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You are here: Home / Open Threads / The Dobbs decision is a disaster for women’s healthcare

The Dobbs decision is a disaster for women’s healthcare

by Betty Cracker|  June 22, 202312:33 pm| 222 Comments

This post is in: Open Threads, Politics, The War On Women, Women's Rights Are Human Rights

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Apart from the important fact that it’s no one else’s damn business whether a woman decides to carry a pregnancy to term or not, banning abortion is an outrageous intrusion into the medical community’s ability to deliver healthcare. That’s because giving birth is a messy, complicated business, and a lot can go wrong.

The miscarriage rate is somewhere in the range of 10% to 20%, and the vast majority of miscarriages — about 80% — happen before the 12-week mark. But elected and appointed religious fanatics with no medical qualifications are inserting themselves into complex, personal, often fraught healthcare decisions anyway, and unsurprisingly, it isn’t going well: (WaPo gift link)

Sweeping restrictions and even outright abortion bans adopted by states in the year since the landmark Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization ruling have had an overwhelmingly negative effect on maternal health care, according to a survey of OBGYNs released Wednesday that provides one of the clearest views yet of how the U.S. Supreme Court decision has affected women’s health care in the United States.

The poll by the health research nonprofit KFF reveals that the Dobbs ruling — which ended federal protection on the right to abortion — affected maternal mortality and how pregnancy-related medical emergencies are managed, precipitated a rise in requests for sterilization and has done much more than restrict abortion access. Many OBGYNs said it has also made their jobs more difficult and legally perilous than before, while leading to worse outcomes for patients.

Almost 70% of surveyed OBGYNs say it’s harder for them to manage emergencies related to pregnancy post-Dobbs. Fully 70% said the ruling is making the shameful racial and ethnic disparities in maternal health outcomes worse. Nearly two-thirds of respondents say the decision is making pregnancy-related mortality rates rise, and 55% report that Dobbs makes it harder to attract doctors to the OBGYN field.

To sum up, by hefty margins, surveyed OBGYNs say the Dobbs decision is a disaster for women’s healthcare. This was predictable before the ruling, and here’s another prediction that also requires no special insight: The fanatics who are imposing restrictions won’t give a damn about these results and will ignore future data that confirms the doctors’ concerns.

Why? Because they don’t give a damn about women. But post-Dobbs election results indicate lots of voters do. I sure hope that continues because otherwise, we’ll keep going backwards.

Open thread.

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Reader Interactions

222Comments

  1. 1.

    The Moar You Know

    June 22, 2023 at 12:37 pm

    precipitated a rise in requests for sterilization

    That’ll be banned next.  Gotta get that white birthrate up!

    These fuckers are coming for it all and we’d better be ready for that.

  2. 2.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 12:39 pm

    Please find Jessica Valenti.

    She is the go-to person for me on the ramifications of these disastrous anti-women laws in Red States.

    Everyday, she informs of another real life horror story.

    One thing she says that must be repeated.

     

    The right only pretends that there are EXCEPTIONS.

    EVERY nightmare case that she brings up should be qualified as an EXCEPTION…BUT NEVER IS…

     

    THERE ARE NO EXCEPTIONS IN ANTI-ABORTION STATES.

    NONE.

    Don’t let the right lie about that.

  3. 3.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 12:41 pm

    Fully 70% said the ruling is making the shameful racial and ethnic disparities in maternal health outcomes worse. Nearly two-thirds of respondents say the decision is making pregnancy-related mortality rates rise, and 55% report that Dobbs makes it harder to attract doctors to the OBGYN field.

     

    Jessica Valenti said to look out for the ‘ obesity causes maternal mortality’. Keep on the lookout for it. That’s the new language for them now that the Maternal Mortality Rates are on the rise in anti-abortion states.

  4. 4.

    trollhattan

    June 22, 2023 at 12:41 pm

    BBC saw fit to expend several thousand words today, on this trixie.

    She helped kill Roe v Wade – now she wants to end abortion in America

    It was years before her organisation, Students for Life of America (SFLA), would become one of the largest, most influential anti-abortion groups in the country. And it was more than a decade before she would stand outside the US Supreme Court to announce to her triumphant supporters that the nationwide right to abortion had been undone.

    But back then, in 2008, the SFLA headquarters were in Arlington, Virginia, and the closest town where Hawkins and her husband could afford to buy a house was 90 minutes away.

    At first, she tried the commute, leaving home at 5am and returning at 8pm. But the drives became too much, gas too expensive.

    So she bought a cheap loveseat from Ikea, figuring she could put in 30 hours of work over two days before driving home for a night. She used a nearby Gold’s Gym for showers, the new couch for naps. When Hawkins found the office was also inhabited by cockroaches, she bought an eye mask and started sleeping with the lights on to keep them away.

    “It was terrible, terrible,” her husband Jonathan said of that period, which was just two years into their marriage.

    But Kristan Hawkins was relentless. And she had a job to do, she was going to see the end of Roe v Wade, overturning the national right to abortion that had been protected for nearly half a century.

    Last June, she was successful. Pro-choice advocates say that her activism since then has already helped cut off abortion access for around 20 million women, and pushed the country into a public health crisis.

    But Hawkins has a new, more ambitious goal: she wants to make abortion unthinkable and unavailable across the US.

    In the year after Roe was overturned, Hawkins has gone into overdrive, growing the size and reach of SFLA and using that power to push state legislatures to pass increasingly severe bans.

    “That’s the momentum thing, right? Like, ok, all of America is watching, push the gas pedal down on everything, right now,” she said. “More, more, more, more, more.”
    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65923956

    It goes on like this for a long while.

    Now perhaps it’s a “Why is America so weird?” examination, but it also feels like a bit of a tonguebath.

  5. 5.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 12:44 pm

    @rikyrah:

    Jessica Valenti said to look out for the ‘ obesity causes maternal mortality’

     

    Ctrl – F “COVID”
    Ctrl – V “maternal mortality”

  6. 6.

    narya

    June 22, 2023 at 12:45 pm

    I think this is actually a stealth issue for 2024. The media bros think it’ll all be forgotten, that somehow we’ll forget about the loss of bodily autonomy. They buy the narrative that rikyrah notes about “exceptions,” they don’t understand pregnancy or bodies more generally, and it’s messy and inconvenient for them, so . . . they think it won’t be a factor next year. I also think they don’t understand how this issue affects what Betty points out, i.e., maternal care more generally, and they sure as HELL don’t take seriously the intention to go after Griswold as well. But a whole LOT of us have NOT forgotten.

  7. 7.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 12:46 pm

    It’s honestly creepy how obsessed with fetuses these people are.

    In OT news, it was Santos’s father and aunt who were his bond guarantors. Gonna be a fun family barbecue on July 4th, I guess.

  8. 8.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 12:48 pm

    @Alison Rose:

    Who was the third?

    Weird that family would want to hide their assistance.  Of all the people who could have helped him, they would seem the ones who most people would have understood.

  9. 9.

    Old Man Shadow

    June 22, 2023 at 12:49 pm

    Of course they don’t care about women or women’s health.

    The cruelty is the point.

    These women today thinking they’re free and equal to men. Having sex all willy nilly. That grates on those that believe women are supposed to be subordinate, submissive, and their vaginas are the property of their future husbands.

    It’s always been about hierarchy, regaining control, and imposing subservience on women. Teaching women that their “betters” won’t tolerate defiance.

    And if women have to die to learn that, that’s a sacrifice they are willing to make.

    Besides, even if their wife dies from pregnancy complications, they probably have a good idea of a replacement they can groom from their church’s youth group, you know, before those kids get an education and ideas like bodily autonomy, equality, and how to kick a creeper in the groin.

  10. 10.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 12:49 pm

    @Baud: Article says:

    There were originally three guarantors to secure Mr. Santos’s release, Mr. Murray said. But one of those people “had a change of heart” and withdrew their support, Mr. Murray wrote, implying that the reversal was related to the media scrutiny of Mr. Santos’s legal case.

    He added that Mr. Santos might be at risk of losing the other two guarantors if their identities were released.

    LOLOL

  11. 11.

    Suzanne

    June 22, 2023 at 12:50 pm

    @The Moar You Know:

    These fuckers are coming for it all and we’d better be ready for that. 

    100% true.
    It is about driving women out of public life entirely, until we are completely under the financial, sexual, reproductive, physical, spiritual control of men. Playthings and baby-incubators and housekeepers and cooks.

    If you don’t follow Man Who Has It All on social media of your choice, you are missing out.

    I saw an exchange this week that really made me think. One person said something like, “Why do we speak badly about women who have ‘daddy issues’ and not, instead, the bad fathers who created those issues?” And someone responded, “For the same reason we rag on single mothers, even though they’re the ones who stay.”

    I am more aware than many about this stuff, and still, every once in a while, I am thwacked upside the head with another example of misogyny and control!

  12. 12.

    MC

    June 22, 2023 at 12:50 pm

    I’m getting a vasectomy. I never have wanted children, but I want to make sure it can’t happen. No contributing to the fascist white baby supply.

  13. 13.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    June 22, 2023 at 12:56 pm

    @narya: I’m still so outraged about abortion that I can’t speak about it coherently. As I think I’ve said before, it’s both an injury and an insult.

  14. 14.

    narya

    June 22, 2023 at 1:02 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: right there with you. I often have trouble listening to (e.g.) podcasts or newscasts about it, because of the enragement it engenders.

  15. 15.

    WaterGirl

    June 22, 2023 at 1:03 pm

    @Alison Rose: But WHERE DID HIS FATHER AND HIS AUNT GET THE MONEY?

    Or shall I say FROM WHOM did they get the money to post the bond?

  16. 16.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 1:03 pm

    @MC: Good move. I knew from a very young age that I didn’t want kids, and if the medical and insurance systems in this country weren’t so patriarchal and patronizing, I would’ve happily had my tubes tied as a young woman who was dating men. But it’s quite difficult to find doctors who will do it because they’re just sooooo sure you’re gonna change your mind one day. (About to turn 43 and still happily child-free!) It’s frustrating that it’s probably easier for men to get vasectomies, but alas. If you know it’s the right thing, then definitely do it.

  17. 17.

    RaflW

    June 22, 2023 at 1:03 pm

    Yesterday I heard Rev. Cecilia Kingman speak. When the video is public, I would LOVE it if we could get a BJ thread about it. “My Little Pony Was Right: Reflections on Fascisms Without and Within”

    I lead off with this because Cecilia is an emerging expert on fascism and rising authoritarianism. And abortion is a central tool in fascist conformity and control.

    Sure there’s religious zealotry behind these laws. But we have to be clear-eyed that Republican politicians used the zealots to increase surveillance, control and hegemony via their churchy adherents.

    (And, yes, the cartoon My Little Pony is a pivot point in her excellent but chilling talk, delivered to UU ministers and guests yesterday at a conference.)

    @Old Man Shadow: Cecilia suggests we recast that as “the cruelty is the tool” or the cruelty is the tactic”, as in, getting us inured to cruelty is another ratchet towards full authoritarianism.

  18. 18.

    Lapassionara

    June 22, 2023 at 1:04 pm

    I’ve seen where Trump is bragging about getting rid of Roe v. Wade. I’m hoping that backfires big time.

  19. 19.

    gvg

    June 22, 2023 at 1:04 pm

    @Suzanne: And women are going to decide they can live without sex. Their lives are at state after all. Or they will move to a blue state. This is not going to go the way the fanatics think it will. But there will be some sick making stuff along the way. I do think they are going to show they don’t really think rape is wrong too.

  20. 20.

    WaterGirl

    June 22, 2023 at 1:05 pm

    @Alison Rose: Yeah, his father and aunt each put in $100.  The other secret person put in the rest.  (my theory)

    So does he get to stay out on bond if all the money isn’t there any longer?

  21. 21.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 1:06 pm

    @WaterGirl: It is indeed a curious question. The article notes that they didn’t have to put up cash or property, but they agreed to be “personally responsible” for ensuring that he did what he was supposed to do regarding the bond and the case. But like…wouldn’t they have to show that they COULD put up the money if needed? His aunt worked for the post office and his dad “worked as a painter or in construction”. I suppose those could be high-paying, but like…

  22. 22.

    Suzanne

    June 22, 2023 at 1:07 pm

    @gvg:

    I do think they are going to show they don’t really think rape is wrong too 

    They already did. With #metoo and the hearings for Squi’s Buddy (I LIKE BEER)…. the subtext was almost text: of course we did all that shit, but that’s not that bad.

  23. 23.

    Old Man Shadow

    June 22, 2023 at 1:08 pm

    @gvg:

     they don’t really think rape is wrong too.

    Based on my knowledge of them, I would say that many of the fundie men don’t think rape exists.

    They think women lie or they think women wanted the rape because of how they behaved or how they dressed and they blame the woman for the “sin” as much or more so than the man involved.

  24. 24.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 1:11 pm

    @gvg:

    they don’t really think rape is wrong too.

     
    Depends on the identity of the raper and the rapee.

  25. 25.

    Redshift

    June 22, 2023 at 1:11 pm

    @narya: I agree, except about the stealth. :-)

    Abortion was a big winning issue in this weeks legislative primaries in Virginia, and definitely will be in the general election campaign in the fall. The one positive in all this (not worth all the suffering it’s caused, of course) is that a lot of Democratic candidates and officials are much more full-throated in their support for abortion.

  26. 26.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 1:12 pm

    @Old Man Shadow: They–and society as a whole–have narrowed the definition of rape so starkly that almost nothing fits within it. Which is intentional, because it means that a lot of things they themselves did wouldn’t be labeled as such. If rape is only “innocent modest virginal young woman is brutally attacked by a big scary stranger while she screams for help and fights back as hard as she can and then immediately goes to the police with perfect recall of every detail and an arrest is made and a trial is held and a conviction obtained”, then that lets a frightening number of people who commit acts of sexual assault off the hook.

  27. 27.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 1:13 pm

    @Alison Rose:

    I’m not sure what you’re referring to. If anything, the definition of rape has broadened over the last few decades.

  28. 28.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 1:17 pm

    @Baud: Not according to a whole lot of people in this country, as can be attested to by many victims who have had their claims dismissed, belittled, excused, ignored, etc. There are a lot of people who do not think it counts as rape if it was your spouse or partner, if you flirted with them, if you went home with them, if you kissed them, if you said yes and then no, if you didn’t report, if you talked to them afterward, and so on and so forth. And a lot of those people are in positions of power where these beliefs are damaging, such as cops

  29. 29.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 1:19 pm

    @Alison Rose:

    Ok, I was referring to the legal definition. Can’t speak to realities on the ground.

  30. 30.

    Chris

    June 22, 2023 at 1:19 pm

    To sum up, by hefty margins, surveyed OBGYNs say the Dobbs decision is a disaster for women’s healthcare. This was predictable before the ruling, and here’s another prediction that also requires no special insight: The fanatics who are imposing restrictions won’t give a damn about these results and will ignore future data that confirms the doctors’ concerns.

    Why? Because they don’t give a damn about women.

    One of the really revealing moments I remember about this was when I was reading a right-wing blogger back in the 2000s – who claimed to be an atheist and thus presumably didn’t have his head filled by all the religious right claptrap – mentioning “abortion” on a long list of issues including welfare, student loan forgiveness, workplace protections against being fired, and so on and so forth, the unifying theme of which was “issues that prove liberals don’t want people to be accountable for their actions.”

    Shortly after that ended up in a conversation with what up to then had seemed to be one of the more reasonable “pro-lifers” I knew, where it turned out that the person was 100% opposed to all forms of birth control other than abstinence, to the same extent that he was opposed to abortion.  Not only can the woman not abort the fetus, she’s supposed to do everything she can to ensure that there IS a fetus in the first place.

    It was those two things that really crystallized for me that no, the “pro-lifers” don’t really believe a fetus is a human being, or more precisely, they don’t give a shit either way.  “Pro-life” politics has nothing to do with the fetus and is 100% about punishing the woman for presuming the right to have sex in any context other than “breeder.”

    (Bonus material: Pat Robertson, that avatar of “pro-life” politics, was once asked about population control measures in China – the one-child policy, women being forced to abort kids even if they wanted them – and instead of denouncing it, just spluttered something about how China was just doing what it had to do to manage its population growth.  You can take that more than one way – “Pat Robertson wants more abortions in China because he’s afraid of a world with more and more nonwhite babies,” “Pat Robertson doesn’t care if women are forced to have abortions or forced to not have abortions as long as it’s someone else making the decision for them,” or both – but it casts an interesting light on their whole “think of the babies!” propaganda).

  31. 31.

    Marigold

    June 22, 2023 at 1:22 pm

    @Alison Rose: I know I saw friends discuss on social media which area doctors were willing to tie tubes without having kids first. Two friends publicly said they had it done.

    One thing I noticed at my annual checkup last month: they didn’t ask me the date my last period started, and that’s been part of the intake questionnaire my whole life. (Ohio, so forced birth state.)

  32. 32.

    Brachiator

    June 22, 2023 at 1:22 pm

    @rikyrah:

    Jessica Valenti said to look out for the ‘ obesity causes maternal mortality’.

    Interesting. I have similarly seen idiots insist that Covid deaths could mainly be attributed to obesity.

    And the subtext here is that maternal deaths are solely due to the poor choices of the women, and not have anything to do with bad medical care, lack of health insurance or other factors.

  33. 33.

    Omnes Omnibus

    June 22, 2023 at 1:23 pm

    @Baud: OT: This touches on one of my big ideas for reforming  criminal codes.  I would remove emotionally charged terms like murder and rape and instead have degrees of homicide and sexual assault.  I would think that it would eliminate (or at least decrease) some of the fights of whether something really was “murder” or “rape” as those terms are commonly understood.

  34. 34.

    Miss Bianca

    June 22, 2023 at 1:24 pm

    @trollhattan: You know, it’s when I hear stuff like this that I start to think that a round of “retroactive abortions” might be a salutary thing for some of these antis.

    Ugh. That’s where my mind goes these days. Thanks, haters.

  35. 35.

    narya

    June 22, 2023 at 1:26 pm

    @Redshift: That actually kind of makes my point! As you correctly note, it IS a real issue that really does motivate voters, but I feel like every time I turn around I see reporting that says, “well, sure, in this ONE case/race it was important, but it’ll go away as an issue.”

  36. 36.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 1:29 pm

    @MC:

    @Alison Rose:

    I am great with kids and babies. Other people think that I want them.

    I was always ambivalent.

    When the ex said “we should have a baby to fix our marriage”, I was NOPE.

    Early on, T and I had a talk. For health reasons and other reason for the possible kids, we decided nope.

    So, even though we were “officially” still dating, ( she was the one, knew it beyond all doubt), I got a vasectomy.

    I still like kids and babies, but I like kittens and puppies too.

  37. 37.

    Old Man Shadow

    June 22, 2023 at 1:29 pm

    @Alison Rose: Right and that definition ties back into patriarchy and white supremacy where white men had to protect the “virtue” of their women by lynching Black men who so as much smiled at a white woman.

  38. 38.

    catclub

    June 22, 2023 at 1:31 pm

    @rikyrah: and 55% report that Dobbs makes it harder to attract doctors to the OBGYN field.

     

    Are the other 45% in states where abortion is still legal?

  39. 39.

    Redshift

    June 22, 2023 at 1:31 pm

    @narya: Hmm, it may be that journalists/commentators got conditioned through the Roe v Wade years that it was an issue that always generated more intensity (and motivation to vote) on the anti side, even though more people were pro-choice. You’d think the midterms would have been enough to prompt a rethink for everyone, but maybe it’ll take a few more cycles of being surprised before they get it.

  40. 40.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 1:31 pm

    @Baud: Yeah, unfortunately the legal definition doesn’t always matter. Look at what happened with the asshole who raped Chanel Miller or how Weinstein’s accusers were treated on the stand. And the views and opinions showcased in those high-profile cases are quite prevalent among the public if the victim doesn’t fit into the narrow mold they’ve constructed.

  41. 41.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 1:32 pm

    @Jay:

    When the ex said “we should have a baby to fix our marriage”, I was NOPE

    Yikes, yeah no. That’s a definite nope.

  42. 42.

    H.E.Wolf

    June 22, 2023 at 1:35 pm

    I’m channeling my disgust at forced-birth policies into GOTV work, in order to elect pro-choice Democrats in 2023 (let’s upgrade the VA legislature) and 2024.

    Boot these Republican-aligned freaks to the curb.

  43. 43.

    Redshift

    June 22, 2023 at 1:36 pm

    @Baud:

    Ok, I was referring to the legal definition. Can’t speak to realities on the ground.

    Makes me wonder how many of the states with supposed “exceptions” base it on the legal definition, which could mean requiring pressing charges or even a conviction (which would make it meaningless.) I honestly don’t know, but if they’re not doing that now, it seems like it’s just a matter of time.

  44. 44.

    Redshift

    June 22, 2023 at 1:37 pm

    @H.E.Wolf: Hear, hear! Me, too!

  45. 45.

    WaterGirl

    June 22, 2023 at 1:38 pm

    @gvg:

    I do think they are going to show they don’t really think rape is wrong too.

    Well, since rape is essentially about power and control, and not recognizing the target fully as a human being, I would have to say that you are not wrong.

  46. 46.

    Miss Bianca

    June 22, 2023 at 1:45 pm

    @Jay:

    I still like kids and babies, but I like kittens and puppies too.

    Does that mean you don’t want kittens or puppies either?!/

  47. 47.

    Steeplejack

    June 22, 2023 at 1:48 pm

    @Alison Rose:

    I haven’t read any stories yet—or even further down this thread—but where’s the money coming from? I thought Santos was sort of “humble beginnings” (not to mention “no visible means of support”). And I don’t remember his father being mentioned before. I guess I need to read up on this.

  48. 48.

    Anonymous At Work

    June 22, 2023 at 1:52 pm

    @Alison Rose: Okay, seriously, FIRST, why the fight?  Your family put up your bond is not a big deal.

    Second, how does a US Postal Worker have that kind of scratch?  Or generate the scratch to have a side-hustle as property owner (no clue if ‘slum lord/lady’ applies) from working in Post Office?

  49. 49.

    Deputinize Eurasia from the Kuriles to St Petersburg

    June 22, 2023 at 1:52 pm

    @Brachiator:

    Valenti has her good points and her bad points.  When she’s on the topic of abortion and women’s health, she’s fantastic.  My issue with her is on her notions of due process regarding workplace harassment  accusations (she seriously doesn’t accept any notion of it) and what constitutes a “credible report”  –  my position is that the correct verbiage is actually along the lines of “X, long considered to be a credible person, has stated Y in a way that can be corroborated by dates, positions and places”.   She, along with too many mediots, says “a credible report has been made” without going into why the report can be believed to be credible, and assumes it correct from the beginning.  That’s inelegant, unfair to all, and seriously bugs me.

  50. 50.

    Steeplejack

    June 22, 2023 at 1:54 pm

    @Alison Rose:

    Yeah, LOLOL. This is making me think Dad and Auntie were in for $10 each and Mr. X was in for the rest. 🤔

  51. 51.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 1:55 pm

    @Steeplejack: @Anonymous At Work: As noted above, they didn’t have to put up any money, they only had to agree to make sure he complied and if not, I guess THEN they’d have to fork over. I don’t know if they had to provide proof that they had the financial capability to do so, but I would imagine so. So it does leave that as an open question, doesn’t it? Maybe they both did really well in Atlantic City.

  52. 52.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 1:56 pm

    @Steeplejack: Maybe Santos has his own right-wing billionaire buddy, à la Thomas and Alito.

  53. 53.

    Maxim

    June 22, 2023 at 2:03 pm

    @Alison Rose:

    But it’s quite difficult to find doctors who will do it because they’re just sooooo sure you’re gonna change your mind one day.

    Friend of mine had a complete hysterectomy when she was already post-menopausal and was asked multiple times before the procedure if she understood it meant she couldn’t have children and was she okay with that. 🙄

    I think part of it is doctors and hospitals being afraid of being sued if someone changes their mind, but still, it gets ridiculous.

  54. 54.

    schrodingers_cat

    June 22, 2023 at 2:04 pm

    And yet a majority of white women and those women who crave white adjacency vote Republican. And even worse are those like Nikki Haley who have sold their soul to sign up to implement these policies.

  55. 55.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 2:06 pm

    @Miss Bianca:

    kittens and puppies, nope.

    A). Can’t have pets in our apartment. Had Jello and Li’l Bit, but they were grandfathered in. They are gone now. I will see them again on the other side.

    B). Kittens and puppies are a lot of work for the first 2 years, and there are tons of older dogs and cats available for adoption.

    Sugar was a puppy, and a lot of work. She ate a kitchen floor. My fishing buddy. Gave her up in the divorce, should not have.

    Popo and Capra were already older cats when I met them. (T’s ex had “custody”, right up to the time his new GF decided she didn’t like cats, so, sent as luggage from San Diego to YVR with no notice, came home from work, T said “guess what, we have cats!”. Capra decided I was his, Popo decided my salad was his.

    Casey and Digger were both older dogs. We adopted Casey, Casey adopted Digger.

    L’il Bit was a kitten, the place we bought in the hills, had tenants with barn cats, etc. Got T’s permission to bring one of the kittens home. I chose the one clinging to my tshirt and nuzzling my face who wouldn’t let go. She was a handful for the first two years.

    Mellow, was about 2. The Cat Ladies had been feeding him and trying to socialize him, since his owners abandoned him. He was “shed roof kitty” as the rental where he was abandoned had a broken ass shed where he would sleep on the roof, safe. We were at a BBQ with the Cat Ladies in September, winter was coming and they stuck him in T’s arms, where his motor kicked in and then he fell asleep. Another cat.

    Sorry, long stories,………..

  56. 56.

    Dopey-o

    June 22, 2023 at 2:07 pm

    OT: a question for Schrodinger’s Cat

    I am watching Biden and Modi holding a press conference. No questions directly addressing the genocide against Muslim Indians, as well as other religious groups.

    Any thoughts? Any links for current developments?

    And bride burnings have apparently fallen off the radar inrecent years.

  57. 57.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 2:08 pm

    @Maxim: Oh good Lord. That’s like the morons who said we couldn’t elect Hillary because “what about that time of the month” about a woman who was 69 on election day 2016. I know sex ed in this country is often poor, but JFC.

  58. 58.

    Suzanne

    June 22, 2023 at 2:09 pm

    @Maxim: To be completely fair….. some people change their minds.

    Which is why I love all the options. LARCs are a game-changer.

  59. 59.

    schrodingers_cat

    June 22, 2023 at 2:10 pm

    @Dopey-o: I have lots of thoughts. I have written up a post for BJ putting some links and edits right now and will mail to Anne Laurie. I am also reviving my blog so I will link to that as well. I will compile a list of good sources too.  I am planning to cover India from now until the elections that take place next year.

    In short this is a public relations coup for India’s foreign policy establishment and Modi but it makes me unhappy. I will elaborate why.

  60. 60.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 2:11 pm

    @schrodingers_cat:

    👍

  61. 61.

    Anonymous At Work

    June 22, 2023 at 2:13 pm

    @Alison Rose: You go to a bail bondsman with a certain % of the amount, pay a fee that’s another % (that’s the bondsman profit) and sign over some collateral, but for a 500k bond, not a ton.  But you’d have to have assets totally 500k for the bondsman to follow through.

    Not hard if it was a “friend” of Santos (native language Russian) but for someone who is a postal worker?  Dunno.  Circles back to the “why fight it?” question.

  62. 62.

    JWR

    June 22, 2023 at 2:15 pm

    Completely O/T, I don’t know if this has been mentioned yet, but it don’t look good:

    Missing Titanic submersible live updates: ‘Debris field’ found in search area, Coast Guard says

    And before catching up with the last 5 threads, time to nap. L8TR.

  63. 63.

    dnfree

    June 22, 2023 at 2:15 pm

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Yes, I think there’s an idea that older women can’t get pregnant, so this isn’t on our radar.  Those of us who were young adults in the early 70s and earlier remember!

  64. 64.

    Joey Maloney

    June 22, 2023 at 2:15 pm

    @Miss Bianca: Yes! Keep abortion safe and legal up to the 123rd trimester!

  65. 65.

    H.E.Wolf

    June 22, 2023 at 2:19 pm

    @Redshift: @H.E.Wolf: Hear, hear! Me, too!

     Comrade! :)

  66. 66.

    Steeplejack

    June 22, 2023 at 2:20 pm

    @Dopey-o:

    I was surprised and disappointed to see that Stephanie Ruhle did a quick bit at the end of her show last night about World Yoga Day—specifically that she (and a bunch of other people) attended a yoga session in some green space near the United Nations that was led by Narendra Modi!

    WTF?! Usually she has a deeper understanding of political issues and personalities that wouldn’t allow her to participate, however unwittingly, in such P.R. cleansing.

  67. 67.

    JPL

    June 22, 2023 at 2:21 pm

    @JWR:  Sky News confirmed it was pieces of the submersible

  68. 68.

    James E Powell

    June 22, 2023 at 2:22 pm

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Democratic candidates and the state & local parties need to focus on white women, no college. It’s the demographic that provides the best opportunity for large gains.

  69. 69.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    June 22, 2023 at 2:23 pm

    @JWR:

    @JPL:

    From what I’m seeing online, this is now reading to the submarine experts like a hull failure and a catastrophic implosion, which at those depths would have been instantaneous.

  70. 70.

    FelonyGovt

    June 22, 2023 at 2:23 pm

    Like the rest of you, I’m still so angry about this I can barely articulate.

    I was at with my hairdresser’s (!) yesterday. He’s a man originally from Algeria whose views on many things I didn’t know before. We got to chatting and he commented, “the anti-abortion people only care about kids until they’re born. After that it’s someone else’s problem and they could care less. If they really cared, they’d be worried about all the kids starving in Africa right now”.

  71. 71.

    schrodingers_cat

    June 22, 2023 at 2:25 pm

    @Steeplejack: Neil DeGrasse Tyson also beclowned himself.

  72. 72.

    MazeDancer

    June 22, 2023 at 2:28 pm

    In other disaster news, reports are debris found that are parts of the Titan submersible.

    Overly rich idiots setting underwater in an unregulated plastic tube could hardly ask for more. No grisly suffocation or starvation. Just a quick ka- boom.

  73. 73.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 2:28 pm

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:

    the “go fast and break stuff” crowd should not be building subs.

  74. 74.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 2:32 pm

    @narya:

    I think this is actually a stealth issue for 2024. The media bros think it’ll all be forgotten, that somehow we’ll forget about the loss of bodily autonomy. They buy the narrative that rikyrah notes about “exceptions,” they don’t understand pregnancy or bodies more generally, and it’s messy and inconvenient for them, so . . . they think it won’t be a factor next year

     

    They tried to ignore it in 2022.

    Yes, they will try in 2024, but, that’s why Valenti’s work is so important. She always connects the dots.

     

    I wish someone would give her a segment weekly on a cable show:

    Nightmare dispatches from Anti-Abortion States.

  75. 75.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 2:32 pm

    @Alison Rose:

    Where did they get $500,000 from ?

  76. 76.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    June 22, 2023 at 2:34 pm

    Had a medical procedure this morning, so I’m just catching up with today’s news cycle.

    I’m confused about the Santos thing. Why is it such a big secret that family members put up his bail? That sounds so… normal. Which means it’s obviously not, otherwise why was he so terrified for the names to come out?

    So do we have any speculation or wild rumors as to what he’s actually covering up?

  77. 77.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 2:34 pm

    @Suzanne:

    100% true.
    It is about driving women out of public life entirely, until we are completely under the financial, sexual, reproductive, physical, spiritual control of men. Playthings and baby-incubators and housekeepers and cooks.

     

    As you so brilliantly pointed it out, and now I can’t NOT SEE IT.

    You speak nothing but THE TRUTH!

  78. 78.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 2:36 pm

    @Suzanne:

    And, trying to get rid of NO-FAULT DIVORCE is part of that too.

  79. 79.

    MazeDancer

    June 22, 2023 at 2:36 pm

    Joy Reid had a great special show on 1 year after Dobbs. The VP was on for the hour with a rotating panel of people fighting the good fight.

    Can only find a 10 minute clip.

    Highly recommend.

    If you have Peacock, you can view the whole episode.

  80. 80.

    JPL

    June 22, 2023 at 2:36 pm

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym: Well it did keep the msm from discussing Hunter.  There’s going to be a news conference at 3.

  81. 81.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 2:37 pm

    @Chris:

    It was those two things that really crystallized for me that no, the “pro-lifers” don’t really believe a fetus is a human being, or more precisely, they don’t give a shit either way.  “Pro-life” politics has nothing to do with the fetus and is 100% about punishing the woman for presuming the right to have sex in any context other than “breeder.”

     

    Say it louder for the bleacher seats.

  82. 82.

    Suzanne

    June 22, 2023 at 2:37 pm

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym: It’s horrible to say that that outcome sounds like…. not the worst option. The idea of them all being stuck for days, slowly suffocating in the dark…. serious nightmare fuel.

    I don’t even like getting a MRI.

  83. 83.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 2:38 pm

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:

    That better than the alternative death scenario.

  84. 84.

    Roger Moore

    June 22, 2023 at 2:40 pm

    @Old Man Shadow:

    Based on my knowledge of them, I would say that many of the fundie men don’t think rape exists.

    They believe it’s real when it’s a Black man and a White woman.

  85. 85.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 2:41 pm

    @rikyrah:

    it’s assets, not cash, and just needs to be claimed and believed by a Bail Bondsman. The cash part is often minimal. $10.

    If the 3rd party who bailed, had significant assets and nym, that would be more than enough for the Bondsman to accept the other two, his “Dad” a postal worker and his “Mom” who has died multiple times in multiple events.

  86. 86.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 2:44 pm

    @FelonyGovt: Yepppp. Like George Carlin said a long time ago, “If you’re pre-born, you’re fine. If you’re preschool, you’re fucked.”

  87. 87.

    Suzanne

    June 22, 2023 at 2:46 pm

    @rikyrah: Absolutely, the moves against no-fault divorce are part of the same impulse, to keep women from leaving men (women initiate divorces in a high percentage of divorces). The push against college education is a part of the same desire to control women, and to reduce the earning power of women.

  88. 88.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    June 22, 2023 at 2:52 pm

    @Suzanne:

    @Baud: Had the same thought. I’ve been getting claustrophic just reading the description of what the trip down and back was like in that thing in normal conditions. Thinking about being stuck down there in the dark and cold and slowly running out of air was giving me nightmares.

  89. 89.

    Manyakitty

    June 22, 2023 at 2:52 pm

    @Suzanne: oof. One yike. That’s a real kick in the gut I missed, and I follow that account.

  90. 90.

    Jackie

    June 22, 2023 at 2:53 pm

    @Baud: Or, who fronted his family the cash? $500,000 is a lot of moola for an un wealthy dad and aunt.

  91. 91.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 2:55 pm

    @catclub:

    Are the other 45% in states where abortion is still legal?

     

    OB-GYN’s are literally leaving states. There is no doctors qualified for pregnancy care.

    Idaho…Mississippi…..

     

    Entire Counties with No Ob-Gyn’s.

  92. 92.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 2:55 pm

    I wish we cared as much about the refugees drowned at sea, whose names are never forgotten because nobody knew who they were in the first place.

    But families still have to mourn the loss of five lives. Do have some sympathy, or at least try to feign it.https://t.co/KS0DBy4J5c— Oryx (@oryxspioenkop) June 22, 2023

  93. 93.

    Ceci n est pas mon nym

    June 22, 2023 at 2:59 pm

    @Jackie: OK, here’s my wild baseless speculation. Santos was embedding a kernel of truth (as all the best liars do) when he said he feared for his guarantors’ safety if their names came out. But the people he feared weren’t the general public as he pretended, but whoever gave them the money.

  94. 94.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 3:01 pm

    @Jackie:

    it’s not cash, it’s assets. The cash was a $10 filing fee.

    The assets are only vulnerable if the conditions arn’t met, but then the bondsman has to go to court to prove their claim.

    $500K =a roach infested  batchelor apartment in a bad area of New York. Or 1/4 of an Alito vacay.

  95. 95.

    Soprano2

    June 22, 2023 at 3:01 pm

    @rikyrah: My mother was big on the “obesity causes Covid deaths” thing. They think obesity is the cause of a lot of things.

  96. 96.

    Suzanne

    June 22, 2023 at 3:02 pm

    @Manyakitty: To be clear, that exchange wasn’t on the Man Who Has It All account. But that account really shows the daily sexist bullshit — even the well-meaning bullshit — into sharp relief.

  97. 97.

    Manyakitty

    June 22, 2023 at 3:04 pm

    @Suzanne: fair enough.

  98. 98.

    Elizabelle

    June 22, 2023 at 3:05 pm

    @JWR:  That’s actually the most merciful outcome.

    Since there was no way the men could have been rescued.

    They were gone before we ever heard about OceanGate or their names.

    Merciful to their survivors, too.  But for the 96 hour vigil until the wreckage was found.

  99. 99.

    FelonyGovt

    June 22, 2023 at 3:06 pm

    @rikyrah: My understanding is that even aspiring doctors in blue states are avoiding OB-GYN practice. They’re overloaded with additional patients from red states and still concerned about potential liability and restrictions on being able to provide the optimum health care.

  100. 100.

    Frankensteinbeck

    June 22, 2023 at 3:13 pm

    @Baud: and @Roger Moore:

    They believe it’s real when it’s a Black man and a White woman.

    I don’t think so.  They’re angry that a black man had sex with a white woman if it’s consensual, too.  Whatever they think rape is, it has nothing to do with whether the woman is willing.

    I remember… was it Rush Limbaugh?  One of the conservative radio pundits said that liberals believe you can have any kind of sex if it’s consensual, and he thought that was a big slam.

  101. 101.

    RevRick

    June 22, 2023 at 3:17 pm

    @Old Man Shadow: You have touched upon the heart of the matter here. All the anti abortion laws are premised on the notion that the only moral question involved in this debate is about the personhood status of the fetus. And the belief that the fetus is a person drives the demand to outlaw abortion.

    But there is another moral question involved here, and that is the personhood status of the woman. Anti abortion fanatics elide this question saying “ of course she is ,” all the while demanding laws which effectively deny it. Simply put, if a fetus is a person then the mother-to-be is not. Two persons cannot coexist in the same body. And if the pregnant woman isn’t a person, then no woman is. If the state can hijack a woman’s body and life for any reason, she ceases to be a human being and is reduced to a thing with no rights whatsoever.

    And on this point, all the Bible thumpers are wrong. What they invoke is circular reasoning that declares a fetus is a person and then applies prohibitions against killing. Yet, there are two weird little passages that say otherwise.

    The first is in Exodus 21:22-25 and the second is in Numbers 5:11-28. The first involves a miscarriage. The second is when the priests seek to induce an abortion. Suffice it to say, the rabbis of old concluded that the life of the one who is superseded the life of the one who might be.

  102. 102.

    West of the Rockies

    June 22, 2023 at 3:19 pm

    @MC:

    It’s how they are raised, not bred.

  103. 103.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    June 22, 2023 at 3:19 pm

    @Suzanne:

    Additionally, I don’t think a lot of men are going to appreciate divorce being harder to obtain either. Combined with the assault on contraceptives, the far-right is painting themselves into an increasingly small corner

  104. 104.

    El Muneco

    June 22, 2023 at 3:19 pm

    @Soprano2: There was a lot of talk about “comorbidities” during COVID, most of which when coming from the right elided the fact that well over 2/3 of the population have some condition that is considered a COVID comorbidity.

  105. 105.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 3:21 pm

    @RevRick: Yep. In Judaism, abortion is not only permitted but is basically required (not by force, of course) if the pregnant person’s life or mental health is at risk. That’s why there have been Jewish orgs and rabbis suing on grounds of freedom of religion to stop anti-abortion laws. It’s also a handy way to prove that when certain politicians say “religion” they don’t mean all religions.

  106. 106.

    Ocotillo

    June 22, 2023 at 3:21 pm

    Relative of mine who works at a teaching hospital in Houston confirms this.  They are being declined by students for this very reason and said students are electing to go to blue state schools.  Also, since this is Texas and DEI has become a crime in the eyes of the Texas Lege, foreign students are declining to attend also due to not feeling partiularly welcome.

    Oh well, this will become an opportunity to cut higher education funding since enrollment is down.

  107. 107.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 3:23 pm

    @schrodingers_cat:

     

    looking forward to your post. I know that it will give us that level of analysis that I would never find from our MSM

  108. 108.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    June 22, 2023 at 3:24 pm

    @Jay:

    This is the right approach. Those people were still human beings with families; two of the crew were a 19 year old son and his father. Shitting on them isn’t going to help the refugees who have drowned and died

  109. 109.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    June 22, 2023 at 3:25 pm

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:

    Q. How was the procedure?

    A. Done!

  110. 110.

    The Moar You Know

    June 22, 2023 at 3:25 pm

    But it’s quite difficult to find doctors who will do it because they’re just sooooo sure you’re gonna change your mind one day. (About to turn 43 and still happily child-free!) It’s frustrating that it’s probably easier for men to get vasectomies, but alas. If you know it’s the right thing, then definitely do it.

    @Alison Rose: I knew I did not want kids back when I was a kid.  Starting in college, I tried to get a vasectomy.

    I was told repeatedly that no doctor would consider doing it unless I was in my mid thirties with at least a couple of kids.  I’m now in my mid fifties and still the urologists I’ve talked to have issues about doing it when they find out I don’t have kids.

    It’s fucked up.

  111. 111.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 3:26 pm

    @Suzanne:

    (women initiate divorces in a high percentage of divorces

     

    70% of all divorces are initiated by women

     

    Women making up their minds that they want out.

  112. 112.

    Elizabelle

    June 22, 2023 at 3:26 pm

    @El Muneco:  And if there is anything you can say about the rightwing, the Rascal Scooter patrol, it is that they are not a sea of comorbidities.

    No, no, no.

  113. 113.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    June 22, 2023 at 3:28 pm

    @The Moar You Know:

    Couldn’t you just lie about having kids to the doctors? How would they know any different?

  114. 114.

    Almost Retired

    June 22, 2023 at 3:34 pm

    @FelonyGovt:  Farouk in Redondo?

  115. 115.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 3:38 pm

    @rikyrah:

    the ex wanted a divorce, (out of the blue), then she didn’t. then she did, then she wanted a baby, then,…….

    well. I was the one who filed for divorce.

    It’s huumans, so, it’s always complex.

    When her fling, ( that she had before the first mention of divorce), ghosted her at Christmas, I was the one who talked her out of the whole “what’s wrong with me” stichk.

    That was a close one.

    Later, she then ghosted me. About two years later, learned from Maya, her BFF, (formerly) who had also ghosted me but then reached out after she got ghosted by the ex,

    it was all about guilt.

    It’s hoomans, they don’t all carry treats in the top pocket of their back pack.

  116. 116.

    Suzanne

    June 22, 2023 at 3:39 pm

    @rikyrah: It’s really revealing how, when women demonstrate that they won’t tolerate being controlled or abused by men, how many men mobilize forces to attempt to force us to do so.

  117. 117.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 3:40 pm

    OT: I put a  beef brisket in the crockpot.

    What sides go with brisket?

  118. 118.

    Steeplejack

    June 22, 2023 at 3:41 pm

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Ugh.

  119. 119.

    raven

    June 22, 2023 at 3:42 pm

    In every presidential election since 1996, a majority of women have preferred the Democratic candidate. Moreover, women and men have favored different candidates in presidential elections since 2000, with the exception of 2008 when men were almost equally divided in their preferences for Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain. In 2020, a majority of women favored the Democratic victor, Joe Biden, while a majority of men voted for the Republican candidate, Donald Trump.

  120. 120.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    June 22, 2023 at 3:44 pm

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Aw geez. I used to like that guy

  121. 121.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    June 22, 2023 at 3:45 pm

    @raven:

    while a majority of men voted for the Republican candidate, Donald Trump

    I will never understand this. The guy was and is an absolute fool. He literally said people should drink bleach to cure COVID!

  122. 122.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 3:47 pm

    @rikyrah:

    if it’s hot out, potato salad, (no raisins) and green salad,

    if it’s not mash or baked potato and two vedge, just steamed.

    Texas Garlic Bread of course.

    Grilled corn on the cob, Mexican or otherwise, is always a good choice,

  123. 123.

    catclub

    June 22, 2023 at 3:48 pm

    @Dopey-o: Any links for current developments?

     

    Isn’t Kashmir’s condition still unchanged from when Modi cancelled civil rights there in 2019

  124. 124.

    Omnes Omnibus

    June 22, 2023 at 3:48 pm

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): And you are now going stop liking him based on one data point?  That’s a pretty harsh standard.

  125. 125.

    RaflW

    June 22, 2023 at 3:48 pm

    @Ocotillo: It won’t be immediate, but I sure do wonder what will happen to high prestige, and very effective, institutions like MD Anderson cancer center (part of the UT system). Oncology of course sometimes directly intersects with OBGYN practice, since ovarian cancer is common, but even more broadly all cancer care requires available, trained doctors. Texas is setting itself up for misery. Do people there get that?!

  126. 126.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 3:49 pm

    @Suzanne:

    @rikyrah: It’s really revealing how, when women demonstrate that they won’t tolerate being controlled or abused by men, how many men mobilize forces to attempt to force us to do so.

     

    It’s women’s fault that men are falling behind?

    Oh really?

    Nobody is preventing them from going to school.

    I remember the reaction to the Stanford Medical Surgery Unit posting the pictures of their new residents.

    There were only 2 men…and only one of them was White.

    The howling in the comments on Twitter were so bad, they had to shut them down.

    They wanted to  know how many ‘applied’.

    Was this CRT?

    Was this being ‘woke’.

    Anything to say that there is no way that these women were qualified for these positions. They had to, of course, be taking the jobs of ‘ qualified’ men.

     

    I looked up the average salary of a surgeon in California.

    $ 368,000

     

    My mind – they will never have to depend upon any man financially.

  127. 127.

    catclub

    June 22, 2023 at 3:50 pm

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): ​
     He literally said people should drink bleach to cure COVID!

    I bet he did not. He speaks like a mob boss, so it is “some people are saying…” for all the crazy stuff.

  128. 128.

    FelonyGovt

    June 22, 2023 at 3:50 pm

    @Ocotillo: I recently read that abortion training is considered an integral part of training to become and qualify as an OB-GYN, so students in Texas and other red states have to come to states like Oregon and California to complete that portion of the training.

  129. 129.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 3:50 pm

    @Jay:

     

    Thanks.

    I ordered corn yesterday, but, the store didn’t have it.

    I have others on your list.

  130. 130.

    FelonyGovt

    June 22, 2023 at 3:51 pm

    @Almost Retired: Yes! You know him?

  131. 131.

    catclub

    June 22, 2023 at 3:52 pm

    @RaflW: ​
      How do medical schools that have an OB/GYN rotation get accredited in the red states? i suspect it means there will be red state accreditation boards and blue state ones.

  132. 132.

    Roger Moore

    June 22, 2023 at 3:52 pm

    @Soprano2:

    My mother was big on the “obesity causes Covid deaths” thing. They think obesity is the cause of a lot of things.

    The tricky part, of course, is that obesity does have a lot of bad medical complications.  Whether that makes it “the cause” of those things is a different issue.  What it really boils down to is that they aren’t looking for an explanation; they’re looking for an excuse to blame the victim.

  133. 133.

    Brachiator

    June 22, 2023 at 3:53 pm

    @raven:

    In 2020, a majority of women favored the Democratic victor, Joe Biden, while a majority of men voted for the Republican candidate, Donald Trump.

    And of course, these results vary somewhat if you look at demographics, such as white men and white women vs other groups. Or married vs non married men and women, or college educated vs non college voters.

  134. 134.

    Dan B

    June 22, 2023 at 3:53 pm

    @The Moar You Know:  And they never consider that even if you don’t want to father children that you could foster or adopt.  They never think of children whose biological parents could not support them or passed away.  They’re only thinking of kids from upper middle class families.

  135. 135.

    The Moar You Know

    June 22, 2023 at 3:53 pm

    Couldn’t you just lie about having kids to the doctors? How would they know any different?

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): with your background you should REALLY know the answer to this:  you don’t go to a doctor, you go to a healthcare system.  Which is tied in with all the other health care systems.  Which is how when I go see a new doc for anything they know I had an appendectomy in 2008.

    They would know if I had kids and they know if I don’t.

    How do you not know this?

  136. 136.

    Almost Retired

    June 22, 2023 at 3:55 pm

    @FelonyGovt:  Yep, our sons played on the same club soccer team together for a couple years around 2011-2012 or so.  Great guy, and his wife Norma is awesome, too.

  137. 137.

    mrmoshpotato

    June 22, 2023 at 3:57 pm

    @Jay:

    the “go fast and break stuff” crowd should not be building subs. 

    Not even sandwiches.

  138. 138.

    NotMax

    June 22, 2023 at 3:58 pm

    @rikyrah

    Difficult to come up with any that don’t. Just to name a few (not necessarily suggesting all at once):

    Buttered carrots, pickled red cabbage, julienne beets, Brussels sprouts, tater tots, couscous, string beans, applesauce, cranberry sauce.

  139. 139.

    The Moar You Know

    June 22, 2023 at 3:58 pm

    Nobody is preventing them from going to school.

    @rikyrah: they are preventing themselves from going to school.  My brother is a professor at a major school Not To Be Named.  Their male enrollment is 26%.  It’s been going steadily down for years.

    And they’re not deciding to take up a trade.  Or going to non-college work.  They’re literally sitting at home, on the internet, playing games and sucking down bullshit about how everything is stacked against them.

    These successful, educated women are not graduating and looking for a guy who is a failure, either.  They are simply staying single.

  140. 140.

    Steeplejack

    June 22, 2023 at 3:59 pm

    @rikyrah:

    Coleslaw.

  141. 141.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 3:59 pm

    @rikyrah:

    if you are doing bakers,

    Alton Brown them.

    Russets of course, stab them with a fork all around to let the steam out, ( hold them in a tea towel to prevent nasty fork accidents),

    coat them in olive oil and salt,

    bake.

    Skins are crispy, inside is fluffy.

    I just add butter but T loves sour cream and chives.

    But then, she also loves cilantro.

  142. 142.

    mrmoshpotato

    June 22, 2023 at 4:00 pm

    @rikyrah:

    OT: I put a beef brisket in the crockpot. 

    What sides go with brisket?

    More brisket. 😁

    How do you feel about Caesar salad?

  143. 143.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    June 22, 2023 at 4:01 pm

    @The Moar You Know:

    It did cross my mind that there are medical records that can be accessed after I asked. I suppose they could look up a spouse’s medical records to see if they’d given birth or not for example. I admit I didn’t think about it before I asked. Sorry

  144. 144.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 4:05 pm

    @mrmoshpotato:

    we would all be better off if they all worked at Subway,…..

  145. 145.

    Suzanne

    June 22, 2023 at 4:05 pm

    @The Moar You Know:

    These successful, educated women are not graduating and looking for a guy who is a failure, either.  They are simply staying single. 

    I recently read an interesting piece about young women in South Korea. Many of them don’t want to deal with patriarchal bullshit, and so many of them are dating other women. Also always an option.

  146. 146.

    NotMax

    June 22, 2023 at 4:07 pm

    @Jay

    Hero worship?
    //

  147. 147.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 4:07 pm

    CNN (@CNN) tweeted at 7:30 AM on Tue, Jun 20, 2023:
    Watch an exclusive interview with former President Barack Obama one-on-one with @Amanpour to talk about Ukraine, the upcoming U.S. election, and the impact of social media. Obama and Amanpour: Will Democracy Win? Thursday at 10 p.m. ET https://t.co/Ni0dtiH0wg
    (https://twitter.com/CNN/status/1671133343612649472?t=-O6d4pqchpgXigwSLE4mbQ&s=03)

  148. 148.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 4:10 pm

    @The Moar You Know:

    These successful, educated women are not graduating and looking for a guy who is a failure, either.  They are simply staying single.

     

    and THAT angers them to no end.

    That these women are like..

    ” My peace and cats…I’m good.”

     

    Used to be that you could scare women about becoming the ‘ Cat Lady’.

    Now women are like..” and? so?”

  149. 149.

    trollhattan

    June 22, 2023 at 4:11 pm

    @Ocotillo: ​
    Thanks a lot! 👋👋👋
    -California

  150. 150.

    Soprano2

    June 22, 2023 at 4:12 pm

    @Anonymous At Work: Back in the ’60’s/70’s our postmaster became a huge rental property owner. He had the postal carriers tell him when someone on their route died, then he swooped in with cash and bought the house.

  151. 151.

    raven

    June 22, 2023 at 4:13 pm

    Mike Reiss served as a show-runner, writer and producer for the animated series The Simpsons previously took the Titanic trip explained he did it because his wife wanted to do it! They booked the trip and she got covid and couldn’t go so he did!

  152. 152.

    James E Powell

    June 22, 2023 at 4:14 pm

    @RevRick:

    And on this point, all the Bible thumpers are wrong.

    The Bible thumpers are wrong on so many things you’d have to believe they either never read the Bible or they are deliberately misrepresenting.

  153. 153.

    Bill Arnold

    June 22, 2023 at 4:14 pm

    @RevRick:

    All the anti abortion laws are premised on the notion that the only moral question involved in this debate is about the personhood status of the fetus.

    They don’t get even that part right scientifically, though. Not even arguably close.
    E.g. I get angry when the anti-abortion religious zealots talk about the “baby” feeling pain at 16 weeks.
    There is no way that a fetus can feel pain until week 23/24, because the connections from sensory neurons to the early fetal brain are not present. And that presumes fetal consciousness at that stage, which remains a very open question (tending to no).

    Growth of Thalamocortical Fibers to the Somatosensory Cortex in the Human Fetal Brain (27 April 2017)

    “Between 23 and 24 PCW, AChE-reactive TH-C axons penetrate the CP concomitantly with its initial lamination.”

    (That means no connection of sensory neurons to the very rudimentary early fetal cortex, until postconceptional week 23/34.)

  154. 154.

    trollhattan

    June 22, 2023 at 4:15 pm

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): He pretended to be manly while saying it.

  155. 155.

    Stacy

    June 22, 2023 at 4:16 pm

    @Redshift

  156. 156.

    trollhattan

    June 22, 2023 at 4:18 pm

    You’re probably asking yourself “What’s happening in German swimming pools this summer?” and the answer will surprise you.

    A spate of mass brawls in German outdoor swimming pools has led to calls for better security at the popular summer bathing spots.

    As temperatures soar across the country, many people traditionally head for their local municipal outdoor swimming pool.

    But over the last few years the start of summer has also been plagued by headlines of violence and mass brawls at open-air pools.

    And this summer is no different.

    A number of incidents have been reported in the last week alone.

    On Wednesday evening dozens of police officers cleared and shut down an outdoor swimming pool in the Berlin district of Neukölln after a fight broke out at the slide.

    On Monday another in the district of Pankow was closed by police after a dispute between two young people and two pool lifeguards descended into a mass brawl involving around 30 people.

    And over the weekend there were injuries after a fight involving more than 40 people at a pool in the south-western German city of Mannheim. A 24-year-old man reportedly suffered knife injuries.

    There are no official figures indicating whether violence at open-air municipal swimming pools is on the rise.

    Pool operators in Berlin say that these are isolated headline-grabbing incidents that don’t reflect the experience of millions of people who attend the thousands of state-run outdoor pools across Germany.

    But police officials say they are concerned.

    “The ability to resolve conflicts respectfully and without violence has reduced,” Jochen Kopelke, the head of Germany’s largest police trade union, told the German RND newspaper group.

    The media debate is full of theories about what’s behind brawls in outdoor pools.

    A combination of heat, alcohol and crowds of half-naked young people is a recipe for the occasional scrap, say some.

    Poland, keeping an eye on this.

  157. 157.

    Gravenstone

    June 22, 2023 at 4:18 pm

    @Alison Rose: Gonna guess one, if not both are fronts for deeper pocketed donors who want to keep the idiot child in the House (for now).

  158. 158.

    James E Powell

    June 22, 2023 at 4:18 pm

    @rikyrah:

    It’s summer, so something light.

    Cucumber & Vidalia Onion Salad or Brazilian Tomato Slaw.

  159. 159.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 4:19 pm

    @trollhattan:

    I blame Biden.

  160. 160.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 4:20 pm

    @rikyrah:

    best marriage I know, is an ER Dr who married a Construction worker. He cooks, cleans, her long hours, took care of the two kids, maintained the house,  his income was just enough to pay the bills when she went back to school. They even survived covid. It’s their 50th July 1st.

  161. 161.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 4:20 pm

    @rikyrah:

    Watch an exclusive interview with former President Barack Obama one-on-one with @Amanpour

     
    I bet he didn’t even confess to a single crime.

  162. 162.

    NotMax

    June 22, 2023 at 4:21 pm

    @mrmoshpotato

    Not to belabor the elementary, FYI.

    How to slice a brisket.

  163. 163.

    trollhattan

    June 22, 2023 at 4:23 pm

    @Baud: ​
    Which one?!?

  164. 164.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 4:26 pm

    @James E Powell:

    depends where you are. Snow on the Coq and into Alberta yesterday. It’s only 22 here today, yesterday was 11.

    For the past week, seeing as I have been cooking, it’s hot comfort food like roast chicken, mash and mythical gravy.*

    my Mom was so worried about salmonella that there was nothing left with which to make gravy when she roasted a bird. Didn’t know that you could until I met T, so 38 years of no chicken gravy, or turkey, or grouse, or duck, or goose,……etc.

  165. 165.

    Elizabelle

    June 22, 2023 at 4:26 pm

    @rikyrah:  I love sweet potatoes, FWIW.  Good luck with your brisket.  I want some!!

  166. 166.

    David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

    June 22, 2023 at 4:28 pm

    @trollhattan: Swimming pool putsch

  167. 167.

    Ruckus

    June 22, 2023 at 4:28 pm

    @Old Man Shadow:

    I almost want to say this comment is over the top. But really it feels spot on. Conservatives, male and female want the world to rotate backwards, at least in time. And I have zero idea why, because it makes life so damn worse for so damn many humans. Are they so afraid of progress, even as slow as it is, will somehow make THEIR lives worse? Are they afraid that someone will have a better life while not being white? Are they afraid that they will find out that their extremely sexist, extremely controlling religion will no longer have the power they give it? Are they afraid that people living better lives will invalidate their lives? Are they afraid that without their insanely asinine control of others they will become less, as in less than the total lack of humanity they already display? What in the hell do they think that controlling some one else, especially someone else without the money and power to live outside their asinine limitations gives them? Is it a power grab? Or is it that they are just so insanely pompous and arrogant that they think everyone else should live the life that they desire?

  168. 168.

    Chris T.

    June 22, 2023 at 4:31 pm

    @rikyrah:

    What sides go with brisket?

    All of them!

  169. 169.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    June 22, 2023 at 4:31 pm

    @trollhattan:

    He pretended to be manly while saying it.

    I’m sure there’s MAGAt’s out there that truly believe that

  170. 170.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 4:32 pm

    @Jay:

    she doesn’t sound like she’s doing all the emotional labor.

    This reads like she gets help.

    Women who are leaving just want some help.

    They work, come home and are expected to do all the work at home too?

    This is why so many women are checking out.

  171. 171.

    Dan B

    June 22, 2023 at 4:34 pm

    @Ruckus:  They’re continually telling each other that the worst lie is: a high tide lifts all boats.  They’re certain that the tide will bring horrible people up from the stygian depths.

  172. 172.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 4:36 pm

    @Jay:

    My mother always worked – she was a teacher.

    But, my father took care of grocery shopping and cooking.

    If there were 100 meals cooked in my childhood home, my father cooked 98 of them.

     

    Now, don’t ask him to wash any clothes or vacuum.

    And, my father worked the night shift so that there would always be an adult in our home. If something went wrong at school, I could always call my father.

    I grew up watching a man help with ‘ the house’, so no, I am never going to settle for anything less. I go to work everyday and then some man is expecting me to do all the labor INSIDE of the house?

    I think the phuck not.

  173. 173.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 4:36 pm

    @NotMax:

     

    Thank you :)

  174. 174.

    Denali5

    June 22, 2023 at 4:37 pm

    Having had a miscarriage, I just cannot get beyond women being prosecuted for this fairly common occurrence.

  175. 175.

    cckids

    June 22, 2023 at 4:37 pm

    @The Moar You Know:

    I knew I did not want kids back when I was a kid.  Starting in college, I tried to get a vasectomy.

    I was told repeatedly that no doctor would consider doing it unless I was in my mid thirties with at least a couple of kids.  I’m now in my mid fifties and still the urologists I’ve talked to have issues about doing it when they find out I don’t have kids.

    12 years ago, my BIL (a Major in the Air Force) was in for a vasectomy; his doctor’s office called my sister to inform her and ask if she was ok with it. Little did they know that she was a charge nurse, who read them the riot act about all the HIPAA violations they had committed.

    And of course she was ok with it – she’d almost died giving birth to each of their 2 kids. But the sheer WTF-ness of it still gets to me. Honestly, why does it matter if she’s ok with it? This insistence that MORE KIDS is everyone’s dream and aim is disturbing.

  176. 176.

    Alison Rose

    June 22, 2023 at 4:39 pm

    @trollhattan: That bolded sentence sounds like a Mad Libs entry.

  177. 177.

    Caveatimperator

    June 22, 2023 at 4:45 pm

    @The Moar You Know:

    I have zero sympathy. Zero.

    What exactly do they think is going to happen to them in life? No school, no job training, no job, are they thinking any further ahead than the next 24 hours and their immediate gratification?

    Are they so paralyzed by right-wing bullshit online from the Andrew Tates and Jordan Petersons of the world that they think every social institution is against them?

  178. 178.

    Ruckus

    June 22, 2023 at 4:46 pm

    @Alison Rose:

    It is of course very easy to get a vasectomy. It’s snip, snip, relax for a couple days, done, thank you very much. I’d bet it isn’t quite as simple to get your tubes tied.

    And I like kids, it’s amazing to watch them grow and mature, to teach them and watch them go out into the world and enjoy life. Yes it can also be terrifying to do this and wonder if you are completely screwing it up. And to wonder if maybe the world doesn’t actually need a few more billion of us. I’m of the side that thinks quite likely we don’t. I am also of the side that thinks that the concept of equality takes away the concept of the MAN is the decision maker, the ruler, the top of the heap. Because I’ve known a few males that should never, ever have any power over any other human, should never be trusted to do anything for humanity because the only thing they know is getting and keeping as much as they can, to make themselves look bright and powerful and wonderful. You (and everyone else) may be able to discuss about quite a few humans we all know of that fit that bill.

  179. 179.

    Timill

    June 22, 2023 at 4:47 pm

    @Chris T.: Except okra.

  180. 180.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 4:49 pm

    @rikyrah:

    you are mis reading it.

    He does the house, she does the (majority) income.

    intellectually, there is no competition between them. There is no alpha, they are a team. He’s happy, she’s happy.

    We dropped by one time, and well, what they were doing in the hot tub was inappropriate.

    T’s way more educated than me, in so many ways, smarter than me. When we got together, she was just so happy that I wasn’t an emotionally distant Tech guy like her ex. The guy made way more money than me, but I was there for her. We even survived when I became distant, (3 weeks per month, 2,100 miles away).

    We are all raised with various expectations of who our spouse is supposed to be.

    The ones I know that are successful, are non traditional in many ways.

  181. 181.

    cain

    June 22, 2023 at 4:50 pm

    @Suzanne: The pandemic has revealed the U.S. for what it is – it’s a huge eye opener.

  182. 182.

    Ruckus

    June 22, 2023 at 4:53 pm

    @Ceci n est pas mon nym:

    So do we have any speculation or wild rumors as to what he’s actually covering up?

    I’m going to go with everydamnthing. I believe he’d lie about the day of the week (not just not know – he’d lie) if he thought it would get him ahead of someone else. His life is a lie. Wanna bet there is something he really, really does not want out there? Or some every things?

  183. 183.

    EarthWindFire

    June 22, 2023 at 4:54 pm

    @James E Powell: Most of the religious folks I know don’t read the Bible. They’re just listening to what their priest or pastor tells them about it. Of the layperson population, I think it’s mostly atheists who read the Bible (I wish I were kidding).

  184. 184.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 4:56 pm

    @Jay:

    Ok, he takes care of the house. They worked it out. She is not left with all this responsibility. She doesn’t feel like she’s all alone.

    Just some sharing of the labor…it’s what most working women want.

  185. 185.

    JPL

    June 22, 2023 at 4:58 pm

    CNN has a few clips online of  Obama and Amanpour.   link

  186. 186.

    rikyrah

    June 22, 2023 at 5:01 pm

    Korie Dean (@koriedean) tweeted at 7:25 AM on Tue, Jun 20, 2023:
    Starting this fall, @DukeU will offer free tuition — almost $64,000 per year — to students from NC and SC whose families make $150,000 or less.

    More @newsobserver: https://t.co/rHWjbrr7Ps
    (https://twitter.com/koriedean/status/1671132251533238272?t=8qQRyQIWGIYd3OMoYPjw-w&s=03)

  187. 187.

    Kay

    June 22, 2023 at 5:06 pm

    Political Polls @Politics_Polls

    2024 National Democratic Primary: Joe Biden 67% Robert Kennedy Jr. 8% Marianne Williamson 4%

    RFK Jr. is dropping. The curse of Elon Musk.

    Biden must have absolutely nothing to do with Elon Musk. We can’t risk it :)

  188. 188.

    EarthWindFire

    June 22, 2023 at 5:10 pm

    @Denali5: I’m so sorry. Sending you light.

    Edit: this sounded like it happened recently. The sentiment remains the same, regardless

  189. 189.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 5:10 pm

    @Kay:

    What was he at before?

  190. 190.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 5:16 pm

    @rikyrah:

    I clean, I cook, I do laundry. My Momma raised me right.

    Sadly, so many people are conditioned to believe that their partner should be either an equal, (economically, etc) or an alpha.

    3M had to fly me back on an “emergency basis”, because the guy they had promoted to Master Production Scheduler was to busy polishing his resume on line, and so 3 production lines were down, and he didn’t know how to fix it.

    He had 4 degrees and an MBA.

    I have High School and some technical courses.

    Flew in Monday am, had the lines back up and running, and was back in Milwaukee by Thursday. Even did my expense reports.

    Some of the smartest people, I know, in IQ and EQ, didn’t do the Paper Chase.

    But societal constraints say that our social bonds are supposed to fit certain stereotypes.

    All of the best relationships I have seen, don’t.

  191. 191.

    JPL

    June 22, 2023 at 5:16 pm

    @Kay: I just saw that the republicans are going to have Jr. testify about free speech.  BTW the big scoop is Breitbart   hahah

    Ashley Oliver

    SCOOP: The
    @Weaponization
    committee is making plans to hear public testimony from Democrat presidential candidate RFK Jr. at its next hearing, currently set for July 20. Topic will focus on censorship.

  192. 192.

    UncleEbeneezer

    June 22, 2023 at 5:20 pm

    @Jay: Hold on, if there’s one thing I’ve learned from smut, there’s nothing that is inappropriate behavior for a hot tub, lol!

  193. 193.

    WaterGirl

    June 22, 2023 at 5:22 pm

    @Ruckus: You forgot about the ice packs on your balls for 2-3 days part!

  194. 194.

    Dan B

    June 22, 2023 at 5:24 pm

    @Baud: RFK Jr is speaking at Moms for Liberty’s national summit.  The Indiana chapter of MFL just posted a Hitler quote at the top of the front page of their newsletter.

    He might go even lower in the polls.

  195. 195.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 5:25 pm

    @JPL:

    Do we have any Jewish grandmothers in the committee that can make him feel bad about what he did with his life?

  196. 196.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 5:25 pm

    @UncleEbeneezer:

    in front of company?

    Balloon Juice After Dark is here early, must be the solstice.

  197. 197.

    Jay

    June 22, 2023 at 5:26 pm

    @WaterGirl:

    frozen peas or corn are recommended.

  198. 198.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 5:26 pm

    @Dan B:

    Apparently, 8% of Dems are old people who have overly fond memories of the 6o’s and having kept up with news since then.

  199. 199.

    Dan B

    June 22, 2023 at 5:26 pm

    @WaterGirl:  My brother can confirm this.

  200. 200.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 5:27 pm

    @Jay:

    BJAD happened early this morning.  It’s always dark somewhere, I guess

  201. 201.

    JPL

    June 22, 2023 at 5:31 pm

    @Baud: hahaha   Believe me you don’t need to be of a particular faith to lay on the guilt.   I’m sure his family tried and failed and his current wife just shrugs her shoulders and goes along with him.

  202. 202.

    James E Powell

    June 22, 2023 at 5:33 pm

    @EarthWindFire:

    Of the layperson population, I think it’s mostly atheists who read the Bible (I wish I were kidding).

    Actually reading the Bible was a major step on my journey to atheism. I was, as the saying goes, raised Catholic. We didn’t do a lot of Bible study. So when I finally sat down & read whole books, there were a lot of “Wait, what?” moments.

  203. 203.

    Kay

    June 22, 2023 at 5:33 pm

    @Baud:

    20

  204. 204.

    Baud

    June 22, 2023 at 5:35 pm

    @Kay:

    That’s nuts.  Dems have their own 27%.

  205. 205.

    Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)

    June 22, 2023 at 5:45 pm

    @Baud:

    @Kay:

    I’m guessing it was name recognition? That’s the only thing I can think of

  206. 206.

    Frankensteinbeck

    June 22, 2023 at 5:47 pm

    @catclub:

    I bet he did not. He speaks like a mob boss, so it is “some people are saying…”

    I was watching that press conference.  Trump was mumbling, sounded tired and confused in general.  He said that cleaning products were effective removing the virus from the outside of the body, and asked the doctor if they would work inside the body.  In context of the speech, he would have meant injection.

  207. 207.

    mrmoshpotato

    June 22, 2023 at 5:54 pm

    @Jay:

    frozen peas or corn are recommended. 

    Bags of frozen veggies make great ice packs for any injury or surgical recovery!

  208. 208.

    E.

    June 22, 2023 at 6:05 pm

    @cckids: wtf? I got snipped in the Boise ID Planned Parenthood in 1993 in my mid twenties and all they ever asked was if I knew it was irreversible.

  209. 209.

    karen marie

    June 22, 2023 at 6:09 pm

    @Alison Rose: If you believe they’re the original guarantors, I have a bridge to sell you.

  210. 210.

    Argiope

    June 22, 2023 at 6:09 pm

    @Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Nope, clinicians cannot look up their patient’s spouse’s medical records without express permission from that spouse.  Medical records are private.  Remember learning about HIPAA in nursing school?

  211. 211.

    karen marie

    June 22, 2023 at 6:15 pm

    @Alison Rose: When I got married, my husband and I agreed we didn’t want children. At the time – the mid ’90s – tubal ligation was considered to be major surgery, with all the potential risks of death or serious bodily injury. Husband didn’t want to expose me to the risk, so he stepped up and got a vasectomy.

  212. 212.

    Steeplejack

    June 22, 2023 at 6:18 pm

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    How soon we forget.

  213. 213.

    karen marie

    June 22, 2023 at 6:21 pm

    @Alison Rose: That makes no sense. I recently transcribed a two-day federal criminal hearing that involved discussion of implications for defendant’s elderly mother posting his bond. She had to sign over her house and was warned that any violation of release would mean she’d lose the house. If Santos’ relatives weren’t required to post a bond, then his bail was reduced to personal recognizance.

  214. 214.

    karen marie

    June 22, 2023 at 6:22 pm

    @Alison Rose: None of that is new.

  215. 215.

    Ruckus

    June 22, 2023 at 6:28 pm

    @Dan B:

    I think it’s more than that.

    I think they think that if someone else gets ahead, if someone that they can hate gets ahead, it LESSENS them. I capitalized that for the obvious reason, they have position of some sort. They made decisions to get to that point. If someone who doesn’t look or sound or whatever gets ahead of them, it lessens them. It’s hierarchy, and they expect that far, far more than any thing that brings equality of humanity, because they DO NOT believe in losing THEIR PLACE in the hierarchy of humanity. They do not believe in equality of position.

  216. 216.

    Ruckus

    June 22, 2023 at 6:34 pm

    @EarthWindFire:

    I’ve read it. And I think you are correct.

    Most who are religious have read snippets at best. Or have been told what it says.

  217. 217.

    Ruckus

    June 22, 2023 at 7:14 pm

    @Jay:

    But societal constraints say that our social bonds are supposed to fit certain stereotypes.

    That statement covers a hell of a lot of ground, air, space and tunnels. And to me seems to end up being a big part of the downfall of a lot of societies. Because humanity really, really, really rarely ever fits those stereotypes.

  218. 218.

    Chris T.

    June 22, 2023 at 8:27 pm

    @Timill:

    Except okra

    Well, I wouldn’t know about that, I consider okra inedible in all contexts myself.

  219. 219.

    El Muneco

    June 22, 2023 at 9:13 pm

    @Ruckus: “It is of course very easy to get a vasectomy. It’s snip, snip, relax for a couple days, done, thank you very much. I’d bet it isn’t quite as simple to get your tubes tied.”

    It’s fairly common for guys to book time off work for e.g. the NCAA basketball finals, have vasectomy surgery at the beginning, then sit around watching the games 12 hours a day until they are feeling better.

  220. 220.

    RevRick

    June 22, 2023 at 10:01 pm

    @Bill Arnold: Thanks for this info. Yet one more reason why we celebrate our birthdays and not the day dad boinked mom.

  221. 221.

    RevRick

    June 22, 2023 at 10:12 pm

    @James E Powell:  As one of my seminary professors said, “All texts without context are merely pretexts.” With Evangelicals the context is that they twisted themselves and Scriptures in knots to justify slavery.

  222. 222.

    Glidwrith

    June 22, 2023 at 10:21 pm

    @rikyrah: Sukatash. Small place we just discovered called the Serpentine. Meadery and Cidery, brisket to die for and they had a great sukatash. Also had smoked Portabella mushrooms that were then tempura fried.

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