Lois Herr has a message for all of you helping to defend reproductive choice by phone banking and spreading the word through One Voice For Choice,

“Don’t forget it’s Stupak/PITTS – I’m the one running against him in PA-16 and I want everyone to know that there’s a radical Republican co-sponsor who should lose his seat over this.”

She’s right. Most of us forget that the Stupak/Pitts amendment’s true author was Joe Pitts, who has one of the most radical, anti-choice records in congress.

Yesterday, the NY Times ran self-serving op-ed from Congressman Bart Stupak (D-Coat Hanger), in which he claims his harmless little amendment was no worse than current law.Forget for a moment the logic disconnect here that Stupak and his coalition of anti-choice Democrats in the House would threaten to derail the entire health care reform bill just to maintain a status quo that wouldn’t have changed one iota if they had left well enough alone.

The one bright spot in yesterday’s firestorm of health care reform news was that Barbara Boxer drove a stake through the heart of Ben Nelson’s version of the anti-choice Stupak amendment. Her motion to permanently table it easily passed with 54 votes.

If anything, yesterday’s events puts a bright, shining spotlight to how this process really works. The cold, hard truth is Obama won’t lift a finger if it means losing even a few votes in the House for the final bill. And so far, One Voice For Choice is the only campaign going on out there that’s targeting the Stupak coalition of conservadems that says you can’t pass a final bill without gutting women’s reproductive rights.

More backstage banter between the FDL crew, this time about who might be the likely GOP nominee in 2012.

Domestic violence cases are nasty and nearly impossible to untangle. And especially tough for kids who get caught in the middle. The one constant: women who have been so beaten down that they don’t feel like they have anyone to turn to are the ones who most need a hand up. 

Joe Biden helped create a safe space with VAWA…

By now, I’m sure you’ve all heard about the fantastic own-goal committed on Hardball Friday night by Minnesota’s very own answer to Katherine Harris, Michele Bachmann.  Bachmann, who apparently also studies the behavior of fellow Republican Congresswoman Jean Schmidt for clues on deportment, not only approved of the robocall lies of the McCain campaign, but [...]

We know Sarah Palin gets speech ideas from Starbucks cups. Last week she quoted Madeline Albright after reading the former secretary of state’s words with her caffeine fix. I hope Palin’s next mocha gets served up in this model:

Looks Sarah Palin has been doing some reading.

At a rally last week she quoted former Secretary of State Madeline Albright…albeit from bon mot inscribed on her Starbucks Mocha cup. Palin said it was providential how that quote got printed on that cup just in time for her to read it. “There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t support other women,” Palin said.

Voight says Palin would make a great commander-in-chief, Palin plugs Starbucks and thinks there are Reagan Democrats. Welcome to Los Angeles. Or at least a suburb.

According to the New York Times, the increasingly failing Sarah Palin is off in  Sedona, Arizona getting polished, primped and prepped for the debate by McCain campaign Pygmalions, including Randy Scheunemann, McCain’s chief foreign policy aide; Mark Wallace, a deputy campaign manager for Mr. Bush’s 2004 re-election campaign; and Nicolle Wallace,  a former Bush communications [...]