Both my practicing Catholic anti-choice cousins had IVF with nary a 2nd thought, so the irony of the Alabama ruling is thicc for me.

Rules for thee but not for me.

Burying the lede, all the way at the end:

‘Hundreds of people gathered on the Capitol steps in Olympia Tuesday to urge state lawmakers to pass a resolution supporting a ceasefire in Gaza. The event was the first “advocacy day” held in Olympia by the Washington Coalition for Peace, a group of Palestinian Americans and 39 organizations statewide that represent different religious and cultural groups, according to the Seattle Times. No state legislators attended the rally.’

This should make Seattle’s ceasefire resolution look astonishingly effective.

fertilized
eggs like
Corporations
Are people, too*
Friendo? so when
they turn 18 they're
allowed to Vote amirite?

"it's
God's
Will!" obv.

*as the 'crimson tide'
tsunamis over the
Populace

slavery's
a Good Thing
in America's prisons:
'there is NO Free Ride!''

and really 'not that
Bad of a Business Model!'
for this, Capitalism's Final Stage.

take it away
Neolibs &
Cons

Boeing has deserved a lot of its recent criticism, but this United plane is a 29 year old 1994 build and things like this happen relatively routinely, hope we don't start seeing news headlines every time even on old planes just because it says Boeing.

University of Alabama health has already canceled all IVF treatments.

I want my embryo Child Tax Credit!!
And the suffocated child was found in Terminal 4 of Sky Harbor Airport, which is fitting, because the child was terminal.

People are really out here trying to pin United's shitty maintenance of a 30 year old plane on Boeing's build quality? JFC come on guys.

Alabama is going out of their way to solidify their status as the absolute worst state in the union. Thanks to their SC, we've entered a new level of Giliadian bullshit.

"Free labor is the cornerstone of US economics, cuz slavery was abolished, unless you are in prison. You think I am bullshitting, then read the 13th Amendment. Involuntary servitude and slavery it prohibits. That's why they giving drug offenders time in double digits" - Killer Mike

That United plane looks like it took a bird strike. The slat still worked fine for the emergency landing in Denver.

@5, 7, 9: plus, if you see something, say something. don't just viddy it before the flight, ding dong.

More from The Most Moral Army In The World(tm): IDF warships fired on a food aid convoy headed to Northern Gaza. The convoy was following an agreed-upon route between the UN and the IDF, and was stopped at an IDF inspection point.

From the same article: an employee of the Palestine Red Crescent Society was arrested at a checkpoint while transferring patients. He was harassed, beaten, stripped naked, blindfolded, and his hands were tied behind his back. Eventually, the IDF decided that he wasn't a threat because they released him without clothes or shoes and hands still tied. It's not recorded how far he had to walk naked. So that's awesome, and definitely a normal way for the Most Moral Army In The World (tm) to conduct itself. Nooooo, no war crimes to see here!

https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/21/middleeast/un-food-convoy-gaza-israel-strike-cmd-intl/index.html

@9 Probably a result of water penetration causing ice formation leading to delamination, has happened with slats before.

@12 In other words, in order to defeat Hamas, the IDF must become Hamas? Because Hamas commits war crimes, the IDF is also forced to commit war crimes? And I marvel at your naivete thinking that Israel will hold any kind of war crimes hearings after the end of the conflict. Oh, and war is not amoral. That is the entire point of the Geneva Conventions, to take an utterly amoral system from WWII and prior and make it less terrible for the civilian populations.

The IDF has every right to detain the medical worker if there's suspicion they may be acting for Hamas. I don't love it, but I understand that is a necessary evil in response to Hamas' actions. I am conflicted about stripping prisoners, though I can see military necessity only for the length of time necessary to ensure that the prisoner doesn't have any weapons. Holding prisoners naked is not acceptable, nor is beating them or releasing them with hands tied and without clothes or shoes and telling them to walk home.

I note that you don't have any defense for shelling the food convoy. Before you start, if the IDF had any actionable intelligence that there was contraband in the convoy, you'd think they'd send the soldiers who were right there to inspect it rather than shelling it from afar. But go ahead and try out a justification.

What can one needing an abortion expect from the neofascist blood red state of Ala-dumbfuck confusion?

@12 Oh, and by the way, it's absolutely not true that war crimes are only prosecuted after the end of hostilities. See, for example, Abu Ghraib, or the US admitting that they made a major error and accidentally bombed the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade. Accountability can come at any time, and the sooner it happens the less likely there will be a culture of impunity which leads to further war crimes.

Yaay, Emily Randall!

Boeing: Just. Say. NO.

@17,

I just googled "is biden in danger of losing new york" and see zero results or evidence to suggest this is a possibility. Link?

@20, The only poll of NY this year is a Siena College poll showing Biden leading Trump by 12 in the state, he's not at risk of losing it, but he wo it by 22 points last time. I think the real risk would be down ballot NYC congressional races.

@18 OK, good to know. It's OK to commit war crimes if it's the IDF doing it. War crimes are definitely the worst thing that ever happened when Hamas does them, but when Israel does? War is hell and boys will be boys, amirite?

You keep asserting that the majority of the civilian deaths are lawful. How exactly do you know that? Have you done an on-the-ground review? Or are you just taking the IDF's word for it? The incidents that I raise make it very clear that (a) war crimes are common and (b) war crimes are committed with impunity. Which, of course, means that more war crimes are likely to be committed because there's no consequences. And those statements apply equally to Hamas and the IDF with only slightly different levels of enthusiasm. I would very much like for there to be a good guy in this conflict. Unfortunately, we're stuck with a bad guy and a worse guy.

Look, I might have some respect for Israel if they said something to the effect that they are fighting people who care nothing for the Geneva Conventions, and so Israel will not be bound by them either. At least they'd be owning their actions, even if that cost them the US' support. But no, they (and you) make a big deal about their respect for human rights while blatantly violating human rights.

PS Tell the Chinese that bombing the Embassy wasn't a war crime because we didn't mean to. I'm sure that'll go over well. Oh, and you know what? We actually punished the people responsible. And paid restitution. Both of which played heavily into the UN decision not to open a war crimes investigation. And because both of that's what a nation that gives a shit about human rights does. Too bad you can't describe Israel that way. Get back to me when Israel punishes a soldier for war crimes. Get back to me when restitution is paid.

get back to us
when the last Gazan
home is leveled -- Domicide
another War Crime. get back to
Us when the Famine begins. Another
War Crime. get back to Us when the last
Hamas has surrendered or the last the vey Last
Gazan exterminated or expelled from their open-Air

Concentration Camp.

History
repeats.

America
a place of
Freedom where
women don't own their wombs

& Embryos
can drink, drive &
buy & sell semi-Automatic
Weapons of Maximal Destruction

Gawd
what a
Country!

@24 kristofarian: Gawd, what a dark, dystopian MAGA / RWNJ-fucked up country!
I really miss how nice things were before neofascism reared its Trump's butt-ugly head.

@22: “The incidents that I raise make it very clear that (a) war crimes are common and (b) war crimes are committed with impunity.”

No, cherry-picking one account of one incident here or there does not establish either of those points. You show no understanding of how evidence is collected, for crimes in either peacetime or in armed conflicts. Most of the “evidence” you think you’ve “collected” would not be admitted into any Western court of law. At most, you’ve noted items which bear further investigation.

Hamas’ extensive and chronic use of civilian infrastructure and civilians as shields against the IDF was documented by NATO, many years ago. (https://stratcomcoe.org/cuploads/pfiles/hamas_human_shields.pdf) There’s really no reason to question this, yet somehow it seems to strike you as incredible news, every time someone mentions it.

@6 pat L: I sincerely hope you get your embryo Child Tax Credit.
I'm SO grateful now that I had my bilateral hysterectomy 3 1/2 years ago. I have no regrets.
A lot could have gone sideways, though. It was the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the procedure was to be performed in a Catholic run hospital, and my admission date, at first, was up in the air because it was considered elective surgery. Additionally, I was required to test negative for COVID to be admitted.
Luckily, I tested negative for COVID, and had an excellent OB-GYN, anesthesiologist, and surgical team. My OB-GYN was retiring in 2021. She compassionately knew how horrible my monthlies were, put her foot gently but firmly down, and I had the surgery done. The only potential snag was a nurse in pre-OP, who asked me if I had had a pregnancy test. My appalled reply: "I'm 56!" All was successful otherwise. The timing was and still is eerie for me. I consider myself among the lucky ones.
I feel sorry for all women and girls feeling the Draconian impact of the reversal of the 1973 Roe decision!

three comments from Nicholas
Kristof’s nyt opinion piece
‘What Can We Possibly
Say to the Children
of Gaza?’

the first, echoing some comments here:

“Hamas could surrender and return all the hostages. The fighting would end instantly. Our the people of Gaza, who we are constantly [told] don't all support Hamas and the atrocities of 10/7, could rise up against Hamas. And the once again the fighting would stop.

But since neither of those things are happening Israel needs to destroy Hamas to the last man to prevent the next 10/7 which Hamas leaders have ensured us will happen.”
--Todd Stuart; Key West

“@Todd Stuart Thanks for your comment on my column, Todd, but let me push back. Yes, it's true that Hamas could surrender and the war would end; I wish that would happen.

But it's always true in any war that it would end if the other side surrendered, and the other side's failure to oblige is not an excuse to level entire neighborhoods, kill many thousands of children and impose starvation on civilians.

And rather than destroying Hamas, Netanyahu has been empowering it in the West Bank and creating a seething resentment that may fuel terrorism for decades to come.

Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon, for example, helped create Hezbollah, perhaps its greatest present threat.

So I don't see Bibi's Gaza war, the way he has prosecuted it against Gazans rather than against Hamas, as either moral or in Israel's security interest.”
--Nicholas Kristof; nyt Columnist

[and, in reply to]
“@Independent Observer Yes, it's certainly true that the Hamas government failed the people of Gaza (and I'd also argue that that the Netanyahu government has completely failed the people of Israel, and polls agree).

The point is that bad political choices by the public are not a justification for what President Biden himself has called "indiscriminate bombing" of civilians.

Children in particular should be protected -- and instead the United States is backing a war that has involved the mass killing of children.”
--Nicholas Kristof;

more:
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/03/opinion/gaza-israel-war-children.html

END the fucking
Massacre Now.

[Ed.: can tS's contributers respond
to readers’ comments as well?

thanks!]

@30 In civilized nations, when the cops take your clothes they are obliged to give them back (or replace them if they need to keep them for evidence) when you leave the police station. Civilized nations don't send released detainees home with hand still bound. Civilized nations don't beat detainees. Too bad we can't count Israel among civilized nations.

@29 It's adorable that you think that Israel's habit of extrajudicial killings, detaining Palestinians without trial, and the whole other nine yards started on 10/7. It's been decades and has never required a war for Israel to justify it.

@33: Yeah, change the subject when you get called on your foolishness. (Throw in some whataboutism, too; that always throws everyone off the scent, you know.)