Thom needs a new lines "It's time to ... (add complaint)" is starting to become passe. Getting a little tired, but I still love ya baby.

AIW -- I am working on detailing how Jesus' statement "Then Jesus told them, 'Give back to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's.' And they were amazed at Him" [Mark 12:17] applies to the employer-employee relationship. I also am amazed at Jesus' understanding of Modern Monetary Theory. To compose those details so someone besides me knows what I am talking about may take a little time. Please stay tuned, at least, to critique my thoughts. Thanks.

Alice, my growing up disfigured revealed ugly truths about looksism that refute everything pompous Christians and psychotherapists lectured me on -- that for women, looks really are everything, especially when dealing with religious conservaturds. My worst insults always come from anti-choice GOPers. Straight men's biggest fear is being stuck married to and impoverished by aging, unattractive women, especially if the women are disfigured by multiple unwanted bankrupting pregnancies with disabled children. Gay men fear being forced to marry the same women! Straight and gay pedophile men just gleefully wait around for the miserable couples to fight so they can make beelines for their neglected kids. Centuries ago, straight and gay looksist Christian playboys and pedophiles realized they could all be winners by simply denying women safe sex. Non-stop lethal childbearing guaranteed that divorce-denied Christian playboy widowers could have multiple, ever-younger wives, while pedophiles enjoyed unlimited homeless orphans.

Democrats really can permanently sink Rethugs with their own pretzel-twisted bigotries just by tying in our overrun borders and outsourced jobs to Rethug opposition to "baby-killing" international family planning. Nothing exports our jobs faster to overpopulated womb and sweatshop slaves, and guarantees overpopulation refugees jumping our borders than GOP/RCC contempt for family planning in those nations.

Democrats need to harp on the true costs of childbearing here: typical childbirth, even with insurance, costs $5,000 to $5,000,000! A nurse in Baltimore was rudely dumped by her husband and insurance company when an infected c-section destoyed her entire torso. She was hospitalized for months and needed mutiple organ transplants and grafts that cost taxpayers $5 million. And the Rethug First Wives Club is made up of embarrassed brood mares who wear Depends because of icky obstetric incontinence!

I realized in my teen years that pregnancy would further disfigure and impoverish me. Why multiply misery?

The only reason I say yes is because who will be responsile for tracking down "Lone Wolves"? Lone Wolves are individuals residing here within the United Sates that are usually influenced by muslim extremists to take it upon themselves to threaten the safety and security of the American people.

SHFabian -- All labor unions are against the TPP. Card check would cure this problem.

WOMB FOR RENT - (Published in the March 2012 issue of The Advocate)

Do you recall Sigmund Freud’s famous theory, that girls suffer from so-called “penis envy”? As I observe the shenanigans going on in Congress nowadays, it seems the opposite is true.

If there’s one thing old-school patriarchs can never get a grip on, it’s an ability women have that none of them will ever possess, despite all the advantages to being male in a “man’s world”. Only females have access to this unique form of power. It sets us apart, for we are the gateway to life itself. Whether a blessing or a curse, it is our exclusive domain, the power to open or close that gate. It is something we’ve inherited as females and it is our birthright. Can you imagine any reality more basic to the laws of the natural world? Which begs the question: what could be more sharply at odds with a patriarch’s worldview than this simple fact of life?

Through the ages, patriarchs have compensated for this by keeping us marginalized, disempowered, handicapped via artificial means. They accomplish this through a variety of methods, ranging from religious custom and repressive legislation to plain old brute force. This battle over the womb has dragged on, literally, for millennia. We women now find ourselves pitted against the current generation of misogynist bigots who are determined to roll back the proverbial clock. This could condemn women and girls to second-class citizenship status, at a level few of us, of either gender, are old enough to recall. Regardless of what motivates these womb-obsessed woman haters, their efforts to keep us down, at the mercy of our own biology, are relentless and never-ending. Womb envy? Perhaps.

The latest episode of this ancient power struggle has erupted in the halls of Congress. We’ve just witnessed a drama so archaic, I’ve had moments when I’ve found myself wondering which century I’m living in. Imagine the implications of an all-male group of legislators, monopolizing a discussion about birth control! These men get to decide on policies that determine who has access to birth control and who doesn’t. It is a dialogue where no woman is allowed to participate, from which we’ve been brazenly and willfully excluded. Never mind that it is our reproductive health on the line, not theirs!

With this planet in such peril, its life support systems collapsing while the fate of humanity hangs by a thread, you’d think our elected officials would have better things to do than attack women’s hard-won rights. As the next presidential election looms near, corporate media’s pundit shills busy themselves filling the airwaves with their loud, toxic drivel. It is so transparent, so predictable, I’d find it laughable if only the stakes weren’t so high. Armed with their latest wedge issue, these guardians of the status quo have picked their target; not abortion, mind you, but birth control! Neo-con legislators not only want to re-criminalize abortion, they aim to take away all means of prevention as well. Yet when it comes to having babies, we’re damned if we do and damned if we don’t, especially if we’re poor.

Like all wedge issues, this one was manufactured to keep us collectively distracted from real problems we face: overpopulation, global warming, the nuclear threat, decaying infrastructure, monopoly crony capitalism, economic injustice, privatization of the commons with its ugly consequences, the erosion of democracy and so on. But for patriarchs and oligarchs, this tired old debate serves a duel purpose. As a wedge issue, it divides and conquers us - the “masses” - while simultaneously, keeping women “in their place”. Double bonus, for them! So here we are at the dawn of the 21st Century, having to fight for access to birth control yet again, while at the same time, a man’s access to gender-specific healthcare services is never scrutinized.

Just blows my mind, this ongoing obsession over the womb. Seems bizarre to me, how a mere body part can provoke so much controversy. Our wombs are fought over nonstop, coveted as if mere territory to be conquered. This uniquely female organ has been the object of male envy throughout recorded history; something highly valued, despite all the negative ways its value might manifest in patriarchal cultures.

With living-wage jobs so scarce these days and the “fruit of the womb” in such high demand, I see a potential source of revenue here. This could be the opportunity of a lifetime! So ladies, if you are of childbearing age, why not transform burden into bounty, leasing womb space to the wombless among us? In hard times like these, you’ve got to think creatively to get ahead. Were I not past childbearing age myself, I’d post an ad in the classifieds: “WOMB FOR RENT”. Hey, I’m a 99er too! I could use some extra cash.

Thanks, Alice! We need a global birth strike to cut off pedophile priests' supply of fresh victims. Since most governments won't arrest priests and collude to keep us in incubating slavery, a global grass roots birth strike would achieve an end-run around corrupt governments.

Chicago Matt, while Hobby Lobby isn't as restrictive as Catholic businesses, its opposition to abortifacient methods is hypocritically dangerous to female employees. Like the Catholic Church, it ignores the hundreds of natural abortifacients, many served in Hobby Lobby and Catholic break rooms! Coffee, tea, colas, and many herbs trigger embryo flushing. I know many women who experienced miscarriages after drinking teas and colas, including my own hypocrite mother and an ex-co-worker at USA Today. Shouldn't such "baby killing" beverages be banned for religious consistency? And if all such flushed "babies" count as fully human, why no "baby" tampon funerals in the Catholic Church? Shouldn't priests be baptizing and saying funeral masses for these used bloody tampons? Why aren't you attending tampon funerals every day for all female relatives and co-workers? Could it be the ick factor?

Moreover, Catholic businesses commit illegal Munchausen by Proxy medical abuse, fraud and womb trafficking by restricting all women to fraudulent and deadly UNnatural Family Cramming. NFP is a scam invented by pedophile priests because most women ovulate two and three times per month, thereby having NO infertile cycles and being at higher risk for intersex offspring whom you Catholics will then hound into suicide. You can't be anti-gay and pro-NFP at the same time because NFP stooges, like my mom, then have the most gay children, like my two XXY Klinefelter Syndrome "brothers." My youngest brother, a Bobby Jindal lookalike, is definitely a chimera singleton fusion from TWO fathers -- my dad and mom's affair with an Indian missionary Jindal deadringer. Older NFP eggs can also be fertilized by more than one sperm! Chimerism is obvious in my Jindal brother because of his calico-patterned blue and brown eyes. Bruce Jenner is slightly intersexed because he likely has XX DNA in his brain FROM HIS OLDER SISTER! -- this results from microchimerism between older and younger fetuses and mothers! This also explains why big Catholic families have younger gay sons!

We know that Catholic misogyny and homophobia are heresies because Jesus himself served ABORTIFACIENT miracle wine to the Cana bride and her female guests, never preached against abortifacient Silphium imported by his cross-bearer Simon of Cyrene, and he whipped the money changers, not the midwife-ABORTIONISTS!

You forced-birthers never hound adulterous, fornicating and pedophile male employees and priests over their insurance-covered Viagra. You don't hound missionary nuns for their birth control pills that prevent rape pregnancies. You only further abuse trafficked rape victims by forcing them to risk death and foul bladder and bowel incontinence by breeding for rapists! You ludicrously think Litter Sister Oppressing the Poor Sosefina Amoa's infanticide is less sinful than popping birth control pills! You hypocritically ignore all the abortions and infanticides committed by priests to hide the evidence of their mistresses and rape victims. Most unforgiveably, you cite Paul VI to justify your war on women's right to life and bodily integrity, never mind that he funded Nazi Ustasha Ante Pavelic's genocide of 1 million Serb Orthodox Christian "heretics" in WWII to "fight abortion" by gutting pregnant Serbs and dicing their "heretic" fetuses! What is so respectable about a mother-killing encyclical written by a Nazi genocider on behalf of your spoiled pedophile priests?

Shame on you, Matt, for forcing such Munchausen by Proxy mayhem on the rest of us!

Reply to #10: Chuck, I’ve heard repeatedly from various sources that Viagra has been covered by health insurance policies. Maybe not all of them. Not having had the occasion or the need to use it, I lack first-hand experience and have to rely on hearsay. But even Thom Hartman has spoken on this topic, and that seems to be his impression too.

Reply to #12: I don’t understand your logic about who owns those insurance benefits an employee has earned. Please explain further, if you would. But long as it doesnt counter Marc’s and my point that these are EARNED benefits not gifts, you’ll get no argument from me.

By the way, thanks for cheering me on in my fight against Veresen, its cheerleaders and enablers. Much appreciated.

Karen Roo: Just like in this country, the formation of labor unions in the "20 to 30 cents an hour" nations you speak of is my answer and idea for movement towards a decent standard of living. I know easier said than done, the powerful will not stop short of murdering those who dare reach for economic justice in these nations, but in my opinion, if overwhelming numbers demand economic justice, then justice it will be.

The TTP is simply another wealth grabbing/union busting attempt by big money, and thus continuation of the global economic race to the bottom, a world in which a few evil winners take all.

What happens when the only two viable parties already decided on the TPP? Apparently, this generation of liberals supports the TPP anyway, since they want to push VP Joe Biden out, running Hillary Clinton again. Clinton was busy promoting the TPP before launching her pre-campaign speaking tour, and the media marketed to libs went into overdrive to sell her. (She even has her own network now -- MSNBClinton.) Strange, strange era. Regardless, the Democrats already lost 2016, since Dems can't win with the votes of middle class Dems alone.