Click for full size.
And, in keeping with Apocalyptica, Vala the Brave fades to black:
© C. Ford.
Affinity
Art, Fun, & Nonsense.
The Message to Women Everywhere.
This post brought to you with a leaden heart sinking in a simultaneous sea of fury and despair. It’s going to be a roundup, because I just can’t. I can’t.
On Thursday, President Trump and the House Freedom Caucus tentatively worked out a deal: Trump would agree to remove mandatory coverage of “essential services” from his health care bill in order to win the far-right caucus’ support for it.
Essential services include maternity and newborn care, pediatric care, emergency services, substance abuse treatment, and prescription drug coverage. Under the Affordable Care Act, every health insurance plan sold in the US must cover them.
White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer told reporters on Thursday that women wouldn’t have to worry about paying more for maternity care under Trumpcare, as long as they’re on a family plan.
The exchange came as a reporter pressed Spicer on reports that the GOP is considering repealing Obamacare’s 10 essential health benefits mandate — a requirement that all insurance plans cover services such as hospitalizations, prescriptions, preventative care, and pregnancy, maternity, and newborn care.
Spicer called the furor over these benefits a “philosophical discussion,” and argued that repealing them was a way to bring premiums down.
On Thursday morning, as the Trump administration frantically tried to save its deeply unpopular Affordable Care Act replacement bill, White House social media director Dan Scavino Jr. tweeted out a message to Trump’s dwindling pool of supporters urging them to call their congressperson in support of the American Health Care Act.
Hours later, similarly worded tweets were sent from the official @POTUS account and Donald Trump’s personal account.
But as some people were quick to note, directly lobbying Congress in support of (or opposition to) a bill using federal dollars—including White House staff who earn federal salaries—is strictly forbidden under 18 U.S.C. § 1913.
The House is expected to vote Friday on a bill that, if a faction of the most conservative House Republicans gets its way, will eliminate the requirement that insurance plans cover certain essential health benefits. These benefits include maternity care, a fact that the Trump White House views as an opportunity to pit men against women.
It’s a common joke among the Affordable Care Act’s opponents. Why should a man pay for women’s health care? Hilarious!
At least with respect to maternity care, however, there’s a very simple answer to this question. Because of the unusual nature of pregnancy, either everyone must pay for pregnancy coverage, or no one will have pregnancy coverage.
The reason why is a problem known as “adverse selection.”
A photo of the House Freedom Caucus and Mike Pence went viral on Thursday, and for good reason — it showed that in a discussion over the future of women’s health insurance plans, the only people in the room were white men.
In a bid to get the far-right Freedom Caucus on board, President Trump and GOP leadership (again, all men) offered to repeal Obamacare’s Essential Health Benefits provision, which mandates that health insurers offer coverage for basic care like hospitalizations, prescriptions, and notably for women, pregnancy, maternity, and newborn care.
According to reports, however, the Freedom Caucus still doesn’t think the bill goes far enough. And on Friday, Trump took to Twitter to levy one more threat at its members, dangling women’s health coverage in front of them as bait:
The irony is that the Freedom Caucus, which is very pro-life and against Planned Parenthood, allows P.P. to continue if they stop this plan!
— President Trump (@POTUS) March 24, 2017
The irony is that the Freedom Caucus, which is very pro-life and against Planned Parenthood, allows P.P. to continue if they stop this plan!
There’s many ways in which Trumpcare would disproportionately affect women. It would price abortion care out of reach for many women, even some on employee-sponsored plans. It would roll back Medicaid and charge seniors more for health insurance, hurting two populations that are predominately female. With the new revisions, it will roll back maternity coverage.
And, as Trump alludes to, it would federally defund Planned Parenthood —which in practice, actually means preventing low-income and rural women and men who depend on Planned Parenthood for cancer screenings, STD testing, and birth control consultations. In 105 counties, Planned Parenthood is the only birth control clinic. Annually, 2.5 million women and men seek care at Planned Parenthood clinics.
Trump knows this.
French far-right National Front leader Marine Le Pen delivers a speech on December 13, 2015 in Henin-Beaumont (AFP Photo/Denis Charlet).
French far-right leader Marine Le Pen met with Russian diplomats in Moscow on Friday in a trip that comes just a month before the French presidential elections.
The National Front leader met with Russia’s State Duma International Affairs Committee and said she would adopt a more positive approach toward Russia if elected, state-owned Russian news agency TASS reported.
Le Pen is currently expected to make the second round of voting in the French presidential election, but pollsters predict that she will lose to centrist Emmanuel Macron, the current frontrunner.
Yes, well. Let’s not forget all the predicting that Trump would lose. Here’s hoping French people have a whole hell of a lot more sense than Americans.
Le Pen has expressed pro-Russian views and favors closer integration between France and Russia. The far-right politician has publicly stated that she sees the disputed region of Crimea, which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014, as part of Russia and wants the European Union to remove sanctions on Moscow.
“I see no reasons that would justify the current hostile attitude of the French authorities toward Russia,” said Le Pen on Friday, according to TASS. “We have always believed that Russia and France need to maintain and develop the ties that have bound us for a long time.”
[…]
The Kremlin on Wednesday denied reports that the conservative presidential candidate, Francois Fillon signed a $50,000 deal with a Lebanese billionaire, Fouad Makhzoumi, to set up meetings for him with Putin. Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that the meetings took place but said the report that Fillon had been paid to arrange it was “fake news.” Fillon’s campaign has denied any wrongdoing.
One of Macron’s top aides has accused Russia of interfering in the election by using state-run media to share “false information” about the centrist candidate, Sky News reported.
I was reading about the Fillon scandal the other day. In France, it was enough to destroy his chances, unlike here behind The Gold Curtain, where people are embracing the scandals. Full story here.
Just in the mood, and it’s a favourite.
8. Februar 2017 Apocalyptica Fade to Black Philharmonie München.
Click for full size.
A poll done by Morning Consult and Politico shows that the constant quake of scandals simply don’t matter much to Trumpholes. If anything, it solidifies their faithfulness to the Tiny Tyrant. That’s a prime marker of how fascism operates, and it emphasises, starkly, just how much The Resistance and all manner of activism simply cannot stop, or slow down at all.
While perusing Right Wing Watch yesterday, I came upon a story, told by one Lance Wallnau, about a magic cake. This cake was so gosh darn magic, it completely changed someone’s sexual orientation.
While streaming a video over Periscope last weekend, right-wing pastor Lance Wallnau received a message from a viewer saying that she needed prayers that would help deliver her son from homosexuality. That message prompted Wallnau to recall an incident he heard about recently in which a gay bar owner was supposedly delivered from his life of sin after eating a cake which had been prepared and prayed over by Christians.
As Wallnau told it, there were some hookers who used to hang out at a bar who were saved by a fellow patron who had found Christianity. Together, Wallnau said, these individuals “baked a cake for the owner of the bar, who was gay and very adamantly anti-Christian” and prayed over it that he would leave homosexuality.
They didn’t pray for him to lose his adamantly anti-Christian views? Oh, what am saying, of course praying away the gay was much more important. Anyway, on with the magical cake!
“It was an anointed cake,” Wallnau said, “and they made the cake and gave it as a gift. And when he ate the cake … the power of God hit him.”
The “presence of God” fell upon the bar owner, Wallnau recounted, and he then got baptized, at which point “the spirit that was working him got broken off,” thus freeing him from his life of homosexuality.
Aw, I’m disappointed. No recipe? How are you supposed to concoct the special anointing oil? I grew up Catholic, that shit’s serious, you have to have the magic recipe! So, ware Christians bearing cake. Now I’m wondering, is there a special cake us atheist types can make and offer? Perhaps a really good magical cake recipe for republicans?
Via RWW.
I really, really don’t want to spoil the surprise here. I’ll just say I was laughing myself silly, and this is someone who is delightfully familiar with the flat rat phenomenon. Go see!
One of my most favourite authors, Jim C. Hines, came out of model retirement for a good cause:
Click for full size!
And, from The Creators Project, Vintage Posters can now be yours, for free!
If the posters of today still had the look of those of yesteryear, would they still get tagged and trolled as often? Much work today, it seems, lacks the graphic audacity of yore, opting instead for forms and formats we’ve become accustomed to. That’s why, when you find vintage posters in flea markets, you find prices that might suggest they were just printed.
Many of these posters are available online, but it’s often difficult to find high enough quality to print them beyond standard A4 printer paper sizing. Finally, our savior: FreeVintagePosters.Com. The name explains the concept rather well. From Soviet propaganda posters and advertisements for airlines of the 60s, it’s up to you—there are several categories ranging from “Sport” to “Film” to “Nature” and everywhere in between. At Creators in France, we’ve been redecorating. Check out a few of our favorites below:
Head on over to see their picks, or go straight to FreeVintagePosters.com.
From rq, click for full size!
© rq, all rights reserved.
Adorable little lizards, from “The”, these were taken in Chile.
© “The”, all rights reserved.
From Kengi, click for full size!
© Kengi, all rights reserved.
A rare capture, a Hairy Woodpecker, who took off after allowing a few shots. Click for full size.
© C. Ford.
In the Tiny Tyrant’s latest interview, he once again went straight back to the past, resurrected old lies, and brought out a couple new ones. Politifact has the fact check, and the truth.
Confronted by his most flagrant falsehoods, President Donald Trump finally faced the question of why he makes so many unsubstantiated claims.
“What have I said that is wrong?” Trump asked.
Trump said his instinct is usually right, and he usually finds evidence supporting his claims that the media and his critics ignore — even as he continued to cite nonexistent evidence.
Here are some of Trump’s most egregious claims from the interview with TIME Washington Bureau Chief Michael Scherer on March 22. Many of the statements are things we’ve debunked again and again.
Fact-checking Trump’s TIME interview on truths and falsehoods.
Yesterday, I had the joy of watching, and capturing a young male Downy Woodpecker, perched in the Lilac, making the portentous decision to invade the finch filled feeder tray. I was lucky enough to get the start of the takeoff, but missed the flight, in spite of continuous shooting. Click for full size!
© C. Ford.