’s not enough to make the case for same-sex marriage. It’s
also important to arm voters particularly parents against an
inevitable propaganda attack. And it’s crucial to rebut lies so parents
don’t panic.

We at MOMocrats knew this about parents–that’s why we had post after post after post after post here on the site (maybe 9 or 10 in all) reassuring parents. We also knew religious conservatives who backed Prop 8 have made deep, dangerous incursions into Latino and Asian Pacific American communities via their churches, and we reached out to APA parents with bilingual video PSAs made on shoestring budgets to help counter this.

I just hope leadership on the marriage equality efforts can absorb these painful, but important lessons and take different steps in the future. When Prop 8 passed, we were horrified and hurt too. Maybe not as much as the people directly affected, but we were right alongside you. Mobilize your allies. We have to validate each other. We will do all we can, but we need your guidance, help, and resources.

Cynematic blogs at P i l l o w b o o k.

By SEAN MURPHY (AP) 6 hours ago

via www.google.com

Oklahoma now has two women vying to fill the seat of governor of the state.

After a come-from-behind victory in the Democratic gubernatorial primary, current Lieutenant Governor Jari Askins wins to face an anti-choice Sarah Palin-backed GOP candidate, Congresswoman Mary Fallins.

While not full-throatedly pro-choice, Lt. Governor Askins supports women’s access to abortions in “hard cases,” a more moderate position than avowedly anti-choice Fallin. Oklahoma is among the most anti-choice states in the country, the legislature having earlier this year voted in a “compulsory ultrasound” law for women seeking abortions and approving public posting of information on women who receive abortions. Askins’ message of gender equality through pay equity resonated with women voters, so it’ll be interesting to see how Fallin responds on that issue.

Askins also benefited from last-minute support from a popular football coach who had also campaigned for sitting Governor Brad Henry previously. She’s demonstrated a bipartisan approach so far, emphasizing bread and butter issues like jobs and education.

It’s important to note that for all of Palin’s vaunted popularity among hard-right Tea Party Republicans, endorsement from the former half-term governor can just as likely be the kiss of electoral death as a boost.

Why? The quitter from Wasilla consistently turns off most moderates and an overwhelming percentage of liberals. One blogger notes that her 29% favorability rating makes her about as popular as George W Bush was–quite a feat when she hasn’t yet had an opportunity to launch two costly and unsuccessful wars or tank the economy. That makes it hard for her strident persona to translate into electoral success–she’s a hothouse orchid who blooms best in the overheated swamps of Faux News and the fact-free right-wingosphere. We’ll see if Oklahoma’s moderates outnumber its hard-right ideologues, and if Askins can get Democrats and independents out to vote.

Cynematic blogs at P i l l o w b o o k.

WASHINGTON (AP) Keeping unemployment benefits flowing for millions of workers whose jobs were eaten by the recession should have been a slam dunk in an election year.

But until this month, Senate Democrats have been unable to bring themselves to pass a simple bill that just does it. Instead they’ve demanded a series of unrelated and often controversial tax and spending add-ons that have enabled Republicans to mount successful filibusters.

• Give unemployed work, instead of more benefits
• Democrats seek to extend emergency jobless benefits
• Brown bill would extend jobless benefits
• Senate bogs down on tax extenders and unemployment benefits
• Jobless in Arizona begin to worry as US benefits runs out

WASHINGTON (AP) Keeping unemployment benefits flowing for millions of workers whose jobs were eaten by the recession should have been a slam dunk in an election year.

But until this month, Senate Democrats have been unable to bring themselves to pass a simple bill that just does it. Instead they’ve demanded a series of unrelated and often controversial tax and spending add-ons that have enabled Republicans to mount successful filibusters.

• Give unemployed work, instead of more benefits
• Democrats seek to extend emergency jobless benefits
• Brown bill would extend jobless benefits
• Senate bogs down on tax extenders and unemployment benefits
• Jobless in Arizona begin to worry as US benefits runs out

My kid ADORES Legos. And yet–

Eleven people dead from the Deepwater Horizon explosion in addition to 41 oil-industry related deaths and 302 injuries between 2001-2007. Oil-covered pelicans. Dolphin carcasses choked with oil.

Legos are made with plastic, a product that requires petroleum in its manufacture.

And there, in a nutshell, is everyone’s addiction to oil. It’s woven so completely in our lives, in our kids’ favorite toys, the convenient sandwich bags we use, the useful stain-free fabric in our upholstered car seats, in our prettifying makeup. To divest ourselves of these things feels like removing joy, ease, or what’s surely a minor, harmless, and pleasing indulgence from our lives. No wonder we resist.

What this devastating disaster for the Gulf has made us do is look at ourselves. Both to see what we can do to help, and to see how we’re part of the problem.

Jon Stewart framed our oil dependency as if we Americans are collectively battered spouses unable to get ourselves free of a clearly abusive relationship. (About 2:48 in.)

Bill Maher took a more punitive line, saying that if the oil industry needs to die in order for us to fully embrace a sustainable energy future, then so be it. (See 3:02 in and onward.)

Now Bill Maher has a way of provoking in the most frat-boy, insensitive-jerk way possible, but I think he has a point when he says, “If the government hired away all 58,000 oil workers who work now in the state of Louisiana, and paid them their same salary repairing infrastructure and building solar panels, that would cost us $5.5 billion–which is what the Pentagon loses in the couch. …Jobs come and go. Once a species is extinct, it’s forever.”

I think the species Maher’s referring to is us.

Both comedians’ analogies, while imperfect, are meant to shock and unsettle. The status quo isn’t sustainable.

We have to contemplate the unspeakable, because clearly oil companies didn’t even contemplate the likely (a leak, explosion, or spill–or all three). The unspeakable? The well won’t be capped or the relief well won’t work until MONTHS from now. Worst of all? The leak can’t be stopped. The truly unspeakable? The Gulf coast turns into a dead zone for decades, if not hundreds of years. The unimaginable? Enough oil despoils the ocean that a good percentage of it is forever polluted, throwing our planet out of balance and threatening animal, human, and plant life in ways we can barely predict. We need to prepare for the unspeakable and unimaginable if we’re ever to prevent it.

And this isn’t even taking into account severe hurricanes expected this summer to hit the Gulf Coast as a result of the global climate crisis. It’s dawning on us that we may be in very deep shit.

Given the stakes of the Deepwater Horizon oil leak, I can see why some found President Obama’s speech from the Oval Office rather lacking. But rather than look for drama in our response to the situation, which seems to be a press priority, I find it reassuring that the president is focused on what the federal government can and must do to hold BP accountable.

• There’s finally a person in charge at Minerals Management Services who seems competent, appropriately skeptical of corporate assurances, and fully capable of cracking down on non-compliance.
• One of the world’s richest and most powerful corporations was brought to heel by our president and voluntarily set aside a minimum of $20 billion in an escrow account and pledged collateral toward it. BP also pays $500 million toward ocean research on mitigating oil and gas pollution and $100 million to oil rig workers left out of work by the disaster.

These are huge steps. They don’t fix the leak, but they at least keep Gulf coast residents from completely going under.

UNLIKE insensitive boob Bill Maher, President Obama has not left those line-level workers in the oil industry high and dry while we transition to some other sustainable energy economy. But those line-level oil industry workers, as well as those in the fishing and tourism industries on the Gulf, must surely be aware that they may need to find new forms of work.

On Earth Day 2009, President Obama announced in Newton, Iowa, that he was opening up the

leasing of federal waters for projects to
generate electricity from wind as well as from ocean currents and other
renewable sources emphasis mine. And this will open the door to major investments in
offshore clean energy. For example, there is enormous interest in wind
projects off the coasts of New Jersey and Delaware, and today’s
announcement will enable these projects to move forward.

While Obama has announced a six month moratorium on deep ocean drilling for oil, I think he should throw the gates open to leasing the same oil-befouled Gulf waters to offshore wind and water turbine development. Oil rig workers understand how to build and maintain complex ocean structures. If we succeed in kicking the oil habit, oil industry jobs will go away–but the expertise of building and maintaining those ocean structures will still be needed to maintain offshore wind and wave farms.

What I did find deeply unsatisfying was the president’s invocation of the ramping up of production for World War II during his “battle plan” speech from the Oval Office. He said:

The one answer I will not settle for is the idea that this challenge is
somehow too big and too difficult to meet. You know, the same thing
was said about our ability to produce enough planes and tanks in World
War II. The same thing was said about our ability to harness the
science and technology to land a man safely on the surface of the moon.

It wasn’t only a matter of technological or manufacturing logistics–during WWII, Americans were asked to sacrifice for a greater good against a clear enemy. We have not been asked to sacrifice as a people for the wars we’re currently fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan–the burden has fallen disproportionately on a few. And here, in the face of this terrible oil spill, one that threatens our future as surely as any enemy, we were not asked to sacrifice any part of the wasteful ways in which we live or to willingly give what we’re ready to part with for the cause. As Bob Cesca has written, “Americans just don’t do sacrifice any more.”

Mr. President, you need to mobilize the American people. We’ve tried 30+ years of blinkered, lackadaisical, meandering energy conservation–or worse, the same old profligate habits. ‘Effort,’ like ‘taxes,’ seems to be anathema to politics. But without it we won’t be able to overcome the inertia that keeps us locked in the same old self-destructive rut. See, this time, WE are our own worst enemy.

This is what I personally want our government to do:

• Use the resources of the non-profit Corporation for National & Community Service to organize volunteers to help in the Gulf states. Organizing for America may also be a valuable resource. People are concerned. People want to help. We are galvanized, we care deeply about the Gulf states. Thousands, maybe millions of volunteers would come to the Gulf states if only they knew what to do. Can they help assemble boom on shore while trained workers paid by BP dispatch it in the water? Can they assist in wildlife counts (necessary to asses punitive damages against BP) and rescue efforts? Can they fill and organize storage of sandbags to stop already delicate shore areas from eroding in the next hurricane? Grassroots people on the ground, observing the direct effects of an oil spill, helping and trying to do what they can–this is how you build stakeholders in not only the Gulf but the bigger project of turning people to renewable energy.




• Train and employ people as part of a new Civilian Conservation Corps, as suggested by Robert Reich and others.

• The “helpline” set up by BP isn’t working. It seems to be a useless venthole. Meanwhile plausible and well-thought out solutions abound online. Use your web 2.0 savvy to crowdsource and implement some of the best suggestions, and if they work, make BP utilize them. Here’s one example: a corral to maneuver leaked oil from the burst well at the seabed floor to the water’s surface, where it can be captured. Let American ingenuity flower by giving thousands of inventors, engineers, innovators, and others with low-cost, low environmental impact solutions a chance to experiment with their fixes. Set up fast-acting science committees to vet projects and then pair waterfront communities and towns with the inventors. Everyone understands that some attempt at a solution is better than no solution at all. Small towns on the Gulf are already ginning up whatever solutions they can muster on their own. Wouldn’t government-facilitated assistance in vetting and implementation be better than doing nothing? Wouldn’t this be a way of sharing and organizing the on-the-ground knowledge of what *does* work so communities can replicate it as soon as possible? Make no mistake, we are under a time clock to shut down the well. The worst thing we can do is let our fickle attention spans wander to the next media spectacle.
• Throw down the gauntlet to the Christian Stewardship movement. Use the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. Where are these Green Christians and other people of faith? I’ve taken a look around the interwebs and so far, with a few exceptions here, here, and here: CRICKETS. (Especially sad this organization is in disarray.) Then again, I’m not a churchgoer, so maybe the horror and need for new behavior is reverberating more powerfully than I give it credit for. But for once I’d like to see the faith community’s profile on renewable energy be as visible and vocal as it is on issues pertaining to women’s health or marriage status.
• I want to hear what plan is in place to PREVENT further ecological destruction as the result of a hurricane or other tropical storm. We know storms are coming. It was bad enough to be caught flat-footed the first time on the explosion and leaking well. I DON’T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT RESCUE AND REMEDIATION EFFORTS AFTERWARDS. NO HANDWRINGING. I want to hear this from BP with great urgency and forethought, and with details tailored to the region, unlike the half-assed spill plans referencing walruses and other sealife not found in the Gulf. The federal government should double check and coordinate emergency evacuation and other plans now, before storms occur.
• Let’s put all the energy/climate bills we have pending on the table and pass legislation that sets real, achievable goals for kicking our oil addiction. Waxman-Markey passed in the House–what’s the status of the Kerry-Lieberman climate and clean energy jobs bill making its way through the Senate?
• We need the messge driven home again and again: it isn’t sacrifice if everyone’s doing it. Instead, it’s patriotism. It’s a greater good we’re striving for, because it fits with our values. It’s not deprivation, it’s discipline we choose in order to bring about our goals. If peer pressure isn’t sufficient, then let’s use the carrots and sticks of our laws to help us go in the right direction.
• Enlist artists in the cause–we need ways to channel our rage, fear,
  confusion, frustration, and hope. We need inspiration to keep from
  backsliding. We need to celebrate when we make progress. Green concerts teach by example–how can a large group of people come together with minimal ecological impact?

So here’s what I personally am doing:

• Meatless Mondays, Carless Sundays (Carless Sundays for religious folks)
• Two varieties of watermelon, sugar snap peas, blue kale, peas, beets, cantaloupe, tomatoes, and fava beans in my garden. We already use plant-based cleaners that are biodegradable, we compost, and have shifted our diet to from mostly meat to mostly greens
• Go on a plastic fast
• Buy only organic plant-based personal care products
• Re-elect Barbara Boxer for Senator from California, because she had the motherwit to send me an email regarding fast-tracking federal funding for Los Angeles city’s “Subway to the Sea” connecting downtown with the westside
• Support Senator Leahy’s proposed Enforcing Environmental Crimes Act (ECEA) to make restitution mandatory for victims of oil company criminal negligence
• By the end of 2010, find the most economical way to get our house solar-powered
• Boycott BP–yes, even though it might not have the economic impact I’d like. Because what a boycott teaches me is that I CAN LIVE WITHOUT OIL, one oil corporation at a time. I can get an electric vehicle. I can ride my bike to the store.
• Support airlines that use biofuel
• I will vote, call, register voters, support wholeheartedly any public official who will pass a stringent energy bill in 2010, as outlined by Rachel Maddow below:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

And Legos? I may have to start a letter writing campaign urging them to use either 100% recycled plastic or switch to plant cellulose or some other substitute. The company is a signatory to the UN Global Compact, but while their plastic toys meet or exceed safety standards and they’ve worked hard to maximize energy efficiency in the manufacture of their toys (pdf), the fact remains that the material they use for their bricks is not sustainable.

In the meantime, the library has plenty of other delights my kid can enjoy.

Cynematic blogs at P i l l o w b o o k.

House Dems try to rally allies on disclosure bill

WASHINGTON House Democratic leaders sought support from organized labor and other traditional allies Wednesday for legislation requiring tougher disclosure on campaign advertising, hoping to overcome political fallout stirred by a blanket exemption for the National Rifle Association.

Unmoved, 45 civil rights, environmental, gun control and other groups wrote Speaker Nancy Pelosi vowing to oppose the legislation unless it is changed. As drafted, they said, it.

• SEC Proposes Tougher Rules for Target-Date Funds
• Regulators propose new required disclosures for target-date retirement funds
• Democrats, NRA said to agree on campaign bill
• Sick and tired of campaign ads? Well, too bad.
• Wis. to launch statewide smoking ban ad blitz – AP

As devastating pictures of sullied waters, ruined beaches and oil-drenched wildlife continue to inundate our television and computer screens; as the idea sinks in that the Deepwater Horizon oil spill devastation is not over, and will not be over next week, or next month, or next year, or this decade, not even if some new feat of technological acrobatics finally succeeds in fully stopping the still-flowing leak; as we realize that the damage from this unprecedented ecological disaster may well permanently alter not only the vital ocean and wetland ecosystems of the Gulf, but also the lives of millions of people who depend, in one way or another, upon those ecosystems for their livelihoods and lifestyle, here at MOMocrats, we ask ourselves: where do we go from here?

BP’s deliberate, mindful neglect of safety procedures in the name of speed and profit appears to have been the most immediate cause of the Deepwater Horizon explosion. The federal government’s lax enforcement of its own oil drilling regulations allowed BP to get away with such negligence, on a far too regular basis, for far too long. When it comes to casting blame in this crisis, there are real people we can point our fingers at, people we, the victims of this disaster, can accuse by name, who committed real and terrible mistakes in their reckless desire to profit from our nation’s hunger for oil. And those people should be punished for their selfish negligence.

But punishing the few whose greed and carelessness directly caused the oil leak will not solve the deeper, more difficult problems that set the stage for this disaster — our dangerous dependence on nonrenewable, dirty energy sources like oil, widespread government corruption and corporate malfeasance, an economy built around conspicuous consumption, and a culture that values wealth over wisdom, speed over substance and convenience over quality.

The Gulf oil leak is not just BP’s disaster, or Transocean’s, or Halliburton’s, or the Minerals Management Service’s, or the Bush Administration’s, or the Obama administration’s disaster. It is your disaster. It is my disaster. It is every American’s disaster.

Everyone who has ever driven a car or lived in a home with vinyl siding or PVC pipe, everyone who has used single unrecycled plastic bottle or bought food that was shipped in a diesel truck, has personally purchased a piece of our oil dependence.

Everyone who has failed to vote, failed to call a congressperson to lobby for environmental protection reforms, failed in to form themselves of pending environmental or green energy legislation because it was easier to read a sports magazine or watch a comedy show on TV, bears some shred of responsibility, however small, for the sordid state of regulatory affairs that shrouded BP’s blatant negligence from public view until it was too late.

And now that all of America is faced with very visible consequences, those of us who do want to make a difference, those who do mean it when we look at the ruined Gulf coast and say,”Never again,” must seize what tattered silver lining we can reach, and ask ourselves, what can we do differently? What have we learned from this? Where do we go from here?

How do we protect our environment without stalling our economy?

How do we change our lifestyles without upending our families?

How do we convince our leaders to protect the lands and waters that are the source of our nation’s wealth before it’s too late?

Over the course of the next several days, several MOMocrats writers will post our personal thoughts on these questions, and more, in a series we’re calling, Where Do We Go from Here?

Part One, by Karoli: Baby, You Can Drive My Car

If you would like to add your voice to our discussion on how to solve the deeper problems behind the Gulf oil disaster, please leave a link to your own post in our comment section. We’ll feature our favorites in an upcoming wrap-up post.

MamaBee recently
opined about her ambivalence about work life policy and her upcoming BlogHer panel
with Morra Aarons-Mele on the same.

MamaBee wondered: Wearing my manager hat, I bristle at the
idea of government involvement in how I manage my employees. How can
government possibly understand the unique needs of my business and
workers? Im all for legislating anti-discrimination and family policy
equal pay; affordable, high-quality childcare; and paid family and sick leave,
for example. But Im having a hard time getting my mind around how the
government can practically be involved with flexible work.

I wonder how we can continue without government intervention. Ive no doubt that MamaBee is a terrific manager but thats my point: she is one manager. For most U.S. employees, your work life balance, your ability to telecommute, to have
flextime or comp time, to have paid time off, or to job share, is only as good (or
bad) as your manager, your department head, your unit, and/or your company. Most of
us are one job reclassification, downsize, merger, acquisition, or reorganization
away from instantaneous disappearance of our work life policies.

I too have concerns that legislating work life policies could result in a backlash against hiring women, particularly those of childbearing age. But when I weigh the potential backlash against our federalist patchwork of worker protections, anything is preferable to what weve got now, which can be summed up as “not much.”

We already see the segregation of women, particularly those with children, into lower paying jobs that have the least worker protections, especially as union membership declines.

Yes, some statutes and regulations exist: the Family and Medical Leave Act and the Americans With Disabilities Act. However, the ADA only covers businesses with 15+ employees. And FMLA is a pathetic excuse for family leave 12 weeks of unpaid leave if you work for a company with at least 50 employees and you worked at least 1250 hours in the previous year.

Save
the Childrens Mothers Index ranked the US 28th because of our
high maternal morbidity and mortality rate and less generous maternal leave
policies. I wonder how much of that maternal morbidity and mortality could be
avoided by strengthening FMLA? If women didn’t work until the absolute last
minute in an effort to save their measly leave, might our national incidence of
preeclampsia responsible for just about 1 in 5 maternal deaths be reduced? Might
our birth outcomes be improved? Some researchers
seem to
think
so.

Sure itd be nice for employers to voluntarily create family-friendly policies. But I’d rather force employers’ hands via legislation than continue defining what is essentially discrimination against families as a “private matter” to be negotiated between employer and employee. Actually, I feel uncomfortable even using “negotiation” when one party’s power so dwarfs the other.

When employers won’t do the right thing, or can’t because it would hinder them in the free market — shades of the health care debate — then legislation is the answer. Businesses learn to cope: FMLA was abhorred by several large
business groups, including the Chamber of Commerce, as was Title VII (pregnancy
nondiscrimination), and the Occupational Health and Safety Act. Today employers crumble over requirements but instituing those merger provisions hasn’t brought down capitalism.

Employers have had eons to make the workplace a better, fairer place for women and families. Instead were seeing national reversal: only 16 percent of employers provide full pay during the period of maternity-related disability, down from 27 percent in 1998. Were seeing more
lawsuits around family responsibilities discrimination. Less pension
investment (29 percent in 2008 compared with 48 percent in 1998). Sure some
companies (Intel, Raytheon, HP, etc.) have been innovative. But why should that
innovation be available only to white collar women?

Without policy to push business wed still have women being fired for getting married (notable examples being teachers, stewardesses, and women in the postal service). Wed be making even less than we do now. Women still wouldnt be able to get their own credit. Wed still be getting fired for being pregnant. Just as flextime and other work life policies are seen as
part of the private contract between employer and employee, so too were all the
aforementioned conditions. All were changed via legislation and/or regulation.

Im a believer in policy change. When I look at how poorly we regulate protections for pregnant women, and then look at, for example, our world ranking for maternal death (were 39th, behind Canada, tiny Malta, Croatia, Serbia, and the United Arab Emirates)
I see a need for more regulation, not less.

At a minimum we should have paid maternity leave. Were the only
industrialized nation that doesnt. At a minimum we should raise the tax credit employers who provide or help pay for childcare (direct payments are more effective than tax credits but politicians HATE direct payment). At a minimum we should have paid sick leave (the late Sen. Kennedys bill is still languishing in Congress). Want to stop the spread of H1N1? Give workers in the lowest earning quartile (60ish percent of whom have NO paid time off) guaranteed leave. And the Fair Labor Standards Act should be updated to protect individuals and families from mandatory overtime above, say 55 hours per week, unless an emergency demands it.

What else would you change?

Do you know these women? You should.

Because they’re pretty much the only thing that stands between us and the next financial collapse of the American economy.

TIME Magazine’s cover story last week was called, The Sheriffs of Wall Street. And those sheriffs aren’t who you might expect — they’re Elizabeth Warren, head of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (better known to us as TARP), SEC Chair Mary Schapiro and FDIC Chair Sheila Bair. These are women who should be in everyone’s address book, because we all ought to be sending them thank you notes (and I bet they wouldn’t mind a little FTD bouquet, either!).

The TIME article takes a look at the ongoing battles these three are fighting to put our economy back on the right track and the uphill fight they’re facing because the men who are used to being in charge don’t want to change the regulatory status quo.

It reminded me of another TIME Magazine cover on a similar subject just a few years ago:

The TIME article has an interesting undercurrent that, as someone who spent a good number of years at the Securities and Exchange Commission and experienced the macho culture of finance, I’ve thought about for a long time — would the seemingly non-stop run of bad “masters of the universe” type of decisions be different if more women were in charge?

No one listened to the WorldCom and Enron whistleblowers. The men in charge at those corporations, as well as at the FBI, poo-pooed the concerns that women raised. They were dismissed out of hand and we all remember how that turned out.

Similarly, one former “sheriff” not on the cover of TIME is Brooksley Born, the former head of the Commodities Futures Trading Commission (one of the many regulators with an eye on investments) who pushed for more than just voluntary regulation of the financial derivatives market, sensing that bad things were looming. It turns out she was right — really right. Yet her concerns and ideas about how to avert our economic collapse in 2008 were dismissed out of hand and the men in charge at the time (with their personal connections to Wall Street) kept us on the road to what the Washington Post described as bringing the world’s trading markets, and our economy, to “the brink of collapse.”

Now as regulators are trying to put things back together to prevent another meltdown, Warren has little power as head of TARP other than to make suggestions to Capitol Hill, Schapiro is suspect because of the misbehavior of some staff attorneys, and it’s been widely rumored that Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner is trying to push Bair out.

I know there are plenty of people who will dismiss this idea out of hand that women would do a better job of running and regulating Wall Street. But I’m not the only onebeen mulling this over. New York magazine published an article in March titled What if Women Ran Wall Street? In January, the New York Times weighed in with Where Are the Women on Wall Street? Both tell stories of hostile atmospheres that force women out if they don’t tow the line that the big boys with a taste for risk and big money draw in the sand. And Jessica Pieklo, another woman professionally familiar with the world of investments, says at her blog, Hegemmommy, that she’s not sure if things would necessarily be different if more women were running the financial and regulatory show, but raises this issue about the long-standing culture of Wall Street:

If you create a work environment that views accountability as a weakness, you create a work environment hostile to women. Its as simple as that.

And that’s the problem, isn’t it? Accountability. The boys who run the financial show aren’t nearly as concerned about that as many women in the industry. Another example of Venus and Mars? Who knows for sure, but why not let the women take over for a while? Things can only get better at this stage of the game.

As even Treasury Secretary Geithner recently admitted when asked about the What if Women Ran Wall Street? article, “How, you might ask, could women not have done better?”

Hear, hear! I say, it’s time to bury the macho and the let “girls” get to work.

Joanne has tried hard to let her inner securities regulator go over the years, but she isn’t having much luck. When she’s not busy writing about politics here at MOMocrats, you can find her getting her inner wonk on at her place, PunditMom.

Images from TIME Magazine.

I’m sure there’s a Very Brady Episode that taught the important life lesson: only losers cheat when they can’t win any other way. That’s certainly what occurred to me when my spouse was mailed this fake GOP “Census” about a month ago. (The accompanying letter signed by RNC Chair Michael Steele is dated March 26, 2010.) We’d already been sent our official 2010 U.S. Census materials and filled it out dutifully. So when we opened the non-profit franked envelope that said in big bold black letters, “DO NOT DESTROY OFFICIAL DOCUMENT,” (Exhibit 1) we raised our eyebrows.

Through the clear window of the envelope, the document inside was folded to show our address and in smaller type, “Special Notice: You have been selected to represent Republican voters in California’s 29th Congressional District. This is not a U.S. Government document” (Exhibit 2, below).

Nobody in our household (upon pain of death) is allowed to register as a Republican or vote that way. So my spouse and I were puzzled. GOP what? Dorothy Parker said it best: “What fresh hell is this?”

Intrigued, we opened the folded-up 4-page questionnaire and read four partly sane questions before the ridiculously leading questions like #9 began: “Do you think the record trillion dollar federal deficit the Democrats are creating with their out-of-control spending is going to have disastrous consequences for our nation? Yes / No / No Opinion.”

We might have howled with laughter at the hysteria, bias, and sheer wingnuttery of it all. Oh my, maybe yes.

Why not a question asking,

“Do you think microchips will be implanted in your perineum for population tracking and control purposes under Herr Obama’s evil regime of not-even-completely-universal mind-control-pseudo healthcare, given that FEMA DeAtH CaMpS OF HeLl aRE aLrEaDY bEinG CONSTRUCTED NOW AS WE SPEAK DON’T LOOK BEHIND YOU GET OUT NOW!!!!!!!! (HELP ME) Yes / No / Not sure because FOX TV hasn’t told me to turn it off yet.”

Oh yes, perhaps we chuckled a tad. I mean, are you even listening to yourself over there, getting all spittle-flecked with the veins popping. Go ahead. Blow a gasket. I actually voted and called my representatives in support of the Affordable Health Care Act so that even people freaking out about scary Obamacare could be covered under that same scary Obamacare which has barely started yet, so my conscience is clear should any of y’all keel over from working yourselves up.

What’s true cause for anger is that this Fake GOP Census is part RNC fundraiser and part deceptive, barely skirting the line of legal, Census imitation. I mean, for this Fake GOP Census, it looks as if you have to “donate” to “certify” your answers and maybe even “defray the cost of processing your Census Document” (Exhibit 3, above). Whereas there are no costs whatsoever for people to return their real Census forms. With the real Census, no one asks you for money, and no one keeps the data. No one at the Census calls you during dinner time to try to get more money out of your wallet into the GOP’s bank account so they can entertain party donors at strip clubs. No, that’s definitely the GOP that does that.

Do I wonder what triggered this suspicious mailing to my spouse, a Declined-to-State voter in California and an Asian Pacific American with a recognizably Asian last name? Do I think maybe the RNC is trying to deflate participation rates in areas where there are large populations who may not use English as their first language? My husband is a native speaker of English, so that concern doesn’t apply to him, but Congressional District 29 has a large number of Latino and Asian immigrants whose first language may be something other than English, so I have to wonder. I know as more reports surface about this pseudo-Census, it’ll be interesting to see if elderly, non-English-speaking, or poor voters are targeted. These are all vulnerable populations who might not understand the purpose of the legitimate Census and therefore be deceived into answering the RNC’s version. They might actually pop a check by mistake into the official-looking envelope (Exhibit 4, below).

So contemptibly deceptive is this fake GOP census that even Republicans are demanding that their own party stop. A Republican congressman is belatedly introducing a bill banning a tactic the RNC has been apparently employing for more than one election cycle, exploiting a loophole in a previous bill that was supposed to ban the practice. Lie, cheat and steal your way back into power–now, would that be John Galt that’s to blame for the underhandedness, or Machiavelli’s spawn Karl Rove? I feel sure Mr. and Mrs. Brady would have said, just run your own
race and win fair and square. The fact you have to cheat to win means
you can’t do it on the up-and-up. That means you’re already a loser.

Just remember when all the “voter ID” bills pop up on state referenda this fall to suppress votes among the non-literate, forgot-to-carry-my wallet, and non-English speaking voters, it was brought to you by the can’t-win-for-loserish cheating, slimy GOP.

Cynematic gets the strangest mail. She writes at P i l l o w b o o k and will shoot her short film in less than 20 days. Exhibit A: she was once a paralegal.

You may recall the greed of Wellpoint, a health insurer that thought it could raise premiums for California purchasers of individual insurance by 39% and do it with impunity.

After much deserved brouhaha, including passage of a health insurance reform law designed to prevent this kind of extortion from happening in the future, one of the results of the conflagration over the proposed rate hike in California was a scheduled review by an outside agency. Their assessment would inform a decision on premium increases by the California Insurance Commission. The deadline for Wellpoint to provide the California Department of Insurance with justifications for rate hikes is May 1, 2010, with a decision released shortly thereafter.

Keep that in mind when you read this long, exhaustively detailed story documenting how Wellpoint used computer algorithms to identify women who developed breast cancer in order to cancel their policies.

Please let the following executives at Wellpoint know exactly how you feel about their rescission policy for those unlucky enough to have breast cancer.

• Angela Braly, CEO, Wellpoint (Blue Cross Blue Shield’s parent company): Wellpoints Indiana headquarters: 120 Monument Circle Indianapolis, In 46204, (317) 488-6748
• Brian Sassi, Executive Vice President, President and Chief Executive Officer Consumer Business, Wellpoint: 1 Wellpoint Way, Westlake Village, CA 91362-3893, (805) 557-6655 or (805) 557-6333
• Cheryl Leamon, Public Policy and Governmental Affairs, Wellpoint: cheryl.leamon@wellpoint.com, (317) 488-6748

While you’re at it, let GOP gubernatorial candidate and current California Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner know he’d better deny Wellpoint’s proposed rate hike if he has a hope in hell of running for governor: 916-492-3500 Sacramento state capitol offices; CA residents 1-800-927-4357.

Cynematic writes at P i l l o w b o o k. She’ll be directing a short film soon which has nothing to do with health insurance, thank goodness. Because that would be a horror show.

You might say I have a little inside information about the SEC.

I spent several years there before I was a “recovering attorney” — first as lawyer in the Enforcement Division who investigated a variety of securities fraud cases and then as Deputy Director of Public Affairs, where I dealt with reporters all day about cases being brought and how the agency worked. Granted, it’s been a few years since I walked around the halls of the agency known as the Investor’s Advocate, but my guess is that for the most part things aren’t so different, except that this relatively small government agency is everyone’s favorite whipping boy right now.

But as cable news shows and newspaper headlines focus on Wall Street reform, Goldman Sachs, the mortgage crisis and the economy (that still isn’t so fine, thank you very much), I just wanted to weigh in on why the mess we’re in is less the fault of the Securities and Exchange Commission than it is of the lawmakers who are all pounding their fists, wanting you to believe that either they’re trying to change the status quo or that changing that status quo will only make things worse. The real problem is this –

Wall Street isn’t afraid of the SEC.

They never have been and they never will be as long as the agency is structured as it is — one that brings only civil, not criminal, cases. The handful of men who run our nation’s investment banking institutions aren’t afraid of consequences that they consider to be mere slaps on the hand from an inconsequential agency. The SEC can only take money from these Masters of the Universe. These guys make gobs of money all day, every day and know that they’ll make more money tomorrow (can you say credit default swaps?). Losing a little of it is just a cost of doing business to them, so you don’t even come close to getting their attention unless you can take away their ability to make more money — like when you say the word ‘prison.’ And the only ones who can bring criminal charges against them are the Justice Department and state Attorneys General.

The SEC might find a case and investigate it. The SEC might be the agency that does all the grunt work when it comes to digging for the dirt. But it can only stand by at the photo op when the criminal authorities start talking about the big house.

Think about it in this smaller, non-investment banking securities case — do you really think Martha Stewart batted an eyelash over her $30,000 fine after alleged insider trading? Or do you think she was more concerned about what five months in the slammer would do to her reputation, her business and the stock price of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia?

So, when it comes to the fraud currently alleged against Goldman Sachs — and cases that the SEC investigates every day — is it any wonder that the Richard Fulds or the Lloyd Blankfeins of the investment world treat SEC investigations with about the same amount of disdain as they would a pesky mosquito?

The Securities and Exchange Commission has the authority to subpoena documents and testimony, but corporations can and do drag their feet for years to delay any actions. This tactic is a good one for those being investigated, because Wall Street also knows that: (1) it takes forever to enforce those subpoenas, and (2) that there’s a lot of staff turnover at the SEC. Corporations and Wall Street big wigs know that a staff attorney there is like the weather — if you don’t like it, you don’t have to wait too long for it to change. And when that happens — when underpaid staff attorneys leave to seek their fortune at a big law firm or one of those Wall Street banks — a new attorney inherits an old case they usually couldn’t care less about.

So, unless and until the SEC can find a way to instill some fear when it comes to enforcing the nation’s securities laws, few will believe there’s much to lose by failing to cooperate when civil cases are filed. It’s a Wall Street mindset that’s existed as we’ve moved from Den of Thieves to Liar’s Poker to the internet trading bubble to today’s mortgage investment crisis. Not to mention that when major investment banks are big contributors to lawmakers’ campaignsGoldman executives get plum jobs in the government, it doesn’t seem likely that there will be any fear on Wall Street in the near future.

That’s probably good news for Gordon Gekko and his real life counterparts.

P.S. — I have a feeling that Jon Stewart agrees with me.

When she’s not hanging out here with her fellow MOMocrats, you can read more from Joanne on politics, Capitol Hill, and lots of other political wonkiness at her place, PunditMom.

Yesterday the Lancet released a major study highlighting maternal morbidity and mortality in 181 countries from 1990-2008.

The United States ranks 39th with 16.7 deaths per 100,000. We’re behind most of the OECD — behind Canada, tiny Malta, Croatia, Serbia, and the United Arab Emirates. Instead of declining is accordance with Millennium Development Goal 5 — the target is a 75%
reduction in the maternal mortality ratio (MMR) from 1990 to 2015 — the U.S. saw a 2% increase in MMR from 1990-2008.

I want you to gaze upon these picture for a few minutes:

I know this is hard to read but bear with me: Countries in blue, from very dark to light, have seen a decline in maternal mortality. Notice that the U.S. is in red. That’s because instead of declining, our rate has increased. Our company in seeing at least a 1% increase, in descending order: Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Botswana, Swaziland, South Africa, Namibia, Cte d’Ivoire, Mozambique, Malawi, United States, Cameroon, Denmark, Singapore, Georgia, Nigeria, Afghanistan, Slovenia and Chad.

Again, hard to read, I know. But I wanted to show you the U.S. with its nearest neighbors, statistically speaking.

Considering that the U.S. spends more than $7200 for every man, woman and child on health care — 16% of our GDP in 2007 — shouldn’t we be seeing a decline? Unfortunately, no. The U.S. does wonderfully on acute, emergency care, and on cutting edge care but we are merely middling when it comes to primary and preventive medicine, including pre- and post-natal care.

Yes, the State Children’s Health Insurance Program lets pregnant women enroll but only very low income pregnant women. And only in states that obtained a Section 1115 waiver. In 2007, that amounted to a whopping 6400 pregnant women. Pregnant women with incomes at or below 133% of the federal poverty line ($29,326 for a family of four) are Medicaid eligible as part of the “categorically needy” eligibility group.

If you’re wondering what the heck can be done to lower our MMR, some good news: health reform included home visitation for low-income pregnant women and covers tobacco cessation services for Medicaid and Medicare eligible pregnant women. But for the most part, we still don’t know enough preeclampsia and HELLP, we mostly don’t know what drugs are safe(st) for pregnant women, we don’t know why women of color — even when you control for income, education, and insurance status — have higher rates of maternal morbidity and mortality.

We need some well-funded research post-haste. As the FY 2011 appropriations cycle starts up, check back here for information on advocacy efforts around safe motherhood including funding for the Maternal Child Health Block Grant (Title V), Population Research and Voluntary Family Planning Programs (Title X, and NICHD.

And let us all repeat the following to anyone in earshot: A safe pregnancy is a human right for every woman regardless of race or income.

A giant, enormous thank-you to the folks at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation for their incredibly useful data set tools.

I lost my grandmother on Tuesday. On the way out of one meeting and already thinking ahead to the next, my cell phone rang. It was my aunt, calling from the grandmother’s house to tell me she had died.

She’d just turned 83 earlier this month. Besides a little hypertension (controlled via medication), she had no serious health conditions. We’re still waiting for final word on what happened — it appears to be a stroke or heart attack — but her death was sudden and unexpected.

Last evening I took to the sofa, exhausted from a long day of work and feeling I need a mulligan on 2010 (besides my grandmother, there have been other serious family illnesses, epic snow and cold, and frantic work schedules). I flipped channels rather aimlessly and eventually settled on MSNBC, where I could half-listen to the news.

And half-listen I did, until Keith Olbermann read his special comment and blew me away.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

I lost my grandmother on Tuesday. On the way out of one meeting and already thinking ahead to the next, my cell phone rang. It was my aunt, calling from the grandmother’s house to tell me she had died.

She’d just turned 83 earlier this month. Besides a little hypertension (controlled via medication), she had no serious health conditions. We’re still waiting for final word on what happened — it appears to be a stroke or heart attack — but her death was sudden and unexpected.

Last evening I took to the sofa, exhausted from a long day of work and feeling I need a mulligan on 2010 (besides my grandmother, there have been other serious family illnesses, epic snow and cold, and frantic work schedules). I flipped channels rather aimlessly and eventually settled on MSNBC, where I could half-listen to the news.

And half-listen I did, until Keith Olbermann read his special comment and blew me away.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

This afternoon, I received the following message from the RNC:

Subject: Your Call Can Make the Difference

** URGENT CALL TO ACTION ** After months working in secret behind closed doors, Harry Reid this week finally unveiled his 2,074-page government-run health care plan. His plan would increase health care premiums, increase taxes on families and small businesses by half a trillion dollars, cut Medicare by another half trillion dollars, and allow federal funds to be used for abortions. Click here for 10 things you should know about the bill. Harry Reid has scheduled a critical vote this Saturday night that will allow the Senate to take-up his bill. If that vote succeeds, Harry Reid will be dangerously close to finally imposing President Obama’s government-run health care scheme on America. Two Democrat Senators – Ben Nelson (D-NE) and Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) – are critically important to defeating Saturday’s vote. The RNC urges every concerned citizen to call Sens. Ben Nelson and Blanche Lincoln TODAY and tell them to vote against Harry Reid’s liberal bill when it comes up for a vote on Saturday. This is the best opportunity there will be to stop President Obama, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi from imposing their government-run health care plan on America. Again, please call Sens. Ben Nelson and Blanche Lincoln TODAY and tell them to vote against Harry Reid’s health care bill when it comes up for a vote on Saturday. Republican National Committee | 310 First Street, SE | Washington, D.C. 20003 p: 202.863.8500 | f: 202.863.8820 | e: info@gop.com Paid for by the Republican National Committee. 310 First Street, SE – Washington, D.C. 20003 – (202) 863-8500 www.gop.com Not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee. Unsubscribe Copyright 2009 Republican National Committee

SAVANNAH, Ga. — The national association representing state highway safety officials on Sunday threw its support behind a growing movement to ban text messaging by drivers, reversing its previous stand.

The Governors Highway Safety Association had come out against new laws banning texting behind the wheel on the grounds that such legislation would prove impossible to enforce. “Highway safety laws are only effective if they can be enforced and if the public believes they will be ticketed for not complying,” GHSA Chairman Vernon F. Betkey Jr. said in July.

• 
  In an unusual ceremony today, Gov. Quinn vetoed a campaign finance reform bill he had testified in favor of.
  He was joined by all four state legislative leaders including those who passed the bill but now say they realize it is flawed…
• 
  Aug. 27 (Bloomberg) — James Hoffa, president of theInternational Brotherhood of Teamsters, said his union may notsupport Senator Arlen Specter in his re-election bid…
• 
  A poll in a leading Japanese newspaper has forecast that the country’s opposition party is on course for a landslide victory in Sunday’s general election.
  According to the Ashahi newspaper…

• Teamster’s Hoffa Weighs Opposing Spec…
• Gov. Quinn vetoes campaign finance re… – Chicago Sun
• Poll predicts Japan vote landslide
• McCain: Obama must drop health care public option
• Hurricane Bill Weakens to Category 1
• Hurricane Bill slides along East Coas…
• Nation Digest: Hurricane Bill Weakens
• Forecasters downgrade Hurricane Bill to a Category 1 storm as it nears the coast of the US
• Hurricane Bill’s winds weaken as it nears US
• Apple Withheld Google Voice Approval …

In our last
installment, we introduced you to the bill drafting process, and some basics
on committee action. This post will cover more of the committee process and
floor action, including why your congressperson pouts like a two-year-old when
the words closed rule are thrown around.

After a bill is introduced, numbered, and assigned to committee,
the process generally goes subcommittee hearing—>subcommittee markup &
vote—>full committee hearing—>full committee markup & vote. This
is called normal order. It might also be called relatively-rare-order since
there are places where this process goes off the rails, both for good and for
ill.

In general, a bill gets at least one hearing and one markup
before it hits the floor of either the House or the Senate. However, to
expedite proceedings committees sometime hold joint hearings. Or, if the bill
went down to narrow defeat in the previous Congress or was vetoed, sometimes it
is simply re-voted in committee or the committees are bypassed altogether. For
a longer discussion, see my post
on Rep. John Culbersons knicker-twisting reaction to moving the State
Childrens Health Insurance Program reauthorization bill outside of normal
order.

The Money: Generally two kinds of legislation moves through Congress: appropriations and everything else. Authorizing (or reauthorizing) legislation
is what creates federal statutes. It says that HHS will do (or not do) this, or
promulgate that set of regulations. The bill also sets a maximum dollar amount
that may be spent to carry out a specified program(s) each fiscal year. Please
note the word maximum the number is a ceiling and it is entirely possible that
the program will receive less or even nothing at all. In general, federal
programs expire after some time period (five or ten years being quite common).
This automatic expiration requires Congress to reauthorize programs periodically.

The 12
appropriations bills actually fund the authorized
programs. They are behemoth bills, generally running several-hundreds
pages. They fund both mandatory (Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid) and
discretionary (everything else) spending. They are supposed to be complete by
October 1 each year. The last time that happened was…never during my
seven-year tenure inside the beltway. In order to keep the government chugging which includes
things like seniors receiving Social Security checks and horrible socialized medicine like Medicare

http://callsforaction.com/blog/go-read-it-health-insurance-reform-is-a-womens-issue/ http://callsforaction.com/blog/go-read-it-health-insurance-reform-is-a-womens-issue/#comments Thu, 27 Aug 2009 12:05:44 +0000 Josh http://callsforaction.com/blog/go-read-it-health-insurance-reform-is-a-womens-issue/ The Nation has a great post on why reforming the health insurance industry is a women’s issue . It starts with the simple fact that women whose primary work is caretaking (of children or others) are ineligible for employer-based insurance, and may not be adequately covered by a spouse’s insurance. It’s easier said than done to have insurance coverage prior to becoming pregnant.

The Nation has a great post on why reforming the health insurance industry is a women’s issue. It starts with the simple fact that women whose primary work is caretaking (of children or others) are ineligible for employer-based insurance, and may not be adequately covered by a spouse’s insurance.

It’s easier said than done to have insurance coverage prior to becoming pregnant. Sometimes life and work don’t coincide that way, nor should a pregnancy be considered a “pre-existing condition,” as too many policies do consider them.

And even if having a child is a far off or non-existent priority for you, personally, I think we can all agree that predatory insurers who target pregnant women with bogus insurance should be put in the stocks and pelted with offal for oh…forever.

Cynematic also blogs at P i l l o w b o o k.

More here:
Go Read It: Health Insurance Reform is a Women’s Issue

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http://callsforaction.com/blog/california-congressional-district-29-congressman-adam-schiffs-health-care-town-hall/ http://callsforaction.com/blog/california-congressional-district-29-congressman-adam-schiffs-health-care-town-hall/#comments Sat, 22 Aug 2009 05:29:56 +0000 Josh http://callsforaction.com/blog/california-congressional-district-29-congressman-adam-schiffs-health-care-town-hall/ In case you were wondering, I attended the town hall held by my congressperson a little more than a week ago, and noticed no one in attendance packing heat . I joke here, but I take any vigilantism or talk of intimidating people with arguments made in the presence of a gun seriously. That’s not reasoned debate, that’s bullying.

In case you were wondering, I attended the town hall held by my congressperson a little more than a week ago, and noticed no one in attendance packing heat. I joke here, but I take any vigilantism or talk of intimidating people with arguments made in the presence of a gun seriously. That’s not reasoned debate, that’s bullying.

Alhambra, CA. August 11, 2009.

The town hall was originally scheduled to be held inside a library, but so many people rsvp’d that it ended up being held outside on the blocked-off street outside the library. It garnered a lot of attention as it was one of the few scheduled in Los Angeles for the week of August 10, 2009.

If anything, my town hall was an exercise in both exasperation and theatrics, with actual information struggling to break through elevated decibel levels. My congressman had chosen a panel of experts to inform constituents about HR 3200, the America’s Affordable Choices Act of 2009. At this stage, the bill is pending with more modification expected in both the House and the Senate. He had invited a high-level administrator with Kaiser Permanente and two doctors to provide information on a public option. Very little of this information got out; the speakers a little drone-y in their delivery, the shouters persistent with their demands (“Read the bill!”).

I thought I’d turn down the volume and show you pictures of my congressman’s town hall.

The banner anti-health insurance reform people put up: “We the people…Take our country back”, and a pro-health insurance reform supporter gets her two cents in.

AARP had members there who support health insurance reform. Incidentally, that is the American Association of Retired People’s official position. They’re the best-known interest group advocating on behalf of Americans over 55 years of age.

The two ladies seated above? Make an excellent point.

Let’s put it this way: I know who lives in my district. It’s a lot of union people: teachers, nurses, film crew folks, screenwriters (yes, who also belong to a union), retirees of all multi-ethnic backgrounds, and Latino, Asian, and white families with young children.

There was no shouting between these two men who disagree. I talked to the African American man afterwards, and he said his conversational partner had some “strange ideas.” Neither man convinced the other.

The aptly named ‘bullhorn,’ wielded by an anti-health insurance reform protester. Apparently he likes the status quo.

You with your suit, tie, and Reagan Library lanyard, and photocopied talking points…you’re not from around these parts, are you? You came all the way from Simi Valley to protest in my district?

It sure isn’t people who look like they came from retirement homes in Orange County, or who recently visited or perhaps worked at the Reagan Library and conveniently had a stack of talking points printed out on papers to hand out.

More anti-health insurance reform people. Apparently union members who support an issue are “stormtroopers” and not merely ‘goons’ or ‘thugs.’ I call rhetoric inflation and egregious metaphorical hijacking with intent to harm.

Here’s a LaRouchey supporter with one of those appalling “Obama-as-Hitler” brochures.

She’s vehemently against health care reform. What, is FreedomWorks subcontracting out astroturf to LaRouche supporters now?

For. Sure. Possibly best sign at the town hall.

People who actually live in my congressional district tend to look like this.

The young LaRouche supporter who held up this offensive sign…

…later found his spot in front of the tv cameras blocked by these nice men. They very quickly and politely quieted down our part of the crowd, where a bit of shouting and jostling broke out, and stood shoulder to shoulder together.

This being LA, of course there was an actor in the crowd. His sign thanked Congressman Schiff for supporting a robust public option. (Extra credit to anyone who can name him!)

These ladies were adorable.

Lots of single payer as well as public option supporters were out in full force.

A homemade sign.

Here’s my summary of what I saw at the town hall: there were as many supporters of health insurance reform as there were opposed, maybe even outnumbering the “no on HR 3200″ people. The people who came to learn more were often prevented from doing so by loud shouts and heckling. This earned the shouters no love from the hometown crowd. I turned around many times to the LaRouchies near me, and said, “I live in this district and I’m trying to listen. PLEASE be quiet. I can’t hear the speakers.” Not one ever challenged me by saying, “I live here too and I have the right to boo and hiss.” NOT. ONE.

And finally, we absolutely could tell who the people were who came from inside the congressional district and those who came from elsewhere. By race and age, the anti-health insurance reform people were generally whiter and older, angrier and louder. Paper tigers.

My only regret from that evening? When anti-health insurance reform people burst into “God Bless America,” that the pro-health insurance reform people didn’t counter with “This Land is My Land, This Land is Your Land.” (No regrets from plastering the LaRouche people with “Health Care Reform Now” stickers. It took them a while to notice but then again it’s hard to look at your own back. )

I defy any conservative to sing a Woody Guthrie song and mean it.

Cynematic also blogs at P i l l o w b o o k.

View original here:
California Congressional District 29: Congressman Adam Schiff’s Health Care Town Hall

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http://callsforaction.com/blog/wonk-101-mommy-where-do-bills-come-from/ http://callsforaction.com/blog/wonk-101-mommy-where-do-bills-come-from/#comments Thu, 20 Aug 2009 06:48:00 +0000 Calls for Action http://callsforaction.com/blog/wonk-101-mommy-where-do-bills-come-from/ MOMocrats is hosting a short series, Wonk 101, to cover some of the intricacies of the legislative process. Why?

MOMocrats is hosting a
short series, Wonk 101, to cover some of the intricacies of the legislative
process. Why? Well, while School
House Rock remains the gold-standard for entertaining and informative, it does gloss over some of the weirder happenings.
In an effort to make it easier to understand why there are three versions of
health reform percolating in the House and Arlen Specter kept repeating, There
is no Senate bill, we present this series. Got a burning question about
something? Please leave a comment.

I thought this first post would cover how a bill gets
written, introduced, and referred to a committee. And the inevitable exceptions
to those rules. The next posts will focus on the chaos wonderment that
is floor action and the conference process. Given the rage over health care
reform, I thought itd be good to provide a sort of blueprint for following the
process.

When Two (or a Couple Thousand) People Love Each Other An
Idea… From the thousands of constituent requests, meetings with lobbyists,
and handed-down party priorities, a representative might cull a couple dozen
ideas in which to actually invest staff time and draft a bill. Alternatively,
an outside group might draft a bill and then shop it around to members. In
either case, the actual drafting can take months
as people duke it out over exact wording (think It depends on what the meaning
of is is.)

There are questions to be asked and answered: Will it alter
(amend) or repeal existing laws or regulations? Where does it fit in existing
federal statutes? Does the counsels office think it is constitutional? Is it
likely to pass? Who can we partner with? How well funded is the opposition?

What happens next?

House: After drafting,
the finished bill is dropped in the hopper, a small box near the Speakers
seat. After a representative drops the bill, it is numbered. There are
different kinds of legislation: a bill (H.R.); simple resolutions (H. Res) that
do NOT carry any force of law; concurrent resolutions (H. Con. Res.) are passed
by both chambers of Congress and do NOT carry any force of law; and joint resolutions
(H. J. Res.), that need to be signed into law or vetoed and DO carry the force
law.

Once the bill is numbered, the parliamentarian decides which
committee(s) have jurisdiction over the bill. The House Parliamentarian is
appointed by the Speaker, but he (and it has always been a he, House-side)
isnt a political appointee. If he is qualified to serve, then he serves. The
current House Parliamentarian, John Sullivan, is only the fourth since 1928 and
was appointed in 2004.

Senate: There is
no spoon hopper. Senate-side, the bill is simply handed to the clerk for
numbering.

The Senate Parliamentarian is Alan Frumin. Mr. Frumin may end up a major player by way of an
obscure rule. Which just illustrates my main point: Knowing the rules is vitally important to (a) knowing when
someone is trying to sell you a tremendous load of crap and (b) understanding
how a guy no one elected and might end up deciding what is in and what is out
in the Senate version of health care reform (more on that in the next posts).

Committee jurisdiction is pretty self-explanatory. A full list
of House Committees
is here; Senate
Committees are here.

After the bill is numbered, the Government Printing Office,
uh, prints the bill, it is loaded into Thomas,
and entered into the daily
proceedings. The bills sponsor (read: author) will try to sign-on
cosponsors, particularly folks who sit on the committee(s) that will consider
the bill.

Then we wait. And wait, and wait, and wait. Of the
4,000-5,000 bill introduced in the House each legislation session (two years in
length), about 400-600 are signed into law. In many cases, the committee never
does anything with the legislation hence the term, die in committee.

An important point
about reading: With regard to health reform and a whole lot of other
legislation, there is hysteria about Not! Reading! The! Bill! To which, I say, Maybe
not. They have staffers and committee staffers who pre-chew and partially
digest material. The Democrats have held a series of health care prep workshops
with staffers going through the bill, section-by-section, and taking questions.
Reading the entire is good for bragging rights among a certain nerdy sect but some
of it is extraneous reprinting of entire sections of existing law, for
example.

In much the same way
that people forego reading the entire Bible and instead rely upon their religious
leader(s) for interpretation, or Catholics forego reading each of the
encyclicals, or the secular among us employ a reader to make it through Pynchons
Gravitys Rainbow, so too do our representatives rely on secondary sources. Do
I think it is acceptable to read none, or very little, of the bill? No. But do
I think it is necessary to read every line? Also no.

Oddities: On
relatively rare occasion, when a bill is deemed especially necessary or
politically important, the committee may have only a limited amount of time to
act on a bill. If you look at this
page, youll see that the Speaker has required action on H.R. 2868 by
September 30, 2009 and H.R. 2989 by October 16, 2009. If the committees dont
act by those respective dates then yoink
the bill will go directly to the House floor for action.

On slightly more common occasion, a bill will be taken up
without committee action on the suspension calendar (suspension of normal
rules of order) and passed by unanimous consent. Unanimous consent (UC) is
reserved for bills that are non-controversial think H.R. 1, Ice Cream is
Awesome. A single dissenter in either the House or Senate can halt the
unanimous consent process. Youll see a lot more UCing of bills near the end
of Congress when members experience a sort of senioritis and just want to go home already, yeesh to
expedite unfinished business, they UC a bunch of bills in a flurry of
last-minute activity.

Where we are with
health care reform: House-side, the bill has been introduced and numbered
(H.R. 3200). It has been referred to three committees: Energy and Commerce,
Ways and Means, and Education and Labor.

Each committee voted on the bill. Each committee altered it
with amendments and striking this and that. What version will ultimately appear
on the floor is a matter of negotiation between the committee chairs and the
Speaker.

Senate-side, the bill has not been formally introduced or
numbered. One committee, the Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee
started working on it and eventually passed a version. Another committee,
Senate Finance, is still working. This is where the Gang of Six comes in
six members of Senate Finance are meeting to hammer out a compromise. As in the
House, which version makes to the floor is a matter for the Majority Leader and
committee chairs.

Up Next: Ringling
Bros. Aint Got Nothing on This Circus (a/k/a Floor Action).

]]> http://callsforaction.com/blog/wonk-101-mommy-where-do-bills-come-from/feed/ 0 http://callsforaction.com/blog/so-much-shouting-so-little-laughter-a-maryland-health-care-town-hall/ http://callsforaction.com/blog/so-much-shouting-so-little-laughter-a-maryland-health-care-town-hall/#comments Tue, 11 Aug 2009 10:05:20 +0000 Calls for Action http://callsforaction.com/blog/so-much-shouting-so-little-laughter-a-maryland-health-care-town-hall/ “Well, I won’t be going inside.” — Jane Aiken, New Hampshire Teabagger in response to MSNBC’s Dylan Ratigan’s opportunity to pose a question on health reform to President Obama And that, ladies and gentlemen, sums it up nicely. Anti-health care reform folks are very interested in appearing on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox but totally, completely, and utterly disinterested in the facts. Such was the case last evening at Senator Ben Cardin’s (D-MD) health care town hall.

“Well, I won’t be going inside.” — Jane Aiken, New Hampshire Teabagger in response to MSNBC’s Dylan Ratigan’s opportunity to pose a question on health reform to President Obama

And that, ladies and gentlemen, sums it up nicely. Anti-health care reform folks are very interested in appearing on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox but totally, completely, and utterly disinterested in the facts.

Such was the case last evening at Senator Ben Cardin’s (D-MD) health care town hall. Despite the 97-degree heat, code red air quality, and oppressive humidity, hundreds of people turned out in an attempt to claim one of the 500 seats at Towson University.

“‘I know some of you don’t want me to mention the facts, but listen to
the facts,’ the senator said early on, drawing an angry response from
opponents in the room and applause from supporters – who were both
outshouted and outnumbered.” — Baltimore Sun

(Full disclosure: I was unable to attend, given the weather and general fish-like gasping after a couple mile trek to retrieve my daughter from daycare. A daughter I apparently I shouldn’t have had, and want to kill, if you believe the protestor’s signs. I did follow the event on Twitter and via the Baltimore Sun. I’ve also been writing extensively on health reform for this website and in my professional life.)

Cardin’s attempt to answer questions was thwarted by “almost nonstop” hecklers. It seems no one is interested in the facts, what the bills really say — and don’t say.

Instead, we’re treated to signs advertising the “Democratic Nazi Party.” An especially classy touch given that the senator is Jewish and heads the Helsinki Commission, an organization dedicated to “advancing comprehensive security through human rights [and] democracy…”

I’ve been trying to call my senator all morning to express my support for health care reform and to thank him for holding the health care town hall. All I’ve gotten is a busy signal. I’ll keep dialing and so should all the other supporters of health reform.

Here is the original:
So Much Shouting, So Little Laughter: A Maryland Health Care Town Hall

]]> http://callsforaction.com/blog/so-much-shouting-so-little-laughter-a-maryland-health-care-town-hall/feed/ 0 http://callsforaction.com/blog/hear-my-story-i-survived-cancer-only-to-be-denied-insurance/ http://callsforaction.com/blog/hear-my-story-i-survived-cancer-only-to-be-denied-insurance/#comments Thu, 06 Aug 2009 18:44:27 +0000 Calls for Action http://callsforaction.com/blog/hear-my-story-i-survived-cancer-only-to-be-denied-insurance/ Health care reform is a women’s issue. Why

Health care reform is a women’s issue. Why? Because well-being and caregiving are so closely linked.

Like it or not, much of the burden of caregiving falls on the shoulders of women. We might have legal responsibility for an aged parent or a mentally or physically disabled sibling. We might be parents ourselves. Whether a single woman or partnered, we are there for our women friends and community members to support, encourage, comfort, celebrate, and rabble rouse together…keeping each other sane.

With Hear My Story, MOMocrats launches a series that highlights the personal stories of women who support health insurance reform because they know the existing system is broken. And they’ve fallen through the cracks–or come close–and survived to tell about it. It’s direct, concrete experience, painful and difficult–filled with the kind of worries that make your nights sleepless and long. Maybe you can relate.

Here’s the story of Jennic Law, a small business owner at KangaRooBoo.com who started a children’s toy company specializing in non-toxic, educational toys and games.

I voted for President Obama. I am
hopeful that he WILL provide those of us with pre-existing conditions
an affordable way to obtain health care coverage. Yes, he will. His
mother was discriminated against due to her own medical conditions he
would be one to understand even if no one else does.

I am a cancer survivor. I am currently living in a health care
nightmare and have been for almost 2 years. I have no health coverage.
I am a married 32 years old small business owner with 2 children under
6 years old living in the midwest.

I had cancer 9 years ago. I was freshly graduated from college and a newlywed of 24
years old at the time of diagnosis. There are no cancer histories in my
family, but what I had was the best kind of cancer to have if there
ever was such a thing Hodgkins disease right up there at the top
with testicular cancer. I was working for a company with group plans
and thank goodness that insurance paid for all treatment-related costs.
Miraculously we were able to have 2 healthy kids a few years after all
the treatments. During a company restructuring, I was laid off when I
was pregnant with our youngest. I didnt bother looking for a job, I
presumed no one would hire a visibly pregnant woman. I stayed home a
couple of years as a Stay At Home Mom. Fortunately my husband was in a
group plan with the employer he worked for at the time, so health care
coverage was not a huge issue.

Fast forward to December 2006 when my husband got laid off. We were
all out of health care. We got on COBRA and paid all 18-months of it
(because we decided to be self-employed), exhausting it and a lot of
our savings as well. After our family COBRA plan exhausted, my husband
and kids got on private individual health insurance they are all
healthy and low risk so no problems any insurance company would
gladly take them without a whimper. We pay for it ourselves; its
pretty reasonable monthly premiums with not so reasonable 80/20
co-insurance and $2500 deductible.

The kids and husband have medical coverage. I, on the other hand, have
been denied health care at every insurance company except HIP.
Fortunately the state that we are living in has HIP. And as you may
know, HIP is for those of us who are un-insurable anywhere else. We are
blacklisted as high risk and high liability and “untouchables.”

Never mind the fact that the cancer I had is coined the best cancer
to have medically and has one of the highest CURE rate of all cancers,
never mind that I have been in remission for almost 8 years, never mind
that I have been healthy all these past 7+ years, and never mind that I
incurred less than $1000 of total medical costs while I was on COBRA
for the entire 18 months duration.

These are things all the insurance companies tells me: NO CAN DO. You
had cancer? You mentioned cancer? Tough luck. No insurance for you.
Take a walk, have a nice day.

HIP is an option. HIP is the *only* option. However, HIP wants
$700/month with $2500 deductible, 80/20 and a bunch of other
limitations. Just for MYSELF.
I cant breathe.
I cant afford that. So I dont have HIP. I dont have health care coverage.
After my chemotherapy and radiation therapy ended 8 years ago, all of
my oncologists advised that I start having mammograms after I turn 30,
because the bulk of radiation was delivered to my chest and neck area.
It is very rare, but the radiation could potentially make me more
susceptible to develop breast cancer in the future. So it is
recommended I get a mammogram baseline when I turned 30. I will be
turning 33 very soon and I have not had one. I do feel fine though.
However, I was also fine for my whole life except the 5 months
leading up to my cancer diagnose.

[Left, extraordinarily expensive Neupogen shots (white blood cell boosters) used during chemotherapy. Cost: approximately $400 a bottle (the height of a quarter or so in size
only!) and I needed 4 bottles every 2 weeks for 6 months. That's $9,600
of drugs doing the sole purpose of boosting my white blood cells during
chemotherapy, not even the chemo drugs itself. All covered by insurance through an ex-employer. I wouldn't have been able to afford the medicine if I did not have insurance.]

I am willing to pay for the entire cost of the mammogram out of pocket
what I AM afraid of and the very reason why Im not getting the
mammogram yet is, what if the result shows something bad? How will I
pay for the treatments?! For I am without health care coverage, and if
it does come back with bad results, I would have yet one MORE
pre-existing condition

Even if I start paying for HIP now, which I cannot afford, I will not
be covered for anything significant for at least a year.I also do not
qualify for medicaid, because we have more than $2000 in assets.
So, no mammograms for me.

Its infuriating knowing that the US, one of the wealthiest nations in the
world, is the only developed, civilized country where affordable health
care is not easily accessible. Even friends in Thailand have that
luxury. I have friends living in Canada, Sweden and England as well,
all of them are very happy with the system. One of them had cancer and
then a recurrence one year later–she received great care and even 18
months of fully paid leave from her job during treatments. All three
of them tell me that on top of their national health systems, everyone
and anyone has the option of purchasing additional private health
insurance if desired but none of them choose to.

A lot of people in the US depend on their jobs to have health
coverage, a lot of people are without that health coverage nowadays
because they have lost that job, and a lot of people who do still have
jobs are afraid to start businesses not because they dont have great
ideas or grand dreams but because they will be without health care
coverage.

It was very discouraging when my husband was laid off 2 weeks prior to
Christmas in 2006, and it propelled us to start our own business sooner
than planned. We are not rich by any means were 2nd generation
immigrants with not much of anything materially the money that we are
using for our business is from selling our house and moving to a lower
cost city. What we do have are big dreams, the entrepreneurial spirit,
a lot of commitment and hard work. Its not uncommon for us to work 7
days a week and 15 hour days.

As a result of my cancer history, the current health care system (or
lack thereof!) is not making entrepreneurship and owning a small
business easy at all. For people like me with pre-existing conditions,
health care reform is the only hope of getting any medical coverage.
Whatever the plan will become, I’m certain it won’t be perfect and will
not fits everyone’s situation perfectly, but for those millions and
millions of uninsurables, at least we will get to be IN the waiting line. And that, is the beginning of a health care system for everyone,
despite their income level, job, gender, ethnicity, or medical history,
because we are looking after their well being and not their wallet.

Re-posted by Cynematic from a comment at Queen of Spain’s blog, in which she asked her readers to send comments, stories, and questions to Valerie Jarrett, one of President Obama’s advisors. Ms. Jarrett had made herself available to several women who attended BlogHer ’09 to discuss health insurance reform. All comments were forwarded to Ms. Jarrett for her to read as Congress begins the last stretch of writing–and passng–health insurance reform legislation.

View original here:
Hear My Story: I Survived Cancer, Only to Be Denied Insurance

]]> http://callsforaction.com/blog/hear-my-story-i-survived-cancer-only-to-be-denied-insurance/feed/ 0 http://callsforaction.com/blog/abortion-and-health-reform-what-the-bills-actually-say/ http://callsforaction.com/blog/abortion-and-health-reform-what-the-bills-actually-say/#comments Wed, 05 Aug 2009 11:29:50 +0000 Calls for Action http://callsforaction.com/blog/abortion-and-health-reform-what-the-bills-actually-say/ I've been reading from the Washington Post to Time to really awesome blogs that abortion is going to derail health reform. Id like to call a time-out and explain what is actually included in the legislation, both House and Senate versions. The amount of hysteria over health reform generally, and womens reproductive health in particular, is alarming.

I've been reading from the Washington
Post to Time
to really awesome blogs
that abortion is going to derail health reform.

Id like to call a time-out and explain what is actually included in the legislation,
both House and Senate versions. The amount of hysteria over health reform
generally, and womens reproductive health in particular, is alarming. What we
need are some facts. And, of course, we need for womens reproductive health not
to be the sacrificial
lamb. Again.

So, onto some facts…

House version:
The House version does not contain the word abortion.

The House version had to be approved by three committees:
Education and Labor, Ways and Means, and Energy and Commerce. During debate on the bill before Ways and Means,
Rep. Sam Johnson (R-TX) tried to amend the bill to prohibit coverage for
abortion services except in cases of life endangerment, rape, or incest. His amendment failed, 19-22.

When Energy and Commerce took up the bill, an amendment by Rep.
Joseph Pitts (R-PA), would have prohibited abortion coverage except in
cases of life endangerment, or forcible rape or incest. Forcible
rape or incest? Are there other kinds? And what is forcible anyway? Do bruises
count or would you need broken bones? Anyway, his ridiculously offensive
amendment failed, 29-30. Rep. Bart Stupak (D-MI) offered a similar
amendment sans “forcible” that also failed, 27-31.

Two abortion-related amendments were approved. The
first, by Rep. Stupak, ensures that medical providers, health plans, or
institutional entities may NOT be discriminated against because they refuse to
provide, pay for, provide coverage of, or refer for abortions. The amendment
protects people who dont want to participate in abortion services. It passed by simple voice vote.

The
second, by Rep. Lois Capps (D-CA) prohibits abortion as a covered
service under the minimum benefits package. Like the Stupak amendment, this one
also would prohibit any health plan in the exchange from discriminating against medical
providers, health plans, or institutional entities because of their willingness
or unwillingness to provide, pay for, provide coverage of, or refer for,
abortion. Finally, it would clarify that nothing in the underlying
bill could be construed to preempt any state laws on abortion, including
parental consent, and that the bill would not affect federal conscious clause
requirements. It passed, 30-28.

(The minimum benefits package is the floor the lowest
number and type of procedures that health insurance plans in the health care
exchange would be required to provide coverage of. It includes mental health services, substance abuse services, physical benefits,
anything that received an A or B rating in the current
recommendations of the United States Preventive Services Task Force;
maternity care; and well baby care.)

Senate Version: Like the
House version, the Senate version does not contain the word abortion.

The Senate version needs to be approved by two committees,
Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP, jurisdiction over public health, employment) and Finance (jurisdiction over revenue/tax/Social Security/Medicaid/Medicare/SCHIP). So far, only HELP has
approved its version; Finance expects to release a version on September 15.

Anyway, HELP started debating
the bill back in June and finished up in mid-July. On July 13, the
committee defeated a couple of amendments one by Sen. Mike Enzi (R-WY) to
prohibit anything in the bill as being construed to require coverage; one by
Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) to codify the Hyde Amendment; one by
Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) to prohibit the Secretary of HHS from overturning any
state law on abortion. All failed, 11-12.

Why this all matters
anyway: This post is a rather desperate and elaborate plea to pay attention
to the policy, not just the politics. With everyone shouting from the rooftops
about the bill being either the 2d coming or a pinko-commie plan to kill
puppies and ban rainbows forever, it is far too easy to tune out. Or to get
caught up in someone else's talking points.

No one expects that most people are going to read the 1000+
pages of the House bill or the 600+ pages of the Senate bill. But there are
many, many resources that will clearly report on the provisions and on
amendments.

Dont get overwhelmed. Try not to get lost in the rhetoric. Try Kaiser Daily Health
News. A short, daily email covering major developments and headlines.

Try Ezra Kleins blog at the Washington
Post; he brings in economists, researchers, and links to fiscal analysis so as
to really explain the short- and long-term financial implications of passing
(and not passing) health reform. Try The
Source, where a weekly newsletter (published every week either the House or
Senate is in session) breaks down the action.

(For more on the economic benefits of family planning, I
direct you to to my very
first post for MOMocrats.)

Originally posted here:
Abortion and Health Reform: What the Bills Actually Say

]]> http://callsforaction.com/blog/abortion-and-health-reform-what-the-bills-actually-say/feed/ 0 http://callsforaction.com/blog/breaking-news-and-a-chance-for-you-to-help-planned-parenthood/ http://callsforaction.com/blog/breaking-news-and-a-chance-for-you-to-help-planned-parenthood/#comments Fri, 24 Jul 2009 07:52:26 +0000 Calls for Action http://callsforaction.com/blog/breaking-news-and-a-chance-for-you-to-help-planned-parenthood/ Today the House will vote on the FY2010 Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies appropriations bill . This is the largest of the 13 annual measures that fund the government.

Today the House will vote on the FY2010 Labor, Health and Human Services, Education, and Related Agencies appropriations bill. This is the largest of the 13 annual measures that fund the government.

Labor-H funds a whole host of programs and agencies — everything from the Maternal Child Health Block Grant to the State Children’s Health Insurance Program to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).

Tossed in there is funding for Population Research and Voluntary Family Planning programs — usually referred to as Title X, its place in the Public Health Service Act. Title X provides — with preference for low-income individuals — family planning and related preventive health services. Every year it receives about $280 million; though the proposed funding in 2010 is about $317 million. (And if that seems like a lot of money, it isn’t. If Title X had kept pace with inflation since 1980, it’d be receiving about $725 million.)

Today on the House floor Reps. Pence (R-IN), Cao (R-LA), Lamborn (R-CO), Terry (R-NE), Pitts (R-PA), Smith (R-NJ), and Latta (R-OH) will be offering an amendment that would prohibit Planned Parenthood from receiving any Title X funds. About 15% of ALL the family planning clinics in the US are run by Planned Parenthood; some 4 million women a year access services at these clinics. And here I feel compelled to point out that Title X does not cover abortion services (see Section 1008 for the prohibition).

If you think women, especially poor women, should have access to Title X services, including at Planned Parenthood, please call your representative and tell them to vote against the Pence amendment to H.R. 3293.

Photo credit: Sarah Consolacion on Flickr. Creative Commons License.

Read more from the original source:
Breaking News and A Chance For You to Help Planned Parenthood

]]> http://callsforaction.com/blog/breaking-news-and-a-chance-for-you-to-help-planned-parenthood/feed/ 0 http://callsforaction.com/blog/kay-hagan-embarrasses-me/ http://callsforaction.com/blog/kay-hagan-embarrasses-me/#comments Wed, 15 Jul 2009 09:01:35 +0000 Calls for Action http://callsforaction.com/blog/kay-hagan-embarrasses-me/ This week the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee wrapped up their multi-week debate on the Affordable Health Choices Act — passed 13-10!. Yesterday, the committee approved, by voice vote, an amendment by Sen

This week the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions
(HELP) Committee wrapped up their multi-week debate on the Affordable
Health Choices Act — passed 13-10!.

Yesterday, the committee approved, by voice vote, an amendment
by Sen. Kay Hagan (D-NC). The amendment that would exclude temporary or seasonal
agricultural workers . . . for the purposes of determining the size of an
employer.

What does that mean? It means that large agricultural
employers wouldnt have to count the tens of thousands of farm workers
(sometimes called Immokalee, after the town in Florida) as employees. If they
manage to exclude enough folks, then they voila! become a small business,
exempt from the employer mandate to provide health insurance benefits.

Hagan was already on my radar after voting
against the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act. Now shes
earned a place on the sh*list for, essentially, denying health insurance
coverage to some of the most vulnerable workers in the United States.

Farmworkers have the worst
health indicators of any US subpopulation. Since were about helping other
mothers, Ill start there: 97% of farmworker mothers are accompanied by their
minor children; only 42% had any sort of prenatal care (compared with 76%
nationally); infant mortality rates among farm workers are at least 25% higher
than the national average (around 10 per 100,000 births); irony alert! 82% of
farm workers households experienced food insecurity and 49% went hungry; 88% of
children were exposed to toxic pesticides; women farmworkers are more
likely to be depressed and attempt or commit suicide.

Think this is a travesty? Call Hagans office at
202-224-6342 (if youre a constituent, you might also want to call either her
Greensboro office at 336-333-5311 or the Raleigh office 919-856-4630). You can
email her here.

Maybe we should start a campaign. Mail Sen. Hagan a pack of
seeds and ask if she thinks the people who plant them, water them, and pick the
resulting fruit and vegetables that feed her and the nation deserve health care.

Photo credit: Korean Resource Center on Flickr. Creative Commons License.

View original post here:
Kay Hagan Embarrasses Me

]]> http://callsforaction.com/blog/kay-hagan-embarrasses-me/feed/ 0 http://callsforaction.com/blog/go-watch-it-bill-moyers-interviews-cigna-pr-exec-on-resistance-to-health-care-reform/ http://callsforaction.com/blog/go-watch-it-bill-moyers-interviews-cigna-pr-exec-on-resistance-to-health-care-reform/#comments Sat, 11 Jul 2009 11:24:21 +0000 Josh http://callsforaction.com/blog/go-watch-it-bill-moyers-interviews-cigna-pr-exec-on-resistance-to-health-care-reform/ Take 30 minutes of your day to watch Bill Moyers and understand who doesn’t want you to have a public option in choosing your health insurance–a public option that has overhead, like Medicare, of about 3%, as compared to the health insurance industry’s 20% for overhead and profit. Says Bill Moyers’ guest, Wendell Potter, “…the industry doesn’t want to compete against a more efficient competitor.” Bill Moyers (about 21.20 in to the video): You told Congress that the [health care] industry has hijacked health care and turned it into a giant ATM for Wall Street. You said, “I saw how they confused their customers and dumped the sick.

Take 30 minutes of your day to watch Bill Moyers and understand who doesn’t want you to have a public option in choosing your health insurance–a public option that has overhead, like Medicare, of about 3%, as compared to the health insurance industry’s 20% for overhead and profit. Says Bill Moyers’ guest, Wendell Potter, “…the industry doesn’t want to compete against a more efficient competitor.”

Bill Moyers (about 21.20 in to the video): You told Congress that the [health care] industry has hijacked health care and turned it into a giant ATM for Wall Street. You said, “I saw how they confused their customers and dumped the sick. Also, they can satisfy their Wall Street investors.” How do they satisfy their investors on Wall Street?

Find out the answer from the former CIGNA exec, who explains how the “medical loss ratio,” or the chunk of every dollar spent to pay medical claims, has been shrinking. If you got sick and needed health insurance bills paid in the 1990s, about $.95 of every dollar went to cure you. Now, only about $.80 of every dollar you pay goes to your care. Wall Street punishes health insurance companies that have a too-high medical loss ratio. That means companies that flourish are ones who figure out how to deny you care, drop you, or give you less expensive care. Your health could literally be standing in the way of their bottom line.

Overhead of 3% via a public option, versus gold-plated tableware for health insurance industry executives who fly first class on the $.20 of every dollar of mine–and yours–that goes to their “overhead”?

Get some facts from someone whose highly-compensated job it was to sell you made-up fear about something that could instead benefit YOU and not them. Your health isn’t someone else’s bottom line.

Cynematic blogs at P i l l o w b o o k.

Go here to see the original:
Go Watch It: Bill Moyers Interviews CIGNA PR Exec on Resistance to Health Care Reform

]]> http://callsforaction.com/blog/go-watch-it-bill-moyers-interviews-cigna-pr-exec-on-resistance-to-health-care-reform/feed/ 0