Obama WANTS to Lose

No really. It’s the only way to explain crap like this:

Sen. Barack Obama’s team will continue its aggressive outreach to evangelical voters at the Democratic National Convention next week. Making a prime-time appearance Thursday night will be Joel C. Hunter, a Florida megachurch pastor who will deliver the convention’s closing prayer following Obama’s speech accepting the Democratic presidential nomination…

Whether or not larger numbers of evangelical voters will join him in accepting the Democrats’ invitation is still unclear, Hunter said. But, he added, his presence in Denver shows the party’s recognition of “pro-life voices.”

Uh, Barack? “PRO-LIFE VOICES” ARE ALREADY BEING LISTENED TO.  You know who’s being ignored? The majority of the population who’re pro-choice, aka your base. Astraea, months ago:

I don’t know how many times I heard in the past six months that Obama needed to tiptoe around abortion so he wouldn’t scare away the Independents. (Of course, I was also told to trust that he would defend reproductive rights once he was in office, so I guess it’s okay to lie to get the Independents).

NARAL sponsored a poll that challenges these assumptions. In fact, NARAL has shown that Obama can gain not just Independent women, but Republican women as well by being strong on choice and making his position clear (not to mention us pesky Clinton supporters who aren’t ready to back Obama). By being a champion for choice and attacking McCain’s pro-life record, Obama could differentiate himself from a candidate portrayed by the media as a moderate and falsely attacked by pro-life groups as less than ideal. By standing up for choice, Obama would strengthen the Democratic party by winning the support of pro-choice women. NARAL lays all this out very clearly. Promoting a pro-choice message:

• Moves the swing vote by drawing Independent women toward Obama.
• Generates crossover support by moving pro-choice Republican women toward Obama.
• Consolidates the base by bringing home Democratic women

…

NARAL’s poll focused on Republican and Independent women in important battleground states and found that when the difference between Obama and McCain’s positions on choice are stated clearly, Obama gains 13 points among pro-choice Independent women and 9 points among pro-choice Republican women. Overall, the impact on the general election is significant:

Once balanced information about Obama and McCain’s respective positions on choice is introduced, Obama gains 6 points, with his overall lead in these twelve states expanding from a net two points (47-45 perconet) to a net 13 points (53-40 percent).

That is huge. Also huge:

Among pro-choice Independent women, pro-choice Republican women, and liberal to moderate Republican women, the issue of abortion produces a larger advantage for Democrats than the economy, the war in Iraq, or health care.

Get that, Democrats? Pro-choice positions aren’t just window dressing for pro-choice women of any political persuasion.

Unfortunately, no, Astraea – the Democrats don’t get it. At all.

(My laptop arrived. If you couldn’t tell.)

Take Your Right-Wing Frame and Shove It

Via campskunk @ Alegre’s Corner:

O RLY?

Dear Barack:

Which ‘late-term abortions’ do you oppose, exactly? Those caused by “all those irresponsible, fickle, ninny-brained straw-women who decide willy-nilly they want abortions” when they’re “feeling blue”? Those mythical ones that do not exist?

Pregnancy is not physically comfortable, Barack, nor does society often look kindly upon the choice we make, whatever it may be.  Since women (even the dirty, whorey ones!) don’t often subject their bodies to supporting a fetus for seven months or more unless they really want to, the likelihood that a late-term abortion is done for any other reason than the “health and life of the woman” is slim-to-nil.

A piece of advice? After two presidential terms under which the reproductive rights of half the population have been under steady, unrelenting attack, the year you beat out this woman* to become the presumptive nominee? Is not the year to be fucking around with the pro-choice base of your party. People are likely to get awful… bitter.

In short – get it together, dillweed.

- RKMK

(*In theory, anyway.)

I haz seene teh lite!

It’s been one of those days, and momentously, I feel I have (finally) totally, completely shrugged off the Disney/mass-media/conventional wisdom brainwashing, and declared myself cured of any inkling to co-habitate or otherwise with a person of the male persuasion, ever.

• Exhibit 1
• Exhibit 2
• Exhibit 3

Punctuated in real life by an entitled asshole who had the gall to adjust my purse and put it in my lap on the way home, as well as a pair of equally-entitled tools at the gym today, I’ve totally had it. Rest assured that I realize that this next statement is a totally unfair vast generalization, but so be it – at this moment in time, it’s my absolute truth: Men suck. Patriarchy sucks. It’s a sucky goddamned screwed-up system, and I no longer wish to be a participant in this rampant bullshit suckiness any longer. I secede the heterosexual union, and declare kittens (and perhaps puppies) to be the natural companion for all sane women everywhere.

“Sometimes I wonder if men and women really suit each other. Perhaps they should live next door and just visit now and then.“
– Katharine Hepburn

Fun Parenting? SACRILEGE!!!

OMG WON’T SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN?!?

For chrissake, I really hope this pearl-clutching-parental-fascism wave cools down by the time I procreate, because at this very moment in time? The thing turning me off the most is enforced proximity to the Stepford Mommies. I really don’t think giving birth inherently requires me to lose all sense of myself, or live a life of tedious, unrelenting piety forevermore.

(And, for what it’s worth, I think if these parties had been going on when I was a kid? My momma and I would have been on them like white on rice, cocktails/mocktails in hand, doin’ the twist.)