Liberal Forum

Commentary: Indiana's new abortion law won't save babies. It will only make my patients suffer.

Even after years of education, training and experience as an obstetrician/gynecologist, I am never prepared to deliver the news that a pregnancy is abnormal. There is no good way to tell a pregnant woman - a woman who may already be wearing maternity clothes, thinking about names and decorating the nursery - that we have identified a fetal anomaly that can lead to significant, lifelong disability or even her baby's death.

In such situations, physicians have two responsibilities. First, we must always be supportive of the mother or family who has suddenly been confronted with the loss of an imagined ideal pregnancy and child. And second, we help them understand that they have options, one of which is the termination of the pregnancy.

Unfortunately, that's no longer the case in Indiana, where a new law signed by Gov. Mike Pence (R), punishes doctors if they perform abortions for women because of their fetus' race or sex, or after a diagnosis of disability. Indiana's state government is intruding on the doctor-patient relationship at one of its most vulnerable, sensitive times. Which means that not only does the new law encroach on women's rights to control their own reproduction, it is also bad medicine.

As a mother as well as a doctor, I am acutely aware of the intensity and fear of the unknown inherent in pregnancy and childbirth. Indiana now expects women who live here to experience them without trusting their doctors' knowledge and with strict limits on how doctors may treat patients - limits driven not by science or research, but by politics.

Supporters of the new law, such as Pence, say the measure "affirms the value of all human life." And yes, some women do choose to carry abnormal pregnancies to term. I am honored to care for them and their babies. I have held and comforted babies as they died, because their mothers were too grief-stricken to bear it. I have cried with families as we watched their babies breathe their last breath.

Not every woman can handle such horror. In the United States, abortion is an ethical, safe, appropriate and - with the exception of North Dakota and Indiana - legal medical option in the case of severe anomalies, one that spares women the emotional pain of stillbirth or the loss of an infant. That loss is dismissed and diminished by this law and by those who support it; the law doesn't save babies, it just forces a horrific fate onto both mother and child. It includes an exception only for termination of babies who would die within three months of being born, as if three months is enough time to justify forcing all women to take on the risks of carrying a pregnancy to term and delivering a baby, only to watch it die.

And that exception would still require women to carry to term pregnancies with some severe and disastrous genetic abnormalities, all of which I've seen in women who chose to have abortions rather than deliver babies who suffer from them.

Read more at link in title.

Donald Trump, whose promises to bring manufacturing jobs back to the United States from China and Mexico have been a cornerstone of his campaign, wrote in his 2011 self-help book that the industrial economy was gone and never coming back.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/andrewkaczynski ... .gnn7r9YBo

Trump plans a series of policy speeches.

GOP front-runner Donald Trump, facing a likely setback in Tuesday's Wisconsin primary, plans to shift gears in the coming weeks, and give a series of policy speeches in settings more formal than the freewheeling rallies that have become his political signature.

Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski said in an interview Tuesday that a memo published by The Washington Post detailing how Trump plans to get Mexico to pay for his proposed border wall is a prelude to a series of moves that flesh out the policies that Trump has been speaking about in general terms in his rallies and in interviews.

Lewandowski insisted that the speeches do not represent a new strategy or course correction, but rather, "the natural maturation of the campaign."

Massive Document Leak Reveals the Hidden Offshore Wealth of the World’s Elite

A massive leak from one of the world’s top offshore services companies has exposed the hidden wealth of the world’s elite, including world leaders, politicians, businesspeople, and celebrities from more than 200 countries.

The “Panama Papers” leak, which includes roughly 11.5 million documents comprising nearly 40 years of day-to-day data, came from the Panama-based law firm Mossack Fonseca, the world’s fourth-largest offshore services company and a top creator of the shell companies used by wealthy to hide their assets.

Their clients, whose offshore holdings in 21 tax havens have been revealed by the leak, include 12 current and former world leaders and another 128 politicians and public officials from more than 50 countries.

The documents demonstrate how Mossack Fonseca has helped its clients launder money, avoid sanctions, and evade taxes — though it’s worth noting that the company denies any wrongdoing and has never been accused of, or charged with, any crimes.

Also, as the Guardian points out, not everyone who uses offshore structures is a criminal, though many are, and having or using an offshore company is sometimes a perfectly ethical and logical way to conduct certain types of international business transactions.

The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, comprising some 370 journalists from 107 media organizations in 78 countries, including the Guardian and the BBC, have spent a year analyzing the leak, which was originally obtained by the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung. The identity of the source has not been revealed.

World leaders of note whose assets and dealings have been exposed by the leak include Russian President Vladimir Putin, whom the Guardian has linked to some $2 billion in wealth, as well as Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif, Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko, King Salman of Saudi Arabia, and Iceland’s prime minister, Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson, who is already facing calls for a snap election over the leak.

[...]
And what about the hidden wealth of Americans? Stay tuned, apparently:

Donald Trump Has An Ace To Play Against Fox News

When Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump launched a crusade against Fox News and its star anchor, Megyn Kelly, last summer, many political insiders saw the move as the beginning of the end of Trump’s upstart campaign.

Why would anyone seeking the Republican presidential nomination attack a network that reaches huge swaths of the Republican primary electorate?

One answer is that Trump was angry with Kelly and Fox News after the anchor asked him a tough question during a Republican presidential debate in August.

But in a newly published article Sunday in New York Magazine, author and journalist Gabriel Sherman reveals how Trump came to possess ultra-insider information about Fox News and its founder, Roger Ailes, that could be damaging if it were ever to be made public.

It’s this leverage, Sherman writes, that has so far discouraged Fox News from launching an all-out war on Trump.

Below is an excerpt from Sherman’s piece:



Sherman’s reporting may also help explain why Trump was so willing to drop out of a major Fox News debate in Iowa in January, a decision that might have hobbled the campaign of a typical GOP candidate.

In March, Trump participated in a Fox News debate in Detroit, where he flagrantly violated the debate rules by consulting with his campaign managerduring a commercial break. Fox did not penalize the Trump campaign.

As CNN reported, Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski refused to leave the stage when Fox News staff asked him to.

Fox said the consultation happened quickly, and other campaigns’ managers were allowed to talk to their candidates as well once the channel realized what was going on.

Even though Trump is accused of breaking debate rules to consult with Lewandowski during other debates, Fox News was the only network to then invite other campaigns backstage, CNN reported after the early March debate.

A spokeswoman for the Trump campaign declined to comment on Sherman’s report.

Trump Pals Around with George Soros

Trump actually spent Christmas Eve with George Soros in 2009, according to the New York Post. But hey, billionaires gotta stick together, you know?

Nevermind that Soros is for a One World Order, an anti-Zionist and an anti-constitutional funder of all things unholy.

The funder of all things unholy also funded the Trump Tower in Chicago. According to the Chicago Tribune: Soros gave Donald Trump a mezzanine loan, which is basically a bailout, because Trump didn’t want to, or couldn’t, front his own money to build the Chicago Trump Tower.

Mezzanine loans are loans offered with outrageous interest that help the developer on the front end of finance, and which often offer a stake in the building.

Trump was also named in a lawsuit along with Soros in New York surrounding the sale of the GM Building, so it’s not as if Trump only dealt with Soros in Chicago.

Many Trump supporters might think this is no big deal—that businessmen have to do business with people they may personally not like.

However, in 2011, when considering a White House bid, Trump attended a Tea Party rally and told people to, “Leave George Soros alone, he has enough problems,” giving the distinct impression that Trump might just owe the global manipulator money.

The magnitude of the George Soros identity is not known universally.

Bronx residents blast Ted Cruz over his ‘New York values’ insult and stance on immigration.

Ted Cruz got the Bronx cheer Wednesday from angry New Yorkers upset over the Republican presidential candidate’s callous “New York values” crack and his harsh stance on immigration.

Cruz was crucified during a stop in the Bronx, where residents and elected leaders derided him for insulting the city and the borough, only to come crawling back begging for money and votes.

A day earlier, a group of students from Bronx Lighthouse College Preparatory Academy got Cruz disinvited from an appearance at their school after threatening a walkout.

Bill Clinton presidential library will release Donald Trump documents.

In response to a Freedom of Information Act request, Bill Clinton's presidential library will release nearly 500 pages of records related to Donald Trump and the Trump Organization, according to the National Archives.

"The Clinton Presidential records proposed for opening consist of email concerning birthday notes sent from President Clinton to Mr. Trump. Email also includes references to his campaign for President in 1999," a National Archives notice from Jan. 14 reads.

The 464 pages of documents could resurface questions about Trump's once-friendly relationship with the political couple -- an association from which the current GOP frontrunner has tried hard to distance himself.

Earlier this month, Trump launched a series of personal attacks against the Clintons while on the campaign trail, even comparing the former president's sexual history to that of Bill Cosby's, the sitcom star recently charged with sexual assault allegations.

Other entries in the presidential library database include "a photograph of President Clinton with Donald Trump at Trump Towers in New York, an autographed copy of Mr. Trump's book The Art of the Deal, and briefing materials for press events that include media questions about Mr. Trump's possible run for the presidency in 2000."

The Clinton library is set to release the documents on April 11, 2016, provided the former or current presidents do not request a delay.

We Asked Cops How They Plan to Enforce North Carolina’s Bathroom Law

How will the state try to enforce its new law, which is the first of its kind to be enacted in the United States?

I picked up the phone and started calling some North Carolina police departments to find out.

"That's a very interesting question. We don't have police officers sitting at public bathrooms all day long," a spokesman at the Raleigh Police Department told me with a laugh.

Over in Greensboro, the state's third-most-populous city, I received a similar answer. "We would respond if we received a complaint. It's not like we would be standing guard at bathrooms," said Susan Danielsen, a spokeswoman for the local police department, also suppressing a laugh.

At the Wilmington Police Department, spokeswoman Linda Rawley said the law struck her as strange. "So that means people have to go to the bathroom with birth certificates? Yeah, that was curious to me."

At the Asheville Police Department, spokeswoman Christina Hallingse noted, "We're not checking birth certificates. We just don't have the police power to be able to do that in bathrooms."

Since the law was enacted March 23, police departments across the state have been working to determine how they will enforce it. In addition to restricting bathroom use, it bans anti-discrimination protections based on sexual orientation.

"Our staff, particularly our attorney's office, is trying to figure out what it all means," says Damien Graham, another spokesman for the Raleigh Police Department. "We haven't mobilized our police force in any kind of different way. We're still digesting."

Public universities like Western Carolina University and the University of North Carolina are also assessing the law to determine how it will affect university policies, spokespeople from both universities said.

Can police patrol public restrooms? Can they demand birth certificates, or some other form of identification, from those accused of violations? In the law, "these are all completely open questions," says Cathryn Oakley, a senior legislative counsel for the Human Rights Campaign, an LGBT advocacy group.

And critics of the law say police officers and universities may struggle to find answers within the text of the legislation.

"The bill was passed by the state legislature in less than 10 hours and then signed by the governor that very same night with very little debate," Oakley says. "And so it's incredibly poorly drafted, leading to all kinds of consequences."

The lack of enforcement guidance in the legislation also suggests "it's not motivated by solving a real problem," she says. "If it was, they would have spent more time understanding and actually addressing a problem. Instead they passed a law that is a political statement."

Postal Worker Does Something Incredibly Selfless To Help Boy Whose Dog Passed



Coping with the loss of a pet, a family member, is difficult for anyone. It may be especially difficult for children who do not yet understand the concept of death.

Sometimes, however, kids prove to be surprisingly resilient and develop creative methods for coping with grief.

When 3-year-old Luke realized his Beagle Moe was no longer around, he constantly asked when his friend would return.

To make himself feel better, Luke decided he wanted to write Moe letters. So with help from Mom, they broke out the crayons and paper (formally addressed to “Cloud One”) and wrote Moe several messages.

Typically, the letters said something along the lines of, “I miss you, hope you’re having fun in doggie heaven,” and each one would find its way to the mailbox before Mom fished them out after bedtime each night.

Somehow, though, one letter was picked up before she could remove it. A kind postal worker retrieved and “delivered” Luke’s letter, and had “Moe” write a response—complete with a U.S. postage stamp of delivery.

The letter (pictured below) reads:

“I’m in Doggie Heaven. I play all day. I am happy. Thank you 4 being my friend. I wuv you Luke.”



This is one of the sweetest things I’ve ever seen, and we hope that Luke will take some comfort in knowing his best friend knows just how much his human loves him.

Huey » 07 Apr 2016 6:09 pm » wrote:

For the story:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/10/9 ... y-Benefits

DONALD J. TRUMP ANNOUNCES NEW YORK STATE CAMPAIGN LEADERSHIP

As Honorary Co-chairman, Carl P. Paladino, the 2010 Republican candidate for governor of New York and a Buffalo developer, has led organization of the state's Donald J. Trump for President campaign.
Paladino said, "I'm very pleased with the courage and commitment our leadership team has shown for Donald Trump is bringing people to the Republican Party like no other candidate in a generation."