Dan Savage Responds To Rick Santorum’s Promise To ‘Pray For’ Him

GOOGLE SANTORUM

“Rick Santorum thinks that women who have been raped should be compelled—by force of law—to carry the babies of their rapists to term, he thinks birth control should be illegal, he wants to prosecute pornographers, etc., etc., basically the guy wants to be president so that he can micromanage the sex lives of all Americans…and I’m the one with issues? Because I made a dirty joke at his expense eight or nine years ago and it stuck? I’m the one with issues?”

Savage concluded, “Rick can pray for me. I’ll gay for him. And we can call it even.”

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AFGE Responds to House GOP Budget Proposal

WASHINGTON – American Federation of Government Employees National President John Gage today issued the following statement in response to the 2013 budget plan introduced by House Republicans:

“The House GOP budget, proposed by Rep. Paul Ryan, proposes a staggering $368 billion in additional federal workforce cuts over the next 10 years. Federal employees would have their salaries frozen for another three years and would face massive cuts to the retirement benefits promised when they were hired. In addition, the federal workforce would be cut by 10 percent, jeopardizing the federal programs and services every American relies on.

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Does Conservatism Have to Be Synonymous With Ignorance? [You Bet’cha!]

The Catholic Church [the well-renowned international child raping organization] has long been an enemy of emerging technology, especially when it comes to reproductive health, opposing any technology that alters the ‘natural’ scheme of sex and reproduction. . . .

But it is Mr. Santorum whose vehement opposition involves not only emerging reproductive technology but also almost any form of medical intervention in reproduction, positive or negative. It would be tempting to chalk up Mr. Santorum’s medieval views to a devout Catholic fundamentalism, but that is unfair to Catholicism. Mr. Santorum instead represents the very epitome of many among the modern breed of conservative Republicans: Ignorant and proud of it.

Mr. Santorum has steadfastly maintained throughout his career an almost perfect record of opposing the well-known evidence of empirical reality. . . .

Santorum’s proud ignorance is unfortunately not unique. Over the past decade, since the success of George W. Bush’s candidacy for President, conservatism in this country has become synonymous with such ignorance. . . .

Choosing to censor or distort knowledge rather than risk the possibility that such knowledge, or the technologies that result from it, might challenge faith or confront preexisting ideological biases is a something that should better characterize the Taliban or al Qaeda rather than the Republican Party.

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A Sarah Palin-style Democrat just ain’t gonna happen

Über-wanker Richard Cohen discovers that Republican GOP candidates are morons (so far so good), then concludes that the Democrats will inevitably follow with its own cast of idiots.

Moron.

Cohen apparently hasn’t noticed politicians railing against Washington since … forever! Heck, every capital of every state and every country gets similar treatment. But that kind of rhetoric has typically focused on corruption and disfunction, not an ideological hatred for the function of government.

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Quote: Isaac Asimov

Isaac Asimov born Eyzik Yudovitš Asimov (c. January 2, 1920 – April 6, 1992)
American author, professor of biochemistry at Boston University, one of the most prolific writers of all time, having written or edited more than 500 books and an estimated 90,000 letters and postcards, a humanist, a rationalist and an atheist

There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that “my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.”

The danger of the current arguments on contraception

. . . Despite Rush Limbaugh’s campaign against what he possibly fantasized Sandra Fluke’s personal life to be, it is very important to remember that none of her testimony centered around the primarily intended use of hormonal contraception—that is to say, pregnancy prevention. Instead, Ms. Fluke’s testimony mainly centered around a friend who needed hormonal contraception as a method of controlling symptoms related to ovarian cysts. . . .

If the defense of the contraceptive mandate, and of contraception in general, focuses heavily on its use for treatment of other medical conditions, it risks creating a bifurcation between uses that are “legitimate” for the purposes of an employer mandate—such as treatment of cysts or menorrhagia—and the use that is not: namely, allowing a woman to control her own fertility. . . .

Examples of the other uses of contraception are very effective at showing the pathetic shortsightedness and tragic indifference of the right, but they cannot distract from the key prize: fighting for a woman’s right to self-determination.

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