From last night’s Country Music Awards. Your feel-good story of the day. Enjoy.

If Marie Stopes International and the International Planned Parenthood Federation could be personified into a cartoon character, it would have to be Ursula from the Little Mermaid. They basically deliver the same message and ask for the same payment. Have a look and see whether you don’t agree.

Comparing child sacrifice in Peru from over 500 years ago and prenatal screening today is not quite the way we like to think about this, is it:

The findings lend credence to the accounts of Spanish conquistadors that described how children were selected for sacrifice from all across the empire, based on their physical perfection. We shudder at such brutal backwardness. Today, using prenatal screening, we scour the empire for children with physical imperfections and sacrifice them to ourselves.

I think this is a painful and offensive comparison. Also that he makes a valid point. We ain’t all as civilized as we’d like to believe.

For all the ills Canadians suffer: high taxes, higher gas prices, even higher food costs, and an ever increasing general cost of living, they have always had better federal health care coverage than their American counterparts. But this beautiful system has one pitfall, abortion, because elective abortion isn’t “health care”. Elective procedures, teeth whitening, nose jobs, hair plugs, abortions, ought not be part of a federal system, and Americans are determined that during their health care overhaul they don’t make the same mistakes as their northern neighbors.

Virginia Gov. Robert F. Mc­Don­nell has added an amendment restricting insurance coverage for abortion into a bill approved by the General Assembly establishing a health insurance exchange as part of the federal health-care overhaul.The health insurance exchange would be managed by the state and allow individuals and some small businesses to pool together to buy insurance at lower rates. Some who cannot afford insurance would receive government subsidies.

Under the federal law, states were given the option of creating their own exchanges or using ones operated by the federal government.

The bill approved by the General Assembly stated Virginia’s intent to create its own exchange, and directed state regulators to figure out how to run it.

After the bill reached Mc­Don­nell (R) for his signature, he added an amendment that would prohibit any insurance plan offered as part of the exchange from including coverage for abortions, except in cases of rape, incest or when the life of the mother is at risk.

“The governor does not believe elective abortions should be covered through the exchange or with taxpayer dollars,” said Mc­Don­nell spokesman Tucker Martin. “This is consistent with his pro-life position and policies passed with bipartisan backing at both the state and federal levels.”

Abortion opponents across the country have been working to get the health-care exchanges to exclude abortion coverage, and similar measures are pending in more than 20 states. They say a government-managed market should not allow dollars to be spent on the procedure.

[…]

She said seven states have adopted similar legislation.

Advocates for abortion rights say the measures are part of a national drive by conservatives to restrict access to abortion.

Federal and state law prohibit using tax dollars for abortions except in cases of rape, incest and when the life of the mother is at risk. McDonnell’s amendment would extend such prohibitions to insurance plans purchased by individuals in exchanges.

I think I’m supposed to be offended by this, a doll that is for little girls and it mimicks breastfeeding. Would I buy it? Probably not. Would it be “sexual” for a little girl to play with this doll? No. Is it a bit weird? Probably yes. 

We should all return to the days of Little House in the Big Woods, where Ma lovingly made Laura a cloth doll that didn’t mimick anything. And where they poured syrup on the snow and it turned into hard candy! And where the smoked their own meat in a little hut out back. How I loved those books.

Just so we’re very, very clear, this has nothing to do with inappropriate sexual encounters. Nope. Nothing:

A new study has found a third of women suffer from post-sex blues — and it’s not because they regret bedding the partner beside them.Researchers at Queensland University of Technology in Australia followed more than 200 young women and found 32.9% suffered negative feelings — or postcoital dysphoria — after “otherwise satisfactory intercourse.”

I’m going to take a stab at the “symptoms” of “postcoital dysphoria.” Ten bucks says it sounds something like this: “I can’t believe he hasn’t called.” “He doesn’t love me.” “I don’t love him, why did I do that?” “Was I used?” “Why hasn’t he called/emailed/texted/responded to my calls/emails/texts?” “Could I be pregnant?” “I hope I’m not pregnant.” “What if I’m pregnant?” Followed up by “Why hasn’t he called?”

It’s called being a woman. Dysphoric, indeed. So keep searching, science, for the ever elusive answer to this new “medical condition.”

You don’t say. The famous folk singer is 62! But of course she could adopt. I actually don’t have a problem if women say they never want to have children so long as they conduct themselves with integrity as they follow that course. Not everyone is meant to have children, much as we might like to. Some people care for other people’s children. Some people save unborn children. There are all sorts of things the childless can do, things that are very, very valuable.

Stevie doesn’t want to lose her freedom though, and that strikes me as a not-so-great reason not to have kids. Though I do suppose children hinder your total and complete freedom. But what you lose in freedom you gain in love. Loving anyone does limit freedom as you consider their needs above your own. Love implies some level of dependence. It’s a trade off.

Well, at least we can listen to Stevie as we ponder all these things. Love this song.

A short post on how women have created female blogging ghettos that don’t really compete. The author also comments on women in the workplace:

For the most part, I prefer to work with men than women. Over the years, I have found female-dominated workplaces to be unfocused and ill-managed, consumed by office politics, less competitive and less ambitious, and I have found male-dominated workplaces to be more focused and better-managed, less consumed by office politics, more competitive and more ambitious. I am not naturally a team player. When I was younger, I rode horses and studied karate — solitary sports. As a journalist, I have been most frequently drawn to subcultures that are dominated by men — from the adult business to the U.S. military. I am more comfortable among men. I would rather be where the boys are — than where they are not.

Since we are being politically incorrect here, I’ll just comment on that last line. She may want to work with men; it’s not entirely clear that they want to work with her. I have read (Margaret Mead, George Gilder) that men prefer a work space separate from women. I’m not sure why. I suspect that male camraderie is important, that men want to compete with other men and not with women. Perhaps this is because men have a desire to protect women, rather than compete with them. I’ve also read that if men must compete with women, they’ll drive us into the ground. (Gilder). These theories deserve more time than I’m giving them here, so if you are interested, you can watch this.

(h/t)

Abby Johnson, former Planned Parenthood clinic director turned pro-life, has done this ad. I am reading her book and I just hit the part where she is told to increase abortions for financial reasons. Giving out birth control was not making the money. Abortions did.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgPqBQQeXh4″>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgPqBQQeXh4]

Adelaide was recently ranked Australia’s “most liveable” city, making it a macabre location choice for Philip Nitschke’s specialist clinics.

GWENETH Nitschke believes she will live to see her son operating Australia’s first euthanasia clinic in Adelaide.

Not that the 90-year-old mother of voluntary euthanasia campaigner Philip Nitschke has a terminal illness.

She reluctantly moved into a northern Adelaide independent living centre last week after a fall at home, and although she has no major health problems, she is urging South Australian MPs to pass a bill allowing doctor-assisted euthanasia.

[…]

Dr Nitschke, the youngest of three children, quietly stopped in to check on his mother yesterday, as he scouted Adelaide’s suburbs for a suitable location to open a specialist euthanasia clinic.

He will spend two days in talks with prospective landlords, but will not disclose potential sites because he said the matter was as controversial as opening abortion clinics. “We really don’t want to go making it impossible to find a place,” he said.

“There is a degree of apprehension here, and people are starting to see this as an extension of the abortion clinic issue, where they fear they are going to be picketed.”

Dr Nitschke said a clinic would initially provide information on procedures required before a doctor could help a patient die, and be fully operational only if a proposed bill passed through both houses of the state parliament on a conscience vote.

The bill last week moved from the second reading stage into committee in the lower house, in what sponsors of the reform hailed as “historic”.

But right-wing Labor government MPs are opposed to the bill and Family First has threatened to withdraw election preferences from any MP who backs the bill.

Health Minister John Hill, who supported the bill last week during a speech about the death of his sister, yesterday said it was not designed to allow a stand-alone clinic. Labor MP Steph Key, who introduced the reworked bill, yesterday said Dr Nitschke’s plan was premature.