Karen Finney on the REAL Costs of War: Must Read / Must Share

Since this blog is about homegirls (and boys) and security,  I think it is appropriate to share here a brilliant analysis  by Karen Finney at The Hill exposing costs of war that fall through the cracks in budget proposals.

This is the real cost, and it is incumbent upon all of us to consider deeply how secure continued operations and deployments keep us and whether current levels are worth these  costs .   Equally important is our encouragement to legislators to be certain these costs are covered in current and future budgets.  Not worth merely a read, worth sharing every way you know how.  Homegirl Karen hit a home run with this one!

The other cost of war

By Karen Finney

- 03/19/12 06:14 PM ET

We may never know all of the factors that led an American soldier to allegedly murder 16 people in Afghanistan. The more we do learn, the more it seems there were signs of the toll that repeated deployments, an injury and the stress of his situation back home were taking. None of that excuses what the soldier reportedly did. However, given the number of Americans who have served or are serving in Iraq and Afghanistan who could be facing similar stressors, we have a responsibility to better understand and factor in these human costs in any conversations about the way forward — particularly for the benefit of the 40 percent of U.S. citizens who still believe the war is worth the costs.

Read more >>>>

Edited to add:

This is  more than an op-ed in a column.  In a comment in the thread below I called it a treatise.  Karen Finney may well be the 21st century Thomas Paine for women and others.  Looking at this text again, I see it as the basis of a doctrine,  the Finney Budgetary Doctrine.  This is very important information that Karen has compiled, and the implications are enormous and look far down the road.   That is where we all should be looking.

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Where are the “Death Panels?”

In order to avoid offending  Homegirls and Homeboys here,  I will refrain from posting a picture of the perpetrator.  We all know what she looks like.  Back in 2009, this Op-Ed  was posted on HuffPo quoting  Sarah Palin’s claim that what is now known as “Obamacare” would result in “death panels” that somehow would have decided   ordered that her son Trig should be aborted.

Palin: Obama’s “Death Panel” Could Kill My Down Syndrome Baby

The Huffington Post   Rachel Weiner First Posted: 09/07/09 06:12 AM ET Updated: 05/25/11 02:50 PM ET

Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin has laid pretty low since resigning. But on her Facebook page, Palin suggested Friday that President Obama’s health care plan might kill her child.

Via Talking Points Memo:

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I wonder why I do not hear allusive arguments today to Palin’s claims then.  Given the now infamous “panel of men”  assembled to decide exactly what kind and how much, if any, health care women should receive, I wonder where Palin is and all her followers who were crying “foul” in 2009?

There is plenty wrong with “Obamacare.”  No one will deny that.  The biggest fault, in my book, was the withdrawal of the single-payer option which would have obviated the conflict with religious institutions we all witnessed last week.  What we did not get with Obamacare are “death panels.”

The Republicans, across the board, are bent on repealing Obamacare.   Where do they attack first?  Coverage of prescriptions and procedures known to be vital to women’s well-being and therefore family health and welfare.  But I hear no voices harking back to Palin’s  prognostication as this panel of men assembles to decide whether women  live in pain and life-threatening conditions or receive the medications and procedures that mitigate these conditions.

Anyone who has lost a mother at a young age,  Madonna and Rosie O”Donnell are two who come to mind, can attest to the devastation that brings to a family.  There are ways, now, to prevent such losses to young families that were not available to mothers of their generation.  My own mother lost her mom in childbirth when she was only six.  That might have been prevented today.  But Republicans think men, some of whom are educated in theology rather than medicine,  should be the voices to be heeded.

Among the Republicans, and specifically among those running for President, there is one who seems to believe essentially what Palin did about “death panels” and all that horror.

I ran across this article in Jezebel today, and there is an opposing argument.   The absolutely beautiful and healthy little baby,  if pictures are worth a thousand words, is testament to the value of pre-natal testing and monitoring.  This story is a must read.

Why Rick Santorum Would Have Killed My Daughter

Next month, my daughter Ella will turn 11 years old. She’s a beautiful girl, with blond hair and green eyes. She’s an amazing artist, a brilliant writer, and she can do the splits without even warming up.

And if I hadn’t had an amniocentesis, she would have died the day she was born.

Read More >>>>

She is a beautiful little baby girl, and she has the whole world in front of her.  Who knows what she might become?

Full disclosure here:  My sister and I were both Rh+ born to an Rh- mother.  We were both born blue.  We both developed jaundice,  and this was in the late 1940s,  so we never knew how we survived.  We do know that our mom had at least two miscarriages, perhaps for this reason, one before I was born and one between the two of us.

I am glad for the procedures, monitoring, and insurance coverage that allowed this beautiful girl-child to survive and thrive.

So WHERE are those “death panels?”

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Where are the Women? Sign the Petition!

The goal is 50,000 signatures.  I think we can do even better than that!

Still4Hill–

We almost couldn’t believe it.  Today, at a House Oversight Committee hearing, House Republicans convened a panel on denying access to birth control converge with five men and no women.  As my colleague Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney asked, where are the women?

Join me in our call to Speaker Boehner, Eric Cantor, Chairman Issa and all House Republicans to demand that women be brought to the table when discussing women’s health issues. Help us gather 50,000 signatures before Congress heads home tomorrow.

Sign the petition >>

Thank you for standing up for what’s right and joining our fight.

Best,
Nancy Pelosi

After you sign you can share on Facebook, Tweet, and you get an email that you can send to your contacts. Let’s share this! Let’s get 100,000! They can’t DO this!  We can STOP them!

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Loving: On Valentine’s Day

A  few days ago I posted this because I see her as an important emerging leader,  and  I was astonished at how many of my readers did not know who she was: Meet Karen Finney.  In the post there was a link to a story Karen originally published in U.S. News & World Report where she mentions a Supreme Court Case.

Thankfully for our country, in the case of Loving v. Virginia, the Supreme Court saw beyond the fear and bigotry of the moment and ruled that antimiscegenation laws violated fundamental American values of Due Process and Equal Protection Under the Law as guaranteed to every American by our constitution.

Tonight at 9 EST HBO will present the documentary story of the Lovings.  What an appropriate way to celebrate this holiday!

Happy Valentine’s Day to all! ♥

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Human Rights and the “New D”

I do not really feel like arguing on this last Sunday of the year, but given the mission of the Department of Homegirl Security,  I feel I must respond to the editorial in today’s Washington Post, Redefining human rights,  addressing  Secretary Clinton’s seminal address on the issue of human rights and the Obama Administration’s agenda for the 21st century,  delivered at Georgetown University on December 14.  (All emphasis below is mine.)

…she did not limit herself to past principles. She offered an innovation: The Obama administration, she said, would “see human rights in a broad context,” in which “oppression of want — want of food, want of health, want of education, and want of equality in law and in fact” — would be addressed alongside the oppression of tyranny and torture. “That is why,” Ms. Clinton said, “the cornerstones of our 21st-century human rights agenda” would be “supporting democracy” and “fostering development.”

Without meaning to insert a chicken/egg question here, I wonder to what degree democracy can emerge and thrive without development. I appreciated her use of the word “supporting” above since it indicates a clear division from eight years of Bush-Cheney democracy building a secondary or tertiary excuse upon which we were in Iraq. I believe Secretary Clinton was saying that we will not impose by force our system upon others, but we will encourage democratic principles where we see them practiced. If the argument we have heard so often post 9/11, that others hate us for our wealth, has any credibility, an effort to aid in development should be a welcome about-face from our cold, hard imposition of our principles by force.

Ms. Clinton said that in adding “human development” to human rights and democracy, “we have to tackle all three simultaneously.” But there are two dangers in her approach. One is that non-democratic regimes will seize on the economic aspect of her policy as an substitute for political reform — as dictators have been doing for decades. Another is that the Obama administration will itself, in working with friendly but unfree countries, choose the easy route of focusing on development, while downplaying democracy.

Change carries risk. This country voted for change, I understand.  I doubt that we will see this administration downplaying democracy. That is a pretty strong word. We probably will see focus on development. No matter what you think of our Afghanistan policy,  that the Afghan troops need all kinds of development is undeniable. It is bad enough that women and girls in that country are prevented from attaining an education in Taliban-controlled regions, but even military recruits are woefully undereducated. Many are illiterate, and those in command have cited that as a primary reason why these troops fail at carrying out their missions. I fail to see how supporting education, or getting one while nourished and healthy,  short-changes anybody in the developing world.  (And before anybody says it, of course this implies that our own youngsters have access to the same advantages).

Judging from Ms. Clinton’s own rhetoric, that is the approach the State Department is headed toward in the Arab Middle East. In a major speech last month in Morocco, she said that U.S. engagement with Islamic countries would henceforth focus on education, science and technology, and “entrepreneurship” — all foundations of “development.” She made no mention of democracy. If the Obama administration believes that liberty is urgently needed in the homelands of al-Qaeda, Ms. Clinton still has offered no sign of it.

If these are not the 21st century tools that can greatly assist in establishing democratic ideals, I would like to know what are. I personally think the Secretary of State made a measured, balanced, wise speech that day.

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