Done yesterday (20111010 Mo)

Mumph. No walk -- both the weather and my left foot were a bit dicey. Grumph. I spent most of work reading documentation, and most of the evening looking for things. Which I eventually found -- more on that below -- but I spent too much time on my knees and bending over, and ended up pretty wrecked. Went to bed early, and wound up spending the hour between 3:30 and 4:30 reading. Thank goodness for Science! It's complex enough that it can grab the hamsters in my head away from their wheels and thwap them until they stop moving. (The next move would be to feed them to the snakes, but I don't think I have snakes in my head right now.)

The one really good thing is that Plink's new bag arrived. It's a Wilson BLX sling bag originally intended for tennis racquets. Plink fits nicely with only her head and an inch of neck showing, along with my songbook (a 1.5" binder). The secondary compartment will hold Minnie, with a little finagling. The obvious name for him is Max Wilson. I think he's Minnie's big brother.

I posted a signal boost for Alan Grayson's Where's Your $50,000?, but it was pointed out in comments that the GAO report shows that he's playing fast and loose with the numbers, counting repeated short-term loans as multiple transactions. There's currently an outstanding balance of about a trillion, and the Federal Reserve is actually making money on the deal.

On the other hand, there's still plenty to be angry about. I believe it's fairly certain that if we still had the tax and regulatory structure that was in place pre-Reagan, the government would have a budget surplus and banks would not be too big to fail.

More links below.

( raw notes )

Hippo, birdie, two ewes...

... to finagler!!!! Have a great one!!

Mississippi Personhood Amendment

Originally posted by gabrielleabelle at Mississippi Personhood Amendment

Okay, so I don't usually do this, but this is an issue near and dear to me and this is getting very little no attention in the mainstream media.

Mississippi is voting on November 8th on whether to pass Amendment 26, the "Personhood Amendment". This amendment would grant fertilized eggs and fetuses personhood status.

Putting aside the contentious issue of abortion, this would effectively outlaw birth control and criminalize women who have miscarriages. This is not a good thing.

Jackson Women's Health Organization is the only place women can get abortions in the entire state, and they are trying to launch a grassroots movement against this amendment. This doesn't just apply to Mississippi, though, as Personhood USA, the group that introduced this amendment, is trying to introduce identical amendments in all 50 states.

What's more, in Mississippi, this amendment is expected to pass. It even has Mississippi Democrats, including the Attorney General, Jim Hood, backing it.

The reason I'm posting this here is because I made a meager donation to the Jackson Women's Health Organization this morning, and I received a personal email back hours later - on a Sunday - thanking me and noting that I'm one of the first "outside" people to contribute.

So if you sometimes pass on political action because you figure that enough other people will do something to make a difference, make an exception on this one. My RSS reader is near silent on this amendment. I only found out about it through a feminist blog. The mainstream media is not reporting on it.

If there is ever a time to donate or send a letter in protest, this would be it.

What to do?

- Read up on it. Wake Up, Mississippi is the home of the grassroots effort to fight this amendment. Daily Kos also has a thorough story on it.

- If you can afford it, you can donate at the site's link.

- You can contact the Democratic National Committee to see why more of our representatives aren't speaking out against this.

- Like this Facebook page to help spread awareness.

NOTE from the mdlbear: basically all I did was push the button. Not fact-checked, though I may do that later. It's still very alarming and worthy of attention.