If recent legislation passed in Arkansas and North Dakota is allowed to stand, it will be harder for women to get an abortion in those states than it was in New England in 1650. Legislators in Little Rock and Bismarck have passed new restrictions that ban abortions according to when a fetal heartbeat is detected, which can occur as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. Federal judges have blocked the new restrictions until legal challenges to their constitutionality are settled. But the six-week deadline contrasts starkly with early American abortion law, where the procedure was legal until “quickening”—the first time a mother feels the baby kick, which can happen anywhere from 14 weeks to 26 weeks into pregnancy.

Abortion was not just legal—it was a safe, condoned, and practiced procedure in colonial America and common enough to appear in the legal and medical records of the period. Official abortion laws did not appear on the books in the United States until 1821, and abortion before quickening did not become illegal until the 1860s. If a woman living in New England in the 17th or 18th centuries wanted an abortion, no legal, social, or religious force would have stopped her.

...

In reality, the Puritans were much more lighthearted than is commonly thought, and in some ways, they were quite progressive when it came to sexual conduct. Puritans believed that marital sex for pleasure was important and that marriage was a contract of love, not just economics. Although premarital and extramarital sexual relationships were illegal, they were so common that enforcement was never very strict. The legal documents of the time are rampant with recorded “sexual offenses,” and the percentage of firstborn children born early or completely out of wedlock hovered at around 40 percent during the colonial era. Since the Puritans believed that one could be godly without children and that life began when a mother felt her baby kick, their strict religious code had no need to outlaw abortion before quickening.

The Puritans brought their laws on abortion from merry old England, where the procedure was also legal until quickening. Although the Puritans changed much of England’s legal system when they established their “city upon a hill,” they kept abortion as a part of Puritan family life, allowing women to choose when and if they would become mothers—whether for the first time or the fifth time.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — For the third day this week, the U.S. House of Representatives wasted scarce floor time to debate and vote on legislation granting favors to the oil and gas industry. Today’s bill seeks to speed gas pipeline approvals—an industry priority in the midst of the current fracking-enabled gas drilling rush. By a vote of 252–165, House members approved HR 1900, the final in a series of pro-industry, anti-environment bills up for a vote this week. None of the bills are expected to be taken up by the U.S. Senate.

Among other things, HR 1900 would require automatic approval of gas pipelines within arbitrary timeframes and limit input and participation from the public on proposed gas pipeline projects, including property owners subject to eminent domain proceedings. This week’s string of votes comes as a new study from the Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington shows that oil and gas industry contributions to congressional campaigns grew 231 percent between 2004 and 2012 in districts and states with fracking activity.

The following is a statement from Earthjustice Senior Legislative Representative Jessica Ennis:

“This week, House Majority Leadership showed that they’ll sacrifice just about anything for the oil and gas industry, whether it’s the hunters and fishermen who enjoy using our public lands, parents trying to protect their children from the health impacts of fracking, even the rights of property owners along proposed gas pipeline projects.

“The reason for this loyalty? Look no further than a damning report out yesterday showing a 231 percent increase in industry contributions to candidates in areas of fracking activity.

Due to popular demand, progressive holiday gifts are here!

Give the gift of Elizabeth Warren this season (although we feel like it's Christmas every day she's in office). We've also brainstormed some other gifts -- progressive media, books, and more.

1) Give the gift of Elizabeth Warren. Our limited edition T-shirts, hoodies, bumper stickers, magnets, and onesies are American made and union printed. Shop here.



2) Give the gift of progressive news.

The Majority Report is a two-time winner of The Best Political Podcast Award. It's hosted by former comedian and Air America host Sam Seder. He has timely, progressive, and often humorous takes on current events. (Adam Green, our co-founder, listens to the show while jogging.)

The first month is free for PCCC members, and it's just $10 a month after that. Click here to give the gift of progressive media to yourself or others.

3) Give the gift of progressive books -- or lots of other stuff.

Powell's Books is a famous independent (and union) bookstore in Portland, Oregon. Their online store sells millions of books, eBooks, and DVDs. Click here to check out Powell's.

We encourage you to find alternatives to Amazon, which opposed letting its workers unionize and funded the right-wing ALEC organization. But if you do use Amazon, use this Amazon link. A small percentage of all sales off this link will be donated to progressives. But again, we encourage you to find more independent, socially-responsible alternatives, such as Powell's.

4) Give the gift of a clean conscience.

Are you tired of giving your money to corporations that contribute to Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, and Michele Bachmann? Switch your cell service to CREDO Mobile, the only progressive phone company. They have all sorts of new phones!

“To give a minority a negative upon the majority (which is always the case where more than a majority is requisite to a decision), is, in its tendency, to subject the sense of the greater number to that of the lesser.… The necessity of unanimity in public bodies, or of something approaching towards it, has been founded upon a supposition that it would contribute to security. But its real operation is to embarrass the administration, to destroy the energy of the government, and to substitute the pleasure, caprice, or artifices of an insignificant, turbulent, or corrupt junto, to the regular deliberations and decisions of a respectable majority.

In those emergencies of a nation, in which the goodness or badness, the weakness or strength of its government, is of the greatest importance, there is commonly a necessity for action. The public business must, in some way or other, go forward. If a pertinacious minority can control the opinion of a majority, respecting the best mode of conducting it, the majority, in order that something may be done, must conform to the views of the minority; and thus the sense of the smaller number will overrule that of the greater, and give a tone to the national proceedings.

Hence, tedious delays; continual negotiation and intrigue; contemptible compromises of the public good. And yet, in such a system, it is even happy when such compromises can take place: for upon some occasions things will not admit of accommodation; and then the measures of government must be injuriously suspended, or fatally defeated. It is often, by the impracticability of obtaining the concurrence of the necessary number of votes, kept in a state of inaction. Its situation must always savor of weakness, sometimes border upon anarchy.”

But at the bottom of this page is a note which apparently is supposed to be a sort of name-dropping reference regarding the work he did for the campaign of David "Chokehold" Prosser. Read it closely several times. It is simply jaw dropping in what he says:




In this one paragraph, along with the poor grammar, Behling is saying that he worked with the third party groups to help the Prosser campaign using "very creative" ways to get around campaign laws. He also laments hat it wasn't as easy as helping Walker's campaign because WISGOP wasn't there to help the campaign.

Again, just to drive the point home, that's an admission of collaboration between Prosser's campaign and the third party, dark money groups. It is also an admission of collaboration between Walker's campaign, the third party groups and WISGOP.

...

ADDENDUM: Since I know that some of you will be looking through the pdf before I can do further work on it, check out pages 51-53 and the emails between Steve Einhorn and Matejov. Einhorn is the guy who took Bradley Foundation money to put up the racist billboards aimed at voter suppression. He was also involved with a pay for play deal with Walker's administration as well.

WASHINGTON — President Obama said last week that the Affordable Care Act would not stop Americans from keeping their health insurance plans, even if those plans did not meet minimum standards set by the health care law. But he did not promise to say nice things about them. On Thursday, the federal government unveiled sample letters that insurance companies will be required to send to anyone seeking to renew one of those policies.

The letters are blunt, declaring that the insurance that is about to be renewed “will NOT provide all of the rights and protections of the health care law.” Renewal letters sent by insurance companies will have to list all the deficiencies in the policy. The letters, among other things, will have to warn that policies might not:

¶Meet standards for premiums, allowing companies to charge more based on factors like gender or a pre-existing condition.

¶Guarantee the policy’s renewal.

¶Prevent discrimination based on a customer’s health status.

¶Cover essential health benefits or limit annual out-of-pocket spending.

The letters must also make it clear that consumers can still voluntarily switch to a plan offered by the new federal or state insurance marketplaces. “The Marketplace allows you to choose a private plan that fits your budget and health care needs,” the letters will have to say. “You may also qualify for tax credits or other financial assistance to help you afford health insurance coverage through the Marketplace.”

Dear Policyholder,

...

If you choose to renew your current policy, it will NOT provide all of the rights and protections of the health care law. These include one or more of the following new protections of the Public Health Service Act (PHS Act) that were added by the health care law and that take effect for coverage beginning in 2014. As a result, your coverage:

• May not meet standards for fair health insurance premiums, so it can charge more based on factors such as gender or a pre-existing condition, and it doesn’t have to comply with rules limiting the ability to charge older people more than younger people (section 2701).

• May not meet standards for guaranteed availability, so it can exclude customers based on factors such as a pre-existing condition (section 2702).

• May not meet standards for guaranteed renewability (section 2703).

• May not meet standards related to pre-existing conditions for adults, so it can exclude coverage for treatment of an adult’s pre-existing condition (section 2704).

• May not meet standards related to discrimination based on health status (section 2705).

• May not meet standards for non-discrimination in providers (section 2706).

• May not cover essential health benefits or limit annual out-of-pocket spending, so it may not cover benefits like prescription drugs.

The ACA provided states with federal funds to institute a Medicaid expansion. The states chose to expand the program also were able to set up their own state exchanges, which were relatively free from the problems the federal site had. Vermont decided to take it a step further by setting up their very own single payer system.

The slogan of the program: Everybody in, nobody out.

The program will be fully operational by 2017, and will be funded through Medicare, Medicaid, federal money for the ACA given to Vermont, and a slight increase in taxes. In exchange, there will be no more premiums, deductibles, copay’s, hospital bills or anything else aimed at making insurance companies a profit. Further, all hospitals and healthcare providers will now be nonprofit.

This system will provide an instant boost the state economy. On the one side, you have workers that no longer have to worry about paying medical costs or a monthly premium and are able to use that money for other things. On the other side, you have the burden of paying insurance taken off of the employers side, who will be able to use the saved money to provide a better wage and/or reinvest in their company through updated infrastructure and added jobs. It is a win-win solution.

...

45,000 Americans die every single year because they cannot afford treatment, are you ready for that? That is 15 times the amount of people that died during the September 11, 2001, attacks, or perhaps for you Righty’s out there you would rather see it put this way, 11,250 times the amount of people that died in the Benghazi attack. That equals 5 Americans that die every hour, of every day, of every year because of a preventable illness that was not taken care of due to lack of access and means.

In Wisconsin, as in other states, democracy is being gerrymandered to death, and now is the time for us to put pressure on the Wisconsin legislature to put an end to partisan redistricting.

In 2012, Republicans won just 46 percent of the votes cast in Wisconsin Assembly races, whereas Democrats won 53 percent. And yet 60 percent of that body are Republicans.

Also in 2012, Wisconsinites cast 43,020 more votes for Democrats than Republicans in U.S. House races, but statewide we are "represented" by five Republicans and three Democrats.



In neither case could you call the election results a mandate. And yet, Republicans are so secure in their gerrymandered little seats that they can openly fly in the face of what the majority of Wisconsinites want. Rather than being concerned with the needs of the majority, the Republicans continually pander to the needs of the corporate backers whose big money put them in office.

According to Bill Lueders of the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism,
In 2012, after a secret and expensive redistricting process, Republicans increased their dominion over the Legislature despite getting fewer total votes than Democrats. They like the current system so much they haven’t even allowed public hearings on bills, AB 185 and SB 163, that would turn this task over to the nonpartisan Legislative Reference Bureau.

In response, media editorial boards across Wisconsin have launched a campaign urging citizens to contact GOP legislative leaders. And records obtained by the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism show that many people are doing so.
And we should, too. Because we seldom have the mainstream media on our side, but in this case we do, along with eight lobby groups such as Common Cause in Wisconsin and the League of Women Voters of Wisconsin. And we should make every effort to take advantage of that.

Even the Wisconsin State Journal published an editorial whose headline says it all:
EARTH TO GOP: HOLD A HEARING NOW
What's happening here is that the Wisconsin media and citizens lobby groups are attempting to shame the shameless WI GOP into action. Regardless of the outcome, this is a project I want in on.

Here are the people to contact:

1. Your state senator and representative. If you're not sure who they are, you can find out here. If you know who they are but need their contact information, check here for the senate and here for the assembly.

2. Senator Mary Lazich, chair of the Senate Committee on Elections and Urban Affairs: sen.lazich@legis.wisconsin.gov

3. Assembly Speaker Robin Vos: Rep.Vos@legis.wisconsin.gov

4. Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald: sen.fitzgerald@legis.wisconsin.gov

5. Representative Chad Weininger, newly assigned chair of the Assembly Committee on Campaigns and Elections: Rep.Weininger@legis.wisconsin.gov

It may seem like there's some work involved here, but it's trivial compared with all that stands to be gained and all that has been lost. Besides, how many opportunities do we have to weigh in on the right side of history?