the great state of texas

Texas: Bible Classes Approved

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: July 19, 2008

"The state’s Board of Education gave final approval to establishing Bible classes in public high schools, rejecting calls to draw specific teaching guidelines and warnings that such approval could lead to constitutional problems in the classroom. The Legislature passed a measure in 2007 allowing Bible courses to be offered as an elective. State officials are still waiting for an attorney general’s ruling on whether the classes must be offered to students or left to school districts to decide. Critics say the rule does not provide specific enough guidelines to help teachers and school districts know how to do that and avoid a First Amendment clash over freedom of religion. Mark Chancey, associate professor in religious studies at Southern Methodist University, has studied Bible classes already offered in about 25 districts. His study found most of the courses were explicitly devotional with almost exclusively Christian, usually Protestant, perspectives. It also found that most were taught by teachers who were not familiar with the issue of separation of church and state."

On the other hand, Texas is seriously developing its wind-power capacity, which is of course very commendable.

in the news

Seriously, what is it with Texas women? Today it's being reported that a young mother in Hudson Oaks, Texas, hanged herself and her four small children, one of whom survived. If you're as morbid as I am, read more here. According to CNN, "Police say Gilberta Estrada, 25, killed herself and then her children." Maybe this is the problem with Texas police. Or with CNN.

On a happier note, the Brazilian government has decided to subsidize contraceptive pills so that all women, poor and wealthy alike, will be able to afford the basic ability to determine when and how many children they have. In fact, the cost of a year's worth of pills will now be the equivalent of about $2.40. This in the immediate wake of the Pope's recent diatribes against "legalized" contraception (what ever that means) while touring South America. Pope Benedict apparently argued that this horrible legal contraception posed a threat to "the future of the peoples" of Latin America. The government of Brazil apparently has better sense.

early evening shadows















nova & friend

odds & ends IV

As it turns out, it's not just women who are crazy in Texas. Yesterday, in the midst of a Juneteenth celebration in Austin, an angry mob actually beat a man to death. Read more on this story here and here.

On a side note, Juneteenth, also known as June 19th, commemorates the day in 1865 that the slaves of Galveston, Texas, were first told of President Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation, which went into effect on January 1st, 1863. In other words, it took two and a half years for freedom from slavery to be enforced in the great state of Texas. Make of that what you will.

On a more mundane note, tomorrow, being the summer solstice here on the northern side of the Equator, will be the longest day of the year. Sunrise at 5:24am, sunset at 8:31pm, at least in grand old New York City.

Lastly, classic Sesame Street for the inner library geek, I mean child, in you.

texas gets even weirder

As if it wasn't frightening enough that Christine Castillo Comer, the director of science for the Texas Education Agency, was forced to resign earlier this month for allegedly "bashing" people's faith (she forwarded an email announcement about an upcoming lecture advocating evolution - oh the horror!). Now, a Texas panel on higher education is recommending that the state allow the Institute for Creation Research to offer online master's degrees in science education.

In other news, Hilary's been feeling the heat from Matt Drudge, Rush Limbaugh, and Co., the men out in force, cackling over a woman of a certain age's crows' feet and laugh lines. And of course our dear Maureen Dowd had to get in on it this morning too, snidely arguing that it's "pretty pathetic" that at this point in her career, Clinton continues to have to try to prove she's "warm-blooded." The thing about this is, I think it's pathetic too, but not exactly in the way Dowd means. It's pathetic that we judge a presidential candidate on being "warm-blooded" at all, and I think it's ridiculous that Clinton has to try to soften her image. I want a strategist in the White House, a tough-as-nails fighter who's endured as much as Clinton has and come out on the other side. Even if Hilary doesn't win the nomination or the presidency, this remains a ground-breaking moment in American history, a woman playing the political game, and playing it well, at this level. Yet it seems that, embarrassingly for the rest of us, her wrinkles and lack of an all-consuming desire to bake cookies continue to be a detriment to her campaign.

questions, quotes, & good news

I get asked a lot of questions during the course of any given day. Work questions, personal questions, easy questions, stupid questions, unanswerable questions. But this one, from a friend of mine leaving soon for Australia, definitely takes the cake: Hey Emily, I forgot to ask you an important question in our last round of messages. Would you be willing to be the keeper of my sex toys for awhile?

How can a person say no to a question like that, I ask you?

In other news, in case you've been living under a rock today, the biggest (population-wise) state in the union has officially declared that it is unconstitutional to ban gay marriage. Oh state of my early childhood, how I adore thee.

In case you were getting bored with the FLDS fiasco in Texas, there is apparently another (and even scarier) polygamist cult under investigation in that same great state. Don't worry, this isn't a death cult a la Jonestown or Heaven's Gate or anything. As the prophet Yisrayl Hawkins himself put it, "I'm not asking much out of you; I'm just asking that you be willing to die rather than leave this house." Remind me again why we didn't just let Texas go?

And then there's always my beloved Idaho offering itself up for a good laugh. This time in the guise of Walt Bayes, running for the Idaho House on a platform of (among other things) separate but equal bathrooms in public schools for straight and gay kids. Actually I don't think he's arguing equal, just separate.

The Bush quote of the day, actually an older quote but new to me, revolves around the incredible sacrifices he's made for the war effort:

"I don't want some mom whose son may have recently died to see the Commander-in-Chief playing golf. I feel I owe it to the families to be as -- to be in solidarity as best as I can with them. And I think playing golf during a war just sends the wrong signal."

I don't even know what to say about that, so probably it's best not to say anything. But it does remind me of Bush's ever so empathetic take on the Katrina disaster as he flew over New Orleans in Air Force One. If I remember correctly, it went something like this, "It's devastating, it's got to be doubly devastating on the ground." Indeed, I'm sure it's got to be. Maybe even triply so.

Maybe we can make up a new yellow ribbon: Support Our Troops. Give Up Golf.

At least we still have California.

paris, texas

(The Gotan Project & Wim Wenders, Paris, Texas)

weekend roundup

Susan Jacoby, author of Freethinkers, has a new book coming out about the dumbing down of America. You may recall the moment Miss South Carolina earned her fifteen minutes of fame awhile back, but you'll be blown away Kellie Pickler's bright and shining moment on Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader if you haven't seen it already. What seems most disturbing to me is not the stupidity, per se, but these girls' utter lack of curiosity about the world in which they live. Kind of reminds me of a certain resident in the White House who can't be bothered to read the newspapers himself because he has people to tell him what they say. And who really enjoyed reading The Stranger a year or two ago. Not that The Stranger isn't an amazing book, but it's a book most of us read when we were fifteen, for Christ's sake.

Mom & Paul joined the insanity that comprises a caucus last weekend out in Washington State and were pleased that the vast majority in their location went on to support Obama. I still can't quite wrap my head around this whole caucus notion, though, and Gail Collin's recent piece describing the process really didn't do much to convince me that it works. At all. Not to mention friend Maia's experience at the Democratic caucus in Anchorage, Alaska last week. Democracy in action, indeed.

A therapist was murdered earlier this week here in Manhattan, on the Upper East Side. I am left with this image of thousands of Manhattanites neurotically obsessing over this with their own therapists in the coming weeks. I got it out of my system on Thursday during my session with Sarah, was reassured that especially at night she always checks the door before buzzing anyone into the suite. But it does make me wonder about the lives of professionals who interact daily with unstable, depressed, needy, sometimes desperate people.

The tale of a Texas mayor 'rustling' a dog made it into the Times this week. I really don't know about Texas. Can we change our minds, let it be its own country after all?

As the CNN lead put it, this is a case that melts in your mouth. Take that as you will.

I posted a rather mocking link about the Saudi Arabian government the other day, and its antipathy towards Valentine's Day. But unfortunately the Saudi government continues to demonstrate its unabated antipathy towards women. Most recently, the story of Fawza Falih's upcoming execution for being a witch is enough to make your blood curdle.

On the homefront, Senator Joe Lieberman declared this week that waterboarding isn't really torture because it's only psychological. And besides, according to Lieberman logic, we're at war, so even if it is torture, which of course it isn't, it would still be okay! I can't believe I voted for this guy, even if only for VP, back in November of 2004. Maybe he should go read this article, an interesting take on the American waterboarding controversy from a British perspective. Or even better, he should absolutely read this piece by Malcolm Nance, a "20-year veteran of the US intelligence community's Combating Terrorism program."

passion for learning

And I thought having to take 14 weeks of home economics in middle school (one 7-week session on baking, and another on sewing! Oh the heart pillows and brownies that were made!) was bad, but now, the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, down in dear old Texas, is offering an academic concentration for the ladies: homemaking.

Also in the news, yet more strife here at Columbia. Between foreign dictators, offending nooses, and anti-Semitic slurs, campus seems to have gone just a little bit haywire these days.

in the news

McSweeney's has very helpfully compiled a list of the pros and cons of the top 20 Democrat and top 20 Republican potential presidential candidates. Take a gander and chuckle whilst you roll your eyes and groan out loud.

In the vein of Andrea Yates, Chante Mallard, and Clara Harris, yet another crazy woman from Texas made the news today. In this case, however, the woman in question was merely a witness to the crime, and not the perpetrator herself. CNN reports on Eva Mauldin, who claims that Satan himself made her husband microwave their baby daughter. According to Ms. Mauldin, the devil doesn't approve of her husband's attempts to become a preacher. Lord knows I wouldn't approve of this, either. Though the child survived the ordeal, Child Protective Services is trying to terminate parental custody.

Undeclared but clearly campaigning, Mike Bloomberg has a new website.

Last, but perhaps not least, and most certainly the most amusing, check out LOL President. Right now. Go. Just keep in mind that this might, to some, be mildly offensive. Don't be offended, laugh! Then maybe cringe.

pride

Very proud to be a New Yorker today, after the folks up in Albany finally got it right last night. It took a long time, but in the end the timing is impeccable as New York City gears up today for another Pride weekend.

I remember attending my cousin's wedding sometime in the spring of, I want to say, 1996 out in Washington State, and how he and his wife-to-be had the officiant acknowledge even back then that though we were celebrating a joyous occasion, until all of their loved ones had the same right to such a joyous occasion, their own beautiful celebration was tempered by sadness.

I remember thinking on the morning after President Obama was elected and Proposition 8 was approved, how sadly ironic an occasion that was, and how grateful I was to come from a family whose progressive worldview goes back generations.

I wrote my grandmother a letter that week thanking her for enshrining in her children and in her grandchildren such a sense of justice, such a sense of fairness and fair-play.

Our "fierce advocate" may have let us down these last two years, but four Republican senators up in Albany crossed the aisle last night and chose to treat all of their fellow New Yorkers with respect.

Today I am proud to be a New Yorker, and can't help but feel a certain sense of coming full circle: this beloved city, this huge state*, the birth place of the gay rights movement as we know it, is once again in the vanguard of civil rights.  And yeah, that makes me a little bit teary-eyed.

*With the passage of same-sex marriage in New York (the third most populous state in the Union, after California and Texas) last night, the percentage of Americans living in states that recognize marriage equality has more than doubled, to 11% of the total population.

pictures, scary people, long lost friends

Jessica was telling me recently about one of her favorite photographers: a war photographer, a photojournalist by the name of Ron Haviv. She was talking specifically about his Blood & Honey collection, a photo essay of the chaos that overtook Yugoslavia following the end of the Cold War.

Funny that she should mention him now, given the world's (and my own) preoccupation these last few weeks with the end of the Cold War. It is easy to forget that the Soviet Union and the Communist Bloc, for all their badness, kept certain horrifying nationalistic, ethnic-cleansing, tendencies in check. (Such a horrific term, 'ethnic cleansing.' Honestly I can't imagine a more horrific term, for all its mundane connotation of purification.)

I've been looking at these pictures (can't seem to stop looking at these pictures) and feeling a little overwhelmed by our capacity to inflict pain upon one other. They make me think of the Rwandan genocide, and how I was old enough in 1994 to have known what was going on, and yet I did not, any more than I understood what was going on in Eastern Europe. I was old enough that I should have known was was going on, but I wasn't paying attention. Five years later, during the summer of 1999, I was house sitting for a friend and read his copy of Philip Gourveitch's We Wish To Inform You. I spent much of the rest of that summer reading about Rwanda, trying late at night to understand the hatred and rage that must have been percolating beneath the surface of that country before the Hutus rose up, spurred on by Radio Rwanda, and slaughtered 500,000 Tutsis. (And not with the systematic, horrific coldness of the gas chambers, or even with the physical distance of guns, but rather largely with machetes. Can you imagine the force it must take to cut someone down with a machete?)

Looking at Haviv's pictures brings up similar feelings of not quite despair, but an incredibly uncomfortable mix of fascination and frustration, sadness and fury and impotence -- how is it that we continue to do this to ourselves?

And I've been thinking about Khalid Shaikh Mohammed's pending arrival here in New York City, epicenter to his frightening hatred of this country I can't help but love. I've been thinking about Jerry, who until recently served on the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, where Mohammed will be put on trial. I remember how, in the days following 9/11, the courts reopened and Jerry couldn't seem to shake a sore throat and a hoarse voice. I remember how this sore throat and hoarseness dragged on and on, after days and weeks and months of breathing in Ground Zero smoke and dust and ash.

And I've been thinking about our own homegrown extremists, the ones who begin to balance out the Khalid Shaikh Mohammeds of the Middle East, at least in rage and hatred if not yet in action. I'm remembering last August's controversial DHS report on the recent rise of rightwing extremism, and of the man who thought it was okay to bring a loaded rifle to a Presidential event, and of the man now sitting in jail after having gunned down Dr. Tiller in the foyer of his church, and of the hordes of teabaggers with their "Obama is a Nazi" rhetoric and their overblown sense of self-righteousness and self-pity. I'm thinking of the recent poll indicating that nearly 1 in 3 conservatives in New Jersey either believe or don't know whether they believe that Obama is the Antichrist. I'm thinking of the Secret Service's report that the number of death threats against our current president is unprecedented, and how when George W. Bush was in office and we left-wingers were fit to be tied, the most extreme of us was a bereaved mother camped outside Bush's ranch in Crawford, Texas. I'm thinking of Fox News and Glen Beck joking about killing our Democratic leaders. And I'm thinking about our current Republican leadership standing by these people with the guns, these people arguing that our duly elected president is not American or is the Antichrist or is a Communist, that he's going to steal our children and kill our grandmas, that his attempt at health care reform is another Final Solution.

I've been reading Chaim Potok's The Promise, and am reminded of Reuven Malter's rage against the extremists in his yeshiva, and his frustration that all extremists sound so much alike. And I am reminded of Rachel Maddow's recent interview with Frank Schaeffer, former rightwinger and religious leader turned apostate, during which he says, "What surprises me is that responsible Republican leadership and the editors of some of these Christian magazines do not stand up in holy horror and denounce this. You know, they're always asking, 'Where is the Islamic leadership denouncing terrorism? Why aren't the moderates speaking out?" Well I'd challenge the folks who I used to work with, and I would say to them, 'Where the hell are you? This is not funny anymore.'"

On another note, I recently reconnected with a girl I met in Paris twenty years ago, and for whom I babysat regularly during the months our families overlapped there. She was a wonderful girl, smart and adventurous and kind, and I still remember fondly recommending books for her to read, cooking dinner for us (boiled spaghetti and jarred tomato sauce and boiled broccoli, probably), listening to her practice the violin, spending New Year's Eve together with our families.

Turns out she's still smart and adventurous and kind, and a writer! This piece, published earlier this fall, moved me almost to tears.

quote of the day & other miscellanies

"I must say, I'm a little envious. If I were slightly younger and not employed here, I think it would be a fantastic experience to be on the front lines of helping this young democracy succeed. It must be exciting for you … in some ways romantic, in some ways, you know, confronting danger. You're really making history, and thanks."
-our illustrious leader, addressing troops currently stationed in Afghanistan

I must say, Georgie darling, that you won't be employed here much longer, that the war will certainly continue beyond your termination date, and that some might argue you have the mental capacity of an adolescent (or, alternatively, a psychopath -- I hear the military's hard up for recruits these days). So go. Act out your romantic fantasies of combat duty since you missed out during Vietnam. Confront danger. Spread democracy. Make history. And, you know, thanks.

On a more domestic note, my beloved alma mater, Barnard, figured prominently in an article recently about the ever expanding horizons of gender. Specifically the place of transmale students at women's colleges. Just don't ask me about my take on this, because I haven't quite figured it out yet myself.

In yet another addition to the chronicles of Texas, a woman threw her children off a bridge the other day, and then jumped. Somehow they all survived.

Last, and I'm not sure which rock I've clearly been living under, but I just recently saw that there's a Broadway musical about my beloved neighborhood! Huh.

our legal system at work

In the news today, a certain Legal Aid lawyer pleaded guilty yesterday to unlawful surveillance. And I knew this guy! He dated my best friend back in our senior year of high school. I thought he was a schmuck back then, and it turns out he's even sleazier now. Ick.

Also in the news today, Judge Sharon Keller of the Texas Court of Criminal Apeals is taking some serious flak for refusing to stop an execution last month. Her reason for allowing it to go forward? The defense team submitted the defendant's final appeal twenty minutes past five o'clock, closing time for this judge at least, due to computer problems.

'she's dancing round in circles, stripping off her armor'

I've been listening this evening to Benewah Road, the most recent project from David Hoffman of Harrison, Idaho days.

On the David note, there must be something about that particular name, because it always seems like the Davids in my life are amongst the kindest, coolest people in the world.

And on the Idaho note, there's a book I might buy if I were buying books these days, by the name of On All Sides Nowhere, the story of a man who went off into the wilds of northern Idaho for graduate school (yes, they have graduate schools in the wilds of Idaho!) and has this to say about the state that Gregory Peck's character in On the Beach claimed as home:

Idaho first registered on my consciousness at the movies. In the summer of 1960 I was sixteen, and in the middle of August there was no place in suburban Pennsylvania to find air conditioning except in supermarkets or theaters. I could not spend summer days amid the cabbages and canned goods, and so to escape the heat I went with my friends as often as I could to the movies; one of the movies I sought out was an elegy for the waning days of modern civilization, On the Beach.

To the filmgoing public in 1960, keenly aware that despite all the best intentions the cold war could suddently turn hot, the movie was perfectly credibe. It was set only a few years into the future; a calendar on the wall read, ominously, "1964." Nuclear war of undisclosed origins had killed everyone in the Northern Hemisphere, and now, as a lethal cloud of radiation spread slowly over the planet, one of the last surviving groups of humans clustered in Melbourne, Australia, to await the end. It was an intoxicating, almost carnivalesque, experience. Gregory Peck played the romantic lead opposite Ava Gardner, and at one point in the film, Peck, the taciturn commander of a nuclear submarine, tells Ava Gardner about his origins. In answer to her question about his childhood home, he repies with a single word that at the time seemed more homiletic than informative: "Idaho."

Whose decision was it for Peck to calim Idaho for his birthplace? Of all the possible states the scriptwriter could have chosen, why that one? And it was a choice: for the record, Peck was born in La Jolla, California, and his character in Nevil Shute's novel from which the movie was adapted comes from Westport, Connecticut. Peck's "Idaho" drops like a stone into a wel of unknown depth; it falls without a trace, without echo. It is a piece, apparently, of purely gratuitous information.

Why Idaho? The name resonates oddly with Melbourne and San Francisco, the environments of On the Beach. Those places set the mood of the film. To Americans in 1960, Melbournce was alien, exotic, and San Francisco brought to mind the glitz and romance of California. Set in that context, and set against the despairing hedonism of humans who number their remaining days according to the drifting global winds, "Idaho" seems dissonant. Its sound is stark, but as Peck speaks it, it sounds also moral and attractive. It seems to express Peck's loneliness, his longing for the simplicity of childhood and for the innocence of a world before the Bomb. None of the familiar mythic names of the American West, not Texas or Oregon or Colorado, would have the same aura of pure expressivity. My guess is that the name "Idaho" was chosen for its semantic emptiness. The name made sense because to most people "Idaho" meant nothing, and, meaning nothing, it could stand in for the infinite pathos of a world that would shortly cease to exist. Idaho was then, and in some ways still is, a geographic What You Will, and as a result the name "Idaho" becomes a kind of cultural Rorschach test for whoever happens to reflect on it.

a way with words

Barbara Bush, that dear, sweet, little old lady, has a certain way with the English language.

Recently asked if the electorate would be wary of Mitt Romney's Mormonism, she replied, "Not at all. I mean it was in 1897 that bigamy was outlawed in that church. You know we have a lot of Christian wild people too, and a lot of Jewish wild people and a lot of Muslim wild people. The Mormon religion takes care of its own, they don't have people on welfare."

Going back to Hurricane Katrina, Barbara had these choice words for the thousands of refugees forced to evacuate New Orleans and flee to the Houston Astrodome, "What I'm hearing, which is sort of scary, is they all want to stay in Texas. Everyone is so overwhelmed by the hospitality. And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this, this is working very well for them."

And further back, on the eve of the invasion of Iraq in March of 2003, Barbara pontificated on the media coverage thereof, "But why should we hear about body bags, and deaths, and how many, what day it's gonna happen, and how many of this or what do you suppose? Or, I mean, it's, it's not relevant. So, why should I waste my beautiful mind on something like that?"

Why indeed.

absurdity

Grand Jury Clears Texan in the Killing of 2 Burglars

Just so I get this straight. The Supreme Court recently found that the death penalty can only be enacted against murderers -- no other crime, not even one as heinous as child rape. But in Texas, it's okay to shoot people in the back if you happen to see them robbing someone else's house, even while a 911 operator is begging you not to shoot and police are on the way.

I know we all theoretically have the right to life, liberty, and property, but I hadn't realized before that we have the right to kill over one person's property at the expense of another person's life. That's a new one.

mid-week news roundup

First, there was that great little article yesterday in Salon about the soon-to-be-released film The Golden Compass, and from a Catholic's perspective, no less.

Here, finally, is an argument supporting global warming that perhaps even the Bushes can understand, being all about the bottom line.

Poor Larry Craig just can't seem to get a break, at least as far as the Idaho Statesman is concerned.

Christine Castillo Comer, the director of science for the Texas Education Agency, was forced to resign recently because she didn't remain neutral enough on evolution. I kid you not. Her crime? Forwarding an email about a lecture being given by a philosophy professor who was an expert witness in the Kitzvmiller vs. Dover Area School District case a few years ago, and who had testified against intelligent design.

I'm sure most people were as relieved as I was yesterday to see that Iran in fact does not have a nuclear weapons strategy at the moment, at least according to the most recent National Intelligence Estimate, which says in part, "Tehran’s decision to halt its nuclear weapons program suggests it is less determined to develop nuclear weapons than we have been judging since 2005. Our assessment that the program probably was halted primarily in response to international pressure suggests Iran may be more vulnerable to influence on the issue than we judged previously."

You'd think that, given the no nukes thing, maybe Bush & Co. would ratchet down their scary WWIII rhetoric. But no. Bush, as we all know by now, is not a man at ease with new ideas. As he so eloquently explained yesterday morning at a press conference, "And so I view this report as a warning signal that they had the [nuclear weapons] program. They halted the program. And the reason why it’s a warning signal is that they could restart it.”

So let me get this straight. Bush has been claiming that the Iranians have nuclear weapons, or are on the verge of having nuclear weapons, and are thus dangerous. Turns out, they not only do not have nuclear weapons, but they haven't really been trying to get them since late 2003, perhaps in response to our invasion of Iraq. But nothing has changed, because Iran could still, some day in the future, again try to get nuclear weapons.

And also, a warning signal, kind of by definition, happens before the thing itself. That's what a warning is. That's even often what a signal is. So this new report cannot be a warning signal that Iran had, in the past, a nuclear weapons program. That's just dumb.

What was it that Stephen Colbert said at the White House Press Dinner a few years back?

"The greatest thing about this man is he's steady. You know where he stands. He believes the same thing Wednesday that he believed on Monday, no matter what happened Tuesday. Events can change; this man's beliefs never will."

All righty then.

in the news

Voters in Bexar County, Texas, were disappointed to find out that Super Tuesday wasn't so super for them after all.

People tend to mock New Jersey but I'm beginning to wonder if it isn't time to change that tune. New Jersey has become probably the most progressive state in the union these last few years, and that's something to admire.

Given my recent pet situation, and given how torn I'm feeling about getting another cat, I found this article from Salon very comforting. (For all you non-Salon readers out there, just a heads-up that you have to click on "Enter Salon" in the upper right hand corner in order to access Salon articles. No sign-in necessary though!)

Mark Bittman, aka the Minimalist of the New York Times dining page and author of my beloved and well-thumbed How to Cook Everything (now also available in a vegetarian edition!), has joined the blogging epidemic with the brand spanking new Bitten.

Columbia University has a way with attracting interesting students, it seems. I suppose it's commendable that she used identity theft to get an education, at least.

On a more serious note, the heartbreaking and infuriating story of a Guantanamo Bay prisoner who was accused of being a Taliban leader but in fact was an Afghan war hero for resistance against the Soviets back in the 1980s and later against the Taliban itself. Unfortunately our military didn't really go out of its way to figure out his actual identity, and he has since died of cancer in Gitmo.

On a lighter note, and bringing me first to the Northwest, is this story of a leatherback turtle that swam from Indonesia to Oregon!

And then there's the craziness of Washington State politics and the thrilling news that Obama swept all three states yesterday, winning handily in Washington, Nebraska, and Louisiana.

That said, I just read an old editorial by Anna Quindlen (fellow Barnard alumn, I might add), on our political leaders and their superior wives. This was written back in 1992, mind you, but it still holds true today. I mean, much as I like Barack, I think that I'd rather be voting for Michelle.

smashmortion & television, or, yet another reason i love friday night lights

Show me a woman who has never endured a moment of panic at the thought that she might be pregnant and I'll show you a virgin or a liar.

I've been thinking a lot this week about abortion.  My own.  Others'.  All those millions who have had one, or who have chosen not to. I've been thinking about the beauty of choice, and how that single word carries within it all the myriad decisions women make.  How sometimes it carries within it motherhood. How sometimes it carries within it death. How sometimes it carries within it an inarguable sense of freedom tempered perhaps with grief. How always it carries within it responsibility: for ourselves, for all that comes from us, and for all that does not.

Planned Parenthood is in danger of losing its federal funding, and this, I can tell you, is a travesty.*  Planned Parenthood was the place I turned to when I found myself trapped in that moment of panic, but it was also the place that made sure, afterward, that I went back for check-ups, for better birth control, for counseling, for a clean bill of health.

Planned Parenthood has been and will continue to be a voice of reason in the face of ongoing attempts, both culturally and legislatively, to control women's sexuality and reproductive freedom.  Bombastic? Perhaps.  But also true.

In Georgia there is legislation pending that would require that every single miscarriage in that state be fully investigated to see if it was actually (as they ever so delicately put it) "prenatal murder." The language of this bill is horrifying, and worth the reading.  It lays out an argument that Supreme Court decisions don't apply to Georgia in this case. It lays out what is to be done if the fetal death takes place in a hospital, in a home, in a moving vehicle, across state lines.  It explains that prenatal murder "does not include a naturally occurring expulsion of a fetus known medically as a 'spontaneous abortion' and popularly as a 'miscarriage' so long as there is no human involvement whatsoever in the causation of such event."**  Which of course does nothing to allay my perhaps overblown fears that any behavior a woman commits could potentially be construed as human involvement in her miscarriage.  A fender bender.  A fall down the stairs or trip on the sidewalk. Not eating enough vegetables during her pregnancy. Smoking. Exercising too much.  Exercising not enough. Having a glass of champagne before (or after) knowing she was pregnant. And so on and so forth.

In Kansas, George Tiller, a longtime abortion provider, was assassinated in the foyer of his church in the morning of May 31st, 2009.

In Ohio in 2007 legislation was proposed that would require that any woman seeking an abortion first get permission from the father of the fetus.  No matter the circumstances.  No matter that the Supreme Court already found in Planned Parenthood v. Casey that a woman doesn't even need her husband's consent, let alone anyone else's consent, to obtain an abortion.

Legislators in South Dakota recently attempted to pass a bill that could be interpreted as allowing for the murder of abortion providers.  (It has since been shelved, at least for now.)

And then there was Justice Kennedy's disturbing justification for banning some types of abortion procedures in Gonzalez v. Carhart also back in 2007: that women are sometimes so traumatized by choosing to have an abortion that we need to be protected from our own poor decision-making skills.

And then there's abortion in popular culture.  Party of Five almost got us there, but our heroine conveniently miscarried on her way to the abortion clinic.  Felicity did get us there, but the girl in question turned out to have cheated on her boyfriend so it was okay that she decided to abort her pregnancy: she was bad already anyway.  Judd Apatow's Knocked Up, while coming from a self-proclaimed pro-choice liberal, avoided the word itself like the plague.

Which brings me, in my ever roundabout way, to Friday Night Lights.  I don't get football but I freaking love Friday Night Lights.  It's got not only great characters but also wonderful character development.  It's got some fun songs. And it's dealt, over the course of its five seasons, with lots of prickly issues from serious football injuries to drug-addled parents to teen sex.  Becky, one of our small town high schools girls, finds herself in dire straits after a romantic night with one of our intrepid football players.  Miraculously, the show not only lets her have an abortion, but also lets her continue to be a decent and normal teenager after the fact.

And made a big splash in the process.

I just started the no-longer-quite-new fifth season this evening and it's looking good for our Dillon, Texas friends so far.  And oh how I still adore those opening credits.

Oh, also, please please please take a moment to write to your congresspeople and tell them not to cut federal funding for Planned Parenthood and all the much-needed services they provide.  Abortions, STD testing, contraception, cancer screening, and information on everything from pregnancy to quitting smoking to getting the flu vaccine.

*To put this loss of funding in perspective: Planned Parenthood is already committed to not spending federal funds on abortion services, but rather uses this money for its many, many other services.  And while abortion makes up a sizable portion of what Planned Parenthood does, this is largely because abortion services have been segregated from all other health care services and organizations such as Planned Parenthood have had to pick up the slack.  So all the conservatives hellbent on punishing Planned Parenthood aren't stopping abortions, they're cutting funds to services that help to prevent more abortions and more unwanted pregnancies.

**Italics mine.  Creepily enough this section contains the only mention of the word "woman", except where the bill states that it repeals the Woman's Right To Know Act which provides that all women seeking an abortion must be offered the chance to see their sonogram and listen to their baby's heartbeat.  Now that all abortions and possibly miscarriages are to be criminalized, the Woman's Right To Know Act is, of course, no longer necessary.

art installation, Project Row Houses, houston, texas













courtesy of the new york times