mercredi 11 novembre 2009

You don't have to be a Republican to be a C Street House denizen

I don't know why I didn't see this coming. It turns out that Bart Stupak, the author of the provision in the House health care legislation that effectively eliminates all ocverage for abortion in this country, is a C Streeter:
tupak-Pitts isn't just "the biggest restriction on women's right to choose in our generation," as Rep. Diana DeGette of Colorado puts it; it's also evidence that on abortion the Democratic Party is now captive, just like the GOP, to Christian conservatism. Of course, Republicans traded away their party's moderate wing for real electoral gains, a base that propelled them to power for decades. The Democrats, already in power, sucker-punched themselves, and all they have to show for it is a big fat shiner in the shape of Bart Stupak's knuckles.

But if Stupak, a former state trooper from Michigan, provided the muscle, his partner, Joe Pitts -- a Pennsylvania Republican with decades in the trenches of the antiabortion battle -- may have brought the brains, and more, a new Christian right coalition custom tailored for the Democratic Party's growing religious conservatism. Stupak is Roman Catholic; Pitts is evangelical. Both are members of the predominantly evangelical organization called the Family; Stupak lives in its C Street house. Together, they're poster boys for the evangelical/conservative Catholic alliance known as "co-belligerency," a culture war strategy designed to take territory within the Democratic Party as well the GOP.

Stupak, the Democratic co-chair of the House Pro-Life Caucus, insists that his amendment does nothing more than ensure that the 1976 Hyde Amendment, which forbids the use of federal funds for abortions, is carried over into healthcare reform. Even some of Stupak's angriest critics within the party concede that Stupak might actually believe that -- nobody has ever accused him of being a subtle legislator. (Though Stupak himself, long known for his amiability, now boasts that he was hiding his "wolfiness" all along.) But the facts are plain: Stupak-Pitts will use the Hyde Amendment as a lever with which to radically roll back abortion rights, effectively strong-arming private insurers -- most of which will be enmeshed with the federal government now -- into abandoning coverage for abortions.

Here's what I don't understand: The C Streeters are opposed to fucking, particularly to WOMEN fucking. Scratch the surface of an anti-abortion legislator and you'll find someone who doesn't want to subsidize health care for the women carrying the babies they would force them to carry. You'll find someone who doesn't want to subsidize health care for those babies once they're born. You'll find someone who doesn't want to subsidize food for hungry children. So what's this "pro-life" stand really about? Fucking. I just have one question: If fucking is bad, and women fucking are Satan's Own Emissaries, why then do so many C Streeters end up fucking women? Or is this yet another one of those cases of God and Satan playing Skee-ball at an arcade in Keansburg, NJ and Satan gets bonus points for getting so-called religious men to have affairs?

Gay progressives have started a "Don't ask, don't give" drive to stop donations from the gay community to the DNC, DSCC, and DCCC to make the gay community heard about the Obama Administration's backtracking on gay rights. It's time for women to do the same. If the Democratic Party is going to sell out to religious nuts, sacrifice women's healthcare on the altar of people who aren't going to vote for them anyway, and be every bit as homophobic as the Republicans, then what the hell is the difference?

CBS News spoke with Jane Hamsher about progressives refusing to lift a finger or write checks to people who sell us out time after time:
Hamsher compared the current situation to the 1994 elections, when, she said, the Democratic base (including union members) was demoralized and disengaged following the passage of The North American Free Trade Agreement. Republicans took control of both the House and Senate in that contest.

She argued that the Obama administration is paying little attention to its base even as the opposition gins up support among the Republican base with events like the Tea Party protests.

"If you're suppressing your base, and the other side is revving up theirs, and midterm elections are all about turning out the base, I sort of question what their strategy is here," she said.

Hamsher has signed on to a financial boycott of the Democratic National Committee, Organizing for America (the DNC-run operation to mobilize Obama supporters) and the Obama campaign. The boycott was organized by Americablog's John Aravosis and Joe Sudbay over what they see as President Obama and his party's failure to keep its commitments to the gay and lesbian community.

"LGBT Americans, our families, and our friends kept our promise at the ballot box, we now expect President Obama to keep his in the White House," they wrote. In addition to Hamsher, cosponsors include the liberal blog Daily Kos, writer and editor Dan Savage and radio host Michelangelo Signorile.

The boycott will be lifted, Aravosis and Sudbay write, when legislation is signed enacting the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, repealing Don't Ask, Don't Tell and repealing the Defense of Marriage Act. During the presidential campaign, Mr. Obama pledged action on all these issues but has not pressed them since entering office.

Go read the rest, and read the responses from the DNC, which essentially amount to "Go ahead. Stay home."

I was never one of those who voted for Ralph Nader because "there was no difference." With Al Gore, there WAS a difference. But when Democrats are selling us out on women's health care, telling gay Americans that their rights don't count; when an Administration is continuing a Republican policy of illegal wiretaps, rendition, and torture, I really have to wonder if ultimately there really IS no difference. And if that's the case, then we might as well grab the popcorn and just watch.

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