I Was a Teenage Feminist

REALITY

I Was a Teenage Feminist

Tidbits from some Tidbits from No Limits

Besides the stall in the Climate Change Bill that Madamab pointed out this morning, Ann Lewis, over at No Limits, has some tidbits to share regarding the perpetual state of starts and stalling of the Congressional loco-motion machine. Excerpts from her email below. (I did not denote “snip” every time I snipped.)

A CRITICAL WEEK FOR HEALTH CARE

Areas of disagreement [in Congress]: Among the biggest areas of disagreement is – surprise – how to pay for the bill. Then there is the question of whether there will be a public option, that can serve as a standard of competition for insurance companies. And now a new one:

Will women’s health be included? A group of anti-choice legislators are calling for restrictions in health reform legislation that would actually reduce care for millions of women by denying them access to reproductive health services now included in their health insurance.

“Anti-choice groups are trying to hijack health care reform” said Cecile Richards, President of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, “jeopardizing women’s health for their own political agenda.”

A COMMITTEE VOTE FOR SONIA SOTOMAYOR

The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to vote to report out the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court on Tuesday, July 28. Support for this highly qualified nominee continues to grow: five Republicans have already announced they will vote for her, including one – Lindsay Graham – who is on the Judiciary Committee.

(Yes, the committee could have voted sooner; but last week our friend Jeff Sessions called for one week’s delay to enable him to “study the record.” Those of us who watched the hearings and listened to Senator Sessions’ questions can certainly understand his need to keep studying.)

A WELCOME RESPONSE TO HATE CRIMES

The Defense Appropriations bill passed by the Senate last week included an important addition: expansion of federal hate crimes to include those committed because of gender, sexual orientation, gender identity or disability.

Named the Mathew Shepard Hate Crimes Prevention Act in honor of the young gay man murdered in Wyoming, the bill passed the House earlier this year as stand alone legislation. While the Senate included several unwelcome amendments (thank you, once again, Jeff Sessions!) civil rights leaders expect that the House-Senate conference committee will drop those amendments, and this long awaited bill could come to the President for signature this fall.

I think Ann was being a little snippy with Mr. Sessions on a few of her Tidbits. Don’t ya think?

Morning Widdershins: We’re Melting!

Holy Crap!

One of the multitudinous crimes of the Bush Administration was its malignant inaction on climate change. Thanks to a series of photos recently declassified by the Obama Administration, we are now able to see the evidence of the polar ice sheets retreating in the summer.

Graphic images that reveal the devastating impact of global warming in the Arctic have been released by the US military. The photographs, taken by spy satellites over the past decade, confirm that in recent years vast areas in high latitudes have lost their ice cover in summer months.

The pictures, kept secret by Washington during the presidency of George W Bush, were declassified by the White House last week. President Barack Obama is currently trying to galvanise Congress and the American public to take action to halt catastrophic climate change caused by rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

One particularly striking set of images – selected from the 1,000 photographs released – includes views of the Alaskan port of Barrow. One, taken in July 2006, shows sea ice still nestling close to the shore. A second image shows that by the following July the coastal waters were entirely ice-free.

The photographs demonstrate starkly how global warming is changing the Arctic. More than a million square kilometres of sea ice – a record loss – were missing in the summer of 2007 compared with the previous year.

Nor has this loss shown any sign of recovery. Ice cover for 2008 was almost as bad as for 2007, and this year levels look equally sparse.

A picture truly does say more than a thousand words, doesn’t it?