Donald Trump has now joined his buddy Vladimir Putin on Amnesty International's list of human rights villains.

Courtesy of Newsweek: 

President Donald Trump joins authoritarian leaders like Russia’s President Vladimir Putin and China’s Xi Jinping in spreading hate and promoting regressive policies in 2017, Amnesty International’s annual human rights report determined. 

The report looks at the human rights situation in 159 countries and territories throughout 2017, Trump’s first year in office. 

“In the U.S.A., President Trump wasted little time in putting his anti-rights rhetoric of discrimination and xenophobia into action, threatening a major rollback on justice and freedoms—including by signing a series of repressive executive orders that threatened the human rights of millions, at home and abroad,” reads the report released Thursday by the human rights group.

The report details how the Trump administration oversaw and promoted abusive border enforcement practices and the detention of asylum-seekers on the U.S. border with Mexico.

And just in case you thought that Amnesty International was being completely unfair, get a load of this.

Courtesy of Politico: 

State Department officials have been ordered to pare back passages in a soon-to-be-released annual report on global human rights that traditionally discuss women’s reproductive rights and discrimination, according to five former and current department officials. 

The directive calls for stripping passages that describe societal views on family planning, including how much access women have to contraceptives and abortion. 

A broader section that chronicles racial, ethnic and sexual discrimination has also been ordered pared down, the current and former officials said. 

The move, believed to have been ordered by a top aide to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, reflects the Trump administration’s rightward turn from the Obama administration on family planning issues. It also appears to highlight the stated desire of Tillerson and President Donald Trump to make human rights a lower priority in U.S. foreign policy.

So yeah when a US report on human rights is stripped of language to identify abuses and protect human rights, I would suggest that we are no longer a leader in that endeavor.

Which I guess answers this question for a number of people in this country.

Yes, yes we are. 

Award winning US diplomat writes stinging resignation letter directed at Rex Tillerson and his State Department.

Elizabeth Shakelford in Somalia.

Courtesy of Foreign Policy: 

An award-winning U.S. diplomat who was seen as a rising star at the State Department has issued a scathing resignation letter, accusing Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and the Donald Trump administration of undercutting the State Department and damaging America’s influence in the world. 

Elizabeth Shackelford, who most recently served as a political officer based in Nairobi for the U.S. mission to Somalia, wrote to Tillerson that she reluctantly had decided to quit because the administration had abandoned human rights as a priority and shown disdain for the State Department’s diplomatic work, according to her letter, obtained by Foreign Policy. 

“I have deep respect for the career Foreign and Civil Service staff who, despite the stinging disrespect this Administration has shown our profession, continue the struggle to keep our foreign policy on the positive trajectory necessary to avert global disaster in increasingly dangerous times,” Shackelford wrote in her Nov. 7 letter. 

“With each passing day, however, this task grows more futile, driving the Department’s experienced and talented staff away in ever greater numbers,” she wrote. 

“She’s emblematic of what we’re losing across the board,” said one of Shackelford’s former State Department colleagues. “She is the best among us. We should not be losing the best among us. And that should concern people that we are,” the former colleague said. 

In her letter, Shackelford said she was leaving with a “heavy heart” as she recognized the potential of the State Department’s mission. She said she was “shocked” when Tillerson appeared to cast doubt on the importance of human rights in remarks to department employees on May 3.

Shackelford ended her letter with this:  

In the closing paragraph of her letter, Shackelford called on Tillerson “to stem the bleeding by showing leadership and a commitment to our people, our mission, and our mandate as the foreign policy arm of the United States. 

“If you are unable to do so effectively within this Administration, I would humbly recommend you follow me out the door.”

The sad truth is that career State Department staff and diplomats are left to question whether their presence within the agency is helping to slow down its slow disintegration, or if they personally are being damaged due to their association with it as it visibly falls to pieces.

If all of the truly talented diplomats and staffers like this woman leave the agency, then diplomacy is no longer available in our tool kit and all we have left is the threat of military action.

For decades the United States and presented itself as a champion of human rights around the world, but if the Trump Administration has its way, we will be reduced to the bully on the playground keeping the smaller kids off the swings and collecting the younger children's lunch money for ourselves.

And we all know what eventually happens to the bullies, don't we?

Draft of new executive order seems designed to protect religious people from progress.

Courtesy of The Nation: 

A leaked copy of a draft executive order titled “Establishing a Government-Wide Initiative to Respect Religious Freedom,” obtained by The Investigative Fund and The Nation, reveals sweeping plans by the Trump administration to legalize discrimination. 

The four-page draft order, a copy of which is currently circulating among federal staff and advocacy organizations, construes religious organizations so broadly that it covers “any organization, including closely held for-profit corporations,” and protects “religious freedom” in every walk of life: “when providing social services, education, or healthcare; earning a living, seeking a job, or employing others; receiving government grants or contracts; or otherwise participating in the marketplace, the public square, or interfacing with Federal, State or local governments.” 

The draft order seeks to create wholesale exemptions for people and organizations who claim religious or moral objections to same-sex marriage, premarital sex, abortion, and trans identity, and it seeks to curtail women’s access to contraception and abortion through the Affordable Care Act.

Language in the draft document specifically protects the tax-exempt status of any organization that “believes, speaks, or acts (or declines to act) in accordance with the belief that marriage is or should be recognized as the union of one man and one woman, sexual relations are properly reserved for such a marriage, male and female and their equivalents refer to an individual’s immutable biological sex as objectively determined by anatomy, physiology, or genetics at or before birth, and that human life begins at conception and merits protection at all stages of life.”

In other words this order would repeal much of the progress made by the Obama administration, and once again allow Christian business owners to discriminate based on sexuality, gender, and lifestyle.

That would mean these fundamentalist Christians, Jews, and even Muslims, could use this order to deny adequate healthcare to women, kick gay students out of their private schools, and refuse to rent to any person, or persons, whose lifestyle they believed conflicted with their faith in some way.

It should be noted that this is still in a draft form, so it is by no means official. 

However based on everything that we have seen since Trump took office I have a high level of certainty that a lot of what is in this draft will find its way to the final executive order.

Rumors swirl that Donald Trump will soon sign executive order targeting the LGBTQ community. Update!

Actually only 14% voted for him.

Courtesy of the Human Rights Campaign: 

There are a number of rumors swirling that Donald Trump is planning to sign yet another discriminatory executive action – this time specifically targeting the LGBTQ community. While only the White House can speak to the veracity of the rumors, given the administration's track record of championing discrimination in just the last week, HRC is preparing to fight this to the fullest. 

“The rumors of an anti-LGBTQ executive action by President Trump are deeply troubling. We already know that he is willing to target and marginalize at-risk communities for his perceived political gain. As the President and his team plan their next steps, we want to make one thing clear: we won't give one inch when it comes to defending equality, whether it is a full-on frontal assault or an attack under the guise of religion. Mike Pence should know that better than anyone given his track record in Indiana," said JoDee Winterhof, the Human Rights Campaign's Senior Vice President for Policy and Political Affairs. “The Human Rights Campaign will stand with those who have already been targeted by this Administration and are prepared to fight tooth and nail against every effort to discriminate.” 

Nearly two-thirds of LGBTQ people have reported experiencing discrimination, according to HRC polling. 

Then-Governor Mike Pence’s support for a bill in Indiana that was intended to allow businesses to discriminate and deny service to LGBTQ people did massive damage not just to the state’s economy, but his own political standing as well.

It should be noted that this is still just a rumor,

However we have already seen Trump throwing out red meat to satisfy his base of support, so going after "the queers" would certainly fit that pattern.

Besides with Pence as his number two you have to know that Trump is being pushed in this direction.

And then of course there is this:

Rumors are true. Expect by end of the week. https://t.co/Mx89ZaY4ND

— Rogue POTUS Staff (@RoguePOTUSStaff) January 30, 2017

Assuming this Twitter account is on the up and up, I think that suggests there is reason for concern.

Update: Thinks might be looking up.

After the enormous pressure from the past several days, POTUS repudiates VP, reverses course on LGBT EO. #resistwin https://t.co/F5T1QrIiEh

— Rogue POTUS Staff (@RoguePOTUSStaff) January 31, 2017

Human Rights Watch lists Donald Trump as a threat to human rights.

Courtesy of The Independent:  

“Donald Trump’s election as US president after a campaign fomenting hatred and intolerance, and the rising influence of political parties in Europe that reject universal rights, have put the postwar human rights system at risk,” wrote Human Rights Watch Executive Director Kenneth Roth. 

“Trump and various politicians in Europe seek power through appeals to racism, xenophobia, misogyny, and nativism. They all claim that the public accepts violations of human rights as supposedly necessary to secure jobs, avoid cultural change, or prevent terrorist attacks.

He added: “In fact, disregard for human rights offers the likeliest route to tyranny.”

That's right folks, our last President won the Nobel Peace Prize and this one is identified as a threat to human rights.

I'm not sure if I should laugh or cry.

In other news it now appears that there are 35 Democratic lawmakers skipping Trump's inauguration.

Those are the REAL American heroes.

Not even president yet and already Donald Trump is threatening to punish Americans for exercising their right to free speech.

Nobody should be allowed to burn the American flag - if they do, there must be consequences - perhaps loss of citizenship or year in jail!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 29, 2016

So not only does Trump want to diminish the rights of the press to do their job, he also wants to punish American citizens for demonstrating their First Amendment rights as well.

How much longer do we think it will be before he threatens to take away our right to assemble peacefully or petition the government for a redress of our grievances?

Are you afraid yet Trump supporters?

Well if you were smarter you would be. 

The great George Takei takes on the anti-gay Tennessee Republicans as only he can.

"Takei pride" I love it!

George Takei really is a national treasure.

Congressional Republicans quietly gut President Obama's executive order protecting LGBT workers employed by federal contractors from discrimination.

Courtesy of HuffPo: 

Republicans quietly voted Thursday to gut President Barack Obama’s executive order barring workplace discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender employees of federal contractors. 

The House Armed Services Committee voted 33 to 29 to tuck language into the 2017 defense authorization bill — must-pass legislation — that blocks the president’s 2014 executive action that makes it illegal to fire or harass employees of government contractors based on their sexual orientation or gender identity. Instead, the amendment applies a broad exemption that would allow contractors to openly discriminate against LGBT people based on the contractors’ religious beliefs. 

More than 2,000 federal contracts are awarded every year to religious organizations. In all, the executive order affects 24,000 companies employing roughly 28 million workers, or about one-fifth of the nation’s workforce.

Here I have a solution.

Why don't we simply stop awarding federal contracts to religious organizations? 

What, too radical?

Oh yeah I forgot, we all have to respect everybody's superstitious nonsense.

And isn't that so much more important than respecting their human rights?

Just a little something to chew on this Saturday morning.

Sometimes the best source for the truth comes from the comic section.

Now THAT is a very powerful, and very accurate, statement.

Human Rights Watch issues a report revealing that sexual assault victims in the Military are suffering retaliation.

Courtesy of Human Rights Watch:  

US military service members who report sexual assault frequently experience retaliation that goes unpunished, Human Rights Watch said. The report is the result of an 18-month investigation by Human Rights Watch with the support of Protect Our Defenders, a human rights organization that supports and advocates for survivors of military sexual assault. Despite extensive reforms by the Defense Department to address sexual assault, the military has done little to hold retaliators to account or provide effective remedies for retaliation. 

The 113-page report, “Embattled: Retaliation against Sexual Assault Survivors in the US Military,” finds that both male and female military personnel who report sexual assault are 12 times as likely to experience some form of retaliation as to see their attacker convicted of a sex offense. Retaliation against survivors ranges from threats, vandalism, and harassment to poor work assignments, loss of promotion opportunities, disciplinary action including discharge, and even criminal charges. 

“The US military’s progress in getting people to report sexual assaults isn’t going to continue as long as retaliation for making a report goes unpunished,” said Sara Darehshori, senior US counsel at Human Rights Watch and co-author of the report. “Ending retaliation is critical to addressing the problem of sexual assault in the military.” 

The report says that some of the retaliation came from superior officers including this chilling claim by one soldier:

“A certain Sergeant in my platoon had told me he would kill me if we ever went to Afghanistan because ‘friendly fire is a tragic accident that happens,’” said a soldier who reported a sexual assault by a male soldier from another platoon in 2012. “After I had been there for a year, someone tried to knife me in a bar and kept screaming ‘DIE FAGGOT, DIE’ and that was when I told my Captain that I wanted a discharge before I ended up dead on the evening news which would be bad for him too.”

It is incredibly troubling that not only are in serious danger of being sexually assaulted in the United States military, whether you are a man or a woman, but that if you dare report the crime you can then be subjected to threats of violence, harassment, and loss of promotion.

That is not just a few assholes being assholes, that is a systemic problem which speaks to an underlying problem in our military structure.

American exceptionalism my ass.

Watch Indiana Governor Mike Pence outright refuse to answer any of George Stephanopoulos's questions about his state's new controversial law.

Courtesy of Mediaite:  

This Week host George Stephanopoulos absolutely grilled Indiana Governor Mike Pence (R) over the newly-signed “religious freedom” bill, which critics maintain would allow businesses to refuse services to LGBT customers. Pence argued that the bill’s intentions had been misrepresented in media coverage, and insisted he would not change the bill, though he did continue to say he would “clarify” it. 

However, Pence refused to answer two “yes or no” questions posed to him by Stephanopoulos over the potentially discriminatory ramifications of the bill, including whether it would allow a florist to deny services to a gay couple, as its supporters maintain. 

“There’s been shameless rhetoric about my state and this law and its intention all over the internet,” Pence said. “People are trying to make it about one particular issue, and now you’re doing that as well.” 

Stephanopoulos asked the question several more times. “It’s a simple yes or no question,” Stephanopoulos said. 

“The issue here is: is tolerance a two-way street or not?” Pence said. “There’s a lot of talk about tolerance in this country having to do with people on the left. Here Indiana steps forward to protect the constitutional rights and privileges of freedom of religion for people of faith in our state, and this avalanche of intolerance that’s been poured on our state is outrageous.”

Wow that is some of the fanciest dancing I have seen since John Travolta on Saturday Night Fever. 

Pence goes on to say that he would NOT pass a law protecting the rights of the LGBT community, which would of course make people less concerned about this new law. And at one point refuses to answer Stephanopoulos's question about whether or not it should be legal to discriminate against gays and lesbians.

By the way as Pence continues his dance more and more businesses are making the decision that Indiana is now a "no go zone" for them and their employees.

Oklahoma State Senator claims that business should have the right to refuse to serve LGBT customers. But it's okay, "he has gay friends."

Courtesy of Salon:  

As the country marches toward nationwide marriage equality and polls show record levels of support for same-sex marriage, there’s a fierce anti-gay backlash underway that imperils some of the most basic rights of the country’s LGBT citizens: Under the guise of protecting religious liberty, conservative lawmakers across the country are proposing bills that would allow businesses and individuals not to serve gay people, provided that they discriminate based on their religious beliefs. Among the states to consider such license-to-discriminate legislation is Oklahoma, where the bill’s chief Republican sponsor flatly states that gay people “don’t have a right to be served in every single store.” 

State Sen. Joseph Silk made that statement in an interview with the New York Times, which examines the broader push for so-called religious freedom laws in a story published online Thursday. Silk told the Times that he while he knows real, breathing homosexuals and even considers some his friends, he nevertheless sees gay people as the top threat to religious liberty. “The L.G.B.T. movement is the main thing, the primary thing that’s going to be challenging religious liberties and the freedom to live out religious convictions,” Silk said. “And I say that sensitively, because I have homosexual friends.” 

“They don’t have a right to be served in every single store,” he added. “People need to have the ability to refuse service if its violates their religious convictions.”

Yeah why should businesses have to serve gay people?

Or black people?

Or women?

Or Republicans even?

I mean can't these people find somewhere else to shop, or get gas, or live?

Well it is certainly a good thing that this guy has gay friends, or I might think that he was a homophobic asshole.

The KKK comes out in support of Alabama's Chief Justice Roy Moore's attempts to stop the legalization of gay marriage. Well of course they did.

Courtesy of AOL:  

A Mississippi chapter of the Ku Klux Klan is supporting Alabama Supreme Court Chief Justice Roy Moore's stand for state's rights and called for members to protest against the legalization of gay marriage. 

"The Mississippi Klan salutes Alabama's chief justice Roy Moore, for refusing to bow to the yoke of Federal tyranny," Brent Waller, the United Dixie White Knights' imperial wizard, wrote on Stormfront, the largest online white supremacist forum. "The Feds have no authority over individual States marriage laws."

Boy you know you're on the right side of history when the Klu Klux Klan gives you a big high five, don't you?

These guys always seem so pathetic in their desperate attempt to stop the inevitable. 

And Alabama seems to ALWAYS be the place that simply refuses to move forward until they have no other choice. How proud they must be of that legacy.

Ted Cruz introduces bill to strip same sex couples of federal marriage rights. So much for THAT presidential campaign!

Courtesy of The New Civil Rights Movement:  

U.S. Senator Ted Cruz is pushing the State Marriage Defense Act, legislation that if signed into law could accomplish two objectives. First, redefine marriage at the federal level to remove from hundreds of thousands of same-sex couples the federal government's recognition of their marriages, and thus, any corresponding federal benefits they are afforded, now or in the future. And second, should the U.S. Supreme Court not find a right to marriage for same-sex couples, encourage states that do not wish to recognize those marriages to potentially nullify them. 

While being framed as states' rights legislation, the bill's language makes clear Cruz's actual intent, and the bill's ramifications. 

"Congress recognizes that current actions by the Federal Government to afford benefits to certain relationships not recognized as marriages by a person’s State of residence go beyond the Supreme Court’s ruling in United States v. Windsor," the bill reads. 

Currently, the federal government has been recognizing all same-sex marriages legally performed in states, even after the state has refused to do so. 

Cruz's bill also changes the federal definition of marriage, by stating "the term ‘marriage’ shall not include any relationship which that State, territory, or possession does not recognize as a marriage, and the term ‘spouse’ shall not include an individual who is a party to a relationship that is not recognized as a marriage by that State, territory, or possession.’’

No way will this get passed in the Senate, and even if it did President Obama would veto the shit out of it.

This is just grandstanding. 

Which is stupid if Cruz is serious about running for President because though this might get Cruz some teabagger support, it will NOT earn him the GOP nomination, and in the general he would wind up as roadkill. 

These days coming out against same sex marriage, is almost like talking smack about kittens on the internet.

David Axelrod: Barack Obama was always a supporter of same sex marriage.

Courtesy of Time Magazine:

Barack Obama misled Americans for his own political benefit when he claimed in the 2008 election to oppose same sex marriage for religious reasons, his former political strategist David Axelrod writes in a new book, Believer: My Forty Years in Politics. 

“I’m just not very good at bullshitting,” Obama told Axelrod, after an event where he stated his opposition to same-sex marriage, according to the book. 

Axelrod writes that he knew Obama was in favor of same-sex marriages during the first presidential campaign, even as Obama publicly said he only supported civil unions, not full marriages. Axelrod also admits to counseling Obama to conceal that position for political reasons. “Opposition to gay marriage was particularly strong in the black church, and as he ran for higher office, he grudgingly accepted the counsel of more pragmatic folks like me, and modified his position to support civil unions rather than marriage, which he would term a ‘sacred union,’ ” Axelrod writes.

The article goes on to characterize this as a "flip flop" and a "black mark" on the President's record as a progressive, and I heard much the same yesterday by some MSNBC commentators.

But I disagree.

It is impossible at this point to argue against the fact that this President has helped to usher in more rights for the gay community than any other president in history, and that by the end of his term he will have done for the LGBT community what President Johnson did for the African American community in the 1960's.

And I think it is also impossible to argue against the fact if candidate Obama had come out in support of gay marriage that it is very likely he would have lost the nomination, or "shudder" lost the general to John McCain and Sarah Palin.

And how much progress do you think the LGBT community would have enjoyed under THAT administration? (Actually would there even be an America left in which to have this debate?)

Look politicians manipulate the truth for their constituents all of the time. Obama was not denying any personal wrong doing, or covering up for a crime, he was simply adopting a political strategy that he needed in order to get the job that would help him to make real change in this country, and do far more for the LGBT community than could be accomplished by a failed presidential candidate.

That's not so much devious, as smart.

 By the way the President has spoken out about this the other day as well: 

“I think David is mixing up my personal feelings with my position on the issue,” Obama said. “I always felt that same-sex couples should be able to enjoy the same rights, legally, as anybody else and so it was frustrating to me not to, I think, be able to square that with what were a whole bunch of religious sensitivities out there.”

Okay isn't that kind of what Axelrod was saying?

“Where my evolution took place was not in my attitude toward same-sex couples, it was in understanding the pain and the sense of stigma that was being placed on same-sex couples who are friends of mine, where they’d say, “You know what, if you’re not calling it marriage, it doesn’t feel like the same thing,” Obama told BuzzFeed. 

Clearly the President is affirming that his personal belief was that ALL Americans should be able to marry who they wanted and enjoy the legal protections that come with that legal union, but was struggling with what Christians in this country would accept at the time he ran for office.

Once again, sounds perfectly reasonable to me.

German human rights group files criminal complaint against Bush Administration in wake of torture report.

Courtesy of Democracy Now:  

A human rights group in Berlin, Germany, has filed a criminal complaint against the architects of the George W. Bush administration’s torture program. The European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights has accused former Bush administration officials, including CIA Director George Tenet and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, of war crimes, and called for an immediate investigation by a German prosecutor. The move follows the release of a Senate report on CIA torture which includes the case of a German citizen, Khalid El-Masri, who was captured by CIA agents in 2004 due to mistaken identity and tortured at a secret prison in Afghanistan. So far, no one involved in the CIA torture program has been charged with a crime — except the whistleblower John Kiriakou, who exposed it. We speak to Michael Ratner, president emeritus of the Center for Constitutional Rights and chairman of the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights, and longtime defense attorney Martin Garbus.

So here's my question.

Are we going to allow ourselves to be shown up by the Germans? 

After all we have several human rights groups here in America, so what in the hell is the holdup?

The Republicans are not only systematically dismantling a woman's right to choose, they are destroying women's rights in general.

The New York Times has an article out bemoaning the outcome of this last election and what the increased numbers of Republicans in public office will mean for women in this country.

In the article it lists some of the most egregious results from the passage of "personhood" amendments around the country, and how it has turned innocent women into convicted criminals.

Take a look:

In Iowa, a pregnant woman who fell down a flight of stairs was reported to the police after seeking help at a hospital. She was arrested for “attempted fetal homicide.” 

In Utah, a woman gave birth to twins; one was stillborn. Health care providers believed that the stillbirth was the result of the woman’s decision to delay having a cesarean. She was arrested on charges of fetal homicide. 

In Louisiana, a woman who went to the hospital for unexplained vaginal bleeding was locked up for over a year on charges of second-degree murder before medical records revealed she had suffered a miscarriage at 11 to 15 weeks of pregnancy. 

Florida has had a number of such cases. In one, a woman was held prisoner at a hospital to prevent her from going home while she appeared to be experiencing a miscarriage. She was forced to undergo a cesarean. Neither the detention nor the surgery prevented the pregnancy loss, but they did keep this mother from caring for her two small children at home. While a state court later found the detention unlawful, the opinion suggested that if the hospital had taken her prisoner later in her pregnancy, its actions might have been permissible. 

In another case, a woman who had been in labor at home was picked up by a sheriff, strapped down in the back of an ambulance, taken to a hospital, and forced to have a cesarean she did not want. When this mother later protested what had happened, a court concluded that the woman’s personal constitutional rights “clearly did not outweigh the interests of the State of Florida in preserving the life of the unborn child.” 

Anti-abortion reasoning has also provided the justification for arresting pregnant women who experience depression and have attempted suicide. A 22-year-old in South Carolina who was eight months pregnant attempted suicide by jumping out a window. She survived despite suffering severe injuries. Because she lost the pregnancy, she was arrested and jailed for the crime of homicide by child abuse. 

These are not isolated or rare cases. Last year, we published a peer-reviewed study documenting 413 arrests or equivalent actions depriving pregnant women of their physical liberty during the 32 years between 1973, when Roe v. Wade was decided, and 2005. In a majority of these cases, women who had no intention of ending a pregnancy went to term and gave birth to a healthy baby. This includes the many cases where the pregnant woman was alleged to have used some amount of alcohol or a criminalized drug. 

I found myself shocked that these are stories of what is happening to women right here in America.

So tell me again that there is no war on women.

There was a time when I thought there was a limit to how far conservatives would go to turn women back into breeding stock and take away their rights as equal human beings altogether.

I am no longer under any such illusions.  If the Republicans not stopped there may well come a time when women in this country are considered human beings, with all the same rights as men, ONLY up until they have  a fertilized egg within their womb. And after that they will be relegated to a human incubator and the rights of the zygote growing inside of them will supersede any rights they may have enjoyed before becoming impregnated.

Once again let express my dismay that any woman in this country votes Republican. It is like a cow giving a positive Yelp review to a slaughterhouse.

94 years ago the 19th Amendment giving women the right to vote was ratified. These are some of the arguments used against it.

And let me just remind you that the very same middle aged conservative white men that are today arguing against raising the minimum wage, closing the gender pay gap, and reforming immigration is the same demographic that fought so hard almost 100 years ago to nip this in the bud as well.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Pennsylvania becomes the latest state to strike down gay marriage ban.

Courtesy of Philly mag:  

It’s official, Pennsylvania has finally jumped on the right side of history. U.S. District Judge John Jones III has ruled that Pennsylvania’s ban on same-sex marriage is unconstitutional. 

The ruling is on Whitewood v. Wolf, a case filed by the ACLU of Pennsylvania last summer on behalf of two dozen Pennsylvania residents who were fighting for their right to wed, or have their out-of-state marriages recognized in the Commonwealth. The lawsuit "alleges that Pennsylvania's Defense of Marriage Act and refusal to marry lesbian and gay couples or recognize their out-of-state marriages violates the fundamental right to marry as well as the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment."

The judge, John Jones, said the following in his opinion:  

“We are a better people than what these laws represent, and it is time to discard them into the ash heap of history.”

"Ash heap of history." Oooh I like this judge.

And well I should becasue as the Friendly Atheist points out he was also the judge who destroyed the Intelligent Design movement in 2005: 

Jones was assigned to the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District bench trial, the first direct challenge brought in the federal courts against a school district that mandated the teaching of intelligent design. He was praised by Tom Ridge, former Pennsylvania Governor and former head of the Department of Homeland Security, who said that "I can't imagine a better judge presiding over such an emotionally charged issue... he has an inquisitive mind, a penetrating intellect and an incredible sense of humor." 

On December 20, 2005, Jones ruled that the mandate was unconstitutional in a 139-page decision. 

After the ruling was handed down, some pundits immediately attacked it, notably Bill O'Reilly on Fox News accusing Jones of being a fascist and an activist judge. Casey Luskin and Jonathan Witt of the Discovery Institute, and activist Phyllis Schlafly, have leveled similar charges. Jones also received death threats as a result of which he and his family were given around-the-clock federal protection.

The danger of actually following the law when deciding a case that the Right Wing wants desperately to have a different outcome.

These same sex marriage bans are dropping like flies., and support for marriage equality is at an all time high. Which is good for the country, but it HAS to be driving the Fundamentalists around the bend.

Which, by the way, is also good for the country.