Planned Parenthood is More Than Just Abortions

A lot of time, thought and effort went into this post. So please read it.




The most annoying thing will be that before even reading this post some people are going to automatically go into the mind state that the only thing Planned Parenthood does is use tax payer's money to pay for abortions. Please continue reading, because there is a lot more to it.

How fitting, after doing a post about how the teen pregnancy rate has lowered there is now a big issue with what will happen to Planned Parenthood if the Government Shutdown occurs.

On CBS News there was a tagline that said: Defund Abortion Providers.
Really? That is not all Planned Parenthood is.

CBS reports that 75 percent of Planned Parenthood clients are living close to the poverty line. The lack of funding or cutting the program all together could lead to terrible things; people need to NOT just associate Planned Parenthood with abortions:

"Planned Parenthood provides a wide array of medical services including reproductive health care, cancer screenings, and STD testing at more than 800 locations across the country. They are also the country's largest abortion provider."

Yes. It is the country's largest abortion provider and federal government funding abortion is not something that every Pro-Choice person agrees with; so put aside the fact that Planned Parenthood is mostly known for abortions and yes, the funding for Planned Parenthood indeed does go to abortions.

CBS continues to talk about those on the right who are opposed to government funding Planned Parenthood. What it should be saying is that there are a lot of Conservatives who are Pro-Life and think that all Planned Parenthood does is take tax-payer's money and have them pay for abortions. No, that's not it.

The CBS report emphasizes on that:

Republican lawmakers have questioned government funding of Planned Parenthood, saying the government shouldn't be in the business of supporting abortion - even indirectly. Planned Parenting receives government support, though the funds are used for purposes other than abortions.

As the article goes on it continues to talk about abortion:

"For all the controversy, abortion remains a common procedure in the U.S. A long-term decline in the abortion rate stalled between 2005 and 2008, according to the Guttmacher Institute. In 2008, 1.21 million abortions were performed, with about 40 percent of unintended pregnancies now being terminated by abortion.

"Abortion yields 37 percent of all Planned Parenthood revenues by conservative estimates," Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.) said in an interview, according to a written statement released by her office. "

This is so redundant.
Could people please realize that there's a lot more than abortions going on.
STD checks, pelvic exams, etc.

Money is brought up once again:

An agency statement says 3 percent of their services are devoted to abortion. They didn't break out the revenue. They also claim to prevent more than half-a-million unintended pregnancies each year by distributing contraceptives. They estimate their efforts prevent 290,000 abortions each year.

Yes this blog post is using the CBS report, because the report from CBS was the most informative out of all the sources reporting on this.

And now we have this:

"Ayotte said he was also worried about a recent "sting" operation by the antiabortion group Live Action, in which men posing as pimps were videotaped interacting with Planned Parenthood workers.

"I'm troubled by what's come out in the videos that have shown that they were essentially looking the other way on sex-trafficking," Ayotte wrote.

Planned Parenthood isn't taking the criticism lying down."

Well, here's what Planned Parenthood has to say. This is the most important piece of this entire post:

"Reasonable people could have agreed on funding the government weeks ago, but a small group of extremists has been allowed to hold the government hostage to their narrow political agenda - one that has no place in the budget process," Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards said in a written statement. "It is truly unacceptable that a small group with an extreme political agenda is forcing a shutdown of the United States government over a dangerous proposal that would bar women from getting the lifesaving health care they need - breast exams, Pap tests, HIV tests and more."


Since this is a blog post and not an article objectivity doesn't need to be an issue; because it is going to be annoying how many skim this post and just think oh well all they do is abortions and take money. Negative, negative, negative.

Go for it, complain it should be a state by state thing and not a federal thing, but guess what? Until states do it themselves the Feds NEED to. If each state was doing this then the Federal Government shut down wouldn't be such a big deal. So many conservatives say they believe things should be "up to the state." Well guess what, the states haven't done it yet, and in regards to the other shut downs I think that it would be better to have the clean water act that the federal government has to contribute and fund rather than having nothing at all. Yes, leave it to the states, but until the states do anything people are getting screwed.

And the people who are screwed might need to go to Planned Parenthood and get that checked out.

--Nikky Raney

Eva Longoria Wardrobe Malfunction, Legs, A Letterman Tradition

Continuing what seems to be a tradition on The Late Show With David Letterman, Desperate Housewives star Eva Longoria came on last night showing nothing but full legs, all thighs, and cleavage. Then, she had a wardrobe malfunction.

A button on Longoria's, er, "tuxedo," which David Letterman said was not really a tuxedo, managed to come off; it happened to be strategically located right at her cleavage.

On noticing this, Longoria, on a New York City television promotional tour that saw her on CNN's Piers Morgan talk show that evening, as well (as Morgan's show is produced and presented from New York), grabbed at the tux to help keep it from literally falling off her body!



It's noted that this is a tradition because a number of big-name female actresses have come on the show as guests wearing a really short skirt, or mini-skirt, with pumps. It happens so often, the wardrobe style must be part of Letterman's contractual appearance requirements for hot Hollywood women. Want an example? Presenting Jennifer Aniston:




Wow.

David Letterman knows how to have his stars help him create buzz. Piers Morgan's probably slamming his fists on the glass table of his set, saying "Why didn't we think of that!"

Stay tuned.

Government Shutdown 2011, Donald Trump Obama Birther Talk Bring Out Racists

One thing's quite clear this week: America has not rid itself of racists. That much is obvious in the total universe of comment conversations around both the so-called "Government Shutdown 2011" (which shows how news website concern for Search Engine Optimization has finally impacted what we call things) and Donald Trump's noisemaking about running for President and constant chirping about a dead issue: the birth certificate of Barack Obama.

First, the Government Shutdown 2011 talk and the Trump noise has some commenters referring to Obama as an "Affirmative Action" President, and this popped up on my YouTube pages yesterday. The truth is that President Obama was elected to office, starting as an Illinois State Senator. To say that "affirmative action" had anything to do with that is to demonstrate racism and ignorance, which do go together, by the way.

Here's my video asking Trump to pipe down about being President:



Also, the racists delight in calling the person who points out racism, racist, showing even more stupidity. Racism is the act of putting someone down because of the color of their skin.

 If one thinks or says that someone black got to where ever they are because of "affirmative action" and without knowing a thing about them, that person is claiming the talent of the one they question could have not got them to where they are, and thus, they are putting that person down for being black.

Thus, that person is being racist. Period.

Now, on the matter of Donald Trump's "Obama Birther" blathering, this issue was killed years ago. Plus, it shows how little people even want to think logically about the issue. To be frank, that the vast majority of people issuing these wild claims about Obama's birth place are white should give pause to anyone with half a brain.

If a subject is split along racial lines, then racism is at play, and all the more reason not to take any claim trying to advance the subject seriously.

It's also why Donald Trump's image is now toast, and will become darker toast with every week he continues to push it. If he does this, he looks like a racist. Period. End of story.   If Trump keeps pushing this, advertisers will start to shun any television show he currently produces.  Indeed, his actions could trigger a backlash where companies are encouraged to avoid him.

President Obama has had to present a birth certificate at various points in his life, not just during his run for presidency. He had to do so when applying for schools; I did when I applied to both undergraduate school at Texas Arlington, and grad school at Berkeley. Barack Obama's place of birth would have been, and has been, established a long time ago.

But with this, in the entire 44-president history of The United States, Barack Obama is the only one who has had to present his birth certificate for inspection. No one bothered to check the backgrounds of the other 43 presidents, all of which have been white.

This is a race issue and because, like many African Americans and minorities, Obama's background does not fit the classic path. Those cultural lines were established in an America where, for much of its history, people of color were not even considered by those who were white as being worthy of the same level of treatment.

Fast forward to post war America and slowly it became more integrated, and people with "strange names" started to make their mark on society, and at a time when record-keeping was always a little off. My name is greek and Jewish, for example, and the product of a complex family history that took place in America. Because of this, I get two or three different explanations of where the name "Abraham," my last name, came from.

For blacks, that history is always one painted by slavery and by integration. There's even a book called Black Names In America, where there are three kinds: names given by slave owners, names that slaves adopted when they were free, and names that blacks had who were free from birth.

Abraham is one such name, and while "Obama" was not listed, it certainly should have been.

Americans need to become more informed about the real America - one that includes a rich and complicated history of not just blacks, but Latinos, and Asians, particularly the Japanese during World War II. But in the discussion of Barack Obama and his birth place, there are many like Donald Trump, who make inbread assumptions about people who don't fit within the lines they're used to, and use those assumptions to advance whole statements, constantly expressing their prejudices.

After a while, it seems that the people who claim Obama's not American are so psychotic in their belief, it's morphed into a sickness that can't be cured by anything other than a lobotomy.

Meanwhile, President Obama's just trying to keep the American government going. Let him do that.

CNN Anderson Cooper 360 Reputation Damaged By Dana Loesh Behavior

Anderson Cooper 360, CNN's flagship primetime program in the wake of Larry Ling's retirement, is commonly associated with in-depth focus on Washington and international issues. Commentators are generally well-prepared, and even if you don't agree with their political stripe, at least can agree that the person was knowledgeable.

That was not the cast on Thursday night's show, as the Tea Party Conservative Dana Loesh (pronounced "Lash"), was hopelessly unprepared against her Liberal counterparts CNN regulars Paul Begala and David Gergen in a talk about the possible shutdown of the Federal Government.

Indeed, Loesh was so terrible, she's started an Internet discussion, mostly unfavorable toward her.

But an aside, Dana's a blogger, radio show host, and mother of two, who somehow became a taking ahead for the St. Louis Tea Party Movement, and describes herself as a "jesus-freak" and a former "potty mouth." In detail:

I enjoy Photoshop, photography, and music. I have tattoos and used to have multiple piercings. I am a recovering potty-mouth. My prior language caused kittens and fairies to spontaneously combust. I don't say dirty words anymore UNLESS I'm yelling at my kids. I want my kids to be able to read the things I wrote about them someday without expressing concern that yes, I did kiss them with that mouth.

The problem was that Dana did not have enough detail to match the policy wonk that is Begala. Where he talked about the vote on the Omnibus Budget Bill in December of last year, and how Democrats took massive cuts in spending in an effort to reach an agreement with Republicans. Indeed, on December 17th, 2010, New American reported this:

Yesterday night, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid reluctantly pulled the 1,900 page $1.1 trillion omnibus bill laden with earmarks that would have funded the federal government through September 2011 from the Senate floor. Aware that the bill would face tremendous opposition and delays, Reid instead announced that he would work with Republican leaders on a smaller, short-term budget to avoid what would have become a government shutdown.

That was repeated by Bagala, but to listen to Loesh, it was as if there was no such vote. Dana kept insisting this is an issue of "reducing spending," and seemed to not know about the vote of last December. Where Begala would give examples of how Republicans were being unreasonable, thus giving the intelligent listener some view of how we got to this point on the brink of shutdown, Dana would either smirk or laugh out loud, in a vain attempt to mask the obvious fact that she was ill-prepared for this national television platform.

To have someone like Loesh on because she's a pretty face is sexist. It's an affront to women ,both conservative and liberal, who do follow these issues and can speak calmly and intelligently about them.

Twitter Tweets Not On Dana Loesh Kind

To get a good understanding of how her 'performance' went, examining Twitter Tweets directed at her and at Anderson Cooper gives a good look. Here's an example:

prollyjolly KING PAUL!
.@DLoesch is acting like a CHILD. I hope @ac360 & @andersoncooper, for the sake of their program, choose not to have her on in the future.
4 hours ago Favorite Retweet Reply

ToThrive To Thrive
@DLoesch is an awful human being.
1 hour ago Favorite Retweet Reply

@DLoesch You cannot deny the 54B$ to oil subsidy deserves to be cut by changing the subject onAC360. Tea Party is corporate sellout!
1 hour ago Favorite Retweet Reply

Learn to act like a professional @DLoesch Maybe people will actually listen to you.
1 hour ago Favorite Retweet Reply

Kinderman Kinderman
Watched reruns of @dloesch on CNN and then lookin at twitter..I think she looked uninformed on #CNN don't know what u all are talkin about.
1 hour ago Favorite Retweet Reply

And this post seemed to sum up the frustration many had in watching Loesh look painfully unprepared on CNN:

I just saw this Dana loesch on CNN, the woman is completely nuts, she has not clue what she is talking about, She made a statement that AARP is cutting out folks from getting medicare advantage from the medicare program which is an out right lie,, many folks do not take medicare advantage like us because in the opinons of hospitals and doctors they have a problem with those programs like taking too long to pay the bills and such,,
and one must have medicare a and b to be eligible to get any of the other plans under medicare,, the lady is plumb full of misinformation,, she has no clue what she is talking about,,
Today,we have caught the republicans and tea baggers is so many lies it is unbeleiveable, one republica dude today pushing fo natrual gas claims that natural gas is at its lowest ever price, that is a lie,, as well, any one that used any sort of natural gas espeically now knows that, and alot of folks in my area, rural area use propane to heat the orchards last night and might today, knows the prices, the more the tea baggers and republicans talks the more they are caught in nothing but their own lies,
--- An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind Gandhi --

Dana Loesh is supposed to appear on CNN in the morning - Friday morning. Given the short time period between tonight and then, it's hard to see how Loesh will be any better prepared for CNN Morning.

CNN can do better.

Masters Leaderboard: Rory Mcilroy Leads; Tiger Woods Six Back

The 2011 Master's Leaderboard reports that the man once said to be "better than Tiger Woods," in 2009 is in the lead as of this writing. Rory Mcilroy, who hails from Hollywood, Ireland, finished at 7-under par, where Woods, who's feeling reportedly upbeat, is six-shots back at 1-under par.

 If Woods can come back and make a run, and win The 2011 Masters, he would score his fifth green jacket, first since 2005, and first major championship win since 2008.

But right now, Woods "would rather be where Rory (McIlroy) is at," he told reporters today. "But, hey, it's a long way to go. We have a long grind ahead of us. The temperature's supposed to warm up, and I'm sure they will start making the pins a little more difficult as the week goes on."

The good news is Woods feels comfortable with his game, but then so does 21-year-old Mcilroy. He put up a no-bogey 65 today, and no one matched it for a time until Alvaro Quiros finished for the day at 7-under par.

Thomas Bonk On The Scene

Long time Golf Writer Thomas Bonk, now blogger at ThomasBonk.com, and who you can follow on Twitter @ThomasBonk is on the scene working for The Masters. Earlier, Thomas and I talked about The 2011 Masters, and Tiger Woods:



Check out his tweets for updates.

Will Donald Trump Please Shut Up About Being President?

This blogger has long admired Donald Trump. The man who smartly figured out how to use the media to help cultivate and elevate his building developer brand, and New York City in the process, is the picture of a person who has a blueprint for marketing success, and implements it.

Even if he started out with his father's money.

But none of that, the skyscrapers, the wives, the TV show series The Apprentice, the table at 21 Club New York, or his hair, translates into being President Of The United States. Donald Trump does not have the judgement or experience to be a good president, even if he were elected, and would certainly do something to sully the brand that is The President Of The United States.

Trump would do something ridiculous like have the Miss Universe contest on the White House grounds, or use the Oval Office as one of the sets for his show The Apprentice. Trump would be more interested in hoarding wealth in the Mid East for himself than actually improving the quality of life for people in that region. And that's the point: Donald Trump is interested in one person: Donald Trump.

Never did this blogger think that this kind of blog would appear in this space, but Trump's constant blathering about President Obama's birth certificate was the last straw. It's not necessary to address an issue that any reasonable person knows isn't worth talking about, because President Obams is an American Citizen.

But what's worth talking about is the fact that many people, especially those who are black, think Trump's being very racist and that Donald would never think of this had Obama been obviously white (Obama is half white).

African Americans are so used to some silly action designed to prove they don't "belong" in America that actions like Trumps amount to dog-whistle racism. And this guy wants to be president?

Donald Trump needs to do America, and himself, a favor, and shut up about being President. It's not going to happen, and Trump's not the right man for it.

Oh, and an official copy of President Obama's birth certificate has been posted online for three years, and has been looked at by experts again and again, and again. While Trump's adviser Roger Stone listed the "positive" reasons for Trumps' strategy, he forgot to list the one big negative of it: it makes him look like a racist, stupid, idiot.

"Reality Rocks" Shaping Up To Be Huge Event

If someone told you there was one event where you could potentially meet or at least see every known reality TV show star that walked the industrialized Earth, you'd probably think they were crazy. But they're not.

Reality Rocks is that event.

It's set to be held this weekend, and Zennie62.com will be there making video-blogs of the happenings at this first-of-its-kind expo to be held at the Los Angeles Convention Center April 9th and 10th.

Who will be there? The total list is here, but try Mark Cuban, Jenn Hoffman, Geoff from Meteorite Men, Nick Cannon, stars from shows like American Idol, Dancing With The Stars, The Amazing Race, and a lot more.

Even YouTube stars like Lisa Nova will be there. Here's one of her videos where she's "doing" P Diddy:



For more information visit the website at RealityRocks.net.

And stay tuned here!