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Another Upchuckable Week: The place where religion meets your rights

separation of church and state smaller

Please welcome back guest blogger K.C. Boyd. You might remember her from her earlier posts. This one is longer than her others, so we’re only posting part of it. You can link over to read the rest here.

Another Upchuckable Week - the place where religion meets your rights – by K. C. Boyd

With the 2012 election a dim memory and it’s crazy-making religion soaked primaries even dimmer, you’d be well advised to keep an eye on the states because that’s where it’s happening when it comes to Christian Crazies. For a brief sampling, take a read:

Here

  • Proving there’s still a little ‘Year of the Bible’ in all of us, last month the Pennsylvania House of Representatives declared the fast-approaching April 30 as “National Fast Day.” http://bit.ly/108RbBq

There

& Everywhere

  • Conservatives target political funding, investing where it gets the biggest political bang: in statehouses. Take a look here to learn about state funding efforts : http://bit.ly/17BbL2Ls

The “State” of Education

  • A Central Mississippi high school allegedly forced students to watch a Christian video and listen to church officials preach about Jesus Christ. http://bit.ly/11WzIMN
  • In Tennessee: The Blue Ridge Christian Academy Gave Fourth Graders the Creationism Test Heard Around the Internet. http://bit.ly/158eumJ
  • In New York, the Godly wonder: Can the Bible Save Minority Students From NYC’s Failing Public Education System? http://bit.ly/12tlgyG
  • HB 1017, which sailed through the Arkansas House of Representatives, would require the state board of education to approve public school courses that teach the Bible. Similar measures were introduced in North Carolina and Wyoming. http://bit.ly/18sAMfa
  • Virginia politicians tried a different tactic: a state constitutional amendment mandating that citizens as well as elected officials and state employees have the right to pray on government premises and public property. http://bit.ly/18sAMfa
  • Pennsylvania must have some pretty dumb pencils because: 20 percent of its high school science teachers say they believe in creationism. Zowie.Zounds. Egad. http://bit.ly/166pZdL
  • Mississippi, (Yet again. – do I detect a pattern – er, a takeover?) opens the door to student-led prayer. The state makes schools develop policies giving opportunity to pray/preach at official school events. http://bit.ly/18sAMfa
  • In the hang-loose, shake your bootie state of Hawaii; Governor Neil Abercrombie (alas, he’s a Dem) proposed amending the state constitution to allow for public funding of religious pre-schools. http://bit.ly/108Smkv
  • Alaska legislators have proposed amending the state constitution to allow for tax aid to religious schools. http://bit.ly/108Smkv
  • Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott ruled that school districts and cities are in violation of the State Constitution for offering health insurance benefits to the domestic partners of their employees.. http://bit.ly/16qIs51
  • A new Alabama tax-credit law that subsidizes tuition at private schools will likely end up helping academies founded to get around racial desegregation of public schools. http://bit.ly/108Smkv
  • Down in the bayou, a Louisiana voucher plan subsidizes religion: http://bit.ly/108Smkv

Speaking of Louisiana, Here’s an Extra Bit of Educational Lagniappe

  • Despite a half century Of Supreme Court Rulings, states still look for ways to sneak prayer Into Public Schools. http://bit.ly/18sAMfa
  • The eight most conservative senators join fight against common core education standards. http://bit.ly/12Jg9up

It’s on to the 2014 Election Upchuckables aka, How To Insure Religion Remains On the Ballot

  • The American Renewal Project, whatever the frick that means, plans to target twelve key swing states in the mid-terms. Reminiscent of Ohio’s ’06 dance with the “Patriot Pastors,” they plan to organize pastor briefings and voter registration drives in an attempt to restore the U. S. to its Judeo-Christian roots. http://yhoo.it/YwDsGE
  • Mat Staver’s Liberty Counsel, an affiliate of Jerry Falwell  Liberty University, announced that it is gearing up to mobilize pastors who share the belief “that America was established as a Christian nation, and the guardians of those Biblical principles has always been His church.” http://bit.ly/17BcYal

Military Issues Provide for Deadly Serious Upchucks (thanks goes to Mikey Weinstein and his Military Religious Freedom Foundation)

Novelist K.C. Boyd is the author of Being Christian: A Novel. According to Mikey Weinstein, President of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, “Boyd created a story so riveting that not only could I not put it down, but upon finishing it, I found myself, like an addict, craving more.

Live Streaming Video- President Obama Speaks at the Planned Parenthood Gala 11:20a EST

over

“A Week of Upchucks: Keep on recruiting for bad guys while you root to undermine education, science, equal rights”

gop fail 3Please welcome back guest blogger K.C. Boyd. You might remember her from her earlier posts:

A Week of Upchucks

By K. C. Boyd

 “Pro-Life” Upchucking

  • Add Ohio’s to the ever-growing list of states whose House voted to defund Planned Parenthood.
  • Senator Brownback signed House Bill 2253 this week. Scribbled at the top of his marked up copy of this “Pro-Life Protections Act,” were the words Jesus & Mary, with “Pro-Life” further down in the margins. Good to confirm in writing that legislators really do govern by Sharia the Bible. After North Dakota, the Kansas bill is second to define life as beginning at conception.

Beyond Upchuck: Second child of faith-healing couple dies after no medical care

  • With the death of an 8-month old baby resulting from Fundamentalist Christians putting faith over science, this is well beyond your average upchuck. When you become a parent, you are responsible for your children’s health and welfare, and that includes after the child is born. If a mother or father chooses God over medicine for themselves, that’s their choice, and their problem. But to sit by and pray while their 8-month baby struggles for days with severe diarrhea and breathing problems, such negligence is criminal (even more so, this being their second child to have died from prayerful neglect.)
  • Meanwhile, out in Oklahoma, self-proclaimed pro-lifers, more accurately described as pro-negligence once the baby is born, have decided that public education’ isn’t all that important or necessary. In line with the ‘drown-it-in-the-bathtub’ meme, Kansas’ governor and legislators have enacted public school cuts that are among nation’s highest and which, over time, may well destroy public education, as we know it. At the same time, the goodly legislators are looking for ways to cut taxes (for the rich.)

Schaudenfreude Upchuck

  • Things aren’t looking too promising for a successful GOP’ wooing of the LGBT community. Despite the spoken desire by one wing of the party to at least appear more gay-friendly, the RNC couldn’t help caving to the Rebiblicans’ that make up its base. At the RNC April meeting in Los Angeles, The GOP confirmed that they cannot and will not change their platform when it comes to gay marriage. Why schaudenfreude, you ask? Quite frankly because this upchucker loves nothing more than to see than the GOP engage in all manner of self-sabotage.

Dino Upchuck

  • Ken Ham is smiling these days thanks to a deal his Answers in Genesis’ ad agency made to screen an animated Creation Museum commercial during previews at each of the 458 theaters showing the newly released Jurassic Park 3-D movie. Not only that but these theaters will also continuously loop said commercial in their lobbies, exposing evermore young people to the Big Lie.

And finally, heading over to the land of whack job Upchucks

  • Ann Coulter exercised her right to persecute Muslims on Fox (cough) News when she stated that the Boston bombing suspect’s wife should be in prison for wearing a hijab. Talk about denying a woman’s rights – - someone needs to sew her mouth permanently shut.
  • Pat Robertson, never one to disappoint averred that “Islam is to blame for not only the Boston Marathon bombing, but terrorism around the world.” Comparing ‘Evil’ Islam To Nazism, Robertson is sure to have ruffled the feathers of many a future would-be terrorist.
  • Lastly there’s the Beckster’s continued accusations of a dreamt–up government cover-up with regards to the Marathon bombing. Informed by what can only be a super-duper top-secret source, Beck accuses the Dems of hiding “damning evidence” that a Saudi National was involved in the Boston bombing. Of course we know he’s a nutcase but something that most folks aren’t aware of is that Homeland Security Chairman Michael T. McCaul, Jeff Duncan, Chairman of the Subcommittee on Oversight and Management Efficiency, Chairman of the Subcommittee on Counterterrorism and Intelligence, Peter King and Chairman of the Subcommittee on Border and Maritime Security, Candice Miller wrote to Secretary of Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano requesting an immediate classified debriefing on the Saudi whose identity is said to be hidden and who the government instantly spirited out of the country/ This can’t help but make one remember when Bush and Co. really did whisk the Bin Laden family out of the country just after 9/11, well before private or commercial planes were permitted back in the air.

I say, keep it up guys. Keep on recruiting for the bad guys while you root to undermine education, science and equal rights.

We’ll see you in 2014.

Novelist K.C. Boyd is the author of Being Christian: A Novel. According to Mikey Weinstein, President of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, “Boyd created a story so riveting that not only could I not put it down, but upon finishing it, I found myself, like an addict, craving more.

VIDEO: “Small government guy” Rand Paul “wants government big enough to monitor every single pregnancy in the country.”

small government my ass

North Dakota banned all abortions by defining life at conception. So much for GOP reinventing itself.

Rachel Maddow covered the “party that so often does not seem know what their policy positions are let alone actually believe in them.” In other words, she reported, again, on their incessant hypocrisy:

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

Rachel Maddow:

Rand Paul wants to be seen as small government guy, but he also wants a government big enough to monitor every single pregnancy in the country, to force all American women into the government’s chosen outcome for their pregnancy. You do not get to decide about your pregnancy, the government gets to decide.

Rand Paul has introduced so-called personhood legislation that would ban all abortions in America, federally. It would also likely ban some forms of hormonal birth control, like the pill, and even in vitro fertilization. So again, under his bill, you would have no choice, no exceptions, you get no say, it’s the government that decides, Rand Paul will decide for you.

Here is the entire segment:

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

North Dakota bans all abortions by defining life at conception. So much for GOP reinventing itself.

abortion ban north dakota choice

Dear GOP: Do you think America is deaf, blind, and/or stupid? On second thought, don’t answer that. Their claims of reinventing themselves are a joke. They can use all the carefully parsed words they want, but they are fooling nobody.

Republicans are once again forcing women to let strangers who work for so-called “small government” make decisions for them, about their bodies, reproductive health, and lives. No reframing, no re-messaging, no makeover can hide that.

“Don’t be fooled” by the so-called GOP makeover. “Rarely has it been more dangerous.”

For example, Wisconsin GOP lawmakers pushed a bill to let parents sue over death of fetus. As I said in that post, declaring that life starts at conception gives a cluster of cells the same rights as born people. So fetal rights would supersede those of women.

But it gets worse. Hey “revamped” GOP, nothing says outreach to women voters like passing a “personhood” abortion ban.

Yes, those poor, helpless women who can’t possibly figure out how to manage their own lives are the luckiest ducks ever! North Dakota is taking care of that overwhelming personal responsibility burden for them. It has become the first state to ban all abortions by defining life at conception. Via Think Progress:

North Dakota lawmakers voted on Friday afternoon to pass a “personhood” abortion ban, which would endow fertilized eggs with all the rights of U.S. citizens and effectively outlaw abortion. The measure, which passed the Senate last month, passed the House by a 57-35 vote and will now head to Republican Gov. Jack Dalrymple’s desk.

The personhood ban will have far-reaching consequences even beyond abortion care, since it will charge doctors who damage embryos with criminal negligence.

Even some pro-life Republicans in North Dakota have come out against this. Republican state Rep. Kathy Hawken (R-Fargo):

“North Dakota hasn’t even passed a primary seatbelt law, but we have the most invasive attack on women’s health anywhere.”

small government my assoutreach my ass reach out inclusive

Wisconsin GOP lawmakers push bill to let parents sue over death of fetus

abortion rights choice

Dorland’s Medical Dictionary for Health Consumers:

fetus /fe·tus/ (fēt´us) [L.] the developing young in the uterus, specifically the unborn offspring in the postembryonic period, in humans from nine weeks after fertilization until birth.

The American Heritage® Medical Dictionary:

ba·by (bb) n.  A very young child; an infant.

In Wisconsin, a couple of Republican lawmakers think families should be able to file lawsuits if someone causes a fetus to die at any point during pregnancy. That would give an embryo a fetus, a blastocyst  (a sphere of about 150 cells) or even a zygote (a fertilized egg) the same status as their mother.

So much for women’s rights.  So much for trusting women to decide for themselves what they need, what is good or bad for their bodies, their lives, their safety, their survival, their health (both physical and mental), and their families. So much for the civil and human rights of an already born person.

It’s obviously better for women if other people, total strangers who work for that coveted “small” government, force them to give birth no matter what the circumstances since they insist on full “personhood” for a few cells or a fetus. After all, whose judgment would you trust with the most personal decisions you could make? Yourself or “big government”? Yourself or a few men and women who think they should control you?

By the way, a recent study shows anti-choice policies lead to widespread arrests of and forced interventions on pregnant women:

This study, however, confirms that if passed, so called “personhood” measures would: 1) provide the basis for arresting pregnant women who have abortions; and 2) provide state actors with the authority to subject all pregnant women to surveillance, arrest, incarceration, and other deprivations of liberty whether women seek to end a pregnancy or not.

Furthermore, the study demonstrates that there is no way to add fertilized eggs, embryos, and fetuses to state constitutions or to the United States Constitution without removing all pregnant women from the community of constitutional persons. These measures create a “Jane Crow” system of law, establishing a separate and unequal status for all pregnant women and disproportionately punishing African-American and low-income women.

Declaring that life starts at conception gives a cluster of cells the same rights as born people. So fetal rights would supersede those of women. If conception takes place outside the United States, would the zygote still be an American citizen?

Associated Press:

Two Republican lawmakers have introduced legislation that would allow parents to sue if a their unborn child dies as a result of someone’s wrongful acts, but it would do so by redefining state law to say life starts at conception.

Current law allows wrongful death lawsuits in a fetus’ death only if a doctor concludes the fetus was old enough to survive birth.

Once commenter had this to say:

mojo:

As I understand it, a woman is born with all the eggs she will ever have. So, ALL women are carrying the unborn preborn — they’re just unfertilized. But aren’t these unfertilized children entitled to the same rights as other hard working middle class tax payers? Does Rep. Jaque not care about the unfertilized preborn unborn? Shouldn’t his bill say that when ANY woman dies, the person responsible for the death should also be charged with homicide x (number of fertile months estimated to have been remaining in the deceased’s fertile life)? Rep Jacque, why have you foresaken the unborn preborn just because they might be unfertilized? An egg is alive, you know.

And, if a female fetus dies, it, too, carried eggs — more unborn preborn — shouldn’t the person convicted of the death of the fetus also be charged with the death of that fetus’s unborn preborn? Doesn’t Rep Jacque care about these children?

So “pro-lifers,” if you believe so strongly that the unborn are worth protecting, please answer these questions for us:

pro life after born abortion

Cartoons of the Day- International Women’s Day

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Oppressed Women

intlwomen2

Via.