lunchlady's Comments (102)

“This is no surprise to me. The Protestant churches with traditionally educated clergy have been generally supportive of Choice for decades, as well as women's rights in general.
The modern anti-abortion movement started in the early 80's, IMO as a rallying point for the new school born-again clergy. The abortion clinics in Seattle were unharassed until then, in spite of Catholic opposition to abortion. The Catholics were too respectful of legal due process to be out intimidating patients and providers at clinics when Roe vs. Wade went into effect, so the harassment didn't start in earnest for another decade when the new crop of Fundamentalist churches got traction and needed something to differentiate themselves from the old school Protestants.”

“I don't remember that stuff- you can post a link though.
My post was about the behavior of elected people in all areas of government- I didn't specify that above, but I expect such people to behave better than ordinary citizens. The people talking about hunting Obama and so on all seem to be Republicans. And other Republicans rush to defend them and insist that the real racism is on the Democrat side. I can only throw up my hands.”

“Ha, ha. I forgot to laugh. Why is that Democrats don't seem to tell jokes like this? Is it because we're so wimpy and PC? Or just because we have more decency?”

“Good article. Now what do we do besides watch them get crazier and crazier?”

“What's Pat driving at anyway? I just don't get it.”

“Yes, a definite downturn for the GOP and a definite upturn in Palin's fame and fortune.”

“Yeah Larry! I will vote for you if you run for POTUS! You've already survived one assassination attempt- go for it!”

“I guess it is if you are anti-immunzation already. I am personally pro-immunizations, but all for improving them and trying to limit the damage they might cause rather than avoiding them and trying to convince others to forgo them.
Homeschooling is a luxury I couldn't afford, and I also don't believe it would have been good for my special needs kid. The other kid might have benefited, but the special needs kid needed the public programs and social contact. I would have been hardpressed to meet all his needs and have really appreciated the professionals who've helped him over the years.
I know an Asperger's guy who was totally homeschooled, at least partly because his ultranerdy mom wanted to protect him from the social abuse she experienced. He's done well on his SATs and been admitted to college, but he has almost zero discipline to do things he isn't fascinated by and his social skllls are really lacking. Maybe these things would have also been true if he'd been in a school system, but being forced to cope with the hoi polloi and apply himself to a dictated curriculum might have made a difference. I realize that bending his stick in such a way might also have had disadvantages. I predict he'll get thorough college, but it will be a rocky road and take him an extra year or two, which his parents can afford. To each his own.”

“I didn't think I was disparaging homeschooling. I wouldn't want to do it, but I'm not feeling superior to homeschoolers or their children.
My point was that avoiding immunizations seemed to be the final factor for them to commit to homeschooling.”

“Yes, you're right. How about a little diptheria then? Or rubella? And without that mass immunization program we would still be having smallpox epidemics. My grandfather had facial scars from a bout with smallpox, which he barely survived. He also lost two beloved cousins in the Great Flue Epidemic. I bet if you asked him about immunizations (he's dead now) he'd be pretty gungho.”

“I would just like to remind everyone of the risks vs. benefits of immunizations.
I know a family who has refused all immunizations and ending up also homeschooling their kids because no school in their area wanted to enroll the kids without immunizations. I suspect they could have challenged this in court and got the kids enrolled, but they were interested in homeschooling anyway.
They are very proud of their dedication about this, but if a lot more people did it we would be back to having epidemics and our child morbidity/morality would go up and up. This family did end up with all three children very ill with whooping cough at the same time. It was scary. They are still prone to catching smallpox, chickenpox, tetanus, and so on. This is the choice of this family but I have been happy to get any immunizations available for myself and my children and prefer to accept the risks of that than the contagions themselves. It wasn't all that long ago that we had polio epidemics and all these other things, but the relative safety these days has made people complacent.”

“I should have said that SOME Asperger's kids can learn to be independent IN SPITE of being nerdy, but are still lonely and ostracized. I realize that many of them ever achieve independence, or that it is so fragile that it requires a steady stream of support so that it is arguable that they are independent at all.”

“I have been a ASd parent for 17 years now. Back then the official ate was 1 in 10,000 to 100,000. That has changed constantly, for whatever reason, to 1 in 100. Going by that there's a 100-1000 fold increase in the incidence of ASD.

If I were contemplating parenthood right now I might Just Say No to the whole thing. Its hard to have a special needs kid, in so many ways, and the apparent boom breaks my heart for all those hopeful new parents out there. I hope its easier for new ASD parents with more programs, more support, less stigma. I love my child and work hard to help him achieve a satisfying life, but I am continually disappointed in how the rest of the world treats him and our whole family. Being "special" is actually pretty unfortunate.
I hope researchers are making progress on how to reduce this boom.

The focus on full recovery seems totally bogus to me. My experience is that kids who really have ASD have it for life, but they can learn to adapt to the demands of the world with a LOT of support. They need to be supervised and protected and often never achieve full independence, no matter how high-functioning they are. Asperger's kids can learn to be nerdy but independent but they often are lonely and ostracized. What constitutes recovery from ASD? Finding a professional wiling to undiagnose you?”

“My experience with newly rich friends is mixed.
One couple is never available anymore. The last time few times I talked to her she was mentioning old friend after old friend, saying that they don't socialize anymore because of jealousy of their new wealth. She was abrupt and weird so I stopped calling her and she never called me again so I guess that's it. I initially felt bad and tried to think of all the reasons she might be angry with me but I've decided that she just wants to climb the social ladder.

We have other friends who have had bigger money longer and they don't act like having money is a reason to separate themselves. The richest guy we know sometimes takes us out to a fancy dinner when he comes to town, but he also likes coming to our place for a homecooked meal.
Another newly rich couple would never take us out for an expensive dinner, perhaps because they don't want to seem condescending, but I think they also don't want to be looked at as moneybags. If anything they've gotten less generous, not more.
Newly rich people are so excited about their money that they want to try expensive things with other rich people, and perhaps doing economical things just isn't fun anymore. If they don't value their old friends enough to either go cheap or treat them then the friendship dwindles.”

“I think more and more journalists and their ways of reaching the public are tainted by bias. I also think that being objective, or at least appearing to be objective, isn't even much valued anymore, and fewer and fewer people are interested in anything besides infotainment and infomercials.

The overall result is that the dollar wins the game, as usual. If people find FOX entertaining they watch FOX. If they find MSNBC entertaining, they watch MSNBC.
I don't watch FOX because its so outrageously rightwing and it makes me feel ill, which is not entertaining to me. Plus they don't even stick to facts.”

“Tempting, but that's playing with fire. We might wake up and realize we've become rightwingers, and that would be too scary.
I say let 'em be crazy and obnoxious. They help drive moderates and reasonable educated people to the left.”

“!!!!!!!!! I'm white, but this reminds me of the jokes about watermelon growing in the White House lawn. I don't think fried chicken and potato salad is going to do the trick, Mr. Steele, unless the blacks you're wooing are totally starved and you keep feeding them day after day after day.”

“What a bunch of creepy bizarre hogwash this guy is involved in! Please everyone get all such psychos out of our government! They will take us over a cliff if they get their way.”

“I think the lax enforcement was due to everyone becoming accustomed to the threat of anti-abortion violence. It seems mundane and we take it for granted, but of course for the people who are being targeted its not mundane at all.”

“I object to her worship of Ronnie and his ideas at least as much as her sloppy lifting from Gingrich. She's probably really pleased with herself for actually reading something and she wanted to show off.

Palin is itching to put on Reagan's shoes, and plenty of conservatives are itching to put her in them. I find it almost unbelievable but she is political threat because her appeal is so similar to Ronnie's. I haven't forgotten all those Reagan Democrats, who were swept along into Ronnie Love. It felt like I was in a B movie when it was happening, but the reality is that lots of Americans are willing to vote for someone who is overconfident, photogenic, and smiles a lot, without a lot of other strengths.”

“Excellent post! You've captured so much of her character so accurately!”

“Everything people hear and see influences them somehow, but they generally have enough sense to act like decent citizens most of the time.
IMO the violence in all forms of media is staggering, and the realism keeps going up. I do think this makes violence seem less abnormal and abhorrent, and passing out handguns is just asking for trouble.
But we have the First Amendment and the free market, so if people choose to consume violent entertainment so be it. This means I can hardly stand to go to the video store or the comic book store or channel surf, but apparently a lot of people enjoy a steady diet of violence and cruelty and gore. I don't advocate putting any limits on this, but it does give me the creeps.

Do Bill and all other pundits have an influence on people? Sure they do, but people have the right to watch whatever they want and think whatever they want.

The dilemma for me is that I want progressives to have equal say, but their relatively intellectual approach isn't as entertaining somehow. People seem to prefer being emotionally manipulated to having to really think about things.”

“Blah blah support the troops blah blah terrorist blah blah socialist blah blah abstinence blah blah not a high school dropout blah blah blah blah screw political correctness blah blah.
We know you're a good old gal with no patience for that wimpy political correctness, but I guess you have to reassure those who hate political correctness now and then. Those people who don't like environmentalism, or gay rights, or animal conservation, or any of those other annoying wimpy liberal progressive causes. Gee, what a gal.”

“Why the change in tone Bill? Did your lawyer tell you to fly right? Or did Roeder's lawyers plan to use the "O'Reilly defense" scare you?”

“I'm sorry but I am skeptical of the 5 months gestation of your brother. 5 month old fetuses are hardly viable today with massive NICU care and they don't weigh 2 pounds. I'm reluctantly willing to believe he was in the 7th month, still far fetched for so long ago, but not the 5th.”