Good morning!

BLOG UPDATE:

Well…some of you may have clicked over to my blog yesterday, and “just noticed” that my blog had drastically changed. I apologize for that. If you were panicking, you can only imagine what I was going through when the change occurred. My web guy was changing all of my sites from one server to another (which I thought was going to be a piece of cake and so I didn’t even mention it to my readers), and we ran into some technical difficulties.

So…in the interim of getting it moved, he put up a temporary site (many of you may have seen it for about an hour yesterday), as a placeholder as he was uploading the blog, to let all of my readers know that we were in the middle of maintenance, and to please be patient. Then to make matters worse, in the process of moving the blog, because the blog has so much content, my web guy was being challenged at getting it all uploaded and moved to the new server. It simply was not uploading with any speed and half way through the upload it would come to a complete halt.

So…in the interim of figuring out how to get it moved to the new server, as it was apparent that it was going to take a lot longer than expected, and I was concerned about you, my readers, not being able to comment or converse with me and the other readers, he took down the temporary site, and put up the blog, which is still on the old server. At this point I am leaving it there since it is now working perfectly fine.

Thank you again for your patience and understanding. And for being here with me. This is probably more info that you needed or wanted to know but I wanted to keep you informed since I am sure it was quite surprising to go to my blog and not see what you usually see.

Now…If that’s my biggest challenge for the day, I have no reason to complain. The Doctors in this write, well…they have good reason – they are hated and their lives are threatened daily. And the women…well, they just want to exercise their legal right and do what they feel is best for their bodies.

Here’s the write from Think Progress: It’s a long one so grab yourself a cup of coffee.

Meet America’s Most Hated Doctors

You received years of specialized training in a field that you’re passionate about. You’ve decided to work in an area of the country where you feel you can make a difference. You have a family, and you’re primarily concerned about helping other families thrive. But at every turn, the state is enacting more barriers to your professional success. Your job options are limited because you’re not welcome in some American communities. And sometimes, protesters show up outside of the home you share with your children, shouting that they hate the work you do.

You’re on the front lines of the abortion wars.

The politicized debate over reproductive rights is typically framed as a tug of war between life and choice, women and babies, pregnancy and abortion. Although it’s no question that women’s bodies have become a battleground, there are other foot soldiers in this fight who don’t always enter the national conversation. The medical professionals who risk their jobs and their lives to perform legal abortions are under siege.

ThinkProgress spoke to eight individuals who either perform abortions for their patients or operate a clinic where abortions are offered. Some preferred to speak under pseudonyms, and others agreed to use their real names. They face unique challenges depending on which state they call home, but their stories all include a common thread. They want to help women — help them choose the best type of contraception, help them have healthy pregnancies, help deliver their babies, help them decide how many children to have, and help them beat cancer. They’re frustrated that they’re singled out, dealing with personal and professional hurdles that no other type of doctor is forced to experience.

They’re also not naive about what’s at stake in their daily lives.

“Let’s put it this way. You probably interview other professionals for news stories all the time and you never have to worry about whether you can identify their name, or the institution where they work,” Dr. David Eisenberg, a doctor practicing in St. Louis, pointed out to ThinkProgress. “It’s very clear to me that the work that I do puts me at risk on many levels. I’m willing to take these risks, but it’s ridiculous they exist in the first place.”

Casualties in the anti-abortion war

Exactly 21 years ago, Dr. David Gunn was shot three times in the back outside of his abortion clinic in Pensacola, Florida. According to media reports, a 31-year-old abortion protestor yelled “Don’t kill any more babies!” before opening fire at point-blank range. Gunn had been operating a clinic in Pensacola for just over a month before he was killed; it bore no signs advertising what type of services it provided.

Gunn was the first doctor to become a casualty of the movement that calls itself pro-life. Since then, there have been seven more. In order to commemorate Gunn’s memory, reproductive rights advocates now mark the date of his death, March 10, as the National Day of Appreciation for Abortion Providers. Activist groups encourage people to send thank you cards to the people who risk their lives to do this work, an effort that abortion opponents typically mock.

“Everyone who does the work we do can’t forget the things that have happened, and the people who have been murdered and attacked,” Dr. Christopher Estes, an abortion provider in Florida, told ThinkProgress. “But I don’t let it stop me from doing what I do.”

“There can be backlash, and there are consequences. Hopefully they’re minimal — someone doesn’t want to invite you to a dinner party — but they can obviously also be much more serious,” Dr. Stephanie Long, a doctor from California, added.

Long noted that the people who do this work are very aware of which areas carry the highest risk. Before she moved to California, she trained and practiced in Idaho and New Mexico. There weren’t necessarily robust support systems there. She knows people who stopped providing abortion care in Idaho because it was too difficult for them. After all, if you’re the only abortion doctor within hundreds of miles, your clinic is on opponents’ radar, and your profile will likely be raised in the anti-choice community.

“There are big barriers for those in small communities. There’s a lot of fear for what someone might say to your family or your children. You’re not as anonymous as you are in a big city — if you’re walking into a town of 2,000, everyone knows who you are and recognizes you in the grocery store,” Long explained. “There’s a certain point along the path, when you’re picking different jobs, you realize that if you work at certain clinics, your name will be out there. You have to decide if you’re okay with that.”

“For a lot of people, they don’t want to deal with the hassles, they don’t want to become a target, they don’t want their clinic to be picketed. For most doctors, it’s not an ideological issue; it’s a practical issue. This work is hard,” Dr. Jennifer Rojas, which is not her real name, told ThinkProgress.

Rojas prefers to remain anonymous because elevating her profile is a threat to her professional life. She practices in Texas, where a new state law is forcing dozens of abortion providers out of work because they can’t comply with a regulation that requires them to obtain admitting privileges, which is essentially a superfluous partnership with a local hospital. It’s hard enough to get these admitting privileges as it is, and many doctors are unsuccessful. But becoming a target of local anti-choice groups can make it even worse. That can lead certain hospitals to refuse to work with you.

In Ohio, another state with some of the harshest abortion laws on the books, Dr. Kate Davis is similarly wary to elevate her profile. She decided not to publicly identify herself becauseOhio Right To Life, the most prominent anti-abortion group in her state, already knows who she is. Her name is on their website; they send letters to her home. “They’re praying for me. I get Christmas cards. Stuff like that,” she said.

Davis isn’t necessarily intimidated by the abortion opponents in Ohio. But, like Rojas, she’s well aware of the vast ripple effects of being targeted by the country’s network of anti-choice groups. Protesters will often try to get abortion doctors evicted from their clinics, either by pressuring their landlords or by lobbying to rezone the local area. They’ll implore other medical professionals to refuse to work with the doctors who provide abortion care. And they’ll direct their attention to the hospitals where abortion doctors work, flooding the institutions with phone calls and letters. Davis doesn’t want to invite those type of “shenanigans,” as she calls them.

“They can do whatever they want to do to me. But I don’t want other people who didn’t choose to do this work to have to deal with this,” Davis said.

A new kind of anti-abortion harassment

Merle Hoffman owns one of the oldest abortion clinics in the United States. Choices Women’s Medical Center was founded in New York in 1971, when abortion was permitted in that state but hadn’t yet been legalized across the country. At this point, she’s seen it all.

“I’m in my 43rd year of doing this work,” Hoffman explained in an interview with ThinkProgress. “I’ve seen the ebb and flow over the decades — I’ve seen the murder of my friends, I’ve seen bombings and harassment, and I’ve personally been evicted from previous buildings because of protesters. I once had armed guards in front of my clinic for three months. Providers have had to endure every type of bullying and harassment.”

Although abortion clinic violence makes the headlines less frequently than it did 20 years ago, and there have been a few pieces of legislation enacted on the state and national levels to protect clinics and staff from harassment, that doesn’t mean the issue has gone away. In some ways, abortion providers are more at risk than ever before, now that state legislatures are effectively targeting them.

“Over the last 30 or 40 years since Roe, the different ways that abortion opponents attack safe abortion care have really changed over time,” Amy Hagstrom Miller, the founder and CEO of Texas’ largest independent abortion provider, Whole Woman’s Health, told ThinkProgress. “In the 1980s and 1990s, there were a lot of clinic blockades and bombings. Then they started specifically targeting physicians — there were a lot of murders. Now, you’ve seen a change in the approach. We have this new front of anti-abortion harassment through the legislature and through the court system.”

Abortion opponents have been working to make it too difficult for doctors to provide abortion care by enacting dozens of complicated state-level restrictions that dictate how these services may be performed. Once state legislatures pass tighter restrictions, anti-choice activists can start filing complaints alleging clinics are breaking the new law and endangering their patients. Sometimes they’ll conduct undercover “stings” — posing as a minor trying to get an abortion without telling her parents, or pretending to be a woman forced to have an abortion against her will — in an attempt to catch the clinic staff making a wrong move. Ultimately, they’re hoping to trigger the state’s agencies to step in and conduct surprise inspections. It’s expensive and time-consuming for clinic staff to continue refuting these false claims.

“The state is really a tool of the anti-abortion movement in this scenario,” Hagstrom Miller noted. She’s been personally impacted by this dynamic. Just last week, Hagstrom Miller announced that she will be forced to close two of her five clinics because she can’t afford to keep them operating under Texas’ restrictive new law.

Meanwhile, abortion doctors have no choice but to do their best to navigate a web of complex state restrictions, even if it goes against their best medical judgment. Many of these state laws carry harsh penalties, like thousands of dollars in penalties and decades in jail, and doctors have to protect themselves.

“Every time I perform an abortion, I have to offer the woman the ability to see or hear the heartbeat of her ‘unborn human individual,’ which is what the law states it must be called,” Dr. Kate Davis, whose work in Ohio forces her to navigate several incredibly restrictive anti-abortion laws, told ThinkProgress. “I need to tell her the probability of this pregnancy going to term if she chooses to continue the pregnancy and doesn’t have the abortion. I need to do this both verbally and in writing. From my medical point of view, this is totally unnecessary. But I’m doing it so I don’t get fined, or charged with a misdemeanor or, heaven forbid, a felony.”

Another one of Ohio’s laws prevents Davis from performing later abortions, even in cases when a woman’s pregnancy has gone terribly wrong and her fetus won’t survive. In those cases, her hands are tied and she’s forced to refer her patients to a different doctor out of state.

“Some of the only complaints I get from patients are when I have to turn them away. When I tell them, I’m sorry, I can’t help you, I know how to do the procedure and I could do it safely, but I can’t,” she said. “It’s heartbreaking. People are begging you — as a physician, you know you can help them, but the only reason you can’t is because of a state law.”

‘If I don’t do it, who will?’

Considering the challenges, it’s perhaps no surprise that this country faces a serious abortion provider shortage. The National Abortion Federation (NAF) estimates that the number of abortion providers in the U.S. has dropped 37 percent since 1982. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) has warned that “the availability of abortion services is in jeopardy” because of this growing lack of available doctors. Indeed, according to one recent study, 97 percent of OB-GYNs have had patients who have come to them for an abortion — but only about 14 percent of those doctors actually knew how to perform one.

That’s partly because some doctors decide they don’t want to deal with the hassles from anti-choice protesters, or the risks of navigating anti-choice laws. But it’s also partly because of structural barriers that exist within the medical community itself.

Many doctors don’t learn enough about abortion care while they’re in medical school — a 2009 study found that a third of medical schools don’t talk about elective abortion at all during the first two pre-clinical years. And as an increasing number of abortion clinics are being forced to close, and as hospitals have eliminated abortion from the services they provide, students in residency are losing out on opportunities to train. For instance, the doctors training in one of the 600 Catholic-affiliated hospitals across the country are barred from doing abortions. Even if new doctors do enter the field with the knowledge and the desire to practice abortion care, it’s often difficult for them to find a job that allows them to do that work.

So, when asked why they continue to do this difficult work, a common theme emerged among the abortion providers who spoke to ThinkProgress. They all said they don’t really have a choice. They know they’re part of a shrinking pool of people who can help women safely and legally end a pregnancy.

“Coming in as a new physician committed to reproductive rights makes it really difficult,” Long, the provider who trained in rural Idaho, noted. “But it’s not just a commitment in words. It has to be a commitment in actions. If I’m not going to do it, there aren’t a lot of other people who will.”

Davis, the anonymous doctor from Ohio, agreed. “I always knew that if I was going to be an OB-GYN, I would be obligated to provide abortions. The field is dwindling, and the providers we have are graying. If I don’t do it, who’s going to do it?”

“As I saw the increasing restrictions on abortion care, well, I came to this from a point of social justice. Since I have the skills to do this, then why wouldn’t I do it? Being in a state like Texas, where access is such a huge issue, it’s become 90 percent of what I do by default,” Rojas explained. “There aren’t that many people to do it. I couldn’t imagine leaving this, no matter how hard it is, because every day I see these women and I think — where else would they go?”

Luckily, there’s some slow progress emerging in this area. Over the past two decades, abortion rights advocates have been laying the groundwork to begin reversing the doctor shortage. The national Ryan Program, which was founded in 1999 and now has dozens of locations at medical schools across the country, is a central part of that effort. It provides critical financial support for OB-GYN departments, and helps them integrate abortion into the rest of family planning training. And local chapters of Medical Students For Choice are supporting individuals who want to become abortion providers.

A new wave of instructors is helping contribute to this shift, too. Doctors like Estes and Eisenberg, who have transitioned into academia and are committed to teaching their students about abortion services as simply another part of reproductive health care, are changing medical schools from the inside.

“People like me are taking on academic roles and roles in medical education. We’re making sure that students receive appropriate education about family planning care and abortion,” Estes, who works at an institution in Florida that’s home to a Ryan Program, noted. “I’ve been fortunate enough to wind up in a situation where I do an awful lot of teaching and I have some control over the curriculum. I put abortion back in, where it belongs. At the very least, students get to see the truth about it, and not have it hidden away like something we should all be ashamed of.”

Brave enough to speak out

Ultimately, abortion providers are caught in somewhat of a Catch-22. In order to preserve their professional and personal safety, they’re often reluctant to speak publicly about their work. But being forced into silence isn’t a great option, either. That ends up having larger consequences for society’s overall approach to issues of abortion rights, and prevents some of the experts in this space from being able to advocate for their work.

Dr. Gretchen Stuart, an abortion provider in North Carolina who was one of the lead plaintiffs in asuccessful lawsuit against the state’s forced ultrasound law, pointed out that even the doctors who feel very strongly about wanting to help change restrictive laws are hampered by the threat of potential consequences.

“Personal safety was certainly a consideration when I decided to be the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit. Fortunately, I haven’t had any problems,” she told ThinkProgress. “But you can see that this has a profound impact on the willingness of abortion providers to speak out on behalf of themselves and their patients.”

“We’re sometimes the quietest when we need to be the most vocal,” Dr. Stephanie Long agreed.

Ultimately, the stigma and shame around abortion will persist unless more of the people who have personal experiences with it feel safe enough to share those stories.

“When people ask, what can I do? Well, here’s what you can do. You can help remove the shame, and help women come out of the closet about the fact that they’ve had an abortion,” Merle Hoffman, the CEO of Choices, said. “The biggest weapon in the other side’s arsenal is shame and stigma. The first step is to normalize this.”

“I keep myself ‘out’ about my career and what I do, because if we all hide away and don’t talk about it, this stigma won’t get any better,” Estes explained. “We need to be vocal and educate people about this — abortion is not a terrible social ill, it’s just a part of women’s health.”

That’s the biggest takeaway that the abortion providers who agreed to be interviewed for this story wanted to communicate. They’re not on some sort of evil crusade to harm women. They’re not interested in taking advantage of their patients or talking them into ending a pregnancy. In fact, since most of them are OB-GYNs who provide the full spectrum of women’s health care, they emphasized that caring for pregnant women and delivering babies is one of the greatest joys of their work. They simply don’t see that as separate from helping women exercise their reproductive freedom in other ways, like having a safe abortion.

“The other side tries to vilify doctors and make us into these horrible people,” Dr. Kate Davis said, noting that abortion opponents are sometimes surprised that she seems so nice. “We’re just like anyone else. We’re just trying to take care of our patients.”

*****

Readers: Thankfully for women, we have doctors that are commited to taking care of their patients’ needs, and supporting a woman’s right to choose by committing themselves to women’s rights, even as they are harassed and their lives are in danger. It is just sickening that they are treated this way, and they have to endure this when they are doing what is legal and right for women.

And it is sickening that women have to endure public shame about having an abortion, or even wanting one. Ladies, I am here to tell you that having an abortion is nothing to be ashamed about. You know that it is my opinion that you have every right to do what you wish with your body. This is a normal part of women’s health, and we should be supported in our decisions.

It is perfectly acceptable if you are one who does not agree with abortions – you have the right to choose not to have one. But please do not put your values or beliefs upon someone else and prevent them from their freedom of choice either. Women need to support each other in this, because men will continue to try and take away our freedoms.  The men don’t need our help. In fact, women need our help and were asking men to support us as well, in making sure that we are able to get the safe and supported assistance we need when making choices that affect our lives.

This is just another huge reason why we need to be very verbal in getting those that oppose our rights, OUT this November. It is no time to be lazy and it is time to ban together and support your sisters in their freedom to choose.

Peace & Love…and Freedom of choice.

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

If you love my blog and my writes, please make a donation via PayPal, credit card, or e-check, please click the “Donate” button below. (Please only donations from those readers within the United States. – International readers please see my “Donate” page)

Or if you would like to send a check via snail mail, please make checks payable to “Michelle Moquin”, and send to:

Michelle Moquin PO Box 29235 San Francisco, Ca. 94129

Thank you for your loyal support!

All content on this site are property of Michelle Moquin © copyright 2008-2012

“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

" Politics, god, Life, News, Music, Family, Personal, Travel, Random, Photography, Religion, Aliens, Art, Entertainment, Food, Books, Thoughts, Media, Culture, Love, Sex, Poetry, Prose, Friends, Technology, Humor, Health, Writing, Events, Movies, Sports, Video, Christianity, Atheist, Blogging, History, Work, Education, Business, Fashion, Barack Obama, People, Internet, Relationships, Faith, Photos, Videos, Hillary Clinton, School, Reviews, God, TV, Philosophy, Fun, Science, Environment, Design, The Page, Rants, Pictures, Church, Blog, Nature, Marketing, Television, Democrats, Parenting, Miscellaneous, Current Events, Film, Spirituality, Obama, Musings, Home, Human Rights, Society, Comedy, Me, Random Thoughts, Research, Government, Election 2008, Baseball, Opinion, Recipes, Children, Iraq, Funny, Women, Economics, America, Misc, Commentary, John McCain, Reflections, All, Celebrities, Inspiration, Lifestyle, Theology, Linux, Kids, Games, World, India, Literature, China, Ramblings, Fitness, Money, Review, War, Articles, Economy, Journal, Quotes, NBA, Crime, Anime, Islam, 2008, Stories, Prayer, Diary, Jesus, Buddha, Muslim, Israel, Europe, Links, Marriage, Fiction, American Idol, Software, Leadership, Pop culture, Rants, Video Games, Republicans, Updates, Political, Football, Healing, Blogs, Shopping, USA, Class, Matrix, Course, Work, Web 2.0, My Life, Psychology, Gay, Happiness, Advertising, Field Hockey, Hip-hop, sex, fucking, ass, Soccer, sox"

Good morning!

…you might be raped.”

Today, Michigan’s “Rape Insurance” law goes into affect. Yep, you read that right. Michigan is requiring women to get extra insurance in planning ahead for the need for an abortion if they are raped.

Watch from The Rachel Maddow Show:

….or read from The Lansing State Journal:

Abortion rider law takes effect Thursday

No companies offering them on private plans

Anti-abortion activist and attorney Rebecca Kiessling, center, and others who say they were born as a result of rape, urged lawmakers to pass the citizen-initiated proposed law targeting insurance coverage of abortion in Michigan. The law takes effect Thursday / AP Photo/David Eggert

Michigan residents who buy health coverage in the private marketplace after Thursday will not have access to abortion coverage, even if a pregnancy is the result of rape or incest.

On that day, a new state law goes into effect that prohibits insurance companies from covering abortion services unless customers purchase separate add-ons — called riders — to their insurance plans ahead of time.

No insurance companies will be offering those riders to new customers in the private marketplace after Thursday, according to the state’s Department of Insurance and Financial Services.

Insurers had to tell the state in February if they planned to offer and sell the abortion riders. Seven companies indicated they plan to do so but only as part of employer-based plans, department spokesman Caleb Buhs said.

That means anyone who purchases insurance as an individual — either inside or outside the new federal health-care exchange — will not be able to obtain coverage for abortion services.

“People who buy coverage for themselves and their families will not find this coverage,” said Marianne Udow-Phillips of the Center for Healthcare Research and Transformation. “It will not be available to them.”

It’s unclear how much the riders in the employer-sponsored plans will cost. Buhs said one company has listed the rider at 32 cents per month.

The Abortion Insurance Opt-Out Act was passed in December by the Republican-controlled Legislature after an emotional and heated debate that garnered national attention.

Proponents say the law protects those who object to abortion from having any of their premiums used to cover the procedure for other customers in their group plans or within the health-care exchange.

“Do we anticipate this will lower abortion rates? No,” said Right to Life Michigan spokeswoman Genevieve Marnon. “But … it’s one thing for you to pay for your abortion and another thing for me to have to pay for it.”

Opponents say the bill threatens women’s health by limiting access to a procedure that is legal and constitutionally protected.

Democrats labeled it the “rape insurance bill” because it would, in effect, require women to buy abortion coverage in advance even if they never expect to need it — such as if a woman becomes pregnant from a rape.

Sen. Gretchen Whit­mer, D-East Lansing, said women who aren’t aware the riders are required or who don’t receive insurance through one of the seven companies will suffer financially and emotionally.

“ A woman in need of a medically necessary D&C procedure will not even have insurance as an option, meaning she would be required to pay for the procedure entirely on her own with a cost often totaling in the tens of thousands of dollars,” Whit­mer said.

“This isn’t talking about someone looking for an elective abortion. This is a woman with a wanted pregnancy who is forced to terminate it because of health concerns and may now may face financial ruin for doing nothing more than trying to start a family. If that’s not a direct attack on women and our health to say insurance can’t cover this type of critically important reproductive care, I don’t know what is.”

Although the law is intended to remove abortion from the list of procedures automatically covered by insurance, the majority of elective abortions in Michigan and nationwide are already paid out-of-pocket.

Only 3 percent of the 22,700 abortions in Michigan in 2012 were paid for with insurance, according to the most recent numbers from the Department of Community Health.

The total number of abortions in Michigan has also plummeted. The 22,700 abortions in 2012 reflects 52 percent drop since 1987.

Marnon said the numbers were not the point of the opt-out bill. It was the fact that someone could unknowingly be helping to pay for even one procedure they oppose on moral grounds.

*****

Readers: This is just outrageous. What is going on here? Really? Yes, this is really happening. Okkayy. Time to get back in the driver’s seat. I HOPE all of you are with me because this crazy bumpy ride has got to end.

Blog me.

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

If you love my blog and my writes, please make a donation via PayPal, credit card, or e-check, please click the “Donate” button below. (Please only donations from those readers within the United States. – International readers please see my “Donate” page)

Or if you would like to send a check via snail mail, please make checks payable to “Michelle Moquin”, and send to:

Michelle Moquin PO Box 29235 San Francisco, Ca. 94129

Thank you for your loyal support!

All content on this site are property of Michelle Moquin © copyright 2008-2012

“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

" Politics, god, Life, News, Music, Family, Personal, Travel, Random, Photography, Religion, Aliens, Art, Entertainment, Food, Books, Thoughts, Media, Culture, Love, Sex, Poetry, Prose, Friends, Technology, Humor, Health, Writing, Events, Movies, Sports, Video, Christianity, Atheist, Blogging, History, Work, Education, Business, Fashion, Barack Obama, People, Internet, Relationships, Faith, Photos, Videos, Hillary Clinton, School, Reviews, God, TV, Philosophy, Fun, Science, Environment, Design, The Page, Rants, Pictures, Church, Blog, Nature, Marketing, Television, Democrats, Parenting, Miscellaneous, Current Events, Film, Spirituality, Obama, Musings, Home, Human Rights, Society, Comedy, Me, Random Thoughts, Research, Government, Election 2008, Baseball, Opinion, Recipes, Children, Iraq, Funny, Women, Economics, America, Misc, Commentary, John McCain, Reflections, All, Celebrities, Inspiration, Lifestyle, Theology, Linux, Kids, Games, World, India, Literature, China, Ramblings, Fitness, Money, Review, War, Articles, Economy, Journal, Quotes, NBA, Crime, Anime, Islam, 2008, Stories, Prayer, Diary, Jesus, Buddha, Muslim, Israel, Europe, Links, Marriage, Fiction, American Idol, Software, Leadership, Pop culture, Rants, Video Games, Republicans, Updates, Political, Football, Healing, Blogs, Shopping, USA, Class, Matrix, Course, Work, Web 2.0, My Life, Psychology, Gay, Happiness, Advertising, Field Hockey, Hip-hop, sex, fucking, ass, Soccer, sox"

Good morning!

It’s not very often that I highlight men on this blog. Not because I don’t think some men do great things but because this is a women’s blog, and I am all about giving the limelight to women because women simply don’t get it enough. Like Janis said yesterday, “We need the recognition.”

But today, I do want to feature men because when men are doing something to promote the protection of women…when men are advocating against the abuse of women, they deserve to be recognized. So…who are these amazing men? Well, in order to discover who they are, you need to buy a few Pixels, to unveil the mystery man. Wha’at?! :)

This is how it works:

The Pixel Project

It’s time to stop violence against women. Together. 

The Pixel Project is a complete virtual, volunteer-led global 501(c)3 nonprofit organisation whose mission is to raise awareness, funds and volunteer power for the cause to end violence against women (VAW) using social media, online strategies and new technologies. Our team of over 50 volunteers is currently scattered across 4 continents, 12 timezones and over 15 cities worldwide, proving that there are no cultural or social barriers when it comes to this issue.

Our flagship campaign is the Celebrity Male Role Model Pixel Reveal campaign which aims to turbo-charge global awareness about VAW using social media while raising US$1 million by getting a global audience to collectively unveil a million-pixel mystery collage of Celebrity Male Role Models at US$1 per pixel in benefit of a range of anti-VAW nonprofits from around the world. We also run a range of campaigns that combine social media, the Arts and popular culture including Paint It Purple, Portraits For Pixels, Music For Pixels, 16 For 16, the Twitter Tag Team etc.

LEARN MORE or GET INVOLVED

Every dollar donated reveals 1 pixel of that portrait. Picture a virtual jigsaw puzzle being assembled by people from San Francisco to Sydney who donate $1 dollar per pixel to play! Donations start at as little as US$10 (10 pixels). Watch the portraits revealed in live time… and as each male role model is revealed, a special message from him will be launched on-site!

The Pixel Reveal campaign showcases the importance of including men in the movement to end VAW by uncovering portraits of celebrity male role models who share the goal of inspiring the global audience to stop VAW in their communities. The philosophy behind choosing positive male role models from different walks of life is to emphasise that men have a major role to play in breaking the cycle of violence against women. All participating male celebrities with strong family connections and no history of violence who are role models for men in relationships with women and children. This distinguished mystery Celebrity Male Role Model line-up includes a prominent Nobel Prize Winner, a Pulitzer Prize winner and a superstar Environmentalist.

The US$1 million raised for the campaign will be shared between the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence and The Pixel Project to fund their work to stop violence against women (VAW).

Award-winning international photographer Jillian Edelstein is the project’s principal portrait photographer. Jillian’s work includes the iconic Nelson Mandela portrait for the cover of the New York Times magazine.

*****

Readers: Aren’t you curious as to who these celebrity male role models are who share a common goal in stopping abuse toward women? Yes! Well then, since you’re answer is yes, you need to buy pixels. :)

And guys…you don’t have to be a celebrity to be a wonderful male role model. All you have to do is join in and support, by helping to stop the abuse against women and girls too.

Thanks to all for all you do.

Happy Sunday! xox

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

If you love my blog and my writes, please make a donation via PayPal, credit card, or e-check, please click the “Donate” button below. (Please only donations from those readers within the United States. – International readers please see my “Donate” page)

Or if you would like to send a check via snail mail, please make checks payable to “Michelle Moquin”, and send to:

Michelle Moquin PO Box 29235 San Francisco, Ca. 94129

Thank you for your loyal support!

All content on this site are property of Michelle Moquin © copyright 2008-2012

“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

" Politics, god, Life, News, Music, Family, Personal, Travel, Random, Photography, Religion, Aliens, Art, Entertainment, Food, Books, Thoughts, Media, Culture, Love, Sex, Poetry, Prose, Friends, Technology, Humor, Health, Writing, Events, Movies, Sports, Video, Christianity, Atheist, Blogging, History, Work, Education, Business, Fashion, Barack Obama, People, Internet, Relationships, Faith, Photos, Videos, Hillary Clinton, School, Reviews, God, TV, Philosophy, Fun, Science, Environment, Design, The Page, Rants, Pictures, Church, Blog, Nature, Marketing, Television, Democrats, Parenting, Miscellaneous, Current Events, Film, Spirituality, Obama, Musings, Home, Human Rights, Society, Comedy, Me, Random Thoughts, Research, Government, Election 2008, Baseball, Opinion, Recipes, Children, Iraq, Funny, Women, Economics, America, Misc, Commentary, John McCain, Reflections, All, Celebrities, Inspiration, Lifestyle, Theology, Linux, Kids, Games, World, India, Literature, China, Ramblings, Fitness, Money, Review, War, Articles, Economy, Journal, Quotes, NBA, Crime, Anime, Islam, 2008, Stories, Prayer, Diary, Jesus, Buddha, Muslim, Israel, Europe, Links, Marriage, Fiction, American Idol, Software, Leadership, Pop culture, Rants, Video Games, Republicans, Updates, Political, Football, Healing, Blogs, Shopping, USA, Class, Matrix, Course, Work, Web 2.0, My Life, Psychology, Gay, Happiness, Advertising, Field Hockey, Hip-hop, sex, fucking, ass, Soccer, sox"

Good morning!

Texas, Georgia, Iowa and Boston, “sucks”: I have clicked over and read all of your writes. All I can say is “Sick, sick, and more sick.”

By the way…Arizona sucks too.

Arizona On Steroids

Will the Supreme Court Issue a License to Discriminate?

The nationwide outcry over Arizona’s anti-LGBT law was swift and severe. Amid mounting pressure from leading Republicans in her own state as well as the business community and others, Gov. Jan Brewer vetoed the law on Wednesday night.

Unfortunately, Arizona is far from the only state where lawmakers are contemplating bills that would give the government, private businesses, and others the a license to discriminate under the guise of “religious liberty.” As Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards wrote yesterday, “this didn’t start with Arizona, and it won’t end with Arizona.”

Indeed, proposals similar to the Arizona law have been introduced recently in states across the country, including Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Maine, Mississippi, Missouri, Ohio, Oklahoma, Wisconsin, Kansas, and South Dakota, and Tennessee.

The Missouri proposal was actually introduced in attempt to model the Arizona bill, but the backlash over Arizona helped propel measures in other states to outright defeat or at least has them on ice for the moment.

As bad as these bills are, they pale in comparison to the damage the Supreme Court could do with an erroneous ruling in the upcoming Hobby Lobby andConestoga Wood cases. While these cases are specifically about the Affordable Care Act’s birth control benefit, the High Court could open the floodgates to discrimination in the name of religious belief.

ThinkProgress’ Ian Millhiser explains how the Supreme Court could essentially impose an Arizona-style law on steroids nationwide:

If this issue sounds familiar, it should, because it’s the exact same issue behind two of the most high profile Supreme Court cases being hear this term — Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby Stores and Conestoga Wood Specialties v. Sebelius. In both of those cases, for-profit businesses object, on religious liberty grounds, to complying with Obama Administration rules increasing access to birth control. One of the most important questions presented by both cases is whether a for-profit corporation can have religious faith at all, and if so, whether it can use that supposed faith as the basis for a legal claim.

So if the Supreme Court agrees with the plaintiffs in these cases that corporations aren’t just people, but they can also be people of faith, the outcome will be very similar to what would happen if Congress had taken the bill Brewer just vetoed, passed it at the federal level and then President Obama had signed it into law — except, of course, for the fact that no one on the Supreme Court was actually elected to make law.

Last year, some of our Center for American Progress colleagues wrote about the dangerous slippery slope we could all go sliding down if the Supreme Court agrees that corporations are not only people, but people entitled to religious beliefs. Such a decision poses a very real threat to core civil rights protections in this country:

• Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibits employment discrimination on the basis of sex, race, color, national origin, or religion. But if for-profit corporations have religious beliefs, they will be able to argue they have the right to side-step Title VII and, for example, hire only those who sign a “statement of faith” or share the same religious beliefs.

• The Pregnancy Discrimination Act, which is part of Title VII, protects against sex discrimination on the basis of pregnancy, but for-profit corporations may try and use their newly found religious rights to fire unmarried pregnant employees.

• The Fair Housing Act makes it illegal to discriminate on the basis of sex, race, color, national origin, or religion, unless you qualify for certain religious organizations exemptions. If for-profit corporations have religious rights, then property-management firms may argue their religious beliefs do not support certain lifestyles such as living together before marriage. They may choose not to rent or sell to those engaging in the unapproved conduct.

• Many states have public accommodations laws that prevent discrimination based on sexual orientation. A holding that a corporation can be exempt from basically any federal law because of its owners’ religious beliefs could lead to similar state law exemptions. (See Elane Photography v. Willock.)

The Supreme Court hears oral arguments in these cases on March 25, so the timing of this growing national backlash against discrimination under the guise of religious liberty could not be better. Justice Anthony Kennedy, who is frequently the Court’s swing vote, has a long history of supporting LGBT rights, including authoring last year’s historic decision striking down the Defense of Marriage Act. That decision has nationwide marriage equality barreling back toward the Supreme Court at breakneck speed.

As Millhiser wrote earlier this week, the Arizona backlash could be of tremendous benefit in the upcoming cases:

The last time a conflict between gay rights and religious conservatives reached the Supreme Court, Kennedy broke with his fellow conservatives and sided with gay equality. [...]

But if Kennedy views Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood and a broad attack on the idea that religious employers have to comply with the law, and specifically, with laws protecting gay people, then he is much more likely to uphold the birth control rules.

The plaintiffs’ legal theory in Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood would, in the words of a brief filed by attorneys from Lambda Legal, “mark a sea change – not only in allowing business owners’ religious views about family planning to burden decisions employees are entitled to make for themselves, but also in opening the door to similar denials of equal compensation, health care access, and other equitable treatment for LGBT people, persons with HIV, and anyone else whose family life or health need diverges from their employers’ religious convictions.” If birth control loses in Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood, it is all but certain that gay rights will be next on the chopping block.

Stay tuned for more on the potential consequences of the Hobby Lobby case.

BOTTOM LINE: Religious liberty is a core American value and progressives believe in religious liberty for all, not just for some. Religious liberty means religious liberty for everyone. And that includes the freedom from having the theological doctrines of your boss or those of business owners in your community being forced upon you.

The Arizona law and the upcoming Supreme Court cases are not really about religious liberty, they are about minority of individuals seeking a license to ignore laws and regulations they disagree with in order to discriminate against LGBT people, women, and others.

*****

So…here is the latest discrimination against women in Arizona:

After Failing To Pass Anti-Gay Bill, Arizona Turns Its Attention To Attacking Abortion Rights

All eyes were on Arizona this past week, after the legislature approved an anti-gay bill that would allow businesses to discriminate against LGBT individuals under the guise of preserving religious liberty. The intense national backlash culminated in Gov. Jan Brewer’s (R) decision to veto the legislation. But that doesn’t mean the lawmakers in the Grand Canyon State are putting controversial social issues to rest.

Just one day after Brewer’s widely publicized veto, lawmakers in Arizona advanced new legislation to attack abortion rights. HB 2284, misleadingly named the “Women’s Health Protection Act,” would allow for surprise inspections at abortion clinics to try to catch them violating state law. The measure also stipulates that abortion clinics need to “report whenever an infant is born alive after a botched abortion and report what is done to save that child’s life,” inflammatory language that the anti-choice community often deploys to suggest that some doctors arecommitting infanticide.

HB 2284 is being spearheaded by the Center for Arizona Policy, or CAP, the same right-wing group that was behind the controversial “right to discriminate” bill.

State lawmakers gave the measure preliminary approval on Thursday. “I mean, for goodness’ sake, we even do unannounced inspections of Burger King and McDonald’s, but we’re not allowing them at abortion clinics?” Rep. Debbie Lesko (R), the bill’s sponsor, said during the legislative hearing on the measure.

In reality, Lesko’s legislation is seeking to solve a problem that doesn’t actually exist. Abortion is already one of the safest medical procedures in the country, and the clinics that perform these procedures are already highly regulated. There’s no good reason to single out abortion providers for this additional red tape. Enacting these type of laws simply gives abortion opponents the opportunity to triggerstate investigations — and, depending on the political affiliations of the people who serve on state health boards, this can be an avenue to force clinics out of business.

“As an organization, we support bills that truly protect patient safety, but House Bill 2284 opens the door to provider and patient harassment,” Jodi Liggett, the director of public policy for Planned Parenthood Arizona, told ThinkProgress in a statement.

HB 2284 is part of a coordinated strategy to close abortion clinics that’s advancingacross the country. And it’s also a clear reminder that, regardless of Brewer’s recent veto, the fight against “religious liberty” legislation isn’t over. This line of argument is driving efforts to restrict LGBT rights in other states across the country — and it’s directly related to attacks on reproductive freedom, too.

Anti-choice legislation often stems from the same right-wing worldview that rejects LGBT rights. Indeed, those are the two issues that the “pro-life and pro-family” Center for Arizona Policy is primarily concerned about — and HB 2284 is hardly the right-wing group’s first foray into abortion policy. CAP also spearheaded the state’s 20-week abortion ban, a restrictive measure that’s been repeatedlyblocked in court. It was the primary impetus behind another anti-choice law that got thrown out by the courts, an effort to strip Medicaid funding from Planned Parenthood because of its affiliation with abortion. Most recently, CAP even threatened to torpedo Medicaid expansion in the state by pushing to defund Planned Parenthood.

On the surface, the state-level push to restrict abortion tends to be framed in terms of “keeping women safe” rather than specifically in terms of religious liberty. But the argument that businesses should have the right to deny services because of their religious beliefs is also doing significant damage to this aspect of women’s health care. For instance, the one in six American patients who are served in Catholic hospitals can’t receive any type of abortion care there, even in cases of dire emergency. This past December, the ACLU sued the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, arguing that those harsh restrictions are forcing hospitals to deliver substandard care to their patients.

This issue extends far beyond Catholic-affiliated institutions. The current legal fight over Obamacare’s contraceptive provision, which allows insured women to have access to birth control at no additional cost to them, is based on the notion that for-profit companies have the “religious liberty” to refuse health care services. And the lawmakers who advocate for abortion restrictions aren’t necessarily shy about articulating their policy positions from an explicitlyconservative religious framework.

“When it comes to attempts to use religion as a cloak for discrimination against the LGBT community and against women’s reproductive rights, the fight isn’t over. We’re seeing these attacks across the country,” Sharon Levin, the director of federal reproductive rights policy for the National Women’s Law Center, told ThinkProgress. “And toward the end of March, at the Supreme Court of the United States, business will be making the same arguments that were made in Arizona — pushing to allow for-profit businesses to evade complying with a law that would require contraceptive coverage.”

Cecile Richards, the president of Planned Parenthood, echoes those sentiments. “This didn’t start with Arizona, and it won’t end with Arizona,” Richards writes in an op-ed recently published in the Huffington Post. “This most recent legislation is part of an orchestrated and radical effort to extend religious liberties to corporations — to treat private businesses like churches under the law, by giving them the right to refuse services, deny health care coverage, and discriminate against people.”

According to Levin, there are important parallels to draw between the recent controversy in Arizona and the broader conservative push to twist religious liberty into something that doesn’t resemble what that term has typically encompassed. That certainly impacts the LGBT community, but also ends up hurting other groups, too.

“Religious liberty is not about harming others and imposing your religion on them,” she noted. “It’s critical to think about, as people did in response to the Arizona bill, about who is really being harmed here and what’s the harm that’s being done. Here, it’s women.”

*****

Readers: Yeah, I’ll say it again, “Arizona Sucks.” What do you have to say? It’s Friday. Start Flapping.

Peace out. 

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

If you love my blog and my writes, please make a donation via PayPal, credit card, or e-check, please click the “Donate” button below. (Please only donations from those readers within the United States. – International readers please see my “Donate” page)

Or if you would like to send a check via snail mail, please make checks payable to “Michelle Moquin”, and send to:

Michelle Moquin PO Box 29235 San Francisco, Ca. 94129

Thank you for your loyal support!

All content on this site are property of Michelle Moquin © copyright 2008-2012

“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

" Politics, god, Life, News, Music, Family, Personal, Travel, Random, Photography, Religion, Aliens, Art, Entertainment, Food, Books, Thoughts, Media, Culture, Love, Sex, Poetry, Prose, Friends, Technology, Humor, Health, Writing, Events, Movies, Sports, Video, Christianity, Atheist, Blogging, History, Work, Education, Business, Fashion, Barack Obama, People, Internet, Relationships, Faith, Photos, Videos, Hillary Clinton, School, Reviews, God, TV, Philosophy, Fun, Science, Environment, Design, The Page, Rants, Pictures, Church, Blog, Nature, Marketing, Television, Democrats, Parenting, Miscellaneous, Current Events, Film, Spirituality, Obama, Musings, Home, Human Rights, Society, Comedy, Me, Random Thoughts, Research, Government, Election 2008, Baseball, Opinion, Recipes, Children, Iraq, Funny, Women, Economics, America, Misc, Commentary, John McCain, Reflections, All, Celebrities, Inspiration, Lifestyle, Theology, Linux, Kids, Games, World, India, Literature, China, Ramblings, Fitness, Money, Review, War, Articles, Economy, Journal, Quotes, NBA, Crime, Anime, Islam, 2008, Stories, Prayer, Diary, Jesus, Buddha, Muslim, Israel, Europe, Links, Marriage, Fiction, American Idol, Software, Leadership, Pop culture, Rants, Video Games, Republicans, Updates, Political, Football, Healing, Blogs, Shopping, USA, Class, Matrix, Course, Work, Web 2.0, My Life, Psychology, Gay, Happiness, Advertising, Field Hockey, Hip-hop, sex, fucking, ass, Soccer, sox"

Good morning!

Over a week ago I spoke about the safety, or lack thereof in prisons, for women. Now, I discovered this recent write on the growth of private prisons. States are guaranteeing private prison building corporations that if they build a prison in their states, they will arrest and convict enough people to meet a minimum requirement.

Ok…this is really sick. And what does it say that the emphasis of that state’s justice will be to put you in jail whether guilty or not, rather than convict you for a crime you did convict?

It’s been a long time since I blogged anything about Corrections Corporation of America (CCA). Here’s the write From Think Progress:

Nebraska Lawmaker Wants Her State To Stop Paying Private Prisons For Empty Cells

Promising to keep private prison cells full will be illegal in Nebraska if a proposal from state Sen. Amanda McGill (D) becomes law.

McGill, who is running for higher state office this year, has introduced legislation banning the government from guaranteeing payment to private contractors regardless of the level of service the contractor provide. While that may sound so obvious as to be unnecessary, states often make those kinds of promises to corporations when they privatize public services.

The most notorious examples are private prison contracts that guarantee companies like the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA) a certain minimum occupancy level at prisons, and promise to pay CCA the difference should prison populations sag below that level. Such “lock-up quotas” appear in two-thirds of all prison privatization contracts, according to a report last fall by the anti-privatization group In The Public Interest (ITPI).

McGill’s legislation would ban those kinds of payment guarantees across all state contracts, but is specifically targeted at prison contracts. The bill also would amend the state’s corrections contracting law in a variety of ways to both protect taxpayers and regulate prison companies more tightly.

While attempts to improve prison contracts won’t stop America from being the world’s leading jailer on their own, reforms like the one McGill proposes would help change the incentives that lawmakers and law enforcement officials face. Contracts that force public payments for empty cells give elected officials reason to keep prisons as full as possible, which means criminalizing as many behaviors as possible. The largest driver of America’s incarceration epidemic is the futile, decades-old War on Drugs, but backroom deals with prison companies compound the country’s larger problem.

If laws like McGill’s were to take root across the country, the prison industry would lose one of its biggest arguments in favor of investing in companies like CCA.

Skyrocketing profits aside, the prison industry saw some setbacks last year. In a single month last fall, CCA lost contracts in Idaho, Texas, and Mississippi. The Idaho prison that closed was so violent and brutal that it was nicknamed “Gladiator School,” and CCA juiced its profits there by understaffing the facility, effectively outsourcing prison security to gangs of prisoners.

America spends 2.5 times as much per prisoner as it does per public school student. The country’s incarceration levels help drive economic inequality, and the combination of criminalization and neglect creates a “cradle-to-prison pipeline” for black and latino Americans.

*****

Readers: The last paragraph of the write is shocking isn’t it? Yes, but not surprising. And…OTWs are the ones that have to live with the sick Just-us justice system.

I decided to click over and read more and this is what I found:

States spend on average two and half times more per prisoner than they spend per public school student, this at a time when a majority of children of all racial and income backgrounds cannot read or compute at grade level in fourth- or eighth-grade and huge numbers of youth drop out of schools. The privatization of juvenile and adult prisons is yet another added danger. The world’s largest for-profit, private prison corporation, the Corrections Corporation of America, recently offered to run the prison systems in 48 states for 20 years if the states would guarantee a 90 percent occupancy rate.

And still more:

The rate of incarceration in the United States has spiraled out of control—with nearly 2.3 million people in prison or jail, the rate is now about 240 percent higher than it was in 1980, and 60 per- cent of this population is comprised of nonviolent offenders. Another 4.8 million individuals are on probation or parole, also mostly for nonviolent offenses. This tragic scenario generates a much larger inmate population than that of the 27 nations of the European Union combined and means we, alone, incarcerate nearly a quarter of the prisoners in the entire world. And while cash-strapped states are shutting down institutions that provide important public services such as hospitals and universities, prison expansion is eating up higher percentages of state budgets.

It does not need to be this way. Continued prison expansion has not been a response to an increase in actual crime. In fact, research shows that if incarcera- tion rates tracked violent crime rates, the incarceration rate would have peaked in 1992 and then by 2008 would have fallen back to about the same level it was in 1980. And while it is true that many states have seen decreases in their prison populations, there has still been a rise in the number of immigrant detention facilities, in addition to private prisons, county jails, and gender-specific facilities. The current criminal justice system not only wastes important state dollars that could be spent on vital services, but it also fails to keep the public safe because the system emphasizes punishment rather than rehabilitation.

What’s more, racial disparities in the current criminal justice system are outrageous, leading to a system of racial disenfranchisement and inequality that some argue we have not seen since slavery or its aftermath of codified segregation, Jim Crow. African Americans account for roughly 40 percent of the nation’s inmate population (while comprising only 13 percent of the total population) and Latinos account for slightly less, representing 21 percent of inmates (while being only 16 percent of the popula- tion). Even after offenders are released, they still face a lifetime of exclusion—often insurmountable job discrimination and disqualification from any public benefits that would help them get back on their feet as productive citizens such as food stamps, public housing, and even student loans.

The rampant and disproportionate imprisonment of people of color is a national tragedy.

 *****

Comments? Blog me.

Peace & Love.

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

If you love my blog and my writes, please make a donation via PayPal, credit card, or e-check, please click the “Donate” button below. (Please only donations from those readers within the United States. – International readers please see my “Donate” page)

Or if you would like to send a check via snail mail, please make checks payable to “Michelle Moquin”, and send to:

Michelle Moquin PO Box 29235 San Francisco, Ca. 94129

Thank you for your loyal support!

All content on this site are property of Michelle Moquin © copyright 2008-2012

“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

" Politics, god, Life, News, Music, Family, Personal, Travel, Random, Photography, Religion, Aliens, Art, Entertainment, Food, Books, Thoughts, Media, Culture, Love, Sex, Poetry, Prose, Friends, Technology, Humor, Health, Writing, Events, Movies, Sports, Video, Christianity, Atheist, Blogging, History, Work, Education, Business, Fashion, Barack Obama, People, Internet, Relationships, Faith, Photos, Videos, Hillary Clinton, School, Reviews, God, TV, Philosophy, Fun, Science, Environment, Design, The Page, Rants, Pictures, Church, Blog, Nature, Marketing, Television, Democrats, Parenting, Miscellaneous, Current Events, Film, Spirituality, Obama, Musings, Home, Human Rights, Society, Comedy, Me, Random Thoughts, Research, Government, Election 2008, Baseball, Opinion, Recipes, Children, Iraq, Funny, Women, Economics, America, Misc, Commentary, John McCain, Reflections, All, Celebrities, Inspiration, Lifestyle, Theology, Linux, Kids, Games, World, India, Literature, China, Ramblings, Fitness, Money, Review, War, Articles, Economy, Journal, Quotes, NBA, Crime, Anime, Islam, 2008, Stories, Prayer, Diary, Jesus, Buddha, Muslim, Israel, Europe, Links, Marriage, Fiction, American Idol, Software, Leadership, Pop culture, Rants, Video Games, Republicans, Updates, Political, Football, Healing, Blogs, Shopping, USA, Class, Matrix, Course, Work, Web 2.0, My Life, Psychology, Gay, Happiness, Advertising, Field Hockey, Hip-hop, sex, fucking, ass, Soccer, sox"