Channel 13 had a good piece on the same sex marriage debate earlier today (it appeared on CW-16).  Here’s an excerpt:

Then, we spoke with Reverend Carley Touchstone, formerly the pastor of Glad Tidings Church in Rochester.  Reverend Touchstone has moved to Missouri, but has long been a leading local voice against gay marriage.

You can watch the interview with Rev. Touchstone on the right side of this page.  Toward the end, I point out that public opinion polls show a steady increase in the number of Americans who support gay marriage.  I ask him if this trend indicates that at some point in the future, is it possible that America as a society might accept gay marriage?

His answer:  “It is possible because we are being re-educated by a liberal society.  We are being re-educated just like Germans who were re-educated against the Jews.”

Godwin’s rule states that whoever compares the other side to Hitler in an argument first loses.  Looks like Rev. Touchstone (can that be his real name?) has lost this argument.

This is the second clip of Howard Dean’s speech to the Monroe County Democratic Committee Designating convention on May 15, 2008. Part one is here.

Listen and learn that at the national level, the tools are being put in place for success and electorial success is dependent on meeting your neighbors and getting them to the polls. In the end it is all about asking for the vote.

Asking for the vote in all 50 states.

50 states are great - how about 20 towns?

Listen

Listen to Howard Dean rail against John McCain- then, simply imagine our Democratic Presidential candidate doing the same.

The head of the Democratic National Committee, Howard Dean, came to Rochester for a fundraiser on behalf of Eric Massa. He took the time to also attend the Monroe County Democratic Designating convention where he rocked the house.

Besides me, Ladkiddo and Grievous Angel were also in the house. We will offer our perspectives throughout the weekend.

The following statement was released by Eric Massa today candidate for Congress in NY-29:

CORNING, NY - Following his opponent’s refusal to take a stand on funding the war in Iraq in a Thursday vote (H.R. 2642, #328), Retired Navy Commander Eric Massa issued the following statement.

“As America continues to spiral into recession, I have joined with a number of Congressional challengers to write the Responsible Plan for Iraq,” said Massa. “We cannot continue spending trillions of dollars on a war with no end. Professional politicians always talk about “making the tough decisions.” On Thursday, my opponent joined with 131 other timid members of Congress that refused to even take an up or down vote on Iraq. This bill will also fund our essential veteran’s services, and Randy Kuhl’s refusal to even take a stand shows that he in fact does not support our troops. This is hypocrisy at its highest and families in Western New York deserve at least a yea or nay vote from their member of Congress.”

We can expect Randy Kuhl and whoever the Republican nominees are in NY-25 and NY-26 to pull out every trick in the books this fall. One trick we’ve been hearing a lot about in special elections is the idea of making Obama into a bogeyman that will scare voters who might otherwise vote Democrat into supporting the Republican candidate. There’s a piece today in the Times about the dangers of such a strategy for Republicans: attacks on Obama drove African-American turn-out through the roof in the special election in MS-1:

With the strong support of black voters, a conservative white Democrat, Travis W. Childers, scored an upset victory in that race, in a district held by Republicans since 1995. Kelvin Buck, a black state representative who helped the Childers campaign, said he saw a “level of enthusiasm and energy” that he had not seen before from black voters — significantly motivated, he said, by a recent Republican anti-Obama campaign.

The numbers appear to bear that out. In one black precinct in the town of Amory, Miss., the number of voters nearly doubled, to 413, from the Congressional election in 2006, and this for a special election with nothing else on the ballot. Meanwhile, in a nearby white precinct, the number of voters dropped by nearly half.

[…]

Between an initial vote on April 22, when Mr. Childers fell just shy of getting the 50 percent he needed to win, and Tuesday’s runoff election, when he won with a decisive 54 percent, the Republican campaign to link Mr. Childers with Mr. Obama intensified, with a barrage of advertisements specifically on that theme. Perhaps not coincidentally, vote totals in counties with large black populations went up sharply between those two dates. In Marshall County, which is 48.8 percent black, the votes nearly doubled, to 5,083. In Clay County, 56.8 black, nearly 1,500 more people voted, pushing the total to 3,898.

The attacks on Mr. Obama clearly had a galvanizing effect, local officials said. “The people I talked to said, ‘Man, I don’t like that they’re trying to use Obama against him,’ ” said Eric Powell, a black state senator who helped in voter turnout efforts. “It actually helped Travis.”

Now, the proportion of African-American voters isn’t nearly as high in local districts (aside from NY-28) as it is in MS-1. But neither is race as big an issue with white voters. All in all, it seems very unlikely that tying Massa, Maffei, and Powers to Obama will help Republicans at all. It will be interesting to see if Kuhl et al. attempt this ploy.

Brighton Town Supervisor Sandy Frankel made that clear, in an emotionally charged speech, last night at the Democratic convention she is not running a primary against Rick Dollinger. Have a listen.

Pay attention about 2:25 into the clip. Sandy calls this is critical year with local and well positioned candidates able to take advantage of it. Sandy calls the Democrats the party of the people, the party of the future. She has that right.

From the Sunlight Foundation comes the latest way to find out your Congressional leaders’ net worth. Hop on over and prepare to wonder how this is happening, why, and is it something to be concerned about. The site urges you to take this information with “a grain of salt” because of the broad definitions allowed in disclosure:

“The Ethics in Government Act of 1978 requires members of Congress to disclose information on their personal finances, including their assets, sources of income, transactions and debts. (However, lawmakers are not required to report everything they own, including the value of their personal residences, nor their related mortgages.) They report the value of their and their spouses’ assets, the amount of income–both earned and unearned–and the extent of indebtedness in broad ranges, making the forms a very inaccurate tool for measuring wealth.”

Will the Golden State become the Rainbow State?  The second state in the union to sanction same sex marriages, California’s LGBT population and their supporters were jubilant today:

Outside the courthouse, gay marriage supporters cried and cheered as news spread of the decision.

The city of San Francisco, two dozen gay and lesbian couples and gay rights groups sued in March 2004 after the court halted the monthlong wedding march that took place when Mayor Gavin Newsom opened the doors of City Hall to same-sex marriages.

“Today the California Supreme Court took a giant leap to ensure that everybody _ not just in the state of California, but throughout the country _ will have equal treatment under the law,” said City Attorney Dennis Herrera, who argued the case for San Francisco.

Yup, this is good news for the whole country.  We’re all in this together.  Why, just 2 weeks ago we traveled to Albany to get our message to the state government.  Remember this?

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And the Saturday before that, we had our own celebration:

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I addressed co-sleeping a couple of days back. Allow me to hone my message a bit.  I just want the truth to come out and not be potentially tossed aside via Scientific Bias (from a presentation by Dr James McKenna):

When an infant dies sleeping prone in a crib, the contributing cause of death is not assumed to be the crib, but sleeping prone.

When an infant dies sleeping prone in an adult bed, even if the infant died alone, the contributing cause of death is said to be bed sharing.

Interesting, isn’t it? 

McKenna is a great speaker. I would encourage anyone who has the opportunity to hear him-take advantage of it. Keep in mind that this is the man who has done the sleep studies and has data to back up his assertions. Here is a list of his safe co-sleeping guidelines:

General Safety Guidelines –

• Parents should not sleep with their babies if they are smokers or have ingested alcohol or drugs.
• Bedding should be tight fitting to the mattress.
• The mattress should be tight fitting to the headboard of the bed.
• There should not be any loose pillows or soft blankets near the baby’s face.
• There should not be any space between the bed and adjoining wall where the baby could roll and become trapped.
• The baby should not be placed on his stomach.
• Some sources also say not to put a baby on a waterbed to sleep

The point here, of course, is the practice of co-sleeping does not just mean a parent and child sharing the same physical bed.

Now, let’s look back at Rachel Barnhart’s original story on “co-sleeping” infant fatalities:

According to the police report, the father placed the baby in bed with him and fell asleep. When he woke up, he found Yarimyl’s lifeless body next to him.

“The only thing I can imagine is that I crushed her when I was sleeping because I sleep too heavy. I know it was my fault,” the father told police.

Any drugs, or alcohol involved? Had the baby started to cry inconsolably and BF rolled over on the baby to stop the crying? There is nothing accusatory here, I’m just asking the questions which should have been asked already. What do we really know, other than what the boyfriend told the police? Lots of unanswered questions here. Safe co-sleeping guidelines adhered to? I think not.

Or. how about these stories from Rachel’s blog post response:

However, I can relate a graphic account from a police report in one of these incidents, in which the father said he was sleeping heavily, and woke up with his infant on the other side of his body. The baby had heavy bruising. Recently, police told me about a 15-year-old sharing a sofa with her baby sibling and two other older siblings. The baby died. To medical and law enforcement professionals who hear these stories, co-sleeping is an obvious risk factor.

Again, no safe co-sleeping guidelines practiced here.

So, let’s get the message out. There are safe ways to sleep with your child. That is the message. Not, “Babies sleep safest alone “, as that is an erroneous statement. No scientific data behind that assertion. It is an emotional, knee jerk response to a series of anecdotes and as Stlo7 pointed out here, data is not plural for anecdote.

So, thank you to Rachel Barnhart for bringing up the original issue. This should continue to be examined. Knowledge is power. Let’s get the information out there so parents can make an informed decision regarding their own, individual parenting choices.

Anyone wanting to continue their education in the advantages of continuous mother/baby contact please feel free to read on for Nils Bergman’s take……

From Kangaroo Mother Care, Dr. Nils Bergman:

__(’Read the rest of this entry »’)

Next week there will be more than 1,000 police checkpoints set up across the state. The police officers will stop every passing car, and look at the inside of the vehicle. If you turn around, and attempt to evade the checkpoint, they will pursue you.

What are they looking for? Abducted children? Escaped convicts? Terrorists? Loose nukes? Kilos of cocaine?

None of the above. They will be checking to see if you’re wearing your seat belt. It’s “Click It or Ticket” week.

Seat belt use in New York State is at about 85%.

I’m curious as to how readers of this blog feel about police checkpoints.

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The Farm Bill passed in the House today (and Randy Kuhl voted “yes”). Some say this Bill has something for everyone, but Bush sees it as “giving money away to rich farmers.” Yes, I know that there are lots of mega-corporate farms out there, but seeing “rich” and “farmers” in the same sentence, seems to me an oxymoron.

The 318-to-106 vote, far over the two-thirds needed to override a veto, sends the bill to the Senate, where the measure is also expected to have veto-proof support. Although predictions can be dicey in political Washington, the measure’s strength in the Senate has been seen as even more robust than in the House.

The House result, with 100 Republicans joining 218 Democrats to vote for the bill, made good on the predictions of the bill’s chief shepherd, Representative Collin Peterson, a Minnesota Democrat who heads the House Agriculture Committee.

This will be the second time that a veto-proof vote has gone down for Mr. Bush. The first was a water projects measure on which the Senate over-rode his veto.

This is the effect that the Farm bill will have on upstate NY:

Senator Schumer said: “This farm bill is one of the best things to happen to Northeast agriculture in a very long time. Our two biggest products–dairy, and fruits and vegetables–take giant steps forward under its provisions.

[snip]

Besides providing important support for dairy farmers, the Farm Bill also helps fruit and vegetable farmers by including about 3.5 billion in new money for specialty crops programs. In addition, the Bill includes block grants to states, conservation programs, disaster relief funding, programs to combat pests and disease, including invasives like PPV, and funding for the Tree Assistance Program. The Bill also contains new programs to assist organic farmers, provide funding for organic farming research, and help conventional farms that desire to transition to organic farming.

Edwards endorses Barack Obama.  MSNBC has this up.

Here’s Hillary’s win in West Virginia as covered by the NYTs.  (my bold)

The number of white Democratic voters who said race had influenced their choices on Tuesday was among the highest recorded in voter surveys in the nomination fight. Two in 10 white West Virginia voters said race was an important factor in their votes. More than 8 in 10 who said it factored in their votes backed Mrs. Clinton, according to exit polls.

I find this interesting.

The following is an Op-Ed piece by Jon Powers, Democratic candidate for Congress in NY-26:

Summer Relief at the Gas Pump

As Memorial Day approaches, many working families across Western New York are preparing their summer plans and struggling to find ways to afford our skyrocketing gasoline prices.  The price for a gallon of gasoline is now over $3.85 and approaching $4 in Western New York, which means that car owners who have a 15 gallon gas tank are now paying almost $60 to fill up at the pump. 

This is a direct reflection of Congress’ lack of foresight on a clear energy policy that shifts the focus from the consumption of foreign oil to innovations that allow cars to get better mileage and alternative energies that we can create right here in America.  This new direction would reduce our dependence on foreign oil, create good jobs right here in America, and ultimately reduce the costs of fueling our cars.  Any shift in policy that moves away from foreign oil is going to take time, but the truth is, Congress has had 30 years of time to address this problem.

In 1975, the United States created the Strategic Petroleum Reserve as a result of the 1973 energy crisis.  The purpose of the reserve was to mitigate supply disruptions so that Americans would not be left dry and allow the United States a safety net while Congress moved aggressively to create a sustainable alternative energy resource.  Basically, it was created for times like these, times when our gasoline prices are going through the roof as a result of our addiction to foreign oil.

By adding oil to the reserve when prices are low, Congress made a sound investment that can provide a buffer to the economy and avert a crisis now that prices are high.  But by continuing to stockpile oil at today’s high prices, Congress is actually making the problem worse for consumers by simultaneously increasing demand for oil and reducing the supply available to the rest of us.

Today, Congress is voting on a bill sponsored by Senator Byron Dorgan of North Dakota which may have a temporary solution to the oil fix America finds itself in today.  This legislation, experts say, could lower the price of a gallon of gasoline by as much as 24 cents.  That could save car owners approximately $3-$5 each time they fill up at the pump.  Senator Dorgan wants to divert 70,000 barrels of oil deposited into the Strategic Petroleum Reserve each day into our economy in order to help increase access to oil and thereby lower the price of gasoline.    

The Strategic Petroleum Reserve currently contains 702 million barrels of oil and is filled to 97% of its capacity.  Using 70,000 barrels is not the answer to our long term problem, but in the short term it will provide some of the relief that many Americans need this summer. 

A lasting solution requires developing an energy policy that weans America from our oil addiction and allows us to be self-reliant with regard to our energy needs..  I hope that Washington will have the courage to do that now, and developing such a plan would be one of my top priorities in Congress.  But, in the meantime, Congress should pass Senator Dorgan’s bill and give us all a brief reprieve from ever-escalating gasoline prices.  This is a summer break that many Americans need.