Obama Blinks on Birth Control

Swell: White House to Announce Contraception Rule 'Accommodation' for Religious Organizations.

With the White House under fire for its new rule requiring employers including religious organizations to offer health insurance that fully covers birth control coverage, ABC News has learned that later today the White House — possibly President Obama himself — will likely announce an attempt to accommodate these religious groups.

Adding cowardice upon cowardice—caving, and announcing it in the Friday News Hole.

One source familiar with the decision described the accommodation as "Hawaii-plus," insisting that it's better than the Hawaii plan — for both sides.

In Hawaii the employer is responsible for referring employees to places where they can obtain the contraception; Catholic leaders call that material cooperation with evil. But what the White House will likely announce later today is that the relationship between the religious employer and the insurance company will not need to have any component involving contraception. The insurance company will reach out on its own to the women employees. This is better for both sides, the source says, since the religious organizations do not have to deal with medical care to which they object, and women employees will not have to be dependent upon an organization strongly opposed to that care in order to obtain it.

Let's be clear about what this means: An additional burden is being placed on women to accommodate the bullshit objections of a vocal minority who are playing politics with religion to complain about a policy the central mandate of which has been law for over a decade.

All of this "religious freedom" malarkey is the invocation of false ethics by some of the most unethical, cynical, opportunistic jerks in the country. This isn't an issue of "religious freedom." They're forcing Obama's hand, seeing if they can get him to throw women's healthcare and equality under the bus again.

And he just blinked.

UPDATE: The administration's position is that it's really no big deal because women will still get free contraception coverage—women who are employed by religious institutions will just get it directly from their insurers rather than through their employers. I still have some grave concerns.

Primarily Terrible

Supporters pray over Republican presidential candidate, former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum (C) during a campaign stop at the Bella Donna Chapel on February 8, 2012 in McKinney, Texas. [Getty Images]

I'm thinking it's images like the one above (barrrrrrrrf) that necessitated frontrunner (!?whut?!) Rick Santorum assuring voters that he is not running to be "pastor in chief" of the United States. (He totally is, by the way.) I will point out yet again, because I'm an asshole like that, that the church in which this revival campaign event was held is a tax exempt entity, since it is not considered inappropriately political for a congregation to lay its hands on a presidential candidate and pray for him in front of the news media.

I will also note (#asshole #atheist) that these laws were put into place back when religious institutions in this country were generally in the business of actually helping the poor in their communities and not building multimillion-dollar entertainment complexes complete with ATMs and gift shops.

Anyway!

Here is a fun quote from Rick Santorum, Master of Projection: "The intolerance of the left, the intolerance of the secular ideology, it is a religion unto itself, it is just not a biblical based religion, and it is the most intolerant. Just like we saw from the days of the atheists of the Soviet Union, it is completely intolerant of dissent. They fear dissent. Why? Because the dissent comes from folks who use reason, common sense, and divine revelation and they want no part of any of those things."

"Reason, common sense, and divine revelation." One of these things is not like the other, Rick Santorum!

Rick Santorum also said at the same revival campaign event: "The institution of marriage saved my life." Rick Santorum is a hyperbolic dipshit, so it is not literally true that marriage saved his life, but he clearly finds his marriage VERY IMPORTANT to the quality of his life. Which, of course, makes it even more heinous that he endeavors to deny participation in the institution of marriage to some people, on the basis of whom they want to marry.

"Here is a life-saving thing that YOU CANNOT HAVE!"—Rick Santorum, Good Christian.

Speaking of Good Christians, the American Conservative Union's Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) is this week, and, naturally Mitt Romney is heading on over in order to pretend like there's a chance in hell that he'll ever appeal to extreme social conservatives.

CPAC FUN FACT! In 2007, Mitt Romney introduced Ann Coulter at CPAC by saying, "I am happy to hear that after you hear from me, you will hear from Ann Coulter. That is a good thing. Oh yeah!" before Coulter took the stage and called John Edwards a nasty gay slur.

Mitt Romney will be in GREAT COMPANY again at this year's CPAC: "CPAC will play host to anti-gay groups such as the Family Research Council, the birther leader of WorldNetDaily, and the Apartheid-nostalgic Youth for Western Civilization. But that isn't all. Following speeches from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Rep. Michele Bachmann, CPAC is hosting (pdf) the panel 'The Failure of Multiculturalism: How the pursuit of diversity is weakening the American Identity' with Peter Brimelow, the founder and head of VDARE.com ... a White Nationalist website, run by [a dude] from Great Britain [who] expresses his fear of the loss of America's white majority, blames non-white immigrants for social and economic problems, and urges the Republican Party to give up on minority voters and focus on winning the white vote."

Awesome! Good company you keep, Mitt Romney!

Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich, who is still definitely in the race for inexplicable reasons, will also be in attendance at CPAC.

I guess Ron Paul isn't attending? Well, that makes sense. He's probably pretty confident everyone already knows he's a racist thanks to those suuuuuuuper racist newsletters.

Talk about these things! Or don't. Whatever makes you happy. Life is short.

P.S. I just saw this wire photo of Rick Santorum wearing a cowboy hat while campaigning in Texas...


...and now I cannot unsee this:


To the Beltway...and BEYOND!
That may be the ticket with the best chance of beating the unstoppable Goat|Paperclip this year!

Have a nice day!

Breaking Nooz

The US Conference of Catholic Bishops says birth control is more powerful than god. You heard it here first.

And It's a Group With Actual Members

Lest anyone get the impression that Bill Donohue and his one-man outrage operation, the Catholic League, or even a serious organization like the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, reflect the entirety of opinion on the issue of reproductive rights, and making birth control available via healthcare plans, Catholics for Choice have joined with 19 other religious groups to sign a letter supporting the Obama administration's position on contraceptive coverage.

The letter can be read here (pdf).

In a statement, Jon O'Brien of Catholics for Choice said that the letter "shows what those of us who work in the field know only too well. Some of the strongest supporters for family planning are in the religious community. We know that the vast majority of all American women use and support access to family planning, including 98 percent of sexually active Catholic women. The loudest voices in the Catholic community are those of the priests and bishops who know that they are being ignored when it comes to their teachings on family planning. They may be the loudest, but we know they also represent a tiny minority of Catholics."

I hope President Obama is listening.

They are loud, but they are a minority. And, most importantly, they are wrong.

Quote of the Day

[Content Note: Rape culture; clergy sex abuse.]

"I'm not the slightest bit surprised that of course the scandal was going to be fun in the news—not fun, but the easiest thing to write about. If you have another bishop in the United States who has the record I have, I'd be happy to know who he is. … Well, the media everywhere made that the whole thing. I never had a case. And I believe that the cases I had were each handled just exactly as they should have been. … [The media] can talk about sex abuse or talk about their concern about finance—that's all right. I believe the sex abuse thing was incredibly good."—Former Bridgeport, Connecticut bishop and New York City cardinal Edward Egan, who, during his tenure at Bridgeport, "let accused priests continue to work in local parishes, authorized payments to victims in exchange for silence agreements, and lied about those payments during a deposition," but continues to maintain that the institutional sex abuse problem in the Catholic Church is a non-story inflamed by sensationalist media, and that the Church's—and especially his—handling of predator priests has been exemplary.

If the interview whence these excerpts came is indicative of the attitude among Church leadership—and one must reasonably believe that it is, given Egan's promotions and plaudits—it's no fucking wonder that there are legions of survivors of clergy abuse who have never seen anything resembling meaningful accountability.

[Via @delong.]

Choice Is Scary!

So, the Catholic Church leadership (and one-man outrage machine Bill Donohue, who continues to be treated as if he represents people other than himself; I am thisclose to starting a "Feminist League" to see if I can get as much attention with obnoxious press releases as he can) are all still angrily pooping their pants over the new requirement to cover birth control in health insurance policies for their employees, even though a majority of the church's parishioners (especially the women) reject their position.

I have a few observations about this:

1. I cannot stress enough how strongly I believe religious institutions do not warrant tax exempt status in this nation, and the fact that this explicitly political position is not even a breach of the exemption underlines how absurd the policy really is. They are political entities every bit as much as this community is, granted special rights only because their political activities are justified by god-belief.

2. This entire debacle exposes what complete balderdash the Church's concept of "faith" really is, because its leaders clearly have no faith in their own adherents to make choices consistent with the Church's anti-contraception doctrine. They'd rather restrict any and all reproductive choice altogether, including access to contraceptives, denying the free will with which their god supposedly imbued his human creations. They don't give a fuck about faith; they're interested in control.

3. Catholic women make the best choices for themselves irrespective of Church doctrine because that's what women do. Further evidence, not that any was needed, that women and other people with uteri will take whatever measures they need to take to not be pregnant when they don't want to be pregnant.

4. This requirement is categorically not a violation of the Catholic Church's right to practice its religion. Catholic organizations in the US (which are not Catholic churches) do not hire only Catholic employees. Catholic hospitals, for example, have in their employ doctors, nurses, techs, orderlies, admin staff, etc. from all different religious and atheistic traditions, most of which do not share the Catholic Church's prohibition on birth control. That's the cost of doing business in a multicultural nation. If the Catholic Church doesn't like the idea of having to provide required services to non-Catholic people, then they can pack up and take their money-making enterprises to Vatican City.

5. Which, of course, still wouldn't make them happy, because individual Catholic people still have free will and should have the right to express that free will, even when it contradicts Church doctrine. If allowing free will is good enough for god, it oughta be good enough for the Catholic Church. Yeesh.

More News from the Conservative Legislation Lab

It was another banner week in Indiana under the governance of Mitch Daniels last week, as my state passed its gross right-to-work bill, the state senate passed a measure that would allow public schools to teach creationism, and our Republican Secretary of State was convicted of six felonies: Three counts of voter fraud, two counts of perjury, and one count of theft.

Ha ha don't worry! The judge will probably reduce them to misdemeanors so he can keep his job!

"Halp! Ha ha! Halp us! Halllllllllllp!"—Indiana progressives.

Primarily Bored

"Hurry! The bus to hell is here!"
Y'all, I am so tired of this primary. There is only so much enthusiasm that one Melissa McEwan can generate over a contest between two super privileged white dudes to determine which super privileged white dude will become the next Republican nominee in a race to see if their corporate shill can defeat the Democrats' corporate shill and accelerate the pace at which this nation will be brought to grim ruination at the avaristic hands of soulless corporations.

Social Security: Sponsored by Sprint!

You know what the worst thing about a joke like "Social Security: Sponsored by Sprint!" is...? That Sprint would never sponsor Social Security. It would just dismantle it and instead sponsor Sprint's Happy Funtime Work Camps for the Aged and Infirm!

Play in the news, Nero...

Frontrunners Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich are neck-and-neck in Florida, ahead of its primary tomorrow. Or they're not, depending on who you ask. If you ask me, Romney is totally ahead and he's going to win, and then this thing should be over, but it probably won't be, because some rich weirdo is going to keep funding Gingrich's SuperPAC, and Gingrich will keep running as long as he's got money he can't spend at Tiffany's.

Reporteth the Wall Street Journal : "Gingrich Predicts 'Straight-Out Contest' for Months."

See?

And when he inevitably keeps hanging in there, lobbing round after round of criticism at Mitt Romney, hoping to defeat him, and Mitt Romney starts stomping on sour grapes to make whine about how Newt Gingrich is hurting his chances in the general election by forcing him to run a long and contentious primary contest, let us remember that is not only evidence of Mitt Romney's bratty entitlement, but of his resounding contempt for democracy.

Speaking of hostility to authentic democracy, something something Ron Paul.


Rick Santorum is one of two Catholics in this now 50% Catholic content, the other being Newt Gingrich. (Ron Paul is a Baptist, and, as you may have heard, Mitt Romney is a Mormon. President Obama, is, of course, a Muslin.) So it was a cool boost for the Catholic candidates this weekend when Catholic bishops and priests read out letters of protest at mass this weekend, vilifying the Obama administration's policy of paid birth control coverage. Neato! I continue to be thrilled that religious institutions are afforded tax exempt status!

POP QUIZ: Is it possible for a man obsessed with biparisanship to be an effective president in an age of hyper-partisanship?

If you said no, give yourself 1,000 points, redeemable at Shakesville's Bitter Irony Shop.

Talk about these things! Or don't. Whatever makes you happy. Life is short.

[Photo via.]

Primarily Horrendo

[Content Note: This post contains discussion of disablism and of the Mormon practice of nonconsensual posthumous baptism.]


"I will keel you!"
So, the Republicans had ANOTHER DEBATE! last night, because, little known fact, standing in front of cameras with 6,000 CNN logos behind you has been found to extend life. Each of these men will live to be at least 200 years old.

Anyway! Mitt Romney went after Newt Gingrich like a full-tilt miffed machine, and delivered the world-class snippiness that only a wealthy white dude who's ordered chocolate chip cookies (effortlessly winning the Republican Primary) but gets served oatmeal raisin cookies (having to work for it) can produce. My favorite line of the evening was: "I spent 25 years in business. If I had a business executive come to me and say they wanted to spend a few hundred billion dollars to put a colony on the moon, I'd say, 'You're fired.' The idea that corporate America wants to go off to the moon and build a colony there, it may be a big idea but it's not a good idea." BURN!

He has a point, though. Corporate America doesn't even want to maintain the colonies here, so it doesn't seem very likely they'll want to build one on the moon.

"Inconceivably, we have even less interest in the moon than in Detroit."—Big Business.

If you want more Funtime Debate Action, Richard Adams' live coverage can be read here. It is, as usual, very enjoyable!

Back on the campaign trail, the Republican Establishment, who's decided Mitt Romney looks pretty good after all if Newt Gingrich is the only other viable option, has decided on its "Fuck Newt" strategy, and it's a doozy: Newt Gingrich is crazy.

The Romney campaign is sending out a print ad that seeks to "rais[e] doubts about Newt Gingrich's 'emotional stability'," and dog whistles cuckoo by calling him, in big block letters, ERRATIC and RECKLESS.

(The main picture of Gingrich, viewable at the link, is also cropped to make maximum hay of the fact that he is fat: "Look at the double chin on this guy!")

Elder GOP statesman and Viagra spokesboner, Bob Dole, who endorsed Romney, is doubling-down with the implications that Gingrich isn't of sound mind, releasing one of the most scathing statements against a member of one's own party I can recall. In the statement, Dole says that Gingrich's ideas as Speaker were "off the wall," and suggests Gingrich himself doesn't even understand why he does things. The statement is brutally honest about Gingrich's ethics problems, ego, and poisonous unpopularity, but there's definitely a troubling undercurrent of "bro be crazy!" running through it.

Meanwhile, on the "Fuck Romney" train, there's more natter about one of the more curious aspects of Mormonism—the practice of posthumous baptism, which is something Romney has said he's done. It's a controversial practice for several legitimate reasons, not just because it's "weird." It's an anti-Semitic practice for one, in habit if not design, as Jewish cemeteries are frequent targets for posthumous baptism, despite repeated requests by Jewish leaders to cease and desist.

I also find it really objectionable that Mitt Romney doesn't consider deeply problematic what is ultimately an issue of consent. Look, I don't believe that performing some ritual over a grave makes a blinking bit of difference in determining where some allegedly sentient soul that vacated the buried body spends its eternal retirement. But Mitt Romney does. He believes that person went into the ground with one belief, and he can change their infinite destiny for them. And he believes he has the right to do that. Which is pretty fucked up.

And it doesn't leave me with a whole lot of confidence that a President Mitt Romney would be very sensitive to other issues of consent that matter in the here and now.

That's something worth asking about. But won't be, because we live in a rape culture, where hostility to consent is the norm.

Also because how could they possibly make room for a question on such a SILLY TOPIC, ha ha, when there are only like 3,000 debates left?!

Moving on...

Something something Ron Paul.

Rick Santorum is still hanging in there, I guess because he believes he actually has a shot at becoming either the nominee and/or the nominee's veep choice? Oof, Rick Santorum. You do not have a shot at either of these things.

In totally unrelated news, ahem, a new study has found that "there is reason to believe that strict right-wing ideology might appeal to those who have trouble grasping the complexity of the world." Huh. Shocking.

In all seriousness, the study was examining correlation between IQ and prejudice, suggesting conservatism and prejudice is an innate intelligence issue. But we should all know by now that IQ tests don't meaningfully measure any kind of comprehensive intelligence. The issue underlying the appeal of right-wing ideology is intellectual curiosity, or the lack thereof, which is really not contingent on what's measured with IQ tests.

There are subcultures that actively discourage intellectual curiosity, by demonizing science, by romanticizing segregationist small-town life, by sneering at people perceived to be elite or over-educated, by framing education as the enemy of faith, by embracing isolationism. Even rape culture narratives are embedded with disincentives against adventure: Don't leave the safety of your home, neighborhood, town, county, state, nation because there are nefarious strangers waiting to get you! And for god's sake don't use the internet!

All of these things conspire to create a mind seized with fear, afraid to be curious. Curiosity is necessary for empathy, and empathy necessary for progressive positions.

Conservatives are not unintelligent by nature; they're incurious by design.

That's an important distinction.

Talk about these things! Or don't. Whatever makes you happy. Life is short.

[Photo via.]

Film Corner! Moses Time

Hey, remember when I wrote about all those Bible-inspired movies that various Hollywood muckety-mucks had in their pipelines of totally unoriginal material that definitely needs to be put on the big screen...? Well, GOOD NEWS: Steven Spielberg is closing in on a commitment to direct an epic about Moses for Warner Bros.

With a working title of Gods And Kings, what's envisioned is "a movie like a Braveheart-ish version of the Moses story," an insider tells us. "Him coming down the river, being adopted, leaving his home, forming an army, and getting the Ten Commandments." ... But this film is as far from a remake of the Cecile B. DeMille-directed epic as you can get even though they cover similar ground. Instead Warner Bros wants Spielberg to direct it with the gritty reality of Saving Private Ryan, which is considered a masterpiece redefining battle movies. "There have been glossy versions of the Moses story but this would be a real warrior story," an insider tells us.

Perfect.

The only question now is who should play this Braveheart-like Moses. Can't be Mel Gibson, since he's busy making his movie about the story of Hanukkah. Oh, and also, he's a raging anti-Semite!

In the well-established tradition of casting the whitest white man who ever whited to play any Biblical character, I'm going to predict Sir Sam Worthington to be cast as Moses.

Fantasy Casting: Jeff Goldblum.

LOL!

Igor at Think Progress: Romney Steps Up Culture War; Claims Obama Is Waging 'An Assault on Religion'.

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA GASP! HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA GASP! HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA GASP! HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA SNORT!

Yes, everywhere I look there is evidence we are about to become a godless society, like: Our Christian president, our last Christian president, their almost exclusively Christian administrations who relentlessly pander to conservative and/or moderate Christians, the almost totally Christian Supreme Court, an almost entirely Christian Congress who start each session with a prayer, the millions and millions of other American Christians whose day of worship is still respected in various state laws across the country (like in Indiana, where you still can't shop for a car or buy booze on a Sunday), whose views are reflected in various federal laws (like denying same-sex couples the right of marriage in order to protect its "sanctity"), whose holidays are also national holidays, whose holy book must be sworn on in state and federal courts, and whose churches are not required to pay taxes, guaranteed freedom of religion, money that says "In God We Trust," a pledge of allegiance that describes us as "one nation under God," television networks who will accept advertising from conservative religious groups but not liberal political groups, schools who are incorporating a religious belief into science classes, conscience clauses for pharmacists and healthcare providers, religion-based residential communities being built, religious museums and amusement parks springing up all over the country, religious leaders being given diplomatic immunity, faith-based initiatives being federally funded, and our national media being constantly embroiled in a debate about in which god the president believes.

We are on the precipice, people!

*clunk*

Just When I Thought I Was Out...

The next time you feel the urge to make a joke about the religion with which Tom Cruise affiliates, or see someone else make one, consider this story in today's Village Voice. It's hard to extricate oneself from that organization even when one isn't its most famous public face on whom the tyrannical chief has some kind of obsessive crush and thus pays people to spy on you to gather information that can be used to extort your continued alliance.

I'm not saying I know that Tom Cruise wants to get out. I'm just saying it probably wouldn't be all that easy if he did.