Abortion No. 2

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Yesterday I wrote about Tennessee and the attempt to use the corona virus crisis to shut down  abortion services.

Tennessee is not the only state determined to end abortion. Other states are using the ruse of declaring abortions “elective”, rather than medical, emergencies.  Texas, Ohio, Iowa, Oklahoma, Alaska and Alabama have issued bans on abortion procedures and threatened legal repercussions for physicians who continue to perform them.  These bans have brought forth a flurry of law-suits by pro-choice advocates, and various federal courts have issued temporary restraining orders, which have been reversed, or have proceeded to appeal.  Other states involved in this issue are Kentucky, Louisiana and Mississippi.   (The Humanist May/June 2020).

My comment: There is no end to the cruelty and vindictiveness of some self-described “christians”, (not all, I hasten to add!)

I have never been involved, peripherally or otherwise, in an abortion.  However, I claim an imagination, and can well imagine the feelings of a young, poor, woman, possibly raped or at least forced to have sex unwillingly, now deeply regretting what happened, barely able to feed and clothe herself, desperate to keep a job but unable to see how she can achieve that and bring up a child successfully.

But it is the baby I feel the most sorry for.  If the “conservatives” (conserving…what exactly?)  have their way there will be even more unloved, poorly cared for, uneducated and resentful young people around, feeling unwanted.  We have more than enough of these people, whose first thought is to buy a gun and mow down the people they blame for their plight. I have no idea how many unwanted human beings there are in the US, but everyone should have a good start in life, surrounded by love.  Now that is conservative!  It is also Christian.  It is despicable to treat women and children like these self-described christians treat their fellow human beings.

Abortion

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At around 12.30 p.m on Juneteenth, with the doors of the legislature locked to the public, Tennessee passed one of the country’s most restrictive abortion bans, one that would prohibit abortion before many patients even know they are pregnant. It includes medically unnecessary, anti-science restrictions, including some rooted in racism and misogyny. If Tennessee Governor Bill Lee signs the bill into law, it will take effect immediately. An emergency lawsuit asks the court to block it.

This law will disproportionately impact Black Tennesseans.   It is a disgrace that in the face of a true public health crisis, Tennessee politicians wasted their time with this last-minute move to attack abortion access before closing up shop this session. We know that the goal of the politicians behind this bill is simple: a total ban on safe, legal abortion, just as the Supreme Court is poised to severely erode Roe v. Wade in a decision due any day.

Tennessee has earned the dubious distinction of being the first state to pass legislation banning abortion since several state governors, including Governor Lee, attempted to use executive orders barring nonessential medical procedures in the wake of COVID-19 to ban abortion. Planned Parenthood and their partners went to court to stop those egregious attempts to exploit a pandemic to block abortion access.  Thanks to a  collective effort access to abortion care has largely been protected.

Now, amidst protests against police violence and the ongoing COVID-19 crisis, politicians are doubling down, pushing racist stereotypes and ignoring public health,  to ban abortion. But we won’t let them. We’re going to do everything in our power to fight back and stand up for reproductive freedom.   (Alexis McGill Johnson, Acting President and CEO, Planned Parenthood Federation of America).

My comment:  I don’t think Epicurus ever specifically addressed abortion, but were he alive today I think he would take the position that abortion is the business of the mother alone, and that bringing into this world unhappy and unwanted children is both a sin and a blight on society.  The last thing we need is more unhappy, angry and violent young people taking it out on society with gunfire and death.  If you cannot love and cherish a child do not have one!  And certainly do not have one as a result of rape.

US voting data being traded on the dark web

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Data on millions of US voters is being illegally traded on the dark web as the US is gearing up for the 2020 presidential election. The data could be used to attempt to influence voters.

The dark web is a part of the internet not searchable using normal means. It is encrypted and visible only through specialist web browsers that anonymise data transfers, and it is a thriving marketplace for illicit material.

Cybersecurity firm Trend Micro has analysed 600 dark web forums dealing in underground trading. The firm found that databases of US voter information, containing names, addresses and political affiliations, could be bought for $9.99 or less – a fraction of the going rate on the dark web of $26 for 1000 fake YouTube likes, which some people buy to boost their popularity on the video site.

Voter information is cheaper because clicking YouTube’s “like” button requires a human or a bot, which costs money,  and voter databases age and depreciate in value.

Information from other nations can cost more – the highest price Trend Micro saw was $400 for a Turkish voter database. That is because, unlike the US, most countries don’t publicly publish information about their voters.

In the US, some of this information is available for free at a state-wide level.  If it’s harder to obtain the information, they’re going to charge more.

Access to US voter registration lists varies by state.  Generally, political parties can view redacted versions of the lists for free, but other organisations or individuals must pay a fee or visit a local government office in person. That can make buying an electronic version on the dark web attractive.

There have been a number of high-profile hacks of voter data. In 2017, more than a terabyte of voter data, covering 62 per cent of the US population, was taken from an unsecured server operated by a firm called Deep Root Analytics. Rosario Fuentes says this data is being sold on the dark web. Deep Root Analytics declined to comment for this article.

The Philippines’s election commission and the Turkish government both had voter data breaches of around 50 million individuals each in 2016, and this data is also being traded, according to Trend Micro. The Philippines’s election commission and Turkey’s justice department didn’t respond to requests for comment.

“Citizens are worried that their country’s election can be interfered with,” says Rosario Fuentes. Recent votes, including the 2016 US presidential election and the UK Brexit referendum, have seen accusations of interference through the use of bots and other social media exploits.

The data being traded on the dark web could be used for this purpose. “If you have a database where you can in some way infer the ideology of someone, carrying out a disinformation campaign would be easier,” says Yevgeniy Golovchenko at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark.  (Chris Stokel-Walker, New Scientist, 20 June 2020)

My comment:  I have no doubt that the November election is going to be chaotic, to say the least, and I think we should fear for the future of the Constitution, which has served us well until now.  As a citizen one  shouldn’t have to worry about politics and the Constitution., but it’s hard not to be concerned.  This is not good for Epicurean peace of mind.

Defund the Pentagon!

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“In 1997, the Department of Defense set up the 1033 program as part of the National Defense Authorization Act to provide thousands of domestic police forces with “surplus” equipment of almost every imaginable militarized kind.

“Since then, thanks to your tax dollars, it has given away $7.4 billion  worth of such equipment, some of it directly off the battlefields of this country’s forlorn “forever wars.”  For items like grenade launchers, mine-resistant armored vehicles, military rifles, bayonets, body armor, night-vision goggles, and helicopters, all that police departments have to fork over is the price of delivery. The Pentagon has, in fact, been so eager to become the Macy’s of militarized hardware that, in 2017, it was even willing to “give $1.2 million worth of rifles, pipe bombs, and night vision goggles to a fake police department,” no questions asked. That “department” proved to be part of a sting operation run  by the Government Accountability Office (GAO). “It was like getting stuff off eBay,” a GAO official said, “only, of course, for free”.

“The militarization (or, thought of another way, the commercialization) of the police has grown apace these last 23 years, while the Pentagon’s ever-soaring budgets for its ever-sinking wars could be thought of as the great American commercial success story of this century. With more and more taxpayer dollars in its wallet, it’s been on a remarkable looting spree. Ask yourself: has there been a weapons system it couldn’t have, a military base it couldn’t establish, a war expense Congress wouldn’t fund even while cutting back on crucial aspects of the domestic budget like infrastructure programs or disease prevention programs?    No wonder the Pentagon could supply all those police departments with a cornucopia of goods with which to turn themselves into over-armed occupying forces in this country.

“It’s never thought of that way, but the Pentagon and the police have essentially been looting the coffers of the American taxpayer for a long time now and, in the Trump era, the process has only intensified.  Nonetheless, even with protests over racism filling the streets of America, protests over defunding the Pentagon have yet to surface in any significant way. Perhaps it’s finally time. (Tom Dispatch 6/23/2020)”   *

My question:  were you aware of the above, dear reader?  I certainly was not.  In another country this would be called gross maladministration and misappropriation, if not corruption.

And what has this to do with Epicurus?  Why, peace of mind, trust in both government and police, the unfairness of taxing the populace then arming a police force not entirely devoted to the welfare of all the people.  If you know any history (doesn’t generally get you a job, so maybe you are not conversant with it?) you will spot a country in sharp decline.  This is a painful and worrying conclusion I hate to arrive at.

* Tom Dispatch is a daily blog that concentrates on the military and the endless wars it fights.

Are they born so uncaring and greedy? An un-Epicurean story

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In 2019, Samuel Hazen, CEO of HCA Healthcare in Nashville, was paid  $26.8 million in compensation ( don’t you just love the word “ compensation”? ).  Until the pandemic hit things looked even better.  Then HCA promptly cut the salaries of 11,000 corporate staff, and even Hazen “sacrificed,” donating $237,000 of his salary — less than 1 percent of his total pay — to a worker relief fund.

HCA nurses and other frontline workers, meanwhile, sacrificed a whole lot more. Two two lost their lives amid widespread staff complaints about a lack of adequate protective gear. Hazen’s HCA responded by denying any gear problems and threatening unionized nurses with layoffs if they didn’t give up scheduled pay increases and accept benefit cuts. The nurses didn’t cave. They demonstrated instead outside 15 HCA hospitals. Hazen’s reaction? HCA has started a new line of business – recruiting scab “replacement workers” to fill in should HCA nurses choose to strike.

It is stories like this that give American healthcare such a dreadful reputation.  Meanwhile, there are thousands of decent doctors and nurses who went into the business to help the sick and the poor.
Thank you, guys!