paikea’s blog

Happy Holidays from New Zealand to all my VOXy friends:)

nobody@vox.com(paikea) — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 00:57:45 +0100

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Sweet. This made my day: Gay Rights Activists Take Over Christian Right Hate-Fest in DC | AlterNet

nobody@vox.com(paikea) — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 02:29:02 +0100

Sweet. This made my day: Gay Rights Activists Take Over Christian Right Hate-Fest in DC | AlterNet

http://www.alternet.org/blogs/peek/14...

Priceless: Gay Rights Activists Take Over Christian Right Hate-Fest in DC By Joshua Holland, AlterNet Posted on November 17, 2009, Printed on November 17, 2009 http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/www.alternet.org/144013/ I guess Dana Milbank just worships power and delights in picking on the marginalized. So while I've grown to detest him for years of snarky columns cherry-picking little vignettes to make progressives -- environmentalists, anti-war activists, human rights experts -- look like hopeless geeks who should be ignored when the GOP was in power, now that the Democrats are riding high he seems to be focusing that admittedly sharp pen on tea-baggers and the religious right -- the GOP's immoderate base. Today he tells an interesting story that could have been titled: Reverend Smith Goes to Washington ... Conservative Christian ministers from across the land, determined to test the bounds of a new law punishing anti-gay hate crimes, assembled outside the Justice Department on Monday to denounce the sin of homosexuality and see whether they would be charged with lawbreaking. Needless to say, no arrests were made. No hands were cuffed. In fact, the few cops in attendance were paying no attention to the speakers, instead talking among themselves and checking their BlackBerrys. The evangelical activists had been hoping to provoke arrest, because, as organizer Gary Cass of the Christian Anti-Defamation Commission put it, "we'd have standing to challenge the law." But their prayers were not answered. Nobody was arrested, which wasn't surprising: To run afoul of the new law, you need to "plan or prepare for an act of physical violence" or "incite an imminent act of physical violence." But there was some drama ... Instead of getting arrested, the ministers got something else: A couple of dozen gay activists, surrounding them with rainbow flags and signs announcing "Gaga for Gay Rights" and "I Am a Love Warrior." By the end, t...

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So much for Separation of Church and State: Catholic Bishops Influence Passing of Stupak Amendment

nobody@vox.com(paikea) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 11:03:07 +0100

So much for Separation of Church and State: Catholic Bishops Put Sex Obsession Ahead of Mission to t

http://www.alternet.org/sex/143945/ca...

Catholic Bishops Put Sex Obsession Ahead of Mission to the Sick and the Poor By Adele M. Stan, AlterNet Posted on November 16, 2009, Printed on November 17, 2009 http://www.alternet.org/story/143945/ They lead a church that claims to stand on the side of the sick and the poor, the meek who shall inherit the earth. But in the course of a single week, the bishops of the Roman Catholic Church proclaimed themselves willing to see health-care denied to millions of uninsured Americans, and to yank the social-service rug out from under the feet of tens of thousands of urban poor in the nation's capital -- all to serve the bishops' obsession with the sex lives and reproductive organs of others. The church's week of shame began with the bishops' role in creating the monster that is the Stupak amendment to the health-care reform bill passed last weekend by the House of Representatives, when the bishops refused to bless a compromise made between pro-choice and anti-abortion Democrats in the language of the bill. (Without the bishops' blessing, anti-choice Democrats vowed to vote against the bill, so Speaker Nancy Pelosi was strong-armed into allowing Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., to bring an anti-choice amendment to the floor.) Finishing off the week with a brutal bang, the church threatened to sever its social service contracts with the District of Columbia if the city council of Washington, D.C., passes a measure legalizing same-sex marriage -- a move that would throw services to 68,000 of the poorest and most vulnerable citizens of the nation's capital into chaos. This week in the life of the church, says Frances Kissling, the long-time Catholic feminist activist and current visiting scholar at the University of Pennsylvania Center for Bioethics, demonstrated the church's "willingness to just be a bully." (Full disclosure: I worked for Kissling in 1998, during her 30-year tenure at the helm of Catholics for Choice.) The Poor Must Suffer for the Sin of Same-Se...

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Sign the petition, send a coat hanger - CREDO - (i just did)

nobody@vox.com(paikea) — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 04:18:03 +0100

Sign the petition, send a coat hanger - CREDO - (i just did)

http://act.credoaction.com/campaign/s...

Did 20 pro-choice Democrats forget what happens when women are denied access to abortion? Why did pro-choice Democrats vote to approve the Stupak amendment, the most serious assault on abortion rights in a generation? According to FiveThirtyEight.com, 20 of the 64 Democrats who joined Republicans to pass the measure are nominally pro-choice. We're telling these 20 Democrats -- all of them men -- to reconsider their vote and urge Congressional leadership to do everything they can to ensure the health care bill that comes out of committee does not take us back to an era of coat hangers and back alley abortions. Sign our petition and we'll send a coat hanger to the 20 formerly pro-choice Democrats who voted to take away women's rights.

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Movie about Darwin Can't Find a Distributor in the US.

nobody@vox.com(paikea) — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 09:41:58 +0200

Seriously, enough is enough - with all the stuff I've been reading about lately: the "furor" over Obama's speech to the school kids; Wilson's (R-S.C.) pathetic display of disrespect at Obama's health care speech; etc. - I'd go on, but it would only depress/anger/(fill in the blank) me more.

(And we're in L.A., heading to NZ on Wednesday and I'd really rather keep the happy as long as I can.)

A few facts about this film: Creation (UK title)

1. Co-written by Randal Keynes, Charles Darwin's great-great grandson - author and conservationist
2. Cast includes: Paul Bettany, Jennifer Connelly (Bettany's wife, for those of you who didn't know:), Toby Jones, Jeremy Northam
3. Produced by Jeremy Thomas, who won an Oscar for The Last Emperor

btw, for those of you in the US, currently, the nearest place you can go see this movie is Canada - as for me, i'll definitely be seeing it when it comes out in New Zealand

before the article, here's the trailer, which i actually watched several weeks ago...

Creation (2009) trailer - likely known in SOME circles as "that @#$%@#$# Darwin movie"

Christian Groups Block Showing of Darwin Movie in U.S.?

By Tana Ganeva, AlterNet
Posted on September 14, 2009, Printed on September 15, 2009
http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/www.alternet.org/142619/

This is the kind of thing that makes it really easy to rant about brainwashed Christians like an angsty high schooler, or snottily proclaim that Americans are stupid and you're moving to another country: a movie about Charles Darwin shown almost all over the world won't play in the U.S. because the film has been turned down by American distributors. Yes, a movie about a 19th century scientist who developed a theory uniformly accepted in the scientific community has been deemed too controversial for distribution in the U.S.

According to the Telegraph UK:

US distributors have resolutely passed on a film which will prove hugely divisive in a country where, according to a Gallup poll conducted in February, only 39 per cent of Americans believe in the theory of evolution.

Movieguide.org, an influential site which reviews films from a Christian perspective, described Darwin as the father of eugenics and denounced him as "a racist, a bigot and an 1800s naturalist whose legacy is mass murder". His "half-baked theory" directly influenced Adolf Hitler and led to "atrocities, crimes against humanity, cloning and genetic engineering", the site stated.

The film has sparked fierce debate on US Christian websites, with a typical comment dismissing evolution as "a silly theory with a serious lack of evidence to support it despite over a century of trying".

Jeremy Thomas, the Oscar-winning producer of Creation, said he was astonished that such attitudes exist 150 years after On The Origin of Species was published.

"That's what we're up against. In 2009. It's amazing," he said.

"The film has no distributor in America. It has got a deal everywhere else in the world but in the US, and it's because of what the film is about. People have been saying this is the best film they've seen all year, yet nobody in the US has picked it up.

To be fair, we probably can't entirely blame Christians. While the Christian media outrage machine is pretty formidable, it's doubtful the U.S. movie industry has been cowed by some ranting on Christian comment boards, or the prospect of a boycott (that's why Hollywood still produces slightly more movies with sex and violence, rather than Jesus, as their major themes).

Probably a bit of cost benefit analysis going on: despite the free publicity generated by riled-up Christians, people will hardly flock to a British-y movie about a 19th century scientist -- at least not enough to outweigh the branding headaches created by screaming, sign-wielding Christians. So, this is your fault too. Or, perhaps the savvy BBC producers are playing up the controversy to trick you into going to a smart movie about history and science. Let's hope for the latter.

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Two Excellent Op-Eds by Nicholas D. Kristof on the Health Care in the US

nobody@vox.com(paikea) — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 16:43:31 +0200

(several of the comments to both articles are worth reading as well)

August 30, 2009

Op-Ed Columnist

Until Medical Bills Do Us Part

By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

Critics fret that health care reform would undermine American family values, not least by convening somber death panels to wheel away Grandma as if she were Old Yeller.

But peel away the emotions and fearmongering, and in fact it is the existing system that unnecessarily takes lives and breaks apart families.

My friend M. — you’ll understand in a moment why she’s terrified of my using her name — had to make a searing decision a year ago. She was married to a sweet, gentle man whom she loved, but who had become increasingly absent-minded. Finally, he was diagnosed with early-onset dementia.

The disease is degenerative, and he will become steadily less able to care for himself. At some point, as his medical needs multiply, he will probably need to be institutionalized.

The hospital arranged a conference call with a social worker, who outlined how the dementia and its financial toll on the family would progress, and then added, out of the blue: “Maybe you should divorce.”

“I was blown away,” M. told me. But, she said, the hospital staff members explained that they had seen it all before, many times. If M.’s husband required long-term care, the costs would be catastrophic even for a middle-class family with savings.

Eventually, after the expenses whittled away their combined assets, her husband could go on Medicaid — but by then their children’s nest egg would be gone, along with her 401(k) plan. She would face a bleak retirement with neither her husband nor her savings...

- read the entire article at
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/30/opinion/30kristof.html)

-------------------

August 27, 2009

Op-Ed Columnist

Health Care Fit for Animals

By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

Opponents suggest that a “government takeover” of health care will be a milestone on the road to “socialized medicine,” and when he hears those terms, Wendell Potter cringes. He’s embarrassed that opponents are using a playbook that he helped devise.

“Over the years I helped craft this messaging and deliver it,” he noted.

Mr. Potter was an executive in the health insurance industry for nearly 20 years before his conscience got the better of him. He served as head of corporate communications for Humana and then for Cigna.

He flew in corporate jets to industry meetings to plan how to block health reform, he says. He rode in limousines to confabs to concoct messaging to scare the public about reform. But in his heart, he began to have doubts as the business model for insurance evolved in recent years from spreading risk to dumping the risky.

Then in 2007 Mr. Potter attended a premiere of “Sicko,” Michael Moore’s excoriating film about the American health care system. Mr. Potter was taking notes so that he could prepare a propaganda counterblast — but he found himself agreeing with a great deal of the film.

A month later, Mr. Potter was back home in Tennessee, visiting his parents, and dropped in on a three-day charity program at a county fairgrounds to provide medical care for patients who could not afford doctors. Long lines of people were waiting in the rain, and patients were being examined and treated in public in stalls intended for livestock.

“It was a life-changing event to witness that,” he remembered. Increasingly, he found himself despising himself for helping block health reforms. “It sounds hokey, but I would look in the mirror and think, how did I get into this?”

- read the entire article at
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/27/opinion/27kristof.html

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hey guys - just checking in - with a pic:)

nobody@vox.com(paikea) — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 21:33:27 +0200

Steven and me walking up to Castle Neuschwanstein - Germany (Bavaria) - a few weeks ago

Germany - Neuschwanstein - Aug '09 - Steven and Me

p.s. heading to the US and then home to New Zealand at the END OF NEXT WEEK!!

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Orphaned hedgehogs adopt cleaning brush as their mother | Mail Online

nobody@vox.com(paikea) — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 21:27:23 +0200

Orphaned hedgehogs adopt cleaning brush as their mother | Mail Online

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/artic...

All together now - AWWWWWWWW! -------------------- Four tiny orphaned hedgehogs are snuggling up to the bristles of a cleaning brush - because they think it's their mother. The four inch long creatures are being hand-reared by staff at the New Forest Otter, Owl and Wildlife Park in Ashurst, Hants. Workers say Mary, Mungo, Midge and Slappy get comfort from playing with the centre's cleaning brush and enjoy rubbing against it. The smells on the brush, which is used to sweep a yard, remind the hedgehogs of their natural habitat while the texture reminds them of their mother. Manager John Crooks, 41, said: "They are a bit like human babies - they need activities to keep them busy. "Because they have very poor eyesight you have to appeal to their sense of smell and touch by giving them different scents and textures. "They like natural scents and have enjoyed playing with our cleaning brushes, soil, leaves, flower pots and the like. "They particularly seem to enjoy rubbing against the brush. "It may sound odd but I imagine the bristles feel a bit like their mum." He added: "Three of the hedgehogs came to us because their mum was sadly crushed by a council palette truck at one of their depots. "They are only a couple of weeks old. "The fourth one is a little bit older and was found wandering around a back garden in the middle of the day. "The home owner left it alone for a while to see if it would find its mum but after a few hours it was still by itself so she brought it into to us." The hedgehogs will be fed until they are full-sized and then they will be released back into the wild. John said: "We are feeding them milk powder mixed with kitten food - but they don't like fish flavour - they prefer nice meaty chunks. "When they get older they will move onto proper cat food and will occasionally be given slugs and snails as a treat. "There has been a real surge in slugs this year because of the wet weather so hopefully t...

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As loathe as I am to have Glenn Beck anywhere near my blog, this is a must see...

nobody@vox.com(paikea) — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 15:25:26 +0200

thanks to Snowy, who steered me to this particularly revealing John Stewart segment, we can really observe the hypocrisy in the US health care "debate".

Glenn Beck's Operation - John Stewart - Comedy Central

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Watch as Palin and her cadre of "Death Panel" MORONS actually influence policy...

nobody@vox.com(paikea) — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 19:40:29 +0200

this health care reform thing in the US is DRIVING ME UP A FREAKIN WALL - and I DON'T EVEN LIVE THERE ANY MORE!!!

(for those of you who don't know, since Aug 2002, i've been living under a socialized health care system in New Zealand that has been working quite well for me - and i have chronic things wrong with me - like IBS - and asthma - and allergies - so i'm one of those people who would really know - i never had to worry about going uninsured and without health care - US style - ever again)

p.s. hello everybody - yes, we're still in Switzerland - back to NZ on Sept. 18th

-------------------------------------------------------------------

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/finance-committee-to-drop-end-of-life-provision-2009-08-13.html

Finance Committee to drop end-of-life provision

By Michael O'Brien
Posted: 08/13/09 02:21 PM [ET]
The Senate Finance Committee will drop a controversial provision on consultations for end-of-life care from its proposed healthcare bill, its top Republican member said Thursday. The committee, which has worked on putting together a bipartisan healthcare reform bill, will drop the controversial provision after it was derided by conservatives as "death panels" to encourage euthanasia.

"On the Finance Committee, we are working very hard to avoid unintended consequences by methodically working through the complexities of all of these issues and policy options," Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said in a statement. "We dropped end-of-life provisions from consideration entirely because of the way they could be misinterpreted and implemented incorrectly."

The Finance Committee is the only congressional committee not to report out a preliminary healthcare bill before the August congressional recess, but is expected to unveil its proposal shortly after Labor Day.

Grassley said that bill would hold up better compared to proposals crafted in the House, which he asserted were "poorly cobbled together."

"The bill passed by the House committees is so poorly cobbled together that it will have all kinds of unintended consequences, including making taxpayers fund healthcare subsidies for illegal immigrants," Grassley said. The veteran Iowa lawmaker said the end-of-life provision in those bills would pay physicians to "advise patients about end-of-life care and rate physician quality of care based on the creation of and adherence to orders for end-of-life care.

"Maybe others can defend a bill like the Pelosi bill that leaves major issues open to interpretation, but I can't," Grassley added.

--------------------------------------

while some fellow GOP members had managed to stay sane on this issue...

http://www.alternet.org/healthwellness/141906/gop_senator_calls_sarah_palin%27s_%27death_panel%27_remarks_%27nuts%27/

GOP Senator Calls Sarah Palin's 'Death Panel' Remarks 'Nuts'

By John Byrne, Raw Story
Posted on August 11, 2009, Printed on August 14, 2009

Georgia’s junior Republican senator has something to say about Sarah Palin’s interpretation of US healthcare reform.

It’s “nuts.”

The Republican lawmaker, Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-GA), made the comments in an interview with Washington Post columnist Ezra Klein Monday. His remarks may underscore how far Palin has strayed from the Republican base. Isakson co-sponsored a measure a measure in 2007 aimed at educating Medicare patients about their options for end-of-life care.

“Is this bill going to euthanize my grandmother?” Klein asked Isakson, referring to former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s comments that Democrats’ healthcare proposal would create “death panels.” “What are we talking about here?”

“In the health-care debate mark-up, one of the things I talked about was that the most money spent on anyone is spent usually in the last 60 days of life and that’s because an individual is not in a capacity to make decisions for themselves,” Isakson said. “So rather than getting into a situation where the government makes those decisions, if everyone had an end-of-life directive or what we call in Georgia ‘durable power of attorney,’ you could instruct at a time of sound mind and body what you want to happen in an event where you were in difficult circumstances where you’re unable to make those decisions.”

“How did this become a question of euthanasia?” Klein asked.

“I have no idea,” the senator replied. “I understand — and you have to check this out — I just had a phone call where someone said Sarah Palin’s web site had talked about the House bill having death panels on it where people would be euthanized. How someone could take an end of life directive or a living will as that is nuts. You’re putting the authority in the individual rather than the government. I don’t know how that got so mixed up.”

The senator noted that all fifty states — including Palin’s Alaska — have some power of attorney or end-of-life directives aimed at protecting guardians from having to make life-or-death decisions.

“All 50 states now have either durable powers of attorney or end-of-life directives and it’s to protect children or a spouse from being put into a situation where they have to make a terrible decision as well as physicians from being put into a position where they have to practice defensive medicine because of the trial lawyers,” Isakson said.

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paikea’s blog

Happy Holidays from New Zealand to all my VOXy friends:)

Sweet. This made my day: Gay Rights Activists Take Over Christian Right Hate-Fest in DC | AlterNet

So much for Separation of Church and State: Catholic Bishops Influence Passing of Stupak Amendment

Sign the petition, send a coat hanger - CREDO - (i just did)

Movie about Darwin Can't Find a Distributor in the US.

Seriously, enough is enough - with all the stuff I've been reading about lately: the "furor" over Obama's speech to the school kids; Wilson's (R-S.C.) pathetic display of disrespect at Obama's health care speech; etc. - I'd go on, but it would only depress/anger/(fill in the blank) me more.

(And we're in L.A., heading to NZ on Wednesday and I'd really rather keep the happy as long as I can.)

By Tana Ganeva, AlterNetPosted on September 14, 2009, Printed on September 15, 2009 http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/www.alternet.org/142619/

Two Excellent Op-Eds by Nicholas D. Kristof on the Health Care in the US

Until Medical Bills Do Us Part

Health Care Fit for Animals

hey guys - just checking in - with a pic:)

Orphaned hedgehogs adopt cleaning brush as their mother | Mail Online

As loathe as I am to have Glenn Beck anywhere near my blog, this is a must see...

Watch as Palin and her cadre of "Death Panel" MORONS actually influence policy...

By John Byrne, Raw StoryPosted on August 11, 2009, Printed on August 14, 2009

Georgia’s junior Republican senator has something to say about Sarah Palin’s interpretation of US healthcare reform.

By Tana Ganeva, AlterNet
Posted on September 14, 2009, Printed on September 15, 2009
http://www.alternet.org/bloggers/www.alternet.org/142619/

By John Byrne, Raw Story
Posted on August 11, 2009, Printed on August 14, 2009