As the presidential race continues to heat up, we're going to hear more and more about the need for unity on major issues. I'm not unsympathetic to that idea, and certainly compromise is a vital part of politics. I like a vibrant marketplace of ideas, and I'm certainly competitive to the extent that I like to win (who doesn't?), but part of sharing a nation (or state or town or street) with other people is making trade-offs. On the other hand, this kind of give-and-take requires good faith on both sides. On some important issues, many conservatives are disingenuous about their positions -- especially when it comes to social conservatism, where too often some policy fig-leaf is used as a cover for the basic desire to punish for perceived social transgressions.
Details after the jump. Mark Kleinman writes about an amazing drug that can instantly reverse the effects of opiate overdoses. The drug is not addictive, cannot itself be overdosed on, costs less than $10 for an effective dose, and can be easily used by people with no medical training. Naturally, the White House Office on National Drug Control Policy opposes its distribution. The reason is, basically, that if heroin users died less, they'd have less incentive to quit. Seriously, that's the justification! Because so many junkies are super psyched about their addiction -- and would totally stop trying to quit if they thought it was less likely they might drop dead. And really, why should we help people -- by, y'know, allowing them to live -- who choose to do Bad Things when we can show them just how awful they are by helping bring about their death?
Right around the same time I read this, a report came out that women on the birth control pill are dramatically less likely to develop ovarian cancer -- even *decades after* they stop taking it. With the caveat that the pill isn't for everybody, for a variety of reasons, this is a great thing! To the extent that, I would imagine, it might be worth it for some women to take the pill simply for the anti-cancer benefit. But you're crazy if you think social conservatives will suddenly reverse course and promote the use of the pill, because it allows for -- horror of horrors -- sex without pregnancy, another Bad Thing. So some people are would rather women be twice as likely to develop ovarian cancer than even have the *possibility* of sex without pregnancy by virtue of the pill. Compassion, or punishment?
Compromise and unity does not equal progressives caving on these kinds of issues.
While Congress shies away from a battle with Bush to provide $1 billion for religious theory to fight AIDS, Brazil builds a pharmaceutical factory in one of the harder hit countries of Africa so they can provide the necessary medicine locally. While the GOP continues their efforts to restrict choice in America, Brazil announces a plan to provide morning after pills for the poor, in addition to the existing program to distribute condoms for almost nothing.
It's an interesting sign of the times to see a developing nation be so much more progressive than the so-called world superpower. In no way am I knocking Brazil which is a great country with so many qualities, but in another time it would have been the US would have been out in front with combating serious issues like this. Our leaders kowtow to the religious right, fearing their wrath and leaders in Brazil decide to be leaders themselves, as it should be in a modern democracy.
Now it's time for Congress to shut this nonsense down. It's pathetic in the US but since this administration has chosen to export this rubbish overseas where the stakes are much higher and people are dying by the thousands, it is downright criminal.
Students who participated in sexual abstinence programs were just as likely to have sex a few years later as those who did not, according to a long-awaited study mandated by Congress.
Also, those who attended one of the four abstinence classes reviewed reported having similar numbers of sexual partners as those who did not attend the classes, and they first had sex at about the same age as their control group counterparts — 14.9 years, according to Mathematica Policy Research Inc.
The federal government now spends about $176 million annually on abstinence-until-marriage education. Critics have repeatedly said they don’t believe the programs are working, and the study will give them reinforcement.
The world has had enough of the American religious right theory and taxpayers have given enough money to their experiments.
Two weeks after Kroger Co. said it was clarifying its policy on stocking the so-called "morning after" pill, activists say dozens of stores continue to block sales of the emergency contraceptive.
Representatives of NARAL Pro-Choice America, an abortion-rights group that also works on other reproductive health issues, sent a letter to Kroger officials Wednesday asking them to carry the drug at all of their pharmacies.
Ted Miller, communications director for the group, said members called 231 Kroger-run pharmacies across the country and found that 21 percent of the stores did not make the drug immediately available.
