25- Adriana Smith, a cautionary tale

Somewhere in a hospital in Georgia a woman lies dead. Her body is being illegally hijacked by the state’s abortion bill and is serving as a dead host to a parasite. Without her permission, against her family’s wishes and permission.

It does not matter that this parasite is a child to be.

It does not matter to the state that she was a nurse.

It does not matter to the state that she was a mother to a five year old little boy who is now confused and

It does not matter to the state that she was a daughter.

It does matter matter to the insurance company who will not pay this astronomical hospital bill because the policyholder has been declared brain dead 12 weeks ago.

It matters that her headaches were not treated appropriately.

It matters that her five year old son cannot conceive that his mother is dead and he thinks that she is sleeping.

It matters that the fetus has been without stimulation from the mother for 12 weeks. No one knows what that does to the fetus.

It matters to women everywhere because we knew this was coming and were unable to stop it.

This is medical experimentation of the worst kind. This smacks of Henrietta Lacks and her immortal cancer cells.

Be mad for her.

But be mad at the crazy politician who wrote the abortion ban in such a way that allows for the state to deny this woman a peaceful passing.

Be mad at the mad scientist who just wants to see what they can do with the bill and how far they can push medical knowledge.

Be sorrowful for Adriana Smith’s family, especially the 5-year old, and the mother who has to watch her child be experimented on with no consent granted.

But be mad at the political machinery that has been put in place to prey upon this woman and her family and the child who may never be.

Most importantly, when this fails and this fetus dies a horrible death, stay mad.

Most importantly, when this fails and this fetus survives into a family that is shocked and appalled at this science fiction bullshit, stay mad.

I have written it before and often. This kind of chicanery is about control.

Only now they have added medical experimentation on top of it.

But stay mad.

Stay vocal.

Tell the mad scientists that there will be no more experimentation without consent. Tell the mad scientists that we are ashamed of them and their ancestors are ashamed of them.

Call this what it is, Handmaid’s Tale bullshit.

A nugget of information that I learned very recently is that Margaret Atwood was intentional about the scenes that she wrote. Nothing that happened to any of the women, to any of the Handmaids, was plucked from history.

Be careful out there.

Tuesday Top of Mind 5/6/25-Missouri is trying to pull a fast one on abortion rights that they just got back

Send abortion rights back to state? That was the plan after the supreme court released the Dobbs decision, right? After all, restoring the power back to the states would make sure that your state made the right decision. Well, right in more ways than one.

Changing the state constitution or passing an amendment protecting a woman’s right to bodily autonomy is never done quickly. It takes a lot of time to gather signatures and gin up support. It takes more time to get the regular public excited about the measure, hopefully enough to get out to the polls.

There were seven states that passed abortion right legislation in the November 2024 election. There were 10 states with abortion related constitutional amendments with on their ballots. The states that wanted to protect abortion rights and enshrine them into the state constitution were Montana, Nevada, Missouri, Colorado, Arizona, Maryland, Wyoming, and Florida. The state that wanted further curtailing of a woman’s right to bodily autonomy was Nebraska. Wyoming and Florida were unable to pass their measure but so was Nebraska. Nevada has a 2 election pass/fail test, and they are half way there. These states join Ohio and Kansas and California and Vermont and Michigan in protecting abortion rights.

Of the seven states Missouri’s state legislature is throwing a temper tantrum. It’s not fair, they whined. People didn’t know what they were voting for, they cried! We deserve a mulligan, they challenged.

Eye roll.

I mean they’ve done everything a spoiled brat would do except stomp their little feet and threaten to hold their breath.

Pouty McPoutyton.

Well, they are kind of doing the last one.

They have put in place as many roadblocks as they possibly could. Including many bills in the state legislature about classifying abortion pills as a controlled substance, and legislation to treat abortion as a homicide. Also they have stopped allowing abortion pills to be prescribed.

But their favorite is crying foul on the Amendment 3. The amendment showed that women will be dying in hospital, unable to receive medical care.

Show me the lie.

Better yet, ask Texas or Georgia.

Best yet, google deaths post Dobbs decision in states that outright ban abortion. Cough, cough, Texas.

Go ahead, I’ll wait.

But the women who need this often life saving care can’t.

Women have died, are dying, and will continue to die without access to abortion.

FFS 5/2/25- Funding, slashing of

Well, there has been a lot of funding slashing in the government in the last 100 days.

All without congressional approval. All at the whim of the mad dictator.

Libraries, defunded. This will need congressional approval.

Vital research to keep us healthy, defunded. This will need congressional approval.

Needed aid to the poorest countries of the world, defunded.

Consumer protection bureau, defunded.

Medicaid that provides healthcare to millions of lower income Americans, not yet defunded but through the machinations of the House Republicans cutting Medicaid is the only way to do what is in the bill they presented. Basically defunded.

NPR and PBS, defunded. You bet I increased my sustaining member contribution to NPR immediately. This is basically an attack on the first amendment. But to the mad dictator is is striking back against people who tell the truth about him.

This is your reminder that 1% or less of the NPR and PBS funding comes from the government. The bulk of the rest is made up of sustaining members and fundraising. My first ask of the post- Join your local NPR and help them resist.

All of this is by executive order as the mad dictator goes around one of the branches of the government.

He is getting hung up by the third branch though. There are lawsuits, so many lawsuits, protesting his illegal actions. Two hundred and twenty to be exact.

There have been protests, nationwide protests against his administration and many of the companies who fell into line to his wishes. The latest was yesterday, 5/1/25.

Down to brass tacks this is a tantrum by a spoiled brat who doesn’t like it when people tell the truth about him and his friends. Well, I say friends.

A lot of this is distraction from the real work of dismantling the constitution that is going on at 1600 Pennsylvania.

They just hope that we aren’t paying attention.

They just hope that by torturing those who they deem lesser than themselves, of those countries they deem lesser than the US, that we are so distracted by the crap that’s going on we don’t pay attention when it counts.

My second ask of the post- Let them know, however you can, that we as American citizens ARE paying attention and that WE DON’T LIKE IT.

My third ask of the post is to ignore what you can, while paying attention. This kind of bottom feeder antics are to generate attention. Because that is what they want, attention. Don’t give it to them.

But Kate, aren’t you giving into their attention whoring with this post?

Yes, but it is a small amount of attention that hopefully spurs others to ignore their bullshit. There is a reason that I only post about political nonsense on Fridays. And healthcare nonsense on Tuesdays. I don’t want to give them the oxygen to fan their flames into a maelstrom.

But the reason that no Republican congress or president has dared to defund PBS is that no one wants to go on record as killing Big Bird.

Make them feel seen.

Make them feel shame.

Or pointing and laughing has always belittled the bully.

School Me Saturday 4/19/26- Fight Fiercely Harvard!

Yeah, I know that Fight Fiercely Harvard isn’t Harvard’s real fight song. But I don’t think 10,000 Men of Harvard sets exactly the right tone.

It’s sexist for one thing and since Harvard is fighting for independence for all of its students, not just the men, I thought Fight Fiercely Harvard was a better fit.

Fight Fiercely Harvard is a satirical song written by an alum, Tom Lehrer. Another song of his that you may be familiar with is The Elements. It is a lilting song with the elements from the periodic table. It is only clocked at 1 minute 26 seconds.

This week Harvard said no, thank you to pressure from the president of the United States. He would not bend the knee and bow to extreme pressure.

Of course, the president whined and threatened (typical). He even went so far as to threaten Harvard’s tax exempt status. This is a “punishment” meant to be punitive for violating tax law. There is no evidence that Harvard has violated tax law.

Side question, if it can be done so quickly, why can’t we do the same to churches and political organizations? I digress.

Apparently there are now pacts between schools where there were rivalries both in the classroom and on the playing field.

According to the Guardian newspaper at least 18 universities have united to defend academic freedom in the fact of these attacks and threats. The universities include 8 universities that comprise part of the Big 10 academic alliance include the University of Illinois, Indiana University, University of Iowa, University of Maryland, University of Michigan, Michigan State University, University of Minnesota, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Northwestern University, Ohio State University, University of Oregon, Pennsylvania State University, Purdue University, Rutgers University-New Brunswick, University of California Los Angeles, University of Southern California, University of Washington and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Some of these schools are in red states and some are in blue. To me this is indicative that academic freedoms are cherished, no matter the political leaning.

It also indicates that academic freedoms are to be protected.

Good for them. I hope other universities join and I hope they keep their courage.

I hope that this message is heard loud and clear.

Now I have to learn all of their fight songs too.

But, but, Kate, what about their billion dollar endowments? Why do they need support?

Those endowments are the emergency fund and the funding for programs that allow the universities to continue to admit students from the lower-economic echelons. And to create scholarships to fund these students. And to create labs that make the discoveries that are why these universities have earned the world class reputation that they have.

Maybe, just maybe, they don’t like being told what to do, or who to listen to, or what to teach, or what to read.

It all goes back to book banning, doesn’t it?

Fight Fiercely Harvard! You are not alone.

Tuesday Top of Mind 4/15/25- This is not a drill…we in danger

There is a scene from the movie Ghost when Oda Mae Brown (played to great comedic effect by Whoopie Goldberg) says to the grieving Molly Jensen (played by Demi Moore) where she says “Molly… you in danger, girl.” This is meant to be a communication from the titular character Sam Wheat (played by Patrick Swayze).

It is meant as a warning to Molly as she is being stalked by Carl Bruner (played by Tony Goldwyn). Sam is desperate to give Molly a warning before something terrible can happen to her at Carl’s hands and whims.

The scene has been meme’d many, many times. Just saying “you in danger, girl” is meant to evoke the danger that whoever it is being said to finds themself.

America…you in danger, girl.

I don’t say this lightly.

But the constitution is in danger.

Therefore our country is in danger.

The current WTF is about a man who is legally living in the country, is married to an American citizen, and is the father of an American citizen. I am writing, of course, of Kilmar Abrego Garcia.

If you don’t know his name you have not been paying attention. Kilmar Abrego Garcia was disappeared off the streets (which is terrifying enough), not given due process (which is the most terrifying of all), and spirited off to El Salvador to a concentration camp. There is no other name for it. The Supreme Court says that the White House has to “facilitate” bringing him back.

And the White House has not done so.

In fact the White House feted and presented and paraded the president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, who then said that there was no way to “smuggle a terrorist into the US”. Kilmar Abrego Garcia is not a terrorist. His entire story is of a boy threatened by thugs and gangs in El Salvador and he fled to the only place that he thought might take care of him.

Little did he know.

In fact, on a hot mic, the current president told Bukele to prepare for incarcerating “home growns”. These are American born citizens that might be spirited away without due process because we have displeased the current administration.

How much louder can we be?

How much danger is America in?

This is a test and we are failing.

This is a test of how far the current administration can go before there is mass protest.

This is a test of how the current administration can go in ignoring the courts, including the Supreme Court.

This is a test and we are failing.

America… we in danger.

Tuesday Top of Mind 4/8/25- The little boy judge in NC who doesn’t like being told no

This is happening in my state.

There was a race for the state Supreme Court. And there were two people running Allison Briggs, a Democrat, and Jefferson Griffin, the aforementioned little boy that doesn’t like being told no.

All the votes of the November 5th election were counted. And recounted. And recounted again. Each time Allison Briggs was the winner by 700+ votes. And each time Jefferson Briggs raised his hand and said I object.

And he pressed all the pedals of the judiciary that he could. Appeal after appeal, defeat after defeat.

This has been going on since the November election.

He finally hit on what he believes is a winning strategy.

To disenfranchise 60,000+ votes of voters who voted according the laws at the time of the election. He wants to take their votes and declare himself the winner. This would shift the balance of the NC state Supreme Court in the Republicans’ favor.

Make no mistake, this is a test case for how to steal elections by stamping feet and shouting NO as loudly as can be. It is akin to a tantrum by a snot nosed, streaming eyes toddler who is red in the face about NOT getting what they want, regardless of how fair it is.

This is a test case for how the heavily Republican state legislature can change the rules in December and have it count for an election that took place more than a month prior.

How else to put their thumbs on the levels of power and swing what should have not been contested into the “appropriate to them” direction?

This is disgusting. And unworthy of a grown man.

How much louder can we be?

Our elections that is a founding tenet of this country of ours are under attack (but not from the fictitious illegal voter) and our duly cast votes are in danger.

Are you paying attention yet?

There are so many hateful shenanigans afoot I feel that we Democrats and the people who are non-political but still paying attention are going crazy trying to plug all the itty bitty holes. Not unlike Hans Brinker in the 1865 novel The Silver Skates where he plugged up the hole in the dike with his finger and sent his brother to get help.

It is just as easy to die from a thousand cuts as it is to die from a slashed neck. Blood loss is blood loss and eventually the loss of blood will cause the heart of the republic to stop.

For North Carolina voters, please check the The Jefferson Griffin’s List site at https://thegriffinlist.com/.

Make sure that your vote is not stolen by a spoiled brat who can’t hear the word no.

Gee, I wonder who he learned that from?

Tuesday Top of Mind 2/25/2025- It is a marathon, not a sprint

However you have arrived to the conclusion, you must admit that we are in danger.

Not only singular we as a personal group of one or two, but we as a nation.

This is mainly by design. Their design.

The chaos, the mass firings, agency by agency.

All those lives ruined.

All those career civil servants who keep the lights on, and the airplanes where they need to be, who kept the national parks open and safe for visitors – gone.

No matter where you sit on the political aisle, no matter who you voted for, or why you voted the way you did, does this feel good to you? Is this what you wanted?

The number one thing that was cited over and over and over and over and over about why the votes were the way they were was the price of eggs. I know that this was a red herring, after all, the price of eggs is higher than it has ever been.

How is that working for you? You realize now that this is a ridiculous argument, right? Right?

We can get mad and scream and shout accusations.

Or we can get to work.

After all, resistance is not a sprint, but a marathon.

I am ready to weigh in with my purchase power. Are you?

Time to let the companies know that the American people mean business. As in, no business to them on those days.

This Friday is the first organized pocketbook protest. It is a no-buy day.

Nothing.

Nada.

Not even a stick of gum.

One of my friends lives near a shopping center and has told me they are going to keep watch on the cars going toward the shopping center on Friday. They hope that the amount of cars will be less. Time will tell.

The Montgomery bus strike lasted over a year. 381 days to be exact. I am prepared to go the long haul.

I have emptied my Amazon cart and most of my lists. The only things that are left are things for school and books for school. I haven’t bought anything from them since Christmas.

We can do this; we’ve just gotten lazy with the ease and convenience of it all.

It is time to make a new plan. I have curated a list of places I will be buying from, of small businesses that get our money. I have made planting plans for the spring, summer, and fall, and plan for the utilization of our fridge and freezer.

And protest with our buying power. A world in which I can make purchases easily but have a boot on my neck politically is not a world I want to live in. This is how we protest, small ripples that become a wave.

My protest begins with a single action. No-buy on Friday. This is the first action step in what will be a marathon of protesting.

It is time to be prepared.

Sometimes the beginning of the protest comes at a shout, like at some of the town halls that happened this last week.

Sometimes, the beginning of the protest comes with a snap, like the closing of the wallet.

What 5 things did I do last week for my employer? I’m not going to tell you.

Tuesday Top of Mind 2/18/25- ripping the wings off of butterflies and laughing about it

There is something laddish about going into government computers and programs and ripping out the guts. And leaving a big mess.

Of course, this time the mess equates to the suffering of many, many people.

It brings to mind the episode of Star Trek the Next Generation called The Naked Now. An affected by the virus that makes everyone act as if they are drunk leads Wesley Crusher to disable the engines just as the Enterprise is in dire straits.

Sound familiar?

It takes Data, the android, who is also affected, to rise to a goad to put the pieces that Wesley has destroyed back in working order.

If that isn’t a metaphor for today’s US I don’t know what is.

A kid gets drunk. Are you with me? Not unlike the teenage and young 20s young men who are playing havoc in our systems. Reminder, the frontal lobe doesn’t finish developing until age 25 or so. Of course, they are charged with this task by an older man who just wants to break things.

Not a perfect metaphor.

A kid disables the engine, leading to peril. If it hasn’t happened yet, see the plane crashes since inauguration day, it will soon.

An android, one who is a valuable member of the crew but one at first who was looked upon with derision and scorn and fear, is the one to right the ship. Oh, and did I mention that he struggles with identity through so much of the series? There is definitely a trans allegory there.

But, I fear, that we will no one who has been othered around to help. Because they have been deported or are living in fear.

They are pulling the wings off the butterfly that is the U.S. And laughing maniacally while doing so.

I wouldn’t be able to plot this and no one would read it because it is so implausible.

But here we are.

Our international reputation is shredding, not unlike the wings of the butterfly.

There is no one coming to save us.

People are suffering. Including people who voted for this madness.

I am trying to find sympathy for them.

I have no sympathy for the government.

But I have a real fear of our standing in the world and the utter trainwreck that Democrats have to right after this. Because it is always up to the Democrats to fix what the Republicans broke while giving billions and billions of dollars to those who do not need it.

Tuesday Top of Mind 2/11/25- the SAVE Act

Well, this is a piece of neo-mansophere trash.

If this vote passes the Senate and is signed into law as written, voting by women will be changed.

On the surface, this bill is about voting. Okay, fine. Not a demonstrable problem, no matter what some republicans think.

However, if you read the summary, voting will be permitted only if you are able to prove that you are a United States citizen. How to prove that? The easiest way is to provide your birth certificate. Your certified birth certificate.

Good on the surface, right?

Why did this not pass last year when it was first introduced?

Because it is a huge waste of time and resources. You already cannot register to vote unless you prove you are a US citizen. Usually by driver’s license or passport.

There is already a REAL ID that will be used by airlines starting in May. The SAVE Act is a belt to that suspenders. I got my REAL ID by showing my passport to the DMV. The same passport that I had to use my driver’s license and birth certificate to obtain.

I will note that I have a certified copy of my birth certificate. Obtained from the state where I was born. But what about the people out there whose birth certificates cannot be certified. What if they were born at home? What if they were born in a time before all of this nonsense?

To obtain a passport, you already have to show proof of residency. To get mine I had to have my driver’s license and my marriage license proving that the name change was legit. Same for the social security card.

Because this act shows their hand. 80% of woman who are married in this country take their husband’s name. I did. Does this bill mean that I would no longer be eligible to vote because my birth certificate and my driver’s license do not match?

I am afraid that this is the intention. In all the reading I have done these last 3 months I have come across a phrase in a couple of places that I thought was straight out of The Handmaid’s Tale. “Family voting”, wherein the man, whose name does match his birth certificate, votes for the entire house.

The real question is what exactly is this bill saving? Nothing. It would cost A LOT of money to implement. Imagine the lawsuits. Imagine the outrage the first time a woman goes to vote and is denied because she took her husband’s name.

For something we didn’t even need. Unless that was the entire point. To more than halve the number of women who are eligible to vote.

This is a feature, not a bug.

Are you frightened yet?

More importantly, are you paying attention yet?

Tuesday Top of Mind 1/7/25-of course babies are being thrown away in TX

SIX babies have been found abandoned in dumpsters in this last year in Houston, TX, alone. According to reporting by Fox News 26 in Houston, this is a 500 increase since 2022. In that year ONE baby was abandoned.

What else happened in 2022? The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade, dooming more than half of their constituents to fear and the possibility of death if pregnancy doesn’t go 100% right.

This sounds like the natural consequences to their actions. To be clear, the government and the legislature are not the ones facing the consequences or death.

The worst part of this story is that 2 of the babies were found dead.

The other worst part of this story is that it is not just Houston.

The other other worst part of this story is that sometimes it is a ditch.

Reminder, Texas has one of the strictest abortion laws in the US.

And they are surprised? No, of course not, this is just expected fallout of their control issues. Acceptable casualties such as these have probably already been calculated and their concern level has not been breached.

There is another way. There are safe haven laws on the books in Texas. It just comes with an eensy, teensy catch. The mothers (it is always the only the mothers, have you noticed?) might not even know about them as the powers that be in TX certainly don’t advertise the laws. To do so would burst their happy little bubble that this is fine, everything’s on fire, but it is fine.

Dead women if you do (abysmal women’s maternal mortality rate, worst in the nation according to the state rankings), dead infants if you don’t (allow abortion rights, fund women’s healthcare, give a damn about your constituents, allow ).

And the women who have the money and the support to go out of state to seek their very much needed healthcare? Texas and Indiana and possibly Idaho would very much like to know where women go when they flee the state for needed healthcare.

A law called HIPAA prevents them. But that doesn’t stop them from trying. From battering down the walls that are protecting women from creeps like them.

Are you paying attention yet?

Or are you pleased this is happening and the dead children and dead women are acceptable losses?