Clevelands Secret Club Blog: WOMEN'S RIGHT'S LEGISLATION

Wouldn't you know it. Women are suffering the most under conservative's budget cuts and social agenda (in federal and state legislatures). Is this what you voted for?

From the Columbus Dispatch:

"Women left far behind as new jobs arrive; analysts say recession had hit men harder

Tuesday, February 22, 2011 02:50 AM

By Tony Pugh

McCLATCHY NEWSPAPERS

WASHINGTON - The early stages of the economic recovery have taken on a decidedly masculine tone.

It was job gains by men that fueled January's steep decline in the national unemployment rate from 9.4 percent to 9 percent.

In fact, men have gained 438,000 jobs since the Great Recession officially ended in June 2009, while women have lost 366,000 over the same period, according to Labor Department figures.

And the 984,000 jobs created from January 2010 to January 2011? Only 47,000 went to women.

That's less than 1 of every 20 new job openings.

These numbers would barely draw a second look in the aftermath of past recessions, when women made up a much smaller share of the labor force. But women now account for nearly half of all U.S. workers, so the great disparity is all the more startling.

The trend has given a new gender-specific meaning to the phrase jobless recovery and is further proof that the hiring rebound isn't reaching all groups.

"The improvements in the overall employment picture obscure what's happening to women. In fact, women have lost ground since the recovery began," said a recent statement by Nancy Duff Campbell, co-president of the National Women's Law Center.

However, some observers say the one-sided jobs picture is more about economic justice than gender bias.

The Great Recession has been called the "mancession" because men absorbed 7 of 10 job losses during the downturn.

Male-dominated industries such as manufacturing, transportation and wholesale trade lost millions of jobs. Even in fields in which men weren't a majority of workers, they still got hit harder, said Heather Boushey, senior economist at the Center for American Progress, a liberal research group.

So as these and other industries slowly rebound, Boushey said it's hardly a surprise that men have landed more than 95 percent of new jobs in the recovery - or "mancovery," as it's playing out.

"If I get hit harder than you do, it does make sense that my recovery should be more dramatic. That's just logical," Boushey said. "The way this recession played out, there was this gendered impact across a wide variety of industries, and I think that's what you're seeing coming back."

After largely avoiding much of the job jeopardy that men faced, women are now enduring some belated suffering.

Education, health care and state and local government fueled women's job opportunities during the recession. But because women make up nearly 60 percent of government workers, they've felt the brunt of recent layoffs at the state and local level.

During the past year, women lost 202,000 government jobs, or 4 out of 5 that were eliminated nationwide.

"A lot of teachers were laid off," Boushey said. "A lot of child-care workers were laid off. A lot of local-administrator types were laid off. Those are disproportionately women's jobs."

As protests over state budget cuts continue in Wisconsin, other states such as Iowa and Ohio are pondering similar measures that could affect mostly women.

"If states and localities are forced to make additional cuts in critical public services, women may fall even further behind," said Campbell, of the National Women's Law Center."

Recovery helping men more | The Columbus Dispatch by Tony Pugh, February 22, 2011

The Dylan Ratigan Show, March 24, 2011

"Why Should You Care about Planned Parenthood?

How defunding Planned Parenthood could affect you:

4.7 million Americans may lose access to reproductive and family planning care, particularly middle- and low-income women.

If you don’t have insurance, you may have to pay for a doctor’s visit to receive a prescription for birth control and pay full price at the pharmacy for it.

Be careful! Without easily available screenings, counseling and treatment, the transmission of STDs and HIV may rise.

Your daughter, niece, or younger cousin (and her boyfriend) may lose their safe, confidential, and free place to receive counseling, birth control, and testing.

If you are low income and/or without insurance, you may have to pay the full price of STD screenings, which can cost $85 to $220 for each type. That doesn’t include the cost of the doctor’s visit, which can be another $200.

You will have to visit a private practice for prenatal health care and, if you don’t have insurance, pay full price.

Depending on the location, you may lose access to free or reduced cost general services like anemia testing, cholesterol screening, diabetes screening, physical exams, flu vaccines, help with quitting smoking, high blood pressure screening, tetanus vaccines, and thyroid screening.

If you are an OB/GYN, your number of patients may increase."

[ABOVE INFORMATION IS FROM LEARNVEST]

Call, email, fax your senator today to say "no" to defunding Parenthood and Title X programs.

MoveOn.org Political Action: Top 10 Shocking Attacks from the GOP's War on Women

Response to Miscarriage Investigation Bill: "I Submit My Used Tampon as Evidence" | AlterNet by Jill Filipovic, February 25, 2011

Excerpt from "Response ....:
There’s a new bill in Georgia sponsored by Rep. Bobby Franklin that would require women to file police reports when they miscarry, since fetuses are Georgia citizens and their deaths are potential crimes. I’m going to write more about the bill later — it’s actually really horrific and scary and basically turns all women into potential criminal."
Daily Kos: Now Republicans want to repeal child labor laws February 14, 2011

Conservative Legislators Attack Abortion Rights - Legal Momentum Briefing Room Women's Legal Defense Fund, January 27, 2011

GA Legislator Wants to Create The Uterus Police to Investigate Miscarriages | AlterNet (Feb 2011)

GOP Attacks Women : Weiner Responds | Video Cafe by Heather, February 25, 2011

Rep. Jackie Speier: "Abortion" Fuels Intolerant Thinking

House Votes to Defund Planned Parenthood February 18, 2011

How Conservative Attacks on Health Care Reform Will Affect You by Tony Carrk, January 5, 2011

Ezra Klein - Health-care reform and women [But wait a minute, the GOP wants to repeal the health reform legislation]

Women’s Health and Rights in Jeopardy as Representatives Look to Eliminate International Family Planning

It’s 4:50am (est.), and I can’t sleep. Anger, resentment, and fear have gripped my heart; and my heart can't stop racing, and each beat becomes louder and louder.

As is my habit when something disturbs me greatly, I have to put pen to paper [key stroke to blog] and release what's gnawing inside me.

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I need you to feel my anger, and understand why I'm upset.

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Last Saturday, we watched every male Republican (but 1 who voted present), and 62 male Democrats, interfere with, and restrict a woman’s freedom and rights. Two women Democrats, and every female Republican, were co-conspirators; and I wonder, if perhaps, there is self loathing in that group.
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I don’t care if you are pro-life or pro-choice. If you did not say no or object to the Stupak-Pitts amendment … you knowingly chose to interfere with, restrict and chip away at a woman’s rights and her freedom. This amendment went beyond the language that was already in the House bill.

The Stupak-Pitts amendment, a male written amendment, was another step in the direction to return women to what many men (around the world) see as a woman’s rightful place. That place is for women [and her body] to be subject to a man’s will and whims.
If you were not outraged, and/or did not write your representatives, or express your anger in some meaningful way, you aided and abetted those men [and their co-conspirators] who felt entitled, and sought to purposely interfere, restrict, and chip away at a woman’s rights and freedoms.

We women have come too far to allow men such as these, and their co-conspirators, to interfere with our rights and freedoms. Women, your body is your own. No man can possess it our own it. No man [or woman] should be able to pass legislation that will ultimately interfere with your decisions about your body, and interfere with and restrict your choice of, and access to health providers who would care for your body. Men would never willingly allow you to do it to them.

You see, ... people come to America from all over the world to celebrate and embrace freedom and choice. They come to America to be free.

Some, who never enjoyed freedom before, kiss the ground when they step on America's soil. They cry out … I’m free … I’m free. Free from ... imprisonment, or domination, or cruelty, or silence, or human rights abuses, or religious persecution; and they feel free to go where they want, or read what they want, or see what they want to see, ... .

Days, or weeks before the House vote on Healthcare, two men started crafting legislation that would have far reaching implications, and impact and further restrict a woman’s freedom. I want you to really think about this. I’ll say it again, … two men … two men crafted [wrote] legislation to interfere with and further restrict a woman’s freedom. *

I don’t know about you, but most psychologically healthy women would never want any man to interfere with and restrict her freedom.

[In the United States] If a woman decided to get up late one morning, that’s her right, and no man can force her to get up early. If she decided not to cook, that’s her right, and no man can force her to cook.

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If a woman wanted to go to work, that’s her right, and no man can tell her to stay home. If she didn’t want to marry, that’s her right, and no man can tell her that she had to marry. If she wanted to go to school, that’s her right, and no man can tell her she can’t go to school.

For a woman to be paid as much as a man doing the same job, that’s now her right, and no man should be allowed to pay her less.****

If a woman went on a date with a man, and he demanded sex, but she refused, that’s her right, and no man can force himself on her. If some man/men wanted to sell her into slavery**, she has a right to say no, and every man has a duty to come to her aid to prevent her from being sold.

If a woman wants an abortion, no man [or woman] can tell her she can't have one. If a woman wants to go to a hospital of her own choosing, no man can tell her she can not go. If a woman wants to see a doctor of her choice, no man can tell her she can not go.

In the United States of America, a woman has the same rights and freedoms as a man. She has a right to liberty; and she has a right to happiness. These are fundamental rights. No man can [legally] take her rights away from her. No man has the right to tell her what to do with her life. No man has a right to touch her if she doesn’t want to be touched. Her body is her own and no man … no man can own her. She and she alone own her body.

It is rare for another woman to form a group or start a movement meant to interfere with her own rights and freedoms as a woman. If there was such a woman, I would think you would agree, that something is wrong with her ... that perhaps she is psychologically damaged in some way.

I want you to think about who is at the forefront of almost every group or movement to restrict or interfere or strip away a woman’s rights and freedoms. ... They are almost always men. They are the Randall Terry’s’; they are the "Men Against Abortion" kind of groups; they are the sex slave traders, the rapists, the men who like to abuse women; they are the men who want to control women; they are the cold blooded killers like Scott Roeder; and now the Ben Nelson's, the Jeff Merkley's, the Orrin Hatch's, the Mike Johanns', and Bart Stupaks and Joe Pitts of this world.***

None of these men would ever willingly allow another man or woman to own his body. He decides how his body is to be used or abused. He makes the decision about his reproductive organs; and he would never willingly allow anyone to interfere with that decision. These men will move heaven and earth; and they will legislate, demand, and fight for a man’s rights and freedoms. [He yells] "Give me liberty or give me death".

That a woman would not fight with every fiber of her being when a man [or another woman] seeks to restrict, take away or strip away her rights and freedoms is incomprehensible; and one would surmise that a woman who does not fight, has low self esteem, or is mentally challenged, or suffers from some other infirmity.

UPDATE 4/29/2010:

OKLAHOMA WHAT HAVE YOUR DONE?

by Mary Alice Carr
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Rachel Maddow on Stupak and C Street:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

[http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/#33814086]

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Comment: What is so unsettling about the Hyde amendment and the Stupak-Pitts amendment is that we are back to where we were when abortion was illegal.

Rich women always had access to abortion services [legal or illegal].

When abortion became legal, all women had access.

With Hyde and Stupak-Pitts, we are now back to where we were before abortion became legal.

This is now about class, control and unequal access; leaving poor women who can least afford to bear children, having less access, and being pushed deeper into poverty.

Hyde and Stupak-Pitts ultimately gets between a patient and her doctor by denying access to a legal procedure if the patient will be receiving federal monies (subsidies).

Hyde and Stupak-Pitts also prevent health insurance companies from providing coverage for a legal procedure if they receive federal subsidies. [The words "restraint" and "free trade" come to mind]

That men are at the forefront, crafting legislation and making it more and more [extremely] difficult for women to have access to a legal procedure, is so much about control of women and very little about pro-life. The fact that these men have female co-conspirators (as do sexual slave traders with their madams) does not negate the fact that these men seek to control and bend women to their will and whims.

There is so much wrong with Hyde and Stupak-Pitts, I can't for the life of me understand why some smart lawyer can't figure a way to get rid of both.

UPDATE 5/22/2010

Pedophilia is Fine but Hold the Abortion

UPDATE 4/29/2010:

OKLAHOMA WHAT HAVE YOUR DONE?

by Mary Alice Carr

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The Assassination of Dr. Tiller
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