Stand With Indiana

Unsurprisingly, after the passage of the law here in Indiana defunding Planned Parenthood, actions were taken to stop it in the courts, and unfortunately, the Medicaid funds which were not supposed to go to Planned Parenthood have been restored.

Also unsurprisingly, the federal government played a role in this battle, even threatening to withdraw all Medicaid funds in order to help Planned Parenthood, a barbaric business which performs over half of the abortions in Indiana but only serves 1% of Medicaid patients, something highlighted by the good people at Live Action:



The idea Planned Parenthood offer services not available at close enough locations for Medicaid patients is proven to be a crock, not only in the video, but also by the state of Indiana, which notes the more than 800 Medicaid facilities found throughout the state.  Cathie Humbarger of Indiana Right To Life further sets the record straight here.

Legislators here in Indiana did the right thing by passing the legislation, Governor Daniels did the right thing by signing the bill into law, and Indiana did the right thing by fighting to keep it intact in the courts.  Pray my state has the backbone to take this fight as far as it can go, and stand with Indiana in this good fight.

Then and Now

National Review published an article by a one Lafayette A. Hooser, which features the following paragraph:

The Right-to-Work law is a protection against laborism — the blind concentration of dictatorial power in the hands of a few irresponsible and self-perpetuating union bosses. Not many people in the labor movement want laborism, but they are getting it rammed down their throats anyway — as attested by the thousands and thousands of scribbled notes received by the McClellan Committee, notes from union members all over the country asking for protection from the union bosses. They are getting what they don’t want, because they are apathetic and afraid. They will not guard their freedoms. Every man, woman and child in America has a stake in the principle of free choice, in the towering importance of man’s right to get and hold a job without being forced into unwanted association and coerced payment of funds over which he has no control.

Well said, relevant to say the least, and very much the reason why I support Right-to-Work legislation (especially here in Indiana), but the most interesting about the article isn't what Mr. Hooser wrote, but rather when he wrote it.  This article appeared in the June 17th issue of National Review...in 1961.

It's amazing to think fifty years ago, the issue of people wanting to work without having to join a union was alive and just as serious; it certainly shows just what the union fat cats (just as today) were trying to do then: hold onto their power any way they could.

Of great importance, however, is since the publishing of the article, union membership (the key to the unions' power) has decreased over the decades, to the point the union fat cats of today fear the potential of the Right-to-Work legislation like Dracula would fear the potential of a wooden stake through his heart (and also why they support Card Check legislation, which has the potential of resurrecting the power previously enjoyed).

The unions were supposed to be looking out for the working man against the fat cat employers, but as Mr. Hooser's article clearly showed fifty years ago, the union leaders were already becoming the very fat cats they claimed then (and still claim now) to be fighting.  I think it's time to put the unions back in their place.

A Victory For Liberty

The trial of Geert Wilders in his home country of the Netherlands ended yesterday with the Dutch statesman acquitted on all counts.  Among those covering the trial who've written about this great news include Pamela Geller at Atlas Shrugs and Big Government, Robert Spencer at FrontPage and the people at Gates Of Vienna, all of them worth the read.

The right to speak freely in Europe has been preserved thankfully, but the trial continues to serve as a reminder of how perilous that freedom is.  With hate speech laws over there combined with a bend-over-backwards appeasement mentality towards those who actually commit what is defined in Europe as the crime of hate speech, what was seen with Geert Wilders's trial (and also Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff's trial) is not an isolated incident.

May Geert Wilders and Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff continue fighting the good fight in Europe, and may others like them answer the call and continue fighting that fight.

On the decisions of some television networks

In the last year or two, there has been a list of complaints over the actions of some cable channels, and I finally decided to vent my beef here:

1. Why is BBC America airing non-British programs like The X-Files, Star Trek: The Next Generation and soon the remake of Battlestar Gallactica?  Even if British actors and actresses were involved in these shows as cast members, as an American, when I tune in to BBC America, it's because I want to see British television.  As long as they were produced originally for British audiences to air on British tellies, it doesn't matter to me.  Just don't give me American-produced shows originally aired for American audiences*; that's what CBS, ABC, NBC, FOX & PBS are for.
2. Why is the Cartoon Network airing live-action shows?  It's a cable channel which by its very title implies it is a network which airs cartoons, and (I would expect) only cartoons.  So why has the Cartoon Network, as part of its Adult Swim package, been producing and airing shows like Eagleheart and Children's Hospital, both live-action shows?  I had the same problem for a time when another channel, Disney XD (formerly Toon Disney), began airing similar shows on what I thought was supposed to be a cartoon-only channel.  Original programs are fine, but would it really kill them to produce and/or air only cartoons?
3. Why has the SciFi channel (or SyFy, thanks to some idiot's idea) aired wrestling?  Doesn't matter what is entailed with the wrestling, why is wrestling being aired on a cable channel which is supposed to be airing programs and movies which have something to do with, I don't know, science fiction?  They don't have to be even good science fiction, as long as it's just science fiction; maybe they could ask BBC America if they can air The X-Files, Star Trek: The Next Generation and the remake of Battlestar Gallactica.
4. Why has the Independent Film Channel (IFC) stopped airing films without commercial interruption and even (I suspect) uncut?  In addition, why has IFC been producing original television shows?  Whatever happened to the days when this particular channel would air uncut, commercial free, independent films?  Seems like IFC has lost some of its independent streak.

If I did enough digging, I'm sure I could find more cable channels taking some strange decisions on their programming, but it does puzzle me why these channels have done what they have done.  If they want to do a 180° turn on their programming, that's their choice, but it would be nice if they followed the path of channels like Disney XD and simply change their titles.

*To further highlight the programming decisions of BBC America, I thought an episode from the classic Are You Being Served? was in order: