More tabs, political this time.

[solarbird]

I've got to stop opening web pages. Seriously, it only leads to trouble. Anyway, here's trouble for you.

Suddenly Republicans want the press to be a watchdog on the American government. A majority of Democrats still do - making them somewhat less inconsistent than Republicans - but that percentage still dropped a lot. This all came up in the contest of Fox News screaming that the Obama administration was trying to "control the media," which is pretty laughable given things like the illegal domestic propaganda campaign in which they participated (and refused to report upon, like all the major networks, when it was discovered), Bush administration threats to arrest reporters, and so on. Fun times, by which I mean fuck you very much.

New York cops are harassing and arresting gay men (mostly) via a law ruled unconstitutional in 1983. Despite losing several cases since then - and being ordered to stop, more than once - they're still doing it. That's fun:

Instead, in the 26 years of this law's odd posthumous career, district attorneys brought 4,750 prosecutions and judges convicted 2,550 defendants. For violating an imaginary law, these defendants paid a decidedly non-imaginary $70,000 in bail and $190,000 in court fees and fines. In the last 10 years, NYPD officers also issued 9,693 citations, forcing citizens to pay $71,000 in fees. The criminal records of these victims have never been expunged and the fees and fines have not been refunded.

Isn't that just awesome?

Here, this is unfathomably vile, but I mean, what do you expect: get raped, take anti-AIDS drugs to ward off possible HIV infection, lose your health insurance. Apparently this is a standard reaction and they can't seem to figure out why anyone might be upset. Ah, health insurance industry, you really are your own worst enemies.

You've heard the horrible story about the Washington State woman on vacation with her partner in Florida when her partner had a stroke and she and their children were forbidden from seeing her dying partner? She sued, of course, but she lost the case, with it being thrown out in Federal court. That actually happened a few weeks ago, but I didn't hear about it until last week.

Comments

[whip-lash.livejournal.com]

You've heard the horrible story about the Washington State woman on vacation with her partner in Florida when her partner had a stroke and she and their children were forbidden from seeing her dying partner?

I have, but unfortunately it seems not to be entirely, well, true. If you read the actual judgment it becomes clear that she was allowed to see her partner (after a long delay), that she was allowed to make medical decisions for her partner and acknowledged that there is nothing she would have done differently, that the reasons for the delay would seemingly have been disputed by the hospital if it had reached trial, and that it didn't reach trial because Florida hospitals are allowed to deny visitation to anyone for any reason at all, a fact over which heterosexual next of kin have apparently frequently sued and had their cases dismissed.

All of which is not to say that if there was no medical reason for the delay in visitation at all, as she alleges, that it wasn't still horrible misbehavior on the part of the hospital.

[oh6.livejournal.com]

The bit about wanting the press to be a watchdog on the government rather reminds me of Jeremy Bentham's Handbook of Political Fallacies, which presents a scenario of rival factions in Parliament fostering freedom of the press despite the lack of support for it in law at the time.

[anfalicious.livejournal.com]

So now rape is a pre-existing condition? Awesome...

[mojave-wolf.livejournal.com]

We have different tabs but read the same stories . . .

(and, well, some. of the same tabs, like NC and Greenwald)

oh

[mojave-wolf.livejournal.com]

not sure about the source, but heard it on the radio news today. Only 57% of Americans now believe there is strong evidence for mainmade global warming, down from 77% in 2006. And this is a war I thought our side was winning/had already won. Yikes!

::goes off to repost in my lj::

Re: oh

[epawtows.livejournal.com]

Technically, there is a somewhat reasonable explanation for that- there HAS been a cooling trend since 2005-6. It's too short-term to mean much in terms of overall climate, but the average person has a VERY poor grasp of statistics.