Category Archives: politics

She’s just a whore…

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…she probably deserved it…we can’t be arresting our star football players…/snark (be sure to click on the Prinniefied.com link–good coverage of the case there.

More here.  

It’s unbelievable that the dude in the video was saying that it should go through the courts…um, yeah, that’s kinda what they’re protesting about–that it wasn’t being forcefully dealt with because of the town’s football worship….

…and attitudes towards women in general and rape specifically…

You know, the arguments are as old as the hills:  the victim brought it on by herself by drinking/partying/wearing skimpy clothes, and on.  What other crime would they ever make that kind of accusation? Rape is the only crime where the victim has to prove they didn’t want the crime to happen.

Case in point (from the NY Times article):

He said that online photographs and posts could ultimately be “a gift” for his client’s case because the girl, before that night in August, had posted provocative comments and photographs on her Twitter page over time. He added that those online posts demonstrated that she was sexually active and showed that she was “clearly engaged in at-risk behavior.”

So….because she was sexually active and wearing skimpy clothes…God, this gets soooo old.…she couldn’t possibly have been raped, because everybody knows that sluts don’t get raped.  They *always* want it and if they don’t put out, well, then one just has to take it. /said with cynicism and dripping sarcasm.

Also telling is the statement “..some people deserve to be peed on…”  In other words, she’s not a human being— she’s an object to be peed on.

The coaching staff’s statement that she “made it up” to cover for her bad behavior is so out of line, but not surprising, given the mindset.  And the coach himself, well, what can one say to “you’ll get yours!” ??

Sadly, the mindset is not just in Steubenville or the U.S. or India, but all over the world. such as this group in Australia.

More blame the victim here.

More here on the politics of rape… note the conservative viewpoint to deny that rapes occur.  As this article illustrates, even women  attack other women about whether they were raped or not.  I seriously wonder if Katie Roiphe wasn’t raped and is in serious denial?

Link in criminal behavior and heavy metals

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One of the members of the support group posted this link to a timely article on the link between lead and criminal behavior–not just here, but around the world.  Pretty impressive.  Unfortunately, the article’s focus is solely on lead, and not other heavy metals like mercury, which also affect brain and body function, and is everywhere in the atmosphere.

Anybody wanna bet that this will not be looked at in the case of Adam Lanza or any of the mass killers?

Most Admired?

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Seriously?

Gallup has the “Most Admired” poll out here:  http://www.gallup.com/poll/145394/Barack-Obama-Hillary-Clinton-2010-Admired.aspx

I kept looking for the numbers, but didn’t find them until the very bottom of the story–they only asked 1,000 adults. I think I heard there were 60 million people in the U.S. now–they could only find  a thousand people to ask?

And if you look at the margin of error at 4 + or – percentage points…it’s laughable.  Anything more than 2% plus or minus is a flawed poll–it’s considered biased and invalid.

Judging from the other women chosen, with two exceptions, the poll is definitely skewed with those of the conservative views.

Things not to admire:

Whitewater.

The link to Chinese censorship. 

More stuff on Bill with his support of the war in Iraq. Oh, wait…he didn’t support the war in Iraq? /snark

And Hillary’s support of the war in Iraq…

And the stuff I brought up in my post here.

And then there’s the self-righteous, fundamentalist connection–here and here.

And personally, I know someone who knows Hillary Clinton.  I can’t go into details, but it’s sufficient to say that her behavior in at least one incident was more of that of a teenage girl and her boyfriend than an adult woman in relation to her husband.   I expect maturity and self-respect and dignity out of my leaders…I guess I’m funny that way.

 

 

PR Watch

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(I’m sooo far behind, I think I’m ahead…)

Trying to play catch up–here are some highlights of issues sent out by Center for Media and Democracy–

I love that he is holding Whole Foods accountable for the food they are saying is organic….but not quite telling all of the possible ingredients (heavy metals and other contaminants)…

The “Don’t ask, don’t tell” I-see-no-evil, I-hear-no-evil is pretty standard.  They aren’t counting on folks like Mario asking questions, either.  The more people ask questions, the harder it is to come up with evasive answers.

Like I’ve said before, know where your food is from–buy locally if at all possible, because the gossip is at least one other national organic food store is selling conventionally grown (using chemical fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides) food is being marketed as organic.

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Addressing the gun violence issue.  Like in my previous post, you can use other weapons for violence instead of guns–it’s the acceptance of violence in our society (and others) that encourages this.  It’s so much easier to throw a rock than to try to reason with someone and to compromise and to recognize one’s own responsibility towards making peace.  A gun is a  quick way to end whatever problem there is…

And the argument that everyone carrying a gun would stop violence…oy vey…

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ALEC member Scott nominated to fill Demint vacancy.

IRS audit for ALEC?  The question becomes “are you a charity if you have a political action committee and go from state to state trying to heavily influence legislation?”

Michigan and ALEC’s right to work law.   This is part of the religious right’s assault on fairness, which I’m finding out in the book Holy Terror.  (I’m slowly getting through it, a better report later.)

 

…and then there’s violence without a gun…

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The human body can be used as a weapon, as well.  How effing vicious does a rape have to be to put a woman into intensive care?  And what about that bus driver?? He had to have known what was going on.

And the way this story is written makes it sound like only in India is rape a stigma…yeah, well, I’ve got news for ya, it’s a stigma *everywhere*…right here in the U.S., we have republicans who say if a woman is raped, she can’t become pregnant...or if she is a Native American woman, a non-native man can rape her without fear of punishment.

Or how about the town I grew up in–where teenage boys tied a mentally challenged woman to a tree and raped her…one of my former friends actually blamed her, saying that she “let them”.  How the hell can you defend yourself if you’re tied to a tree? Or not in command of all your mental faculties?

So we come back to the acceptance of violence in our society.  “Boys will be boys” and all that crap…

Genetic tests on Lanza?

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Oh.My.God.

I am just stunned.  Eugenics, anyone??

Nothing in this article about him having amalgams or mercury exposure or diet (if he is gluten intolerant, leading to schizophrenia).

No…we can’t have scientists looking at stuff like that, because that’s too simple an answer and the ways to fix it make us uncomfortable.   It means we have to give up some things that pollute our environment and we have to make more of an effort to understand the diet and immune system and how they affect our brains.

I mean, really, “science” has taught us that amalgams are safe, right??

…and “science” has brought us pesticides, herbicides, chemical fertilizers, and genetically modified organisms.

So, yeah, scientists with biases and prejudices should *absolutely* assign a value to a gene and making sweeping generalizations with those biases. /snark

More here. Be sure to note the Americans funding this garbage.