Advice Goddess Free Swim
Thursday night, after my first day in the LA City Attorney's office as a volunteer mediator, and I'm a little wiped.
The experience was just amazing, as are the people who are supervising and continuing to train me. More about that in the newspaper...very soon!
You pick the topics. I'll try to post a piece in the morning.
P.S. One link per comment or my spam filter will eat your post.
The Boss wants to know what you think -
https://action.donaldjtrump.com/msm-media-accountability-survey/
Snoopy at September 20, 2018 5:09 AM
I have a message for virtue-signaling men who’ve rushed to embrace #MeToo operatives hurling uncorroborated sexual assault allegations into the chaotic court of public opinion.
http://michellemalkin.com/2018/09/18/dont-believe-a-gender-believe-evidence/
Snoopy at September 20, 2018 5:16 AM
Snoopy has a "message"!
It's a link to a thing. By someone else.
Because he's articulate, and not afraid to really flesh out his system of belief for others.
Crid at September 20, 2018 12:17 PM
Thing about Kavanaugh is (and I've forgotten which Twitterist first suggested this): If he doesn't get SCOTUS, it will shortly be affirmed that maybe he has no business on the D.C. Court of Appeals, either. Or on any court... When a presumption of guilt is a conviction, why should he have authority over anyone at all? The whole point would be that no one can ever be forgiven for anything, no matter how long ago or unsubstantiated.
And of course: Trump's next nominee will almost certainly do no better under a microscope, and will probably be even more offensive to lefty sentiments ideologically.
I have no idea how this should work out.
But as a rule of thumb, I think everyone's full of shit... So the greater your certainty that you know what the correct outcome is supposed to be here, the deeper my faith that you should be ignored.
Crid at September 20, 2018 12:27 PM
It was Big Mac, of course.
The guy's on a knife edge: SCOTUS or the Drive-Thru.
Crid at September 20, 2018 12:45 PM
> The whole point would be that no one can ever be
> forgiven for anything, no matter how long ago or
> unsubstantiated
If Republicans were smart, they'd focus on Keith Ellison - play offense, rather than defense.
Snoopy at September 20, 2018 12:57 PM
I find it interesting that the Usual Suspects who are screaming "abuse of power" over Trump declassifying and releasing FISA applications and FBI 302 forms, but are urging him to abuse his power and order the FBI to investigate an alleged incident that if it is actually criminal in nature is really in the jurisdiction of local officials.
Tell me again how he intends to become a dictator?
I R A Darth Aggie at September 20, 2018 1:11 PM
More on BK.
This isn't our least-fun political crisis.
Crid at September 20, 2018 1:12 PM
Amy A.— If you take any kind of class/training with Voss in Los Angeles, I'll pay half your fees.
Crid at September 20, 2018 1:25 PM
We really need to revisit giving women the vote. Or Joy Behar is a dirty, dirty misogynist.
https://www.redstate.com/brandon_morse/2018/09/20/joy-behar-claims-white-men-arent-protecting-women-people-like-probably-guilty-kavanaugh/
I R A Darth Aggie at September 20, 2018 1:30 PM
Statistifact.
Crid at September 20, 2018 1:33 PM
> Statisfact
The Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 close at record highs. It's the 100th record close for the Dow since Election Day.
https://twitter.com/FoxBusiness/status/1042867716946845697
Snoopy at September 20, 2018 1:41 PM
You don't have the literacy (or courage) to say what you mean, but you presumably infer that Trump had something to do with it.
He didn't. Capiche, Muffin?
Crid at September 20, 2018 1:44 PM
And of course: Trump's next nominee will almost certainly do no better under a microscope, and will probably be even more offensive to lefty sentiments ideologically.
_____________________________________
I trust you saw the last thread where I quoted pretty much the same thing?
In the meantime, regarding Roe. v. Wade, I wanted to ask: How many people would really even want to look their sister, daughter, niece, or granddaughter in the eye and say "I don't care if you become a single mother and lose any chance at a real education or job, and I don't care if you are forced to give birth, choose adoption and end up shattered for life as a result. I still will never let you or anyone else get an abortion even in the first 30 days, if I can get the law on my side."
And, as another male letter writer (a former teacher at a private school) wrote yesterday, how likely is it that a super-rich school like Georgetown Prep was loaded with students who considered themselves entitled to do as they pleased, whether it was legal or not? Very likely, he said.
lenona at September 20, 2018 2:09 PM
That is quite the mish mash Lenona. And the biggest problem with Roe v. Wade is there is no legal basis for it. It is pretty much the court saying 'I like this, so suck it.' A few more decisions like that and everyone will reply, 'Well, I got guns. Eat hot lead.'
As for the poll, I'm not surprised by only ~25% finding this accusation credible. If it was real this isn't the way to deal with it. Even Nancy Pelosi more or less admitted she didn't find it credible. Which is why she sat on it until it was politically useful.
Ben at September 20, 2018 3:26 PM
> you presumably infer that Trump had something to
> do with it. He didn't.
How far into Trump's term until you will admit the surging economy is due to his actions? No new wars, tax cuts, jobs are up with less immigration, unfair trade deals are being ripped up, optimism is up, etc.
Here is what the pundit class predicted would happen in the Trump economy -
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DQEEp00VoAAUc3K.jpg
> Muffin?
No thanks, too many carbs.
Snoopy at September 20, 2018 3:35 PM
"It's a link to a thing. By someone else."
...says the undisputed king of Twitter links.
Mote, beam, eye, some disassembly required.
Weren't you more cheerful ten years ago? What's going on? We haven't changed.
Radwaste at September 20, 2018 3:57 PM
> Mote, beam, eye
Even more than in your case, his thinking is all atomized insinuations. He can't put three sentences together describing his beliefs, and I believe there's a reason for that.
> We haven't changed.
Indeed you have not, but it was never cute.
Crid at September 20, 2018 4:23 PM
> I trust you saw the last thread
> where I quoted pretty much the
> same thing?
Well, no...
> How many people would really even
> want to look their sister,
> daughter, niece, or granddaughter
> in the eye and....
The scope of cataclysmic, Hollywood-style fantasy-nightmare composition by lefties on this matter is one of the most amazing things I've seen in public life. (Remember the instantaneous leftside hatred for Sarah Palin?... Those first few hours? This is like that.) Abortion's not going away... And it's a pathetic eagerness to regard one's political challenges in cartoon form that makes people pretend that it is.
Meanwhile, even if (as I am) one is pro-abortion, it's an indisputable truth that the abortion industry and its enthusiasts are an atrocious force in Western life. Details upon request.
Crid at September 20, 2018 4:31 PM
> Details upon request.
Details requested.
Snoopy at September 20, 2018 5:10 PM
Great argument re mistaken identity and Ford's allegations -
https://twitter.com/EdWhelanEPPC/status/1042893987747713024
Snoopy at September 20, 2018 5:14 PM
Google employees brainstormed, but didn't implement, ways to alter search functions to counter Trump's 2017 travel ban, internal emails show
https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-workers-discussed-tweaking-search-function-to-counter-travel-ban-1537488472?mod=e2tw
Snoopy at September 20, 2018 5:32 PM
Lenona, I find this casual disregard by pro abortion enthusiasts for the soon-to-be human life involved at the heart of abortion to be barbaric.
Let's keep abortion legal - with reasonable limits - but let's be adult enough to face the reality of what abortion is and is not. It's not a simple "procedure" like lancing a boil; and it's not about "women's health."
Having a child as a single mother in this modern age does not mean a woman will "lose any chance at a real education or job ... and end up shattered for life as a result." Some might, others won't. But to act as if the worst case scenario is a predetermined result for every unmarried pregnant woman is an overly dramatic hyperbole and not helpful to the ongoing debate.
Conan the Grammarian at September 20, 2018 5:34 PM
I wonder if one of the reasons crazy American religious zealots are dying off is that young women are finding contraception and abortion are more easily accessible these days, Texas notwithstanding.
I'm okay with that.
Gog_Magog_Carpet_Reclaimers at September 20, 2018 6:13 PM
> Details requested.
Sorry, pun'kin, you're ineligible. The offer is to Lenona and other Lenonoid personalities here who [A.] have shown themselves capable of considering lengthy and diverse sources of text of the non-Skinner-pellet Fox News variety and [B.] who are not moving through the world of public affairs in blinding, desperate need of a subject for their needful teenage hero-worship.
Do your own reading. Good luck out there.
Crid at September 21, 2018 9:10 AM
"Great argument."
Crid at September 21, 2018 9:21 AM
"We'll prove things with Zillow!!"
This is like a child dreaming of going to war with his pop gun.
The "Great argument," withdrawn in shame.
Maybe we should short your stock.
Crid at September 21, 2018 9:44 AM
Having a child as a single mother in this modern age does not mean a woman will "lose any chance at a real education or job ... and end up shattered for life as a result." Some might, others won't. But to act as if the worst case scenario is a predetermined result for every unmarried pregnant woman is an overly dramatic hyperbole and not helpful to the ongoing debate.
____________________________________________
Um, Conan, that's why I said "if." Twice. It's not predetermined, of course. At any rate, losing any chance to go to college is very often what DOES happen, with the poorer teen girls. Or losing the chance to get a job that you don't hate or isn't menial.
Besides, as the anti-abortion Orthodox speaker Frederica Mathewes-Green said:
“No woman wants an abortion like she wants an ice cream cone or a Porsche. She wants an abortion like an animal caught in a trap wants to gnaw off its own leg.”
So, I suspect that she, at least, understands that most ADULTS seeking abortions would be only be too glad to get them as early as possible - if there weren't so many roadblocks in the way. Such as poverty, needing weeks to build up the funds for gas money and the motels, and not being allowed to take a week off from work without getting fired - which might require a more expensive plane trip. (Of course, the week is what it might take to travel both ways, stay in a motel, and go through the mandatory waiting period.)
Here's what I said last year:
Call it a hunch, but I suspect that at least half of anti-choicers would be happy to ignore any first-month abortions IF those abortions did not require a doctor's help in any way.
Why do I say that? Because I don't remember hearing anything about attempts to ban abortifacient herbs from being sold in, say, natural health stores. So if there HAVE been such bans, there likely haven't been very many.
Not that those herbs can always be counted on, of course. Also, while tea brewed from certain herbs are generally safe, taking oils internally can be deadly.
(end)
And you deliberately misquoted me and I think you know it. Choosing ADOPTION is what very often shatters a woman for life - emotionally, anyway. This is why even those single women/girls who are poor and giving birth for the first time seldom choose it anymore. (In the 1990s, for teens at least, it was 3 percent of white girls and 1 percent of black girls.) It's also why so many - not all - birth mothers who were more or less forced into "choosing" adoption before 1980 very much want to find their children again.
From Katha Pollitt, in 2008: "even among pregnant women who plan on adoption, 35% change their mind once the baby is born."
And from an earlier column:
"...you don't find many 15-year-olds dropping out of the Dalton School to have babies. Girls with bright futures--college, jobs, travel--have abortions. It's the ones who have nothing to postpone who become mothers."
Not to mention that 60%(?) of women seeking abortions already have children. Clearly, THEY aren't about to choose adoption.
On top of everything else, thanks to fertility clinics, it's harder than ever for foster children to get adopted - and there aren't as many couples looking to adopt at all as there used to be. Why should foster children be made to suffer even more?
lenona at September 21, 2018 11:38 AM
> I trust you saw the last thread
> where I quoted pretty much the
> same thing?
Well, no...
_________________________________________
Crid, the thread is here:
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2018/09/linkbots-1.html#comments
And if you WANT to post the details, you don't need my permission. Given your choice of hyperbolic words in the last paragraph, however, I can't say I'm going to trust your sources.
In the meantime, I can't understand why no state (that I've ever heard of) that wants to ban abortion is particularly friendly to women who want easy access to Foolproof Contraception. How does lack of contraception access help lower the abortion rate?
(It's a Catch-22 for pro-choicers, unfortunately; if teens don't use contraception carefully, the anti-abortion people see that as an excuse to ban abortion, but when they DID start using it well, the abortion rate dropped to an all-time low in the U.S. - which is ALSO seen as an excuse for the anti-abortion people to shut down more and more clinics in states like Texas.)
Here's what I wrote and quoted in 2016:
It's nice to see that at least ONE governor is brave enough to refuse to let the Colorado vision of birth control fade away...
In this case, it's the governor of Delaware, who wrote an op-ed. If any other governor or senator is working in this direction, please let me know.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/12/opinion/what-states-can-do-on-birth-control.html?_r=0
Excerpt:
...In a national survey, fewer than 20 percent of respondents said that their community health centers (on which many low-income women rely) offer the full range of contraceptive methods. And unplanned pregnancy rates among women at or below the poverty level are more than five times as high as among the most affluent women.
To address these problems, Delaware has formed a public-private partnership with Upstream USA, a nonprofit group that provides training and advice to health centers to improve reproductive health care and access to contraception. The initiative has raised millions of dollars from philanthropic sources, while the state has reallocated about $1.75 million from the Division of Public Health budget for the project. By the end of 2017, we will ensure that the nearly 200,000 women of reproductive age in our state have access to the full range of methods.
When Colorado pioneered a similar program, in three years it saw savings of $5.85 in Medicaid costs for every $1 invested, because mothers and babies ended up healthier. Although the State Legislature's failure to pass a bill providing further funding has hampered Colorado's efforts, the program's benefits -- better birth outcomes, a reduced teenage birthrate and millions of dollars saved -- are cause for celebration. With luck, the Legislature will change course this year.
Delaware's initiative will be subject to a rigorous evaluation process that will not only track pregnancy and birth outcomes, but also assess its impact on birth-related spending in Medicaid and private insurance plans. Changes in reimbursement policy can help...
(snip)
In other words, yes, there are teens and women who get pregnant on purpose, but there are plenty of others who are simply human, want to have sex, and previously couldn't get access to good bc - and now they can.
(end)
lenona at September 21, 2018 12:08 PM
To clarify something about adoption, I was talking about those birth mothers who could not expect to see their children for 18 years - if ever. As Pollitt also said in 1996:
"Maybe more (pregnant teens would choose adoption) if adoption were more fluid and open--a kind of open-ended 'guardianship' arrangement--but that would surely discourage potential adoptive parents. The glory days of white-baby relinquishment in the 1950s and 1960s depended on coercion--the illegality of abortion, the sexual double standard and the stigma of unwed motherhood, enforced by family, neighbors, school, social work, medicine, church, law. Those girls gave up their babies because they had no choice--that's why we are now hearing from so many sad and furious 50-year-old birth mothers. Do we really want to create a new generation of them by applying the guilt and pressure tactics that a behavior change of such magnitude would require?"
(I know open adoptions exist these days, of course - but given the semi-shortage of adoptive couples, how many are willing to consent to one?)
lenona at September 21, 2018 12:24 PM
I did use ellipses to truncate your quote, but was not off in the context of my comments about it. Please note that I included the complete quote earlier in my post. No deception intended.
Your original quote was not that adoption "often shatters a woman for life" but strongly alluded that "shattered for life" was a probable result of giving up a child for adoption - to wit, every woman who chooses adoption will end up "shattered for life."
The worst-case scenario as the default result is a poor argument. You can make a good argument for keeping abortion legal that doesn't have as its basis overly-dramatic images of women in back alleys with coat hangers bleeding to death or disguises abortion as a "women's health procedure" akin to having a mole removed.
Let's acknowledge the horror that is at the root of abortion as well as the occasional necessity of such a horror; not to mention the destructive complications that an unplanned pregnancy can bring to the lives of the young or the poor (men and women).
I'll agree with you that fertility drugs and techniques likely reduce the availability of adoptive couples. I don't have any data, but it seems logical. However, the "cultural appropriation" backlash directed at white couples adopting minority babies likely also plays a role in making adoption less attractive, especially for middle-class white couples.
Lenona, you might enjoy this article from Salon in 2000. Caroline Ruhle, a single mother on welfare, contemplates what it would have meant to her son to have given him up for adoption as well as what it means to be poor.
Conan the Grammarian at September 21, 2018 2:21 PM
"Probable" is not a synonym for "every." Jeez.
And no one thinks abortion is any fun - or that every woman feels nothing but huge relief afterward. (Comic Margaret Cho on hers: "It wasn't a F------ TEA PARTY!")
But if it's wrong at any stage, why don't we hear more calls for women to go to JAIL, at least, for abortions they had in the first 30 days?
And just this week, I saw two young, very white boys on the local news, available for adoption. It's hardly the first time I've seen white kids begging on TV for a family, either.
My obvious point was, IF you knew that your dear friend or relative was very likely at risk for those scenarios, would you still make it harder for her to get an abortion? What if her life isn't at risk - but her health is? Or her job - or marriage? If you wouldn't, what makes the cases of strangers any different?
And, see here:
http://www.prochoiceactionnetwork-canada.org/articles/anti-tales.shtml
"The Only Moral Abortion is My Abortion"
First paragraph:
"Abortion is a highly personal decision that many women are sure they'll never have to think about until they're suddenly faced with an unexpected pregnancy. But this can happen to anyone, including women who are strongly anti-choice. So what does an anti-choice woman do when she experiences an unwanted pregnancy herself? Often, she will grin and bear it, so to speak, but frequently, she opts for the solution she would deny to other women -- abortion."
(Several stories follow. Here are some of them.)
"In 1990, in the Boston area, Operation Rescue and other groups were regularly blockading the clinics, and many of us went every Saturday morning for months to help women and staff get in. As a result, we knew many of the 'antis' by face. One morning, a woman who had been a regular 'sidewalk counselor' went into the clinic with a young woman who looked like she was 16-17, and obviously her daughter. When the mother came out about an hour later, I had to go up and ask her if her daughter's situation had caused her to change her mind. 'I don't expect you to understand my daughter's situation!' she angrily replied. The following Saturday, she was back, pleading with women entering the clinic not to 'murder their babies.'" (Clinic escort, Massachusetts)
"Recently, we had a patient who had given a history of being a 'pro-life' activist, but who had decided to have an abortion. She was pleasant to me and our initial discussion was mutually respectful. Later, she told someone on my staff that she thought abortion is murder, that she is a murderer, and that she is murdering her baby. So before doing her procedure, I asked her if she thought abortion is murder -- the answer was yes. I asked her if she thought I am a murderer, and if she thought I would be murdering her baby, and she said yes. But murder is a crime, and murderers are executed. Is this a crime? Well, it should be, she said. At that point, she became angry and hostile, and the summary of the conversation was that she regarded me as an abortion-dispensing machine, and how dare I ask her what she thinks. After explaining to her that I do not perform abortions for people who think I am a murderer or people who are angry at me, I declined to provide her with medical care. I do not know whether she found someone else to do her abortion." (Physician, Colorado)
"In 1973, after Roe v. Wade, abortion became legal but had to be performed in a hospital. That of course was changed later. For the first 'legal abortion day' I had scheduled five procedures. While scrubbing between cases, I was accosted by the Chief of the OB/Gyn service. He asked me, 'How many children are you going to kill today?' My response, out of anger, was a familiar vulgar retort. About three months later, this born-again Christian called me to explain that he was against abortion but his daughter was only a junior in high school and was too young to have a baby and he was also afraid that if she did have a baby she would not want to put it up for adoption. I told him he did not need to explain the situation to me. 'All I need to know', I said, 'is that SHE wants an abortion.' Two years later I performed a second abortion on her during her college break. She thanked me and pleaded, 'Please don't tell my dad, he is still anti-abortion.'" (Physician, Washington State)
"My first encounter with this phenomenon came when I was doing a 2-week follow-up at a family planning clinic. The woman's anti-choice values spoke indirectly through her expression and body language. She told me that she had been offended by the other women in the abortion clinic waiting room because they were using abortion as a form of birth control, but her condom had broken so she had no choice! I had real difficulty not pointing out that she did have a choice, and she had made it! Just like the other women in the waiting room." (Physician, Ontario)
"We have anti-choice women in for abortions all the time. Many of them are just naive and ignorant until they find themselves with an unwanted pregnancy. Many of them are not malicious. They just haven't given it the proper amount of thought until it completely affects them. They can be judgmental about their friends, family, and other women. Then suddenly they become pregnant. Suddenly they see the truth. That it should only be their own choice. Unfortunately, many also think that somehow they are different than everyone else and they deserve to have an abortion, while no one else does." (Physician, Washington State)
"The medical director at a Dallas abortion clinic told this story: A white woman from an affluent north Dallas neighborhood brought her black maid in for an abortion and paid for it. While the maid was in a counseling session, a commotion was heard in the waiting room outside. The maid's employer was handing out anti-abortion leaflets to other women waiting for abortions."
"Sometimes I say to patients who have that 'I have no choice, I know I'll regret it, just do me' attitude: 'You may not care, but we do. We only do abortions on women who want our services. We will not knowingly contribute to any possible trauma of any woman.' They seem surprised that we care how we do our work, but they also accept it." (Counselor, New York)
"I never dreamed, in my wildest nightmares, that there would ever be a situation where I personally would choose such an act. Of course, we would each like to think that our reasons for a termination are the exception to the rule. But the bottom line is that you people spend your lives, reputations, careers and energy fighting for, maintaining, and providing an option that I needed, while I spent my energy lambasting you. Yet you still allowed me to make use of your services even though I had been one of your enemies. You treated us as kindly and warmly as you did all of your patients and never once pointed an 'I told you so' finger in our direction. I got the impression that you cared equally about each woman in the facility and what each woman was going through, regardless of her reasons for choosing the procedure. I have never met a group of purely non-judgmental people like yourselves."
lenona at September 22, 2018 7:44 AM
Personally I think every woman should be given an IUD for free, and it should be mandated for any woman on welfare
I would also change the law to make it a crime for any women who refuses the free IUD to fail to disclose that fact to any sexual partners including spouses, and make it illegal for any woman who fails to have a notarized disclosure form to collect child support form the father
Do that and guarantee you most abortions wont ever happen, most pregnancies either
lujlp at September 23, 2018 11:00 PM
Um, did you know that one reason it's not the most popular form of female BC is that it can be pretty dangerous in more ways than one - leaving aside the fact it doesn't protect against STIs? (Even faithful couples sometimes have to worry about those, if one party already has herpes or something else incurable.) Doctors often tell certain patients NOT to use it, just as they tell certain patients not to use hormonal methods, for good reasons. But even when they don't discourage a woman from using it, she's often scared of it.
And I hope you're not saying that men in long-term relationships shouldn't have to control their own fertility if they don't want kids. (If they don't like condoms, what's stopping them for funding Vasalgel, since right now, rich male celebs don't seem to be helping Parsemus out of its financial difficulties?)
But thanks for the "free" offer.
lenona at September 24, 2018 8:09 AM
Your welcome
lujlp at September 25, 2018 3:26 PM
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