I agree that Costas was right to bring up access to guns regarding Jovan Belcher. And I like this article, except for this sentence which I think is not a good characterization of domestic violence.  "If Jovan Belcher didn’t have a gun, perhaps his mother, who watched her son shoot the mother of his three-month-old daughter, could have helped calmed the fight."

I obviously was not there. But most of the time domestic abuse is not a "fight" that needs to be "calmed" but it is a male treating his girlfriend/wife like his property that he can do whatever he wants with. There just aren't equal numbers of wives and husbands going to ER (or the morgue.) These men are not out of control, they are making cruel decisions based on devaluing women.

It is possible that Belcher was full of respect for women and just took too many hits to the head which is tragic, but I think it is also possible and still tragic that Belcher was the typical batterer who thought that a man should control his woman by any means necessary and if he could not have his way he is allowed to kill her.


 http://thinkprogress.org/alyssa/2012/12/03/1270841/bob-costas-jovan-belcher-gun-control/

finally learned my health insurance lesson

I have no food allergies. Dr. Kammermeyer sent me to take some blood tests at Mercy to confirm the negative skin tests, but I was wise this time and asked the hospital how much the tests would cost, then called my health insurance and learned I would have to pay 80% until I met my deductible. So, I decided not to take 12 lab tests at $52 each or the $300 celiac panel. I went back to my allergist, who is so awesome that he sat down and discussed it some more with me. I cut wheat out completely for 3 weeks and still had headaches so I don't think  wheat is the problem. I'm cutting way down on meat. Trying to cut way down on artificial sugars. I'm going to start a journal so I have better information than vague memories. 

Costco advice

Alright - here's the low down on Costco - some things are probably only for the Coralville store.

Best sample times:
1:15-4 is the overlap of the two sampling shifts. Samples are available about 11am-7pm
Weekends have more than weekdays.

My favorite products:

Sweet Kale Salad Mix -produce dept. Seven superfoods - it tastes like broccoli salad with poppyseed dressing. Ingredients that I can remember: kale, brussel sprouts, broccoli  cabbage, roasted pumpkin seeds and dried cranberries, poppyseed dressing. Around $5 for a large bag.


Madras lentils: super easy in heat and serve pouches, and very healthy ingredients. About $8 for 4 pouches.

Dried Mangoes - 30 oz for $11.99 

Sweets:
Skinny Cow Ice Cream sandwiches: not perfect food obviously but if you are going to eat ice cream...
2 grams fat, 3 grams of fiber, 4 grams of protein

Brookside dark chocolate covered fruitsnacks -from juices of blueberry acai, goji raspberry, or cranberry. We always sample the large bags, but I do better buying the 100 calorie packs to make it easier to stop at one serving.

In addition to clearance items ending in .97 or .00 there will be an asterisk for seasonal or not going to be restocked items.

In response to my grandfather's responce to my last post on facebook:
And I agree that the fewer abortions the better. I'm still with Trusting Women because I honestly believe that every woman who gets an abortion has a good reason. Abortions are inconvenient, expensive, physically painful (thought probably not as much as giving birth) and women know the risk of being condemned by a large part of society (called a murderer the rest of their life.) I don't think anyone in the US gets an abortion unless they really needed to. I think in the US abortion is unusual (unlike China and some other countries where abortion is the main method of birth control, sadly.) Anyway, hopefully with better access to birth control under Obamacare fewer US women will have unwanted pregnancy and women won't have to worry so much about not being able to afford health care for a pregnancy and 18 years of a child's life.

 Also, we should do a better job of educating everyone about how pregnancies happen- even I had an accidental pregnancy and I should know that two weeks after going off the pill is exactly when I would be fertile. 
And, we need to make sure men know that they should not push women into intercourse - that that is criminal - not cool behavior. The good news is that cutting down on sexual assault will also reduce unwanted pregnancies.

Hooray to the women of Indiana and Missouri for defeating the extreme Republicans.
And the message Republicans is Trust Women to make their best decisions and Rape is not acceptable.
We don't need a few men thinking that they can make better decisions on abortion than the families involved.  And women do get pregnant when they did not even want to have sex and Rape is Rape.

"When a mother’s life is in danger, I’m not going to make that decision. Incest is so rare, I mean, it’s so rare. But the rape thing…you know, I know a woman who was raped and kept her child, gave it up for adoption, she doesn’t regret it. In fact, she’s a big pro-life proponent. But on the rape thing, it’s like, how does putting more violence onto a woman’s body and taking the life of an innocent child that’s the consequence of this crime, how does that make it better? You know what I mean?"  John Koster, Republican running for Congress, in answering a question. 

First: even in America, having a baby is more dangerous than having a midterm abortion. Pregnancy is often a time that domestic violence begins or worsens. But being pregnant is always dangerous because you are trying to grow a second person inside you. And the baby could die, or get stuck, or cause you to bleed to death. Pregnancy is always an invasion of your body. Happy pregnant people like sharing their body for nine months. But I thought nine months was a long time to share my bladder and lung space. And suddenly mom’s needs are second to possible harm to fetus from prescriptions, any OTC pills, lunch meat, coffee, carousels, you name it. Nine months is a long time to live in pain: nausea, headache, backache, carpal tunnel, diabetes, bloody noses. Constant doctor’s visits. New wardrobe. Bigger shoes. And the grand finale: pushing a seven-pound baby out of a whole normally the size of a quarter.  Considering the obvious forced labor to the mother of bearing a child she did not want, I think the Supreme Court should have based the Constitutional right to a choice of bearing a pregnancy on the 13^th Amendment: Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Second: Incest is so rare? I hope that Koster knows more than me on incest being rare – sexual assault rates have been falling and maybe suddenly incest is rare? I will grant that many victims of incest are not old enough or the right gender to get pregnant, and we are only discussing pregnancies from incest.  Incest is not nearly rare enough! 

Third: “The Rape Thing.” Letting a rape victim chose an abortion is giving her back control of her body not "putting more violence on it." Any forced abortion would be horrible, and probably does happen in some domestic violence situations, but we are talking about giving the woman the choice. The "Rape Thing" can be physically painful but its major pain is the loss of control of your most intimate privacy. They need to be allowed to control their own bodies, and they might not want to have to prioritize the needs of a fetus for the next nine months while they recover. Women who survive rape need to be trusted to make their best choices for them.

And, like, Koster sounds like a Valley girl, you know what I mean?

Ryan and the Catholic Deepest Principle

"Nothing undermines the essential and honorable work these groups do quite like the abuse of government power. Take what happened this past January, when the Department of Health and Human Services issued new rules requiring Catholic hospitals, charities and universities to violate their deepest principles. Never mind your own conscience, they were basically told –- from now on you’re going to do things the government’s way.

This mandate isn’t just a threat to religious charities. It’s a threat to all those who turn to them in times of need. In the name of strengthening our safety net, this mandate and others will weaken it." Paul Ryan October 24 2012

Miriam - Is preventing women from using birth control really one of the Catholic Church's "deepest principles?" I don't remember Jesus preaching on birth control. Or even Paul, besides his preference for abstinence and vegetarianism.   Is "Thou shalt not have sex without trying to bring a child into the world" in the Bible anywhere? If the government was requiring euthanasia or executions, I can see that violating the Catholic Church's deepest principles. But forbidding birth control is the Catholic Church's deepest principle?  

Does "Thou shall not have sex without trying to bring a child into the world" not apply if you are a priest having sex with a child?  I would have to support priests using condoms even if it is "Do as I say, not as I do." And, of course, there is a huge difference between molesting a child and a couple deciding not to get pregnant. I'm guessing my God is more ok with a couple deciding not to get pregnant, but I guess you would have to ask the Pope because from his actions you really might get confused. 

And how is the birth control mandate a threat to the people who turn to religious charities? The Catholic church is wasting so much of its energy fighting about birth control that they don't have any left to actually help people? The people who turn to the Catholic Hospital for help will be asked if they are on birth control and denied help if they are?