Tuesday, March 07, 2006

Echo and the Bunnymen -- Turquoise Days

I am getting ready to go on a last-minute work trip to the Bay Area. I'll fly up, drive to the hotel, take a bath, and tomorrow train two sets of people, go back to the airport, come home. Woo hoo! It's fun.

While I'm on the plane I'll watch part of Schultze Gets the Blues, probably half each way, since the flight is only an hour. so there.
Perhaps not the best choice for watching on an airplane? It's supposedly a slow, quiet film. We'll see.

South Dakota banning abortion? I remind everyone that most states defacto have no abortion already, because few places will do them. South Dakota has ONE place performing abortions. Check this out at ldi's anti-abortion website which calls places performing abortions "DeathCamps" --- it lists clinics per state. Take a good look. MANY states have very few places. Take a look on a map and see how going to seek an abortion is a huge undertaking for women not located near a clinic. Abortion is viewed as a right, but right now, even without a ban on abortion in South Dakota or a Supreme Court overruling of Roe v Wade, abortion rights in this country, for those not living in major cities, are a joke.

And this is just abortion. When you consider the rising trend of right-wing pharmacists refusing to fill prescriptions for birth control, women not fortunate enough to live in major cities on the coasts are royally fucked over. You may find it hard to get birth control, and you may find it impossible to affordably have an abortion.

Imagine the situation you are in if you need to have an abortion and are in some rural area hours away from a clinic. How do you get there? If you are poor, you can't afford the bus fare, you just can't get there. A right only affordable to rich women is no right.

I love the politicians in South Dakota for pushing this issue because America needs to wake up. We like to give lip service to the idea that abortion is a right, but average Americans need to take a stand and insist that affordable abortion be made available all over the country. Otherwise this talk of rights is just stupid pipe dreams. We need to have an open battle on this issue on tv, radio, and in the streets. Most Americans are on the fence on this issue and we need them to take a side.

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