North Dakota Lawmaker: Banning Abortion Will Help Women ‘Realize’ They Don’t Want One After All

North Dakota Lawmaker: Banning Abortion Will Help Women ‘Realize’ They Don’t Want One After All: Rep. Bette Grande, one of the primary backers of North Dakota’s new unconstitutional abortion ban, is no stranger to anti-choice efforts to coerce women out of their decision to terminate a pregnancy. Four years ago, she spearheaded the state’s forced ultrasound law. Since then, she says young women have told her they decided not to [...]/p

How Right-Wingers in Congress Came to Represent a Whole Different Country | Alternet

How Right-Wingers in Congress Came to Represent a Whole Different Country | Alternet
"With an assist from some long-term demographic trends, House Republicans have redistricted, propagandized and policed themselves into another country.

As a result, they have become unmoored from the political incentives that typically drive law-makers' decision-making process. Public opinion no longer sways them, and that is creating a potentially insurmountable problem for the party establishment's efforts to broaden the GOP's appeal beyond angry old white people."

Middle Out Economics 101

Everything We Know About What's Happened Under Sequestration

Everything We Know About What's Happened Under Sequestration
"Children in Indiana have been cut from the federally funded Head Start preschool program. Last week, the White Houseannounced furloughs for480 staffers in the Office of Management and Budget. And cuts to Medicare have forced cancer clinics to turn away thousands of patients who are being treated with drugs the clinics can no longer afford.

We’ve taken a look at what’s actually happened in the six weeks since sequestration took effect."

Sen. Warren and End of the Minimum Wage Debate

Virginia Abortion Rights Undermined By TRAP Tricks

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Senator Elizabeth Warren's opening statement and Q&A at the April 11, 2013 Senate Banking Committee

BREAKING: Virginia Board Of Health Passes Regulations Meant To Shut Down Abortion Clinics

BREAKING: Virginia Board Of Health Passes Regulations Meant To Shut Down Abortion Clinics: The Virginia Board of Health voted 11-2 on Friday “to require abortion clinics to meet strict, hospital-style building codes” that many women’s health advocates say will put abortion providers out of business and prevent women from accessing essential medical services. Pending final approval by conservative state Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R) and Gov. Bob McDonnell [...]/p

Republicans Push 700 New Laws to Regulate Women's Bodies | Alternet

Republicans Push 700 New Laws to Regulate Women's Bodies | Alternet
"In the first quarter of 2013, states have proposed 694 provisions related to a woman’s body, how she gets pregnant, or how she chooses to end that pregnancy."

Organic Eden Foods’ Secretive Right-Wing Agenda | Alternet

Organic Eden Foods’ Secretive Right-Wing Agenda | Alternet
"The slogan for Eden Foods, which describes itself as the “oldest natural and organic food company in North America,” is “creation and maintenance of purity in food.” Its CEO and founder, Michael Potter, has been prominent in debates over labeling of organic food and GMOs. But the company has been quietly seeking in court another form of purity — to Catholic doctrine about sex being solely for procreation. That goes not just for Potter, but for all 128 of his employees."

Elizabeth Warren Tears Into Federal Regulators For Shielding Big Banks

Elizabeth Warren Tears Into Federal Regulators For Shielding Big Banks: Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) embarrassed government regulators during a Senate Banking Committee hearing on Thursday morning as she demanded to know why they won’t reveal how frequently big banks illegally foreclosed on homeowners. In January, regulators abandoned a case-by-case review of foreclosure fraud conducted by some of the nation’s largest banks in favor of a [...]/p

Sen. Warren, Rep. Cummings Seek Docs To ID Mortgage Servicers

Sen. Warren, Rep. Cummings Seek Docs To ID Mortgage Servicers
"Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Rep. Elijah E. Cummings sent a letter to Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and Comptroller Thomas Curry, challenging a decision by agency staff not to supply documents related to violations of federal and state law by mortgage servicing companies. This is why we wanted her, and by gum, it's good to have her!"

In Just Three Months, States Proposed An Astonishing 694 Provisions About Reproduction

In Just Three Months, States Proposed An Astonishing 694 Provisions About Reproduction: In the first quarter of 2013, states have proposed 694 provisions related to a woman’s body, how she gets pregnant, or how she chooses to end that pregnancy. A new report released on Thursday by the Guttmacher Institute takes a comprehensive look at how the War on Women has continued past the election cycle and [...]/p

Democrats Try To Force Republicans To Allow Vote On Pay Equity

Democrats Try To Force Republicans To Allow Vote On Pay Equity: Last summer, Republican senators filibustered the Paycheck Fairness Act, which would have bolstered protections for women who are discriminated against in their paychecks and increased salary transparency to let women find out if they were being paid less than their male colleagues. The bill was filed again this year by Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-CT), with [...]/p

The Southern State Fast Becoming Ayn Rand's Vision of Paradise | Alternet

The Southern State Fast Becoming Ayn Rand's Vision of Paradise | Alternet
"As you would expect, this translates into hard times for its public school systems, which rank 48th in school revenues per student and 45th in teacher salaries. The failure to invest in education also corresponds with poverty: the state has the 40th worst poverty rate (15%) and the 13th highest state percentage of poor children (26%). 

Employment opportunities also are extremely poor for the poor. Only 25% have full-time jobs, 45% are employed part-time, and a whopping 30% have no jobs at all. So what do you do with all those low-income folks who don't have decent jobs? You put a good number of them in jail. In fact, only Louisiana, Georgia and New Mexico have  higher jail incarceration rates."

'There Are Now States Where It's Not Safe to Be a Woman' | Common Dreams

'There Are Now States Where It's Not Safe to Be a Woman' | Common Dreams
"Chalk another one up for the extremists. Three weeks after Arkansas’ legislature overrode a veto and prohibited most second trimester abortions, North Dakota’s Governor signed into law a ban that kicks in just six weeks after conception. As the Associated Press noted, both sides recognize the laws for what they are: “an unprecedented frontal assault” on the Supreme Court’s landmark ruling in Roe v. Wade."

Arkansas Republicans Vote To Eliminate Sex Ed Program In Public High Schools

Arkansas Republicans Vote To Eliminate Sex Ed Program In Public High Schools: Abortion opponents in Arkansas are currently focused on targeting Planned Parenthood, apparently unconcerned about the fact that their crusade could actually have much broader consequences in areas unrelated to abortion care. On Tuesday, the state Senate voted to strip funding from the women’s health organization, advancing a measure that would effectively kill a comprehensive sex [...]/p

On Abortion, the GOP Tacks Right

On Abortion, the GOP Tacks Right
"Similarly, Kansas’s rigid changes to the tax code or the requirement that abortion material provide false information to patients could also catch fire around the country. What’s started in a handful of places isn’t likely to stay within state lines."

Thousands Rally To Protest Sequestration Cuts To Medical Research Programs

Thousands Rally To Protest Sequestration Cuts To Medical Research Programs: Thousands of researchers, patients, doctors, scientists, and advocates gathered rallied outside of Carnegie Library in Washington DC to protest sequestration cuts towards medical research. Organizers estimated that the Rally for Medical Research, protesting budget cuts to the National Institutes of Health, had around 10,000 attendees. “When [Congress] sees a grassroots movement rising up from doctors, [...]/p

The 10 Jobs With The Biggest Gender Wage Gap

The 10 Jobs With The Biggest Gender Wage Gap: Today is Equal Pay Day, the day of the year when the typical woman worker finally catches up to the wages the average male worker made last year. Women make 77 cents for every dollar earned by men, and though that gap has shrunk since President John F. Kennedy signed the Equal Pay Act in [...]/p

Rape Culture Claims Another Victim: Teen Ends Life After Photo Of Her Alleged Gang Rape Goes Viral

Rape Culture Claims Another Victim: Teen Ends Life After Photo Of Her Alleged Gang Rape Goes Viral: Seventeen months ago a Canadian teen was allegedly gang-raped by four of her peers and the photo evidence of the rape spread across her community. But unlike the situation that unfolded in Steubenville, where the victim was at least given the comfort of knowing her assailants received some measure of punishment (even if the media [...]/p

Rosie The Riveter On A Wind Turbine: Women And The Growing Green Economy

Rosie The Riveter On A Wind Turbine: Women And The Growing Green Economy: By Mari Hernandez and Rebecca Lefton In March, the Bureau of Labor Services released its green jobs report, which reported a total of 3.4 million jobs associated with the production of green goods and services in 2011 – up from 3.1 million green jobs in 2010. Growing at a rate four times faster than all [...]/p

Americans In All 50 States Speak Up In Support Of Obamacare’s Birth Control Provision

Americans In All 50 States Speak Up In Support Of Obamacare’s Birth Control Provision: The comment period for Obamacare’s birth control provision came to a close on Monday. According to a recent Sunlight Foundation analysis, that regulation — which seeks to help eliminate the gender-based disparity in health costs by requiring insurance companies to cover contraceptive services without a co-pay — was Obamacare’s most controversial provision, as more comments [...]/p

60 Minutes Talks To Sandy Hook Parents

60 Minutes Talks To Sandy Hook Parents
"If you don't at least get a lump in your throat at the raw pain and grief of these parents of the victims of the Sandy Hook shootings, you don't have a heart."

How One Multi-Millionaire Is Turning North Carolina Into A Tea Party Utopia

How One Multi-Millionaire Is Turning North Carolina Into A Tea Party Utopia: Shutting Down Abortion Clinics: Another bill in the state senate would add new restrictions to abortion clinics in an attempt to force them to close their doors. Among other things, the bill requires doctors to have admitting privileges in a hospital located within 30 miles of the clinic, an unnecessary restriction that serves little purpose other than to limit the pool of doctors available to clinics.

Kansas Is Poised To Become The Latest State To Define Life At Conception

Kansas Is Poised To Become The Latest State To Define Life At Conception: Last week, Dr. George Tiller’s former abortion clinic re-opened its doors to the Kansas public, a huge victory for the women in Wichita who haven’t had access to a nearby clinic since Tiller’s murder in 2009. One the heels of that step forward, however, the state’s anti-abortion lawmakers are working hard to pull Kansas yet [...]/p

Morning Joe Host Blasts GOP For Putting ‘Rapists’ Rights Over Parents’ Rights’ In Gun Debate

Morning Joe Host Blasts GOP For Putting ‘Rapists’ Rights Over Parents’ Rights’ In Gun Debate: Former Republican Congressman Joe Scarborough tore into the growing number of conservative senators who have pledged to filibuster a comprehensive gun safety bill without reading the proposal. The 13 senators — including likely 2016 presidential candidates Marco Rubio and Rand Paul — will win support “from a segment of your voting population,” Scarborough reasoned, but [...]/p

The Escalating War on Women

GOP Lost Without Bedroom Intrusion Agenda

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Report: Ohio Is Illegally Throwing Poor People In Jail For Owing Money

Report: Ohio Is Illegally Throwing Poor People In Jail For Owing Money: The Americans Civil Liberties Union on Friday revealed that courts in Ohio are illegally throwing poor people in jail for being unable to pay off a debt. In a report titled, “The Outskirts of Hope,” (PDF) the ACLU shines a light on a harrowing “debtors’ prison” system in Ohio — one that violates both the [...]/p

Tennessee Clergy Speak Out Against Bill To Cut Welfare For Children Who Get Poor Grades

Tennessee Clergy Speak Out Against Bill To Cut Welfare For Children Who Get Poor Grades: As Tennessee prepares to consider two bills to reduce welfare assistance for needy families whose children are not doing well in school, a Change.org petition has popped up to fight the measure. The petition was started by Clergy for Justice, a Tennesse-based organization of clergy that has previously advocated for causes including immigration reform, health [...]/p

Nevada Lawmaker Gets Death Threats After Revealing Her Abortion at Sex Ed Talk

Nevada Lawmaker Gets Death Threats After Revealing Her Abortion at Sex Ed Talk
"The life of a Latina assemblywoman in Nevada has been threatened after she used a story about her own personal abortion experience at age 16 to make a point about the importance of sex education."

Defying Extremist Threats, Clinic Reopens With Community Support

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In Kansas, Legalizing Switchblades Is Less Controversial Than Protecting Women’s Health

In Kansas, Legalizing Switchblades Is Less Controversial Than Protecting Women’s Health: The Wichita Eagle reports that a bill to legalize switchblade and stiletto knives passed the Kansas Senate on Wednesday “[w]ith little discussion and no dissent.” If passed by the state House and signed into law, it would remove the knives from the state’s banned weapons list — although under a 1958 federal law, the manufacture, [...]/p

Judge Rules Emergency Contraception Should Be Available To All Women Over The Counter

Judge Rules Emergency Contraception Should Be Available To All Women Over The Counter: In a victory for birth control access, a U.S. federal judge has ordered the Food and Drug Administration to remove the current restrictions on the morning after pill, commonly known as “Plan B.” Even though the FDA initially recommended that Plan B should be available without a prescription for women of all ages, the Obama [...]/p

How The Right Wing Manufactured A Fake Controversy Over Planned Parenthood’s ‘Infanticide’

How The Right Wing Manufactured A Fake Controversy Over Planned Parenthood’s ‘Infanticide’: On Wednesday, RNC Chairman Reince Priebus published an editorial lambasting the mainstream media for “covering up” Planned Parenthood’s “support for infanticide.” According to Priebus, the national women’s health organization — in addition to providing contraceptive services, STD testing, cancer screenings, and reproductive care for millions of women across the country — is also in the [...]/p

War On Women Advances Despite Legal Protections

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Nevada Lawmaker Receives Death Threats After Talking About Her Abortion

Nevada Lawmaker Receives Death Threats After Talking About Her Abortion: Nevada, which has one of the highest rates of unintended teen pregnancy in the nation, is considering updating its abstinence-only education policy to require more comprehensive sexual health instruction in public schools. This week, in a debate over that proposed legislation, Nevada Assemblywomen Lucy Flores (D) testified in favor of the bill, sharing her own [...]/p

Georgia Students Want To Hold The First Integrated Prom In Their High School’s History

Georgia Students Want To Hold The First Integrated Prom In Their High School’s History: Four students at Wilcox County High School in Georgia want to attend prom together — but under the current setup, they won’t be allowed to unless they throw their own. Wilcox County High School’s proms are still segregated by race, meaning Stephanie Sinnot, Mareshia Rucker, Quanesha Wallace, and Keela Bloodworth — half of whom are [...]/p

VIDEO: The Pain From Sequestration As Told By Local News

VIDEO: The Pain From Sequestration As Told By Local News: The automatic spending cuts that went into effect at the start of March are spread out over a host of domestic programs and are having a real impact on communities across the country. Sequestration is cutting jobs, shutting down essential services, and hurting state economies. And while the consequences of the reductions are not leading [...]/p

Arkansas GOP Prioritizes Targeting Planned Parenthood Over Funding Rape Crisis Centers

Arkansas GOP Prioritizes Targeting Planned Parenthood Over Funding Rape Crisis Centers: So far this session, Arkansas Republicans have already pushed through some of the most restrictive abortion bans in the country. But state lawmakers aren’t finished with their attacks on reproductive rights. Now, the Arkansas legislature is attempting to strip funding from Planned Parenthood — and, intent on attacking the women’s health organization, Republicans are advancing [...]/p

How South Carolina Republicans Belittle Elizabeth Colbert Busch

How South Carolina Republicans Belittle Elizabeth Colbert Busch: Former South Carolina Governor and current Republican nominee for Congress Mark Sanford has his work cut out for him if he wants to win the special election on May 7th, his first attempt at staging a political comeback after being forced to resign his governorship following a very public affair. But that didn’t stop one [...]/p

GOP Pitches ‘Family-Friendly’ Policy That Would Weaken Overtime Pay

GOP Pitches ‘Family-Friendly’ Policy That Would Weaken Overtime Pay: House Republicans are planning to consider legislation that would weaken rules requiring businesses to pay workers when they work more than 40 hours in a week. Instead of allowing workers to make increased wages for working overtime, the legislation would give employers the option of providing workers with “comp time,” or more time off of [...]/p

Family Planning Clinics Are Essential Health Care Providers, But They’re Under Attack

Family Planning Clinics Are Essential Health Care Providers, But They’re Under Attack: In states across the country, women rely on publicly-funded family planning clinics — such as their local Planned Parenthood affiliates — for their primary care needs. In fact, according to the Guttmacher Institute, women choose to go to family planning clinics even when other health care providers are available in their community, largely because some [...]/p

President Obama Announces Bipartisan Brain Initiative

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Mike Huckabee: Obama May Be Planning To Grab Guns And Launch A Nazi-Like Dictatorship

Mike Huckabee: Obama May Be Planning To Grab Guns And Launch A Nazi-Like Dictatorship: Since calls for stricter gun regulation have increased after the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre, the gun lobby has deployed the Nazi comparison frequently. However, under Nazi rule, gun laws were actually relaxed. While Jews were banned from owning any weapons, the legal age to own a gun was lowered, while rifle and shotgun possession was deregulated. Experts say gun policy had little effect on Nazi power either way.

Even with no evidence to back up the confiscation conspiracy, gun advocates and Republican lawmakers have embraced rhetoric comparing President Obama to Hitler and Stalin. Meanwhile, 92 percent of the public supports mandatory background checks for all gun purchases, including overwhelming majorities of gun owners and NRA members.

Zina's Story

Ken Cuccinelli’s Legal Appeal And How He Helped Undermine Virginia’s Protections Against Adult Sex With Minors

Ken Cuccinelli’s Legal Appeal And How He Helped Undermine Virginia’s Protections Against Adult Sex With Minors: Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli II (R) filed an appeal last week after a federal appeals court struck down Virginia’s sodomy law as unconstitutional. Virginia prosecutors had charged a 47-year-old man with soliciting oral sex from a 17-year-old girl — a felony under the disputed law. But whether or not Cuccinelli’s appeal succeeds, his vote [...]/p

If Election Were Held Today, Democrats Would Win House In A Landslide — And Only Win A 5 Seat Majority

If Election Were Held Today, Democrats Would Win House In A Landslide — And Only Win A 5 Seat Majority: According to a Quinnipiac poll released today, if the election were held today 43 percent of the electorate would support a Democratic U.S. House candidate, as opposed to just 35 percent who would back a Republican. That 8 point lead for Democrats is significantly more than the GOP’s margin of victory during the 2010 Republican [...]/p

Seven States Working Hard To Shut Down Abortion Clinics

Seven States Working Hard To Shut Down Abortion Clinics: Abortion opponents are chipping away at reproductive rights from all angles — and one particularly insidious attack on women’s health is currently advancing in states across the country. Under the guise of “protecting women’s safety,” Republican lawmakers are successfully pushing unnecessary, complicated restrictions on abortion clinics that will ultimately force them to close their doors. [...]/p

How 'Pro-Life' Legislation Is Putting Women in Jail | Common Dreams

How 'Pro-Life' Legislation Is Putting Women in Jail | Common Dreams
"The cases documented in our study, as well as recent cases, make clear that, 40 years after Roe v. Wade was decided, far more is at stake than abortion or women's reproductive rights."

University of North Carolina Faces Backlash For Its Mistreatment Of Sexual Assault Victims

University of North Carolina Faces Backlash For Its Mistreatment Of Sexual Assault Victims: To mark the start of Sexual Assault Awareness Month, the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill student paper has a message for their university over its disciplinary system, which handles sexual assault with the seriousness of a minor infraction. Since the school received national attention for threatening to expel a college sophomore who spoke publicly about [...]/p

PERRspectives: GOP Fights to Keep Texas Health Care Among Nation's Worst

PERRspectives: GOP Fights to Keep Texas Health Care Among Nation's Worst
"As it turns out, Texas is a role model only in the sense of being a horrible example to be avoided at all costs. As the numbers show, by almost every objective measure the Texas health care system ranks among the very worst in the nation."

Which States Are Best For Women's Health

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Kansas Republicans Mock Rape Exceptions For Abortion Restrictions As ‘Little Gotcha Amendments’

Kansas Republicans Mock Rape Exceptions For Abortion Restrictions As ‘Little Gotcha Amendments’: The Kansas legislature is advancing an omnibus abortion bill that would, among other things, define life as beginning at conception in the state constitution and place unnecessary restrictions on abortion providers in the state. HB 2253 has already passed the House, and looks poised to gain enough support to sail through the Senate — but [...]/p