For the last few years, the Illinois GOP has been getting raked over the coals due to a corruption scandal that came to light when an accident involving a part that fell off of a truck with a driver who got his license by bribery caused a van with a minister, his wife, and their 9 kids to catch on fire, incinerating 6 of the kids. The Republican then-Secretary of State denied everything, and was elected Governor. But the whole thing blew up during his term, and he couldn’t run for re-election. The scandal has resulted in 67 indictments, 59 convictions, and the now ex-Governor is currently on trial. The scandal also gutted the infrastructure and the reputation of the Illinois GOP, who put on a ridiculously ineffective effort in the last election. Democrats are now in all but one state-wide office (Treasurer) and both Senate seats.

But this is unusual. It doesn’t necessarily reflect the long-term makeup of the Illinois electorate. And the same prosecutor (Fitzgerald, the same one working on Rove) has just nailed a Democratic big-wig and is about to try to climb the ladder to Mayor Daley II. If he succeeds, it could fry up the Illinois Democratic party and we could see a reversal; it’s not like the Illinois Democratic party is known for being corruption-free. Also, Governor Blagoyevich (sp? anyway, Blago for short) is not all popular and is looking like he’s vulnerable to a decent GOP challenger.

I say all this to give everyone a perspective that Illinois could start turning purple at least (if not red) fairly soon. Don’t assume that Illinois will stay true-blue.

“Guns have little or nothing to do with juvenile violence. The causes of youth violence are working parents who put their kids into daycare, the teaching of evolution in the schools, and working mothers who take birth control pills.” –Tom Delay

Admittedly, he was discussing teenagers and violence, but I’m sure the Wisconsin legislature is working from the same page.

What I don’t understand is what right does state rep LaMahieu have to stop promiscuity?

Because sluts that have premarital sex are going to HELL. If Representative LaMahieu doesn’t stop people from going to HELL he is as guilty as if he was selling tickets for the train that goes there.

This is really, truly the way that some of the more guilt-ridden denominations work: you are given an impossible task, you fail, and therefore are proven a sinner! Put another twenty in the collection plate and come back next week, you poor soul. It’s the ugly side of Christianity, the one that stretches the new testament over the bones of the old, giving us fear, triumphalism, and misogyny in Christ’s name…

This is a stupid, ugly bill, and I predict stupid, ugly results if it passes.

So if the bill applies only to emergency contraception (not to “all” contraception), and if it makes an exception for the largest hospital on campus, what is there to be so alarmed about? Disagree on principle, I can understand that, but alarmed?

The largest hospital on campus is *not* where students get their health care. If they go there they will have to pay–and it’s not cheap, or even moderate in cost, I’ll betcha (if our local uni is anything to go by). Others have mentioned the UW campuses in the hinterlands where there may not be *any* sort of alternative, let alone one on campus.

And…excuse me, but isn’t emergency contraception for - well, emergencies? I find it MORE alarming that EC not be available. If BC of any sort is not available through the uni, people will indeed find some way to make arrangements, even if it is a (completely unnecessary) hardship, especially given that they have the time to do so.

But the nature of emergency contraception is that the necessity for it is…you know, kinda unexpected. Thus the “emergency” part, hmmmm? And the fact that no exception is made for rape victims I find more than alarming, I find it PURPOSELY VICIOUS, CRUEL and CALLOUS. Not to mention STUPID and INDEFENSIBLE.

Again, Grrrrr.

Sorry, I don’t buy the “pee on the rug to get attention” school of thought. If you present a subject with hype and fear that turns out not to be true, then you teach people that you’re not playing entirely straight, and they aren’t quite as likely to believe the true parts. (Cf.: The War on Drugs.)

Good thing I wasn’t selling anything then. =P.

The point being, Mythago, that I did a story that pretty much was the same thing (though focused more on the players that surrounded the issue) and it didn’t generate nearly as much attention. Maybe I’m not creative enough, but to me it seems that the theory ‘the more commotion, the more promotion’ gets attention. This story absolutely is deserving of attention, and attempting to pass it off as anything but a wolf is far more dishonest than a title that might be questionable.

Niels - One reason this is alarming is that UW has many branch campuses which offer 4-year degrees nowhere near their medical schools. The UW system is scattered across the state, and only a couple of the campuses are near the particular locations which are exempted. Women in La Crosse, Platteville, and Oshkosh will only be able to get EC at off-campus clinics, if they exist in these otherwise mostly rural areas. The off-campus clinics won’t be able to advertise their EC services on campus. many women don’t hear about EC until they get to college, with the prevalence of abstinence only sex ed and strict christian families (many Catholic in WI). That is the cause for alarm.

Sorry, I don’t buy the “pee on the rug to get attention” school of thought. If you present a subject with hype and fear that turns out not to be true, then you teach people that you’re not playing entirely straight, and they aren’t quite as likely to believe the true parts. (Cf.: The War on Drugs.)

Of course, this is going to hurt rape victims disproportionately. And it’s especially going to hurt those who are TRYING to be “good” girls by the reckoning of social conservatives and don’t have sex so therefore are less likely to know what their resources are if they are raped. Dirty sluts like me know our various options, but more virginal types may not have any clue. So that’s your morality right there–let’s make the “good” girls run around freaking out looking for help that’s not available in the sad event that they are raped.

Yep, because promiscuous girls just love taking candy that makes them sick-as-a-dying-animal for a few days. ::rolls eyes::

‘(AP) St. Paul Minnesota doctors were trying to figure how to implement the new “Unborn Child Pain Prevention Act,” which requires physicians who perform abortions to offer anesthesia for late-term fetuses.

Abortion foes applauded the passage of the act last week by the Minnesota Legislature as part of a major health bill, but it has raised many questions for doctors specializing in prenatal medicine.’
(this is from http://wcco.com/topstories/local_story_197151606.html)

“I think it puts young women at great risk when they are told by medical professionals it’s just OK to take these emergency contraceptives at whim,” said state Rep. Jean Hundertmark, R-Clintonville, a co-sponsor of the bill. “It shouldn’t be taken like candy.”

It’s got a few links to some interesting articles with commentary from state officials (including the fact that Governor Doyle has in fact vowed to veto the bill if it came past his desk), and from anti-choice/pro-choice folks.

The players involved in this debacle certainly shed a very ominous perspective on the bill.

Also:

Robert, the largest problem with your commentary (as I see it) is that your snipes and comments like ’seeing a wolf’ deny the existence of the very real wolf that is embedded within this legislature, regardless of whether or not PA was provocative in her title. And to be fair, this subject deserves attention, and if provocative titles are what makes that happen, then so be it. You’re throwing out the proverbial baby with the bathwater when you attempt to assert that this is just a blind swing from the left at the right.

what is there to be alarmed about? a few public officials are trying to take away the right of the university health programs to advertise, discuss, prescribe, or dispense emergency contraception. many students at universities are returning or grad students, or are for other reasons not covered under their parents’ insurance, which means that even if EC is available across campus at the hospital, one would have to either go to the emergency room or set up a same-day appointment, and pay out-of-pocket for these services. for many students, the university health center is the only health care available. also, these schools are not located in big cities, which tend to have low-cost or sliding-scale fee clinics.

remember also that the services provided by the university are paid for by student fees, not public taxes.

how alarmed would you be if you thought you might be pregnant, and your only health care provider wouldn’t discuss or prescribe EC? or if you didn’t even know EC existed, and you thought abortion was your only choice? not everyone is as enlightened about BC choices as readers of this blog.

this whole thing started when dan saw an ad in the student paper, urging women to get prescriptions for EC to bring along for spring break.